It was a foot in diameter, and was carved au naturel as the Maori lingam and yoni throughout Polynesia, and in India, where doubtless the cult originated.

O best of the Bharatas by bathing in the tirtha there, that is called Yoni, a man (in his next birth) becometh, O king, the son of a goddess, bearing ear-rings decked with pearls, and obtaineth also the merit of the gift of a hundred thousand kine.

Accordingly we find in the Cteis of the Greeks, and the Yoni of the Indians, a symbol of the female generative principle, of co-extensive prevalence with the Phallus.

The union of the Phallus and Cteis, or the Lingam and Yoni, in one compound figure, as an object of adoration, was the most usual mode of representation.

This was the universal doctrine in all the ancient religions, and was very naturally developed in the symbol of the phallus and cteis among the Greeks, and in the corresponding one of the lingam and yoni among the Orientalists; from which symbols the masonic point within a circle is a legitimate derivation.

All this, of course, is nothing more nor less than the phallus and cteis, or lingam and yoni, under a different form.

It is a symbol of the life-giving and sustaining power of God. YONI.

Among the nations and religions of India the yoni was the representation of the female organ of generation, and was the symbol of the prolific power of nature.

YONI, a Hindu symbol of the female principle in nature, and as such an object of worship.