THE GREAT DIONYSIAK MYTH. CHAPTER I. THE SUBJECT AND ITS TREATMENT. To trace to its original source, and, in so doing, to explain and illustrate the underlying meaning and significance of that vast and varied mythologico-religious concept the Great Dionysiak Myth, is the object of the present work. The Hellenik Dionysos, with his endless train of Seilenoi, Satyrs, Nymphs, Fauns, and Bakchanals, is familiar to every student of antiquity; and a superficial acquaintance with the subject has reduced the worship of Bacchus in popular idea to the use of wine, and that chiefly in excess. Facts and beliefs are, however, frequently well known, while at the same time their causes are very obscure; and though it is undoubtedly necessary to know that a thing Is, before we can consider, Why it is, or, Why it is as it is, yet an examination of the reason of actualities is the chief difference between the intellectual and the animal life. Finding, then, the concept of Dionysos, we are next impelled to ask why it exists, and in this particular form. To the enquiry it may be objected in limine that the subject is (1) unimportant, or (2) already sufficiently investigated. To the first objection, I reply that the belief of great numbers of mankind during many centuries, and the B |