phallus was worn as a charm,
somewhat as a fetish to ward off disease. Such charms were supposed to
bring good luck and prosperity to the owner and they were used
particularly as a charm against barrenness in women. A sign which could
be made by the hand, the phallic hand, was used as a protection against
the evil eye. Ancient representations of Priapus have been found with
the hand in this attitude. As further evidence to show the total
degeneracy of these beliefs, it may be said that the phallic hand was
adopted as a symbol of prostitution.

In this we see the worship of sex degenerated to its lowest form, _i. e._,
a superstition to be followed by the lower classes and the ignorant. The
phallus which once had been attended with all ceremony had become a mere
charm.

The conclusions which R. P. Knight reaches in relation to these decadent
beliefs are worthy of remark. He states:[23] "We have thus seen in how
many various forms the old phallic, or priapic worship presented itself
in the middle ages, and how pertinaciously it held its ground through
all the changes and development of society, until at length we find all
the circumstances of the ancient priapic orgies, as well as the
mediaeval additions combined in that great and extensive
superstition,--witchcraft. At all times the initiated were believed to
have obtained thereby powers which were not possessed by the
uninitiated, and they only were supposed to know about the form of
invocation of the deities who were the objects of this worship, which
deities the Christian teachers invariably transformed into devils. The
vows which people of antiquity addressed to Priapus, those of the middle
ages addressed to Satan. The Witches' Sabbath was simply the last form
which the Priapeia and Libernalia assumed in Western Europe, and in its
various decadences all the incidents of those great and licentious
orgies of the Romans were reproduced." It is little wonder that the
persecution of witches by the Christians long survived the middle ages.

Hargrave Jennings[24] has referred to phallic principles in a number of
the early chivalric societies of England. He states that the Knights of
the Round Table of King Arthur had phallic emblems and other features
similar to those of the Rosicrucians. The same author submits
considerable evidence to indicate that the Order of the Garter is of
much greater antiquity than is generally believed and that phallic
principles were associated