A large number of writings in the tone of the Orphic religion were ascribed to Orpheus.
In the Orphic cosmogony the origin of all goes back to Chronos, the personification of time, who produces Aether and Chaos.
It also included a collection of Orphic hymns, liturgic songs, practical treatises, and poems on various subjects.
In this system we distinguish not only the asceticism of Pythagoras and the later mysticism of Plato, but also the influence of the Orphic mysteries.
Thus the Orphic hymns are careful to specify, in connexion with the several deities celebrated, a great variety of substances appropriate to the service of each; in the case of many of these the selection seems to have been determined not at all by their fragrance but by some occult considerations which it is now difficult to divine.