Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/289

 unconnected change in things, a flash in a clear sky, a bird rising up in a wide uniform horizon, and which breaks in upon the indeterminateness of the inner irresolution. This is an appeal to what is inward, an appeal to act suddenly, and to come to a determination within the mind in a chance way without a knowledge of the connection and grounds, for this is just the point at which the grounds or reasons stop short, or at which they are in fact absent.

The outward phenomenon which is nearest at hand for the accomplishment of the end in view, namely, the finding out of what is to determine action, is a sound, a noise, a voice, ὄμφη, whence Delphi has got the name ὄμφαλος, a supposition which is certainly more correct than that which would find in it the other meaning of the word, namely, the navel of the earth. In Dodona there were three kinds of sounds—the sound produced by the movement of the leaves in the sacred oak, the murmuring of a spring, and the sound coming from a brazen vessel struck by rods of brass moved by the wind. At Delos the laurel rustled; at Delphi the wind which blew on the brazen tripod was the principal element. It was not till later on that the Pythia had to be stupefied by vapours, when in her raving she emitted words without any connection, and which had first to be explained by the priest. It was the priest, too, who interpreted dreams. In the cave of Trophonius the inquirer saw visions, and these were interpreted to him. In Achaia, as Pausanias relates, there was a statue of Mars, and the question was spoken into its ear, after which the questioner went away from the market with his fingers in his ears. The first word heard by him after his ears were opened was the answer, which was then connected with the question by interpretation. To the same class of signs belong also the questioning of the entrails of sacrificial animals, the signification of the flight of birds, and several other such purely external rites. Animals were slaughtered in