"Noë fidelis amans æqui servata periclis Egredere audenter, simul et cum conjuge nati Tresque nurus: et vos terræ loca vasta replete, Crescite multiplice numero, _sacrataque jura Tradite_ natorum natis.... Hinc nova progenies hinc _ætas aurea_ prima Exorta est hominum.... ... ast illo se tempore regia primum Imperia ostendent terris quum _foedere facto_ Tres justi reges, divisis partibus æquis, _Sceptra_ diu populis imponent _sanctaque tradent Jura_ viris."... Compare also the following verses (Orac. Sybil, i. 145) with the Vedic tradition (_infra_, p. 238) of the promise made to Satiavrata, and the Babylonian tradition respecting Hoa (_infra_): "... Collige, Noë, tuas vires ... ... Si scieris me Divinæ te nulla rei secreta latebunt." [199] I only instance this as evidence that laws of some sort were attributed to Bacchus, whom the traditions also speak of as King of Asia: to judge of these laws by what we know of the Subazian mysteries, would be as if we were to form our opinion of the Mandan ceremonies (_vide infra_, ch. xi.) by the last day's orgies only. In this matter we may say with Cicero, _De Legibus_, ii. 17--"Omnia tum perditorum civium scelere ... religionum jura polluta sunt." If we turn back to the mythological prototypes in Assyria we find him as Hoa in connection with "the mystic animal, half-man half-fish, which came up from the Persian Gulf to teach astronomy and letters to the first settlers on the Euphrates and Tigris," himself "known to the first settlers;" he is called "the intelligent guide, or, according to another interpretation, the intelligent fish," "the teacher of mankind," "the lord of understanding;" "one of his emblems is the wedge or arrow-head, the essential emblem of cuneiform writing, which seems to be assigned to him as the inventor, or at least the patron of the Chaldæan alphabet." In the Vedic tradition as Satiavrata (_vide_ Rawlinson's "Bampton Lect.," lect. ii. 67), having been saved "from the destroying waves" in "a large vessel" sent from heaven for his use--which he entered accompanied "by pairs of all brute animals"--he is thus addressed, "Then shalt thou know my true greatness, rightly named the Supreme Godhead; by my favour all thy questions _shall be answered_ and thy mind abundantly instructed;" and it is added that "after the deluge had abated," Satiavrata was "instructed in all _human_ and _divine_ knowledge." In fine, if we recognise him as Hoa, we shall find his benefactions to mankind thus summed up in Berosus. (_Vide_ the original in Rawlinson's "Ancient Monarchies," i. 154.)[200]