Myth, Ritual, and Religion, vol 1 | Page 7

was wrong, and my critic ought not to
accept but to expose my error. The Wiraijuri Daramulun, who was
annihilated, yet who is "an evil spirit that rules the night," is not the

Murring guardian and founder of recognised ethics.
[1] J. A. I., xxv. p. 297.
[2] Ibid., May, 1895, p. 419.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid., xiii. pp. 458, 459.
[5] Folk-Lore, ix., No. iv., p. 299.
But, in the Wiraijuri mysteries, the master, Baiame, deceives the
women as to the Mysteries! Shocking to US, but to deceive the women
as to these arcana, is, to the Australian mind in general, necessary for
the safety of the world. Moreover, we have heard of a lying spirit sent
to deceive prophets in a much higher creed. Finally, in a myth of the
Mystery of the Wiraijuri, Baiame is not omniscient. Indeed, even
civilised races cannot keep on the level of these religious conceptions,
and not to keep on that level is-- mythology. Apollo, in the hymn to
Hermes, sung on a sacred occasion, needs to ask an old vine-dresser for
intelligence. Hyperion "sees all and hears all," but needs to be informed,
by his daughters, of the slaughter of his kine. The Lord, in the Book of
Job, has to ask Satan, "Whence comest thou?" Now for the sake of
dramatic effect, now from pure inability to live on the level of his
highest thought, man mythologises and anthropomorphises, in Greece
or Israel, as in Australia.
It does not follow that there is "nothing sacred" in his religion. Mr.
Hartland offers me a case in point. In Mrs. Langloh Parker's Australian
Legendary Tales (pp. 11, 94), are myths of low adventures of Baiame.
In her More Australian Legendary Tales (pp. 84-99), is a very poetical
and charming aspect of the Baiame belief. Mr. Hartland says that I will
"seek to put" the first set of stories out of court, as "a kind of joke with
no sacredness about it". Not I, but the Noongahburrah tribe themselves
make this essential distinction. Mrs. Langloh Parker says:[1] "The
former series" (with the low Baiame myths) "were all such legends as
are told to the black picaninnies; among the present are some they

would not be allowed to hear, touching as they do on sacred things,
taboo to the young". The blacks draw the line which I am said to seek
to draw.
[1] More Legendary Tales, p. xv.
In yet another case[1] grotesque hunting adventures of Baiame are told
in the mysteries, and illustrated by the sacred temporary representations
in raised earth. I did not know it; I merely followed Mr. Howitt. But I
do not doubt it. My reply is, that there was "something sacred" in Greek
mysteries, something purifying, ennobling, consoling. For this Lobeck
has collected (and disparaged) the evidence of Pindar, Sophocles,
Cicero and many others, while even Aristophanes, as Prof. Campbell
remarks, says: "We only have bright sun and cheerful life who have
been initiated and lived piously in regard to strangers and to private
citizens".[2] Security and peace of mind, in this world and for the next,
were, we know not how, borne into the hearts of Pindar and Sophocles
in the Mysteries. Yet, if we may at all trust the Fathers, there were
scenes of debauchery, as at the Mysteries of the Fijians (Nanga) there
was buffoonery ("to amuse the boys," Mr. Howitt says of some
Australian rites), the story of Baubo is only one example, and, in other
mysteries than the Eleusinian, we know of mummeries in which an
absurd tale of Zeus is related in connection with an oak log. Yet surely
there was "something sacred" in the faith of Zeus! Let us judge the
Australians as we judge Greeks. The precepts as to "speaking the
straightforward truth," as to unselfishness, avoidance of quarrels, of
wrongs to "unprotected women," of unnatural vices, are certainly
communicated in the Mysteries of some tribes, with, in another,
knowledge of the name and nature of "Our Father," Munganngaur. That
a Totemistic dance, or medicine-dance of Emu hunting, is also
displayed[3] at certain Mysteries of a given tribe, and that Baiame is
spoken of as the hero of this ballet, no more deprives the Australian
moral and religious teaching (at the Mysteries) of sacred value, than the
stupid indecency whereby Baubo made Demeter laugh destroys the
sacredness of the Eleusinia, on which Pindar, Sophocles and Cicero
eloquently dwell. If the Australian mystae, at the most solemn moment
of their lives, are shown a dull or dirty divine ballet d'action, what did

Sophocles see, after taking a swim with his pig? Many things far from
edifying, yet the sacred element of religious hope and faith was also
represented. So it is in Australia.
[1] J. A. I., xxiv. p. 416.
[2] Religion in Greek