Forlong - Rivers of Life

Serpent and Phallic Worship.
admissible, and thus we are assured that we are not mistaken as to the symbolism
which the milder forms portrayed. Plutarch writes that Osiris had a crosier
with an eye above; and Hurd tells us that the hooked stick or form was a great
fetish with Africans, and hung oyer their doors, and we know already what sort of
feminine objects were there; no doubt this hook
was their sexual complement. Most Japanese
Gods have a regular “Shepherd’s crook” in their
hands, and, of course, wherever the God is represented
as a “Shepherd of his sheep,” he will be
usually given the shepherd’s staff—that wherewith
he catches up into his arms the young and feeble,
and guides the leaders; and as all faiths ever and
again blend with one another, so we may expect
to see the serpent forming the curve and the
Phallus, or a phallic emblem, the staff, just as may
be observed in this celebrated Crosier of Cashel,
which I here give, Fig. 122. It was found in a
Sarcophagus called the “Font of the Cashel
Temple”—a coffin showing elaborate serpent
sculpturings, and believed to be “the coffin of
the great Cormak.” The Serpent is here
springing out of a sheath which we can confidently
call the vagina, as we see a fish on it
looking downwards as we now hold the staff,
with open mouth and yoni spots. The entrance
of the Sheath, Cave or Cavern, is also formed
like a Polyps or Anemone, which is a wellknown
favourite with the votaries of IOnism,
and not seldom alluded to in the poetry of
Sivaism. Note also that the end of the Sheath is
adorned, like most arghas, with a wreathing
Serpent denoting Passion; whilst humanity
Fig 122.—THE CROZIER OF CASHEL. SERPENT
EMERGES FROM FISHY SHEATH.
stands upon its coiled head, and on that of a biting dragon who clings to, or seizes the
Staff of the hero.
The old Crosses of Ireland are also usually living with Serpents. Mr. Marcus
Keane says that “no figure is more conspicuous on Irish sculpture, or more frequently
met with than the Serpent” 1 yet no living Serpents are to be found
in Ireland! though “there is scarcely a cross or handsome piece of Irish
ornamental work which has not got its serpent or dragon.” From him
1 Towers and Temples of Anc. Ireland. Dublin, Hodgson, p. 156-8.
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