ave been really,
nay, even earnestly, religious. Their religion, it must be admitted, was
of a sensuous character. They not only practised image-worship, but
believed in the actual power of the idols to give protection or work
mischief; nor could they rise to the conception of a purely spiritual
and immaterial deity. Their ordinary worship was less one of prayer than
one by means of sacrifices and offerings. They could, however, we know,
in the time of trouble, utter sincere prayers; and we are bound
therefore to credit them with an honest purpose in respect of the many
solemn addresses and invocations which occur both in their public and
their private documents. The numerous mythological tablets testify to
the large amount of attention which was paid to religious subjects by
the learned; while the general character of their names, and the
practice of inscribing sacred figures and emblems upon their signets,
which was almost universal, seem to indicate a spirit of piety on the
part of the mass of the people.

The sensuous cast of the religion naturally led to a pompous ceremonial,
a fondness for processional display, and the use of magnificent
vestments. These last are represented with great minuteness in the
Nimrud sculptures. The dresses of those engaged in sacred functions seem
to have been elaborately embroidered, for the most part with religious
figures and emblems, such as the winged circle, the pine-cone, the
pomegranate, the sacred tree, the human-headed lion, and the like.
Armlets, bracelets, necklaces, and earrings were worn by the officiating
priests, whose heads were either encircled with a richly-ornamented
fillet, or covered with a mitre or high cap of imposing appearance.
Musicians had a place in the processions, and accompanied the religious
ceremonies with playing or chanting, or, in some instances, possibly
with both.

It is remarkable that the religious emblems of the Assyrian are almost
always free from that character of grossness which in the classical
works of art, so often offends modern delicacy. The sculptured remains
present us with no representations at all parallel to the phallic
emblems of the Greeks. Still we are perhaps not entitled to conclude,
from this comparative purity, that the Assyrian religion was really
exempt from that worst feature of idolatrous systems--a licensed
religious sensualism. According to Herodotus the Babylonian worship of
Beltis was disgraced by a practice which e