bear a faint likeness to the human
fabric: roots, likewise, and sprays, are often so fantastic in their
evolutions, as to betray a remote resemblance. The antients seem to have
taken advantage of this fancied similitude, which they improved by a little
art; and their first effort towards imagery was from these rude and rotten
materials. Apollonius Rhodius, in his account of the Argonauts, gives a
description of a monument of this sort, which was by them erected in a dark
grove, upon a mountainous part of [814]Bithynia. They raised an altar of
rough stones, and placed near it an image of Rhea, which they formed from
an arm or stump of an old vine.

[Greek: Eske de ti stibaron stupos ampelou, entrephon hulei]
[Greek: Prognu gerandruon, to men ektamon ophra peloito]
[Greek: Daimonos oureies hieron bretas; exese d' Argos]
[Greek: Eukosmos, kai de min ep' okruoenti Kolonoi]
[Greek: Idrusan, phegoisin eperephes akrotatesin;]
[Greek: Hai ra te pasaon panupertatai errhizonto]
[Greek: Bomon d' au cherados paraneneon, amphi de phullois]
[Greek: Stepsamenoi druinoisi thuepolies emelonto.]

A dry and wither'd branch, by time impair'd,
Hung from an ample and an aged vine,
Low bending to the earth: the warriors axe
Lopt it at once from the parental stem.
This as a sacred relick was consigned
To Argus' hands, an image meet to frame
Of Rhea, dread Divinity, who ruled
Over Bithynia's mountains. With rude art
He smooth'd and fashion'd it in homely guise.
Then on a high and lonely promontory
Rear'd it amid a tall and stately grove
Of antient beeches. Next of stones unwrought
They raise an altar; and with boughs of oak
Soft wreaths of foliage weave to deck it round.
Then to their rites they turn, and vows perform.

The same circumstance is mentioned in the Orphic Argonautics[815]; where
the poet speaks of Argus, and the vine branch:

[Greek: Amphiplakes ernos]
[Greek: Ampelou aualies oxei apekerse sideroi,]
[Greek: Xesse d' epistamenos.]

The Amazonians were a very antient people, who worshipped their provincial
Deity under the character of a female, and by the titles of Artemis, Oupis,
Hippa. They first built a temple at Ephesus; and according to Callimachus
[816]the image of the Goddess was formed of the stump of a beech tree.

[Greek: Soi kai Amazonides polemou epithumeteirai]
[Greek: Ek kote parrhaliei Ephesou bretas hidrusanto]
[817][Greek: Phegoi hupo pre