a harmonious sound, inaudible to mortal ears, which was called "the music of the spheres." Hence, in making this procession around the altar, great care was taken to move in imitation of the apparent course of the sun. For this purpose, they commenced at the east, and proceeding by the way of the south to the west, and thence by the north, they arrived at the east again. By this method, it will be perceived that the right side was always nearest to the altar.
Much stress was laid by the ancients on the necessity of keeping the altar on the right hand of the persons moving around, because it was in this way only that the apparent motion of the sun from east to west could be imitated. Thus Plautus, the Roman poet, makes one of his characters say, "If you would do reverence to the gods, you must turn to the right hand;" and Gronovius, in commenting on this passage, says that the ancients, "in worshiping and praying to the gods, were accustomed to turn to the right hand." In one of the hymns of Callimachus, supposed to have been chanted by the priests of Apollo, it is said, "We imitate the example of the sun, and follow his benevolent course." Virgil describes Corynæus as purifying his companions at the funeral of Misenus by passing three times around them, and at the same time aspersing them with the lustral water, which action he could not have conveniently performed, unless he had moved with his right hand toward them, thus making his circuit from east to west by the south.
In fact, the ceremony of circumambulation was, among the Romans, so intimately connected with every religious rite of expiation or purification, that the same word, "lustrare," came at length to signify both to purify, which was its original meaning, and also to walk around anything.
Among the Hindoos, the rite of circumambulation was always practiced as a religious ceremony, and a Brahmin, on rising from his bed in the morning, having first adored the sun, while directing his face to the east, then proceeds by the way of the south to the west, exclaiming at the same time, "I follow the course of the sun."
The Druids preserved this rite of circumambulation in their
