Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/591

 when the re-awakening of the earth from its winter sleep suggests to man his own re-awakening from the sleep of death; and it is probable that the Church turned this coincidence in time to good account by making her own festival a substitute for the festival of Demeter or other kindred rites, and even by modelling her own services after the pagan pattern; for it would seem that the Church, when once her early struggles had secured her a firm position, exchanged hostility for conciliation, and sought to absorb rather than to oust paganism. Her complaisance is clearly seen in the ceremonies of Good Friday and Easter; for, with all her severe repression of the use of idols (whose place however is well supplied by the pictures which are called icons), she has permitted the use of a sculptured figure at this one festival, and even down to this day Christ is represented in some localities in effigy; and it can hardly be doubted that the purpose of this concession was to make the Christian festival as dramatic and attractive as the pagan mysteries celebrated at the same season. Again the absorption of pagan ideas is well illustrated by the belief still prevalent among the peasants that the Easter festival, like the cult of Demeter, has an important bearing upon the growth of the crops. A story in point was told to me by one who had travelled in Greece. Happening to be in some village of Eubœa during Holy Week, he had been struck by the emotion which the Good Friday services evoked; and observing on the next day the same general air of gloom and despondency, he questioned an old woman about it; whereupon she replied, 'Of course I am anxious; for if Christ does not rise to-morrow, we shall have no corn this year.'

In other details too there is a close correspondence between the pagan and the Christian festivals. As a period of abstinence was required of the mystae, so during Lent and still more strictly during Holy Week the Greek peasants keep a fast which certainly predisposes them to hysterical emotion during the services; and en revanche, just as the initiated are said to have indulged themselves too freely when the mysteries were over, so the modern peasants, when the announcement of the Resurrection has been made, disperse in haste to feast upon their Easter lamb,