Mistletoe

This curious plant, which grows only as a parasite upon other trees, such as the apple and the oak, was a mystic plant in several ancient religions, notably that of the Celtic Druids: their priests cut the Mistletoe with much ceremony at certain seasons, and then only with a specially consecrated golden knife. Hislop suggests as a religious explanation that the Mistletoe being a Branch growing out of a Mother tree was worshipped as a Divine Branch out of an Earthly Tree, the union of deity and humanity. The name in German means "all heal". Compare the Golden Branch in Virgil 's ^neid, vi. 126 : and Pliny, Hist. Nat., xvii. 44. ''Sacerdos Candida vesta cultus arhoreni scandit, falce aurra dcmrtit". [w.w.w.] Mitra or Mithra. (Pers.). An ancient Iranian deity, a sun-god, as evidenced by his being lion-headed. The name exists also in India and means a form of the sun. The Persian Mithra, he who drove out of heaven Ahriman, is a kind of Messiah who is expected to return as the judge of men, and is a sin-hearing god who atones for the iniquities of mankind. As such, however, he is directly connected with the highest Occultism, the tenets of which were expounded during the ]\Iithraie ^Mysteries which thus bore his name.