After what we have seen concerning the numerous virgin-born, crucified and resurrected Saviours, believed on in the Pagan world for so many centuries before the time assigned for the birth of the Christian Saviour, the questions naturally arise: were they real personages? did they ever exist in the flesh? whence came these stories concerning them? have they a foundation in truth, or are they simply creations of the imagination? The historical theory—according to which all the persons mentioned in mythology were once real human beings, and the legends and fabulous traditions relating to them were merely the additions and embellishments of later times—which was so popular with scholars of the last century, has been altogether abandoned. Under the historical point of view the gods are mere deified mortals, either heroes who have been deified after their death, or Pontiff-chieftains who have passed themselves off for gods, and who, it is gratuitously supposed, found people stupid enough to believe in their pretended divinity. This was the manner in which, formerly, writers explained the mythology of nations of antiquity; but a method that pre-supposed an historical Crishna, an historical Osiris, an historical Mithra, an historical Hercules, an historical Apollo, or an historical Thor, was found untenable, and therefore, does not, at the present day, stand in need of a refutation. As a writer of the early part of the present century said: "We shall never have an ancient history worthy of the perusal of men of common sense, till we cease treating poems as history, and send back such personages as Hercules, Theseus, Bacchus, etc., to the heavens, whence their history is taken, and whence they never descended to the earth." The historical theory was succeeded by the allegorical theory, which supposes that all the myths of the ancients were allegorical and symbolical, and contain some moral, religious, or philosophical In the preceding pages we have spoken of the several virgin-born, crucified and resurrected Saviours, as real personages. We have attributed to these individuals words and acts, and have regarded the words and acts recorded in the several sacred books from which we have quoted, as said and done by them. But in doing this, we have simply used the language of others. These gods and heroes were not real personages; they are merely personifications of the Sun. As Prof. Max MÜller observes in his Lectures on the Science of Religion: "One of the earliest objects that would strike and stir the mind of man, and for which a sign or a name would soon be wanted, is surely the Sun. "Few nations only have preserved in their ancient poetry some remnants of the natural awe with which the earlier dwellers on the earth saw that brilliant being slowly rising from out of the darkness of the night, raising itself by its own might higher and higher, till it stood triumphant on the arch of heaven, and then descended and sank down in its fiery glory into the dark abyss of the heaving and hissing sea. In the hymns of the Veda, the poet still wonders whether the Sun will rise again; he asks how he can climb the vault of heaven? why he does not fall back? why there is no dust on his path? And when the rays of the morning rouse him from sleep and call him back to new life, when he sees the Sun, as he says, stretching out his golden arms to bless the world and rescue it from the terror of darkness, he exclaims, 'Arise, our life, our spirit has come back! the darkness is gone, the light approaches.'" Many years ago, the learned Sir William Jones said: "We must not be surprised at finding, on a close examination, that the characters of all the Pagan deities, male and female, melt into each other, and at last into one or two; for it seems as well founded opinion, that the whole crowd of gods and goddesses of ancient Rome, and modern Varanes, mean only the powers of nature, and principally those of the SUN, expressed in a variety of ways, and by a multitude of fanciful names." Since the first learned president of the Royal Asiatic Society paved the way for the science of comparative mythology, much has been learned on this subject, so that, as the Rev. George W. Cox remarks, "recent discussions on the subject seem to justify the conviction that the foundations of the science of comparative mythology have been firmly laid, and that its method is unassailable." If we wish to find the gods and goddesses of the ancestors of our race, we must look to the sun, the moon, the stars, the sky, the earth, the sea, the dawn, the clouds, the wind, &c., which they personified and worshiped. That these have been the gods and goddesses of all nations of antiquity, is an established fact. The words which had denoted the sun and moon would denote not merely living things but living persons. From personification to deification the steps would be but few; and the process of disintegration would at once furnish the materials for a vast fabric of mythology. All the expressions which had attached a living force to natural objects would remain as the description of personal and anthropomorphous gods. Every word would become an attribute, and all ideas, once grouped around a simple object, would branch off into distinct personifications. The sun had been the lord of light, the driver of the chariot of the day; he had toiled and labored for the sons of men, and sunk down to rest, after a hard battle, in the evening. But now the lord of light would be Phoibos Apollon, while Helios would remain enthroned in his fiery chariot, and his toils and labors and death-struggles would be transferred to Hercules. The violet clouds which greet his rising and his setting would now be represented by herds of cows which feed in earthly pastures. There would be other expressions which would still remain as floating phrases, not attached to any definite deities. These would gradually be converted into incidents in the life of heroes, and be woven at length into systematic narratives. Finally, these gods or heroes, and the incidents of their mythical career, would receive each "a local habitation and a name." These would remain as genuine history, when the origin and meaning of the words had been either wholly or in part forgotten. For the proofs of these assertions, the Vedic poems furnish indisputable evidence, that such as this was the origin and growth of Greek and Teutonic mythology. In these poems, the names of many, perhaps of most, of the Greek gods, indicate natural objects which, if endued with life, have not been reduced to human Of this vast mass of solar myths, some have emerged into independent legends, others have furnished the groundwork of whole epics, others have remained simply as floating tales whose intrinsic beauty no poet has wedded to his verse. "The results obtained from the examination of language in its several forms leaves no room for doubt that the general system of mythology has been traced to its fountain head. We can no longer shut our eyes to the fact that there was a stage in the history of human speech, during which all the abstract words in constant use among ourselves were utterly unknown, when men had formed no notions of virtue or prudence, of thought and intellect, of slavery or freedom, but spoke only of the man who was strong, who could point the way to others and choose one thing out of many, of the man who was not bound to any other and able to do as he pleased. "That even this stage was not the earliest in the history of language is now a growing opinion among philologists; but for the comparison of legends current in different countries it is not necessary to carry the search further back. Language without words denoting abstract qualities implies a condition of thought in which men were only awakening to a sense of the objects which surrounded them, and points to a time when the world was to them full of strange sights and sounds, some beautiful, some bewildering, some terrific, when, in short, they knew little of themselves beyond "We have then before us a stage of language corresponding to a stage in the history of the human mind in which all sensible objects were regarded as instinct with a conscious life. The varying phases of that life were therefore described as truthfully as they described their own feelings or sufferings; and hence every phase became a picture. But so long as the conditions of their life remained unchanged, they knew perfectly what the picture meant, and ran no risk of confusing one with another. Thus they had but to describe the things which they saw, felt, or heard, in order to keep up an inexhaustible store of phrases faithfully describing the facts of the world from their point of view. This language was indeed the result of an observation not less keen than that by which the inductive philosopher extorts the secrets of the natural world. Nor was its range much narrower. Each object received its own measure of attention, and no one phenomenon was so treated as to leave no room for others in their turn. They could not fail to note the changes of days and years, of growth and decay, of calm and storm; but the objects which so changed were to them living things, and the rising and setting of the sun, the return of winter and summer, became a drama in which the actors were their enemies or their friends. "That this is a strict statement of facts in the history of the human mind, philology alone would abundantly prove; but not a few of these phrases have come down to us in their earliest form, and point to the long-buried stratum of language of which they are the fragments. These relics exhibit in their germs the myths which afterwards became the legends of gods and heroes with human "The mythical or mythmaking language of mankind had no partialities; and if the career of the Sun occupies a large extent of the horizon, we cannot fairly simulate ignorance of the cause. Men so placed would not fail to put into words the thoughts or emotions roused in them by the varying phases of that mighty world on which we, not less than they, feel that our life depends, although we may know something more of its nature. "Thus grew up a multitude of expressions which described the sun as the child of the night, as the destroyer of the darkness, as the lover of the dawn and the dew—of phrases which would go on to speak of him as killing the dew with his spears, and of forsaking the dawn as he rose in the heaven. The feeling that the fruits of the earth were called forth by his warmth would find utterance in words which spoke of him as the friend and the benefactor of man; while the constant recurrence of his work would lead them to describe him as a being constrained to toil for others, as doomed to travel over many lands, and as finding everywhere things on which he could bestow his love or which he might destroy by his power. His journey, again, might be across cloudless skies, or amid alternations of storm and calm; his light might break fitfully through the clouds, or be hidden for many a weary hour, to burst forth at last with dazzling splendor as he sank down in the western sky. He would thus be described as facing many dangers and many enemies, none of whom, however, may arrest his course; as sullen, or capricious, or resentful; as grieving for the loss of the dawn whom he had loved, or as nursing his great wrath and vowing a pitiless vengeance. Then as the veil was rent at eventide, they would speak of the chief, who had long remained still, girding on his armor; or of the wanderer throwing off his disguise, and seizing his bow or spear to smite his enemies; of the invincible warrior whose face gleams with the flush of victory when the fight is over, as he greets the fair-haired Dawn who closes, as she had begun, the day. To the wealth of images thus lavished on the daily life and death of the Sun there would be no limit. He was the child of the morning, or her husband, or her destroyer; he forsook her and he returned to her, either in calm serenity or only to sink presently in deeper gloom. "So with other sights and sounds. The darkness of night brought with it a feeling of vague horror and dread; the return of daylight cheered them with a sense of unspeakable gladness; and thus the "That these phrases would furnish the germs of myths or legends teeming with human feeling, as soon as the meaning of the phrases were in part or wholly forgotten, was as inevitable as that in the infancy of our race men should attribute to all sensible objects the same kind of life which they were conscious of possessing themselves." Let us compare the history of the Saviour which we have already seen, with that of the Sun, as it is found in the Vedas. We can follow in the Vedic hymns, step by step, the development which changes the Sun from a mere luminary into a "Creator," "Preserver," "Ruler," and "Rewarder of the World"—in fact, into a Divine or Supreme Being. The first step leads us from the mere light of the Sun to that light which in the morning wakes man from sleep, and seems to give new life, not only to man, but to the whole of nature. He who wakes us in the morning, who recalls all nature to new life, is soon called "The Giver of Daily Life." Secondly, by another and bolder step, the Giver of Daily Light and Life becomes the giver of light and life in general. He who brings light and life to-day, is the same who brought light and life on the first of days. As light is the beginning of the day, so light was the beginning of creation, and the Sun, from being a mere light-bringer or life-giver, becomes a Creator, and, if a Creator, then soon also a Ruler of the World. Thirdly, as driving away the dreaded darkness of the night, and likewise as fertilizing the earth, the Sun is conceived as a "Defender" and kind "Protector" of all living things. Fourthly, the Sun sees everything, both that which is good and Let us examine now, says Prof. MÜller, from whose work we have quoted the above, a few passages (from the Rig-Veda) illustrating every one of these perfectly natural transitions. "In hymn vii. we find the Sun invoked as 'The Protector of everything that moves or stands, of all that exists.'" "Frequent allusion is made to the Sun's power of seeing everything. The stars flee before the all-seeing Sun, like thieves (R. V. vii.). He sees the right and the wrong among men (Ibid.). He who looks upon the world, knows also all the thoughts in men (Ibid.)." "As the Sun sees everything and knows everything, he is asked to forget and forgive what he alone has seen and knows (R. V. iv.)." "The Sun is asked to drive away illness and bad dreams (R. V. x.)." "Having once, and more than once, been invoked as the life-bringer, the Sun is also called the breath or life of all that moves and rests (R. V. i.); and lastly, he becomes the maker of all things, by whom all the worlds have been brought together (R. V. x.), and ... Lord of man and of all living creatures." "He is the God among gods (R. V. i.); he is the divine leader of all the gods (R. V. viii.)." "He alone rules the whole world (R. V. v.). The laws which he has established are firm (R. V. iv.), and the other gods not only praise him (R. V. vii.), but have to follow him as their leader (R. V. v.)." That the history of Christ Jesus, the Christian Saviour,—"the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world," 1. The birth of Christ Jesus is said to have taken place at early dawn "The division of the first decan of the Virgin represents a beautiful virgin with flowing hair, sitting in a chair, with two ears of corn in her hand, and suckling an infant called Iesus by some nations, and Christ in Greek." This denotes the Sun, which, at the moment of the winter solstice, precisely when the Persian magi drew the horoscope of the new year, was placed on the bosom of the Virgin, rising heliacally in the eastern horizon. On this account he was figured in their astronomical pictures under the form of a child suckled by a chaste virgin. Thus we see that Christ Jesus was born on the same day as Buddha, Mithras, Osiris, Horus, Hercules, Bacchus, Adonis and other personifications of the Sun. 2. Christ Jesus was born of a Virgin. In this respect he is also the Sun, for 'tis the sun alone who can be born of an immaculate virgin, who conceived him without carnal intercourse, and who is still, after the birth of her child, a virgin. This Virgin, of whom the Sun, the true "Saviour of Mankind," is born, is either the bright and beautiful Dawn, This Celestial Virgin was feigned to be a mother. She is represented in the Indian Zodiac of Sir William Jones, with ears of corn in one hand, and the lotus in the other. In Kircher's Zodiac of Hermes, she has corn in both hands. In other planispheres of the Egyptian priests she carries ears of corn in one hand, and the infant Saviour Horus in the other. In Roman Catholic countries, she is In the Vedic hymns Aditi, the Dawn, is called the "Mother of the Gods." "She is the mother with powerful, terrible, with royal sons." She is said to have given birth to the Sun. The poets of the Veda indulged freely in theogonic speculations without being frightened by any contradictions. They knew of Indra as the greatest of gods, they knew of Agni as the god of gods, they knew of Varuna as the ruler of all; but they were by no means startled at the idea that their Indra had a mother, or that Varuna was nursed in the lap of Aditi. All this was true to nature; for their god was the Sun, and the mother who bore and nursed him was the Dawn. We find in the Vishnu Purana, that Devaki (the virgin mother of the Hindoo Saviour Crishna, whose history, as we have seen, corresponds in most every particular with that of Christ Jesus) is called Aditi, In the Mahabharata, Crishna is also represented as the "Son of Aditi." Indra, the sun, who was worshiped in some parts of India as a Crucified God, is also represented in the Vedic hymns as the Son of the Dawn. He is said to have been born of Dahana, who is Daphne, a personification of the Dawn. The humanity of this SOLAR GOD-MAN, this demiurge, is strongly Horus, the Egyptian Saviour, was the son of the virgin Isis. Now, this Isis, in Egyptian mythology, is the same as the virgin Devaki in Hindoo mythology. She is the Dawn. Among the goddesses of Egypt, the highest was Neith, who reigned inseparably with Amun in the upper sphere. She was called "Mother of the gods," "Mother of the sun." She was the feminine origin of all things, as Amun was the male origin. She held the same rank at Sais as Amun did at Thebes. Her temples there are said to have exceeded in colossal grandeur anything ever seen before. On one of these was the celebrated inscription thus deciphered by Champollion: "I am all that has been, all that is, all that will be. No mortal has ever raised the veil that conceals me. My offspring is the Sun." She was mother of the Sun-god Ra, and, says Prof. Renouf, "is commonly supposed to represent Heaven; but some expressions which are hardly applicable to heaven, render it more probable that she is one of the many names of the Dawn." If we turn from Indian and Egyptian, to Grecian mythology, we shall also find that their Sun-gods and solar heroes are born of the same virgin mother. Theseus was said to have been born of Aithra, "the pure air," and Œdipus of Iokaste, "the violet light of morning." Perseus was born of the virgin Danae, and was called the "Son of the bright morning." "The Saviour of Mankind" was also represented as being born of the "dusky mother," which accounts for many Pagan, and so-called Christian, goddesses being represented black. The dark earth was also represented as being the mother of the god Sun, who apparently came out of, or was born of her, in the East, In Hindoo mythology, the Earth, under the name of Prithivi, receives a certain share of honors as one of the primitive goddesses of the Veda, being thought of as the "kind mother." Moreover, various deities were regarded as the progeny resulting from the fancied union of the Earth with Dyaus (Heaven). Our Aryan forefathers looked up to the heavens and they gave it the name of Dyaus, from a root-word which means "to shine." And when, out of the forces and forms of nature, they afterwards fashioned other gods, this name of Dyaus became Dyaus pitar, the Heaven-father, or Lord of All; and in far later times, when the western Aryans had found their home in Europe, the Dyaus pitar of the central Asian land became the Zeupater of the Greeks, and the Jupiter of the Romans, and the first part of his name gave us the word Deity. According to Egyptian mythology, Isis was also the Earth. Tacitus, the Roman historian, speaking of the Germans in A. D. 98, says: "There is nothing in these several tribes that merit attention, except that they all agree in worshiping the goddess Earth, or as they call her, Herth, whom they consider as the common mother of all." These virgin mothers, and virgin goddesses of antiquity, were also, at times, personifications of the Moon, or of Nature. Who is "God the Father," who overshadows the maiden? The overshadowing of the maiden by "God the Father," whether he be called Zeus, Jupiter or Jehovah, is simply the Heaven, the Sky, the "All-father," According to Egyptian mythology, Seb (the Earth) is overshadowed by Nut (Heaven), the result of this union being the beneficent Lord and Saviour, Osiris. "The Sky appeared to men (says Plutarch), to perform the functions of a Father, as the Earth those of a Mother. The sky was the father, for it cast seed into the bosom of the earth, which in receiving them became fruitful, and brought forth, and was the mother." This union has been sung in the following verses by Virgil: "Tum pater omnipotens fecundis imbribis Æther Conjugis in grenium lÆtÆ descendit." The Phenician theology is founded on the same principles. Heaven and Earth (called Ouranos and GhÈ) are at the head of a genealogy of Æons, whose adventures are conceived in the mythological style of these physical allegorists. In the Samothracian mysteries, which seem to have been the most anciently established ceremonies of the kind in Europe, the Heaven and the Earth were worshiped as a male and female divinity, and as the parents of all things. The Supreme God (the Al-fader), of the ancient Scandinavians was Odin, a personification of the Heavens. The principal goddess among them was Frigga, a personification of the Earth. It was the opinion among these people that this Supreme Being or Celestial God had united with the Earth (Frigga) to produce "Baldur the Good" (the Sun), who corresponds to the Apollo of the Greeks and Romans, and the Osiris of the Egyptians. Xiuletl, in the Mexican language, signifies Blue, and hence was a name which the Mexican gave to Heaven, from which Xiuleticutli is derived, an epithet signifying "the God of Heaven," which they bestowed upon Tezcatlipoca, who was the "Lord of All," the "Supreme God." He it was who overshadowed the Virgin of Tula, Chimelman, who begat the Saviour Quetzalcoatle (the Sun). 3. His birth was foretold by a star. This is the bright morning star— "Fairest of stars, last in the train of Night, If better, thou belongst not to the Dawn, Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn With thy bright circlet"— which heralds the birth of the god Sol, the beneficent Saviour. A glance at a geography of the heavens will show the "chaste, pure, immaculate Virgin, suckling an infant," preceded by a 4. The Heavenly Host sang praises. All nature smiles at the birth of the Heavenly Being. "To him all angels cry aloud, the heavens, and all the powers therein." "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men." "The quarters of the horizon are irradiate with joy, as if moonlight was diffused over the whole earth." "The spirits and nymphs of heaven dance and sing." "Caressing breezes blow, and a marvelous light is produced." For the Lord and Saviour is born, "to give joy and peace to men and Devas, to shed light in the dark places, and to give sight to the blind." 5. He was visited by the Magi. This is very natural, for the Magi were Sun-worshipers, and at early dawn on the 25th of December, the astrologers of the Arabs, Chaldeans, and other Oriental nations, greeted the infant Saviour with gold, frankincense and myrrh. They started to salute their God long before the rising of the Sun, and having ascended a high mountain, they waited anxiously for his birth, facing the East, and there hailed his first rays with incense and prayer. "Will the powers of darkness be conquered by the god of light?" And when the Sun rose, they wondered how, just born, he was so mighty. They greeted him: "Hail, Orient Conqueror of Gloomy Night." And the human eye felt that it could not bear the brilliant majesty of him whom they called, "The Life, the Breath, the Brilliant Lord and Father." And they said: "Let us worship again the Child of Heaven, the Son of Strength, Arusha, the Bright Light of the Sacrifice." "He rises as a mighty flame, he stretches out his wide arms, he is even like the wind." "His light is powerful, and his (virgin) mother, the Dawn, gives him the best share, the first worship among men." 6. He was born in a Cave. In this respect also, the history of As the hour of his birth drew near, the mother became more beautiful, her form more brilliant, while the dungeon was filled with a heavenly light as when Zeus came to Danae in a golden shower. At length the child is born, and a halo of serene light encircles his cradle, just as the Sun appears at early dawn in the East, in all its splendor. His presence reveals itself there, in the dark cave, by his first rays, which brightens the countenances of his mother and others who are present at his birth. 6. He was ordered to be put to death. All the Sun-gods are fated to bring ruin upon their parents or the reigning monarch. The Sun scatters the Darkness; and so the phrase went that the child was to be the destroyer of the reigning monarch, or his parent, Night; and oracles, and magi, it was said, warned the latter of the doom which would overtake him. The newly-born babe is therefore ordered to be put to death by the sword, or exposed on the bare hillside, as the Sun seems to rest on the Earth (Ida) at its rising. In oriental mythology, the destroying principle is generally represented as a serpent or dragon. 7. He was tempted by the devil. The temptation by, and victory over the evil one, whether Mara or Satan, is the victory of the Sun over the clouds of storm and darkness. Free from every obstacle, and from every adversary, he sets in motion across space his disk with a thousand rays, having avenged the attempts of his eternal foe. He appears then in all his glory, and in his sovereign splendor; the god has attained the summit of his course, it is the moment of triumph. 8. He was put to death on the cross. The Sun has now reached his extreme Southern limit, his career is ended, and he is at last overcome by his enemies. The powers of darkness, and of winter, which had sought in vain to wound him, have at length won the victory. The bright Sun of summer is finally slain, crucified in the heavens, and pierced by the arrow, spear or thorn of winter. Throughout the tale, the Sun-god was but fulfilling his doom. These things must be. The suffering of a violent death was a necessary part of the mythos; and, when his hour had come, he must meet his doom, as surely as the Sun, once risen, must go across the sky, and then sink down into his bed beneath the earth or sea. It was an iron fate from which there was no escaping. Crishna, the crucified Saviour of the Hindoos, is a personification of the Sun crucified in the heavens. One of the names of the Sun in the Vedic hymns is Vishnu, In the hymns of the Rig-Veda the Sun is spoken of as "stretching out his arms," in the heavens, "to bless the world, and to rescue it from the terror of darkness." Indra, the crucified Saviour worshiped in Nepal and Tibet, The principal Phenician deity, El, which, says Parkhurst, in his Hebrew Lexicon, "was the very name the heathens gave to their god Sol, their Lord or Ruler of the Hosts of Heaven," was called "The Preserver (or Saviour) of the World," for the benefit of which he offered a mystical sacrifice. The crucified Iao ("Divine Love" personified) is the crucified Adonis, the Sun. The Lord and Saviour Adonis was called Iao. Osiris, the Egyptian Saviour, was crucified in the heavens. To the Egyptian the cross was the symbol of immortality, an emblem of the Sun, and the god himself was crucified to the tree, which denoted his fructifying power. Horus was also crucified in the heavens. He was represented, like Crishna and Christ Jesus, with outstretched arms in the vault of heaven. The story of the crucifixion of Prometheus was allegorical, for Prometheus was only a title of the Sun, expressing providence or foresight, wherefore his being crucified in the extremities of the earth, signified originally no more than the restriction of the power of the Sun during the winter months. Who was Ixion, bound on the wheel? He was none other than the god Sol, crucified in the heavens. The wheel upon which Ixion and criminals were said to have been extended was a cross, although the name of the thing was dissembled among Christians; it was a St. Andrew's cross, of which two spokes confined the arms, and two the legs. (See Fig. No. 35.) The allegorical tales of the triumphs and misfortunes of the Sun-gods of the ancient Greeks and Romans, signify the alternate exertion of the generative and destructive attributes. Hercules is torn limb from limb; and in this catastrophe we see the blood-red sunset which closes the career of Hercules. Achilleus and Meleagros represent alike the short-lived Sun, whose course is one of toil for others, ending in an early death, after a series of wonderful victories alternating with periods of darkness and gloom. In the tales of the Trojan war, it is related of Achilleus that he expires at the Skaian, or western gates of the evening. He is slain by Paris, who here appears as the Pani, or dark power, who blots out the light of the Sun from the heaven. We have also the story of Adonis, born of a virgin, and known in the countries where he was worshiped as "The Saviour of Mankind," killed by the wild boar, afterwards "rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven." This Adonis, Adonai—in Hebrew "My Lord"—is simply the Sun. He is crucified in the heavens, put to death by the wild boar, i. e., Winter. "Babylon called Typhon or Winter the boar; they said he killed Adonis or the fertile Sun." The Crucified Dove worshiped by the ancients, was none other than the crucified Sun. Adonis was called the Dove. At the ceremonies in honor of his resurrection from the dead, the devotees said, "Hail to the Dove! the Restorer of Light." "We read in Pindar, (says the author of a learned work entitled "Nimrod,") of the venerable bird Iynx bound to the wheel, and of the pretended punishment of Ixion. But this rotation was really no punishment, being, as Pindar saith, voluntary, and prepared by himself and for himself; or if it was, it was appointed in derision of his false pretensions, whereby he gave himself out as the crucified spirit of the world." "The four spokes represent St. Andrew's cross, adapted to the four limbs extended, and furnish perhaps the oldest profane allusion to the crucifixion. The same cross of St. Andrew was the Taw, which Ezekiel commands them to mark upon the foreheads of the faithful, as appears from all Israelitish coins whereon that letter is engraved. The same idea was familiar to Lucian, who calls T the letter of crucifixion. Certainly, the veneration for the cross is very ancient. Iynx, the bird of Mautic inspiration, bound to the four-legged wheel, gives the notion of Divine Love crucified. The wheel denotes the world, of which she is the spirit, and the cross the sacrifice made for that world." This "Divine Love," of whom Nimrod speaks, was "The First-begotten Son" of the Platonists. The crucifixion of "Divine Love" is often found among the Greeks. IÖnah or Juno, according to the Iliad, was bound with fetters, and suspended in space, between heaven and earth. Ixion, Prometheus, Apollo of Miletus, (anciently the greatest and most flourishing city of Ionia, in Asia Minor), were all crucified. Semi-Ramis was both a queen of unrivaled celebrity, and also a goddess, worshiped under the form of a Dove. Her name signifies the Supreme Dove. She is said to have been slain by the last survivor of her sons, while others say, she flew away as a bird—a Dove. In both Grecian and Hindoo histories this mystical queen Semiramis is said to have fought a battle on the banks of the Indus, with a king called Staurobates, in which she was defeated, and from which she flew away in the form of a Dove. Of this Nimrod says: "The name Staurobates, the king by whom Semiramis was finally overpowered, alluded to the cross on which she perished," and that, "the crucifixion was made into a glorious mystery by her infatuated adorers." Here again we have the crucified Dove, the Sun, for it is well known that the ancients personified the Sun female as well as male. We have also the fable of the Crucified Rose, illustrated in the jewel of the Rosicrucians. The jewel of the Rosicrucians is formed The emblem of the Templars is a red rose on a cross. "When it can be done, it is surrounded with a glory, and placed on a calvary (Fig. No. 36). This is the Naurutz, Natsir, or Rose of Isuren, of Tamul, or Sharon, or the Water Rose, the Lily Padma, Pena, Lotus, crucified in the heavens for the salvation of man." Christ Jesus was called the Rose—the Rose of Sharon—of Isuren. He was the renewed incarnation of Divine Wisdom. He was the son of Maia or Maria. He was the Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Valley, which bloweth in the month of his mother Maia. Thus, when the angel Gabriel gives the salutation to the Virgin, he presents her with the lotus or lily; as may be seen in hundreds of old pictures in Italy. We see therefore that Adonis, "the Lord," "the Virgin-born," "the Crucified," "the Resurrected Dove," "the Restorer of Light," is one and the same with the "Rose of Sharon," the crucified Christ Jesus. Plato (429 B. C.) in his PimÆus, philosophizing about the Son of God, says: "The next power to the Supreme God was decussated or figured in the shape of a cross on the universe." This brings to recollection the doctrine of certain so-called Christian heretics, who maintained that Christ Jesus was crucified in the heavens. The ChrÈstos was the Logos, the Sun was the manifestation of the Logos or Wisdom to men; or, as it was held by some, it was his peculiar habitation. The Sun being crucified at the time of the winter solstice was represented by the young man slaying the Bull (an emblem of the Sun) in the Mithraic ceremonies, and the slain lamb at the foot of the cross in the Christian ceremonies. The Chrest was the Logos, or Divine Wisdom, or a portion of divine Fig. No. 37, taken from Mr. Lundy's "Monumental Christianity," is evidently a representation of the Christian Saviour crucified in the heavens. Mr. Lundy calls it "Crucifixion in Space," and believes that it was intended for the Hindoo Saviour Crishna, who is also represented crucified in space (See Fig. No. 8, Ch. XX.). This (Fig. 37) is exactly in the form of a Romish crucifix, but not fixed to a piece of wood, though the legs and feet are put together in the usual way. There is a glory over it, coming from above, not shining from the figure, as is generally seen in a Roman crucifix. It has a pointed Parthian coronet instead of a crown of thorns. All the avatars, or incarnations of Vishnu, are painted with Ethiopian or Parthian coronets. For these reasons the Christian author will not own that it is a representation of the "True Son of Justice," for he was not crucified in space; but whether it was intended to represent Crishna, Wittoba, or Jesus, Who was the crucified god whom the ancient Romans worshiped, and whom they, according to Justin Martyr, represented as a man on a cross? Can we doubt, after what we have seen, that he was this same crucified Sol, whose birthday they annually celebrated on the 25th of December? In the poetical tales of the ancient Scandinavians, the same legend is found. Frey, the Deity of the Sun, was fabled to have been killed, at the time of the winter solstice, by the same boar who put the god Adonis to death, therefore a boar was annually offered The ancient Mexican crucified Saviour, Quetzalcoatle, another personification of the Sun, was sometimes represented as crucified in space, in the heavens, in a circle of nineteen figures, the number of the metonic cycle. A serpent (the emblem of evil, darkness, and winter) is depriving him of the organs of generation. We have seen in Chapter XXXIII. that Christ Jesus, and many of the heathen saviours, healers, and preserving gods, were represented in the form of a Serpent. This is owing to the fact that, in one of its attributes, the Serpent was an emblem of the Sun. It may, at first, appear strange that the Serpent should be an emblem of evil, and yet also an emblem of the beneficent divinity; but, as Prof. Renouf remarks, in his Hibbert Lectures, "The moment we understand the nature of a myth, all impossibilities, contradictions, and immoralities disappear." The serpent is an emblem of evil when represented with his deadly sting; he is the emblem of eternity when represented casting off his skin; As the Dove and the Rose, emblems of the Sun, were represented on the cross, so was the Serpent. This is seen in Fig. No. 39, taken from an ancient medal, which represents the serpent with rays of glory surrounding his head. The Ophites, who venerated the serpent as an emblem of Christ Jesus, are said to have maintained that the serpent of Genesis—who brought wisdom into the world—was Christ Jesus. The brazen serpent was called the Word by the Chaldee paraphrast. The Word, or Logos, was Divine Wisdom, which was crucified; thus we have the cross, or Linga, or Phallus, with the serpent upon it. Besides considering the serpent as the emblem of Christ Jesus, or of the Logos, the Ophites are said to have revered it as the cause of all the arts of civilized life. In Chapter XII. we saw that several illustrious females were believed to have been selected and impregnated by the Holy Ghost. In some cases, a serpent was supposed to be the form which it assumed. This was the incarnation of the Logos. Although generally, it did not always, symbolize the god Sun, or the power of which the Sun is an emblem; but, invested with various meanings, it entered widely into the primitive mythologies. As Mr. Squire observes: "It typified wisdom, power, duration, the good and evil principles, life, reproduction—in short, in Egypt, Syria, Greece, India, China, Scandinavia, America, everywhere on the globe, it has been a prominent emblem." The serpent was the symbol of Vishnu, the preserving god, the Saviour, the Sun. The principal god of the Aztecs was Tonac-atlcoatl, which means the Serpent Sun. The Mexican virgin-born Lord and Saviour, Quetzalcoatle, was represented in the form of a serpent. In fact, his name signifies "Feathered Serpent." Quetzalcoatle was a personification of the Sun. Under the aspect of the active principle, we may rationally The mysteries of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, in Egypt; Atys and Cybele, in Phrygia; Ceres and Proserpine, at Eleusis; of Venus and Adonis, in Phenicia; of Bona Dea and Priapus, in Rome, are all susceptible of one explanation. They all set forth and illustrated, by solemn and impressive rites, and mystical symbols, the grand phenomenon of nature, especially as connected with the creation of things and the perpetuation of life. In all, it is worthy of remark, the SERPENT was more or less conspicuously introduced, and always as symbolical of the invigorating or active energy of nature, the Sun. We have seen (in Chapter XX.) that in early Christian art Christ Jesus also was represented as a crucified Lamb. This crucified lamb is "the Lamb of God taking away the sins of the world, and slain from the foundation of the world." We find, then, that the stories of the crucifixions of the different so-called Saviours of mankind all melt into one, and that they are allegorical, for "Saviour" was only a title of the Sun, 9. "And many women were there beholding afar off." All the Sun-gods forsake their homes and virgin mothers, and wander through different countries doing marvellous things. Finally, at the end of their career, the mother, from whom they were parted long ago, is by their side to cheer them in their last hours. The ever-faithful women were to be found at the last scene in the life of Buddha. Kasyapa having found the departed master's feet soiled and wet, asked Nanda the cause of it. "He was told that a weeping woman had embraced Gautama's feet shortly before his death, and that her tears had fallen on his feet and left the marks on them." In his last hours, Œdipous (the Sun) has been cheered by the presence of Antigone. At the death of Hercules, Iole (the fair-haired Dawn) stands by his side, cheering him to the last. With her gentle hands she sought to soothe his pain, and with pitying words to cheer him in his woe. Then once more the face of Hercules flushed with a deep joy, and he said: "Ah, Iole, brightest of maidens, thy voice shall cheer me as I sink down in the sleep of death. I saw and loved thee in the bright morning time, and now again thou hast come, in the evening, fair as the soft clouds which gather around the dying Sun." The black mists were spreading over the sky, but still Hercules sought to gaze on the fair face of Iole, and to comfort her in her sorrow. "Weep not, Iole," he said, "my toil is done, and now is the time for rest. I shall see thee again in the bright land which is never trodden by the feet of night." The same story is related in the legend of Apollo. The Dawn, from whom he parted in the early part of his career, comes to his side at eventide, and again meets him when his journey on earth has well nigh come to an end. When the Lord Prometheus was crucified on Mt. Caucasus, his especially professed friend, Oceanus, the fisherman, as his name, PetrÆus, indicates, 10. "There was darkness all over the land." It is the picture of a sunset in wild confusion, of a sunset more awful, yet not more sad, than that which is seen in the last hours of many other Sun-gods. 11. "He descended into hell." In the ancient sagas of Iceland, the hero who is the Sun personified, descends into a tomb, where he fights a vampire. After a desperate struggle, the hero overcomes, and rises to the surface of the earth. "This, too, represents the Sun in the northern realms, descending into the tomb of winter, and there overcoming the power of darkness." 12. He rose again from the dead, and ascended into heaven. Resurrections from the dead, and ascensions into heaven, are generally acknowledged to be solar features, as the history of many solar heroes agree in this particular. At the winter solstice the ancients wept and mourned for Tammuz, the fair Adonis, and other Sun-gods, done to death by the boar, or crucified—slain by the thorn of winter—and on the third day they rejoiced at the resurrection of their "Lord of Light." With her usual policy, the Church endeavored to give a Christian significance to the rites which they borrowed from heathenism, and in this case, the mourning for Tammuz, the fair Adonis, became the mourning for Christ Jesus, and joy at the rising of the natural Sun became joy at the rising of the "Sun of Righteousness"—at the resurrection of Christ Jesus from the grave. This festival of the Resurrection was generally held by the ancients on the 25th of March, when the awakening of Spring may be said to be the result of the return of the Sun from the lower or far-off regions to which he had departed. At the equinox—say, the Throughout all the ancient world, the resurrection of the god Sol, under different names, was celebrated on March 25th, with great rejoicings. In the words of the Rev. Geo. W. Cox: "The wailing of the Hebrew women at the death of Tammuz, the crucifixion and resurrection of Osiris, the adoration of the Babylonian Mylitta, the Sacti ministers of Hindu temples, the cross and crescent of Isis, the rites of the Jewish altar of Baal-Peor, wholly preclude all doubt of the real nature of the great festivals and mysteries of Phenicians, Jews, Assyrians, Egyptians, and Hindus." All this was Sun and Nature worship, symbolized by the Linga and Yoni. As Mr. Bonwick says: "The philosophic theist who reflects upon the story, known from the walls of China, across Asia and Europe, to the plateau of Mexico, cannot resist the impression that no materialistic theory of it can be satisfactory." Allegory alone explains it. "The Church, at an early date, selected the heathen festivals of Sun worship for its own, ordering the birth at Christmas, a fixed time, and the resurrection at Easter, a varying time, as in all Pagan religions; since, though the Sun rose directly after the vernal equinox, the festival, to be correct in a heathen point of view, had to be associated with the new moon." The Christian, then, may well say: "When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of winter, thou didst open the kingdom of heaven (i. e., bring on the reign of summer), to all believers." 13. Christ Jesus is Creator of all things. We have seen (in Chapter XXVI.) that it was not God the Father, who was supposed by the ancients to have been the Creator of the world, but God the Son, the Redeemer and Saviour of Mankind. Now, this Redeemer and Saviour was, as we have seen, the Sun, and Prof. Max MÜller tells us that in the Vedic mythology, the Sun is not the bright Deva only, "who performs his daily task in the sky, but he is supposed to perform much greater work. He is looked upon, in fact, as the Ruler, as the Establisher, as the Creator of the world." Having been invoked as the "Life-bringer," the Sun is also There is a prayer in the Vedas, called Gayatree, which consists of three measured lines, and is considered the holiest and most efficacious of all their religious forms. Sir William Jones translates it thus: "Let us adore the supremacy of that spiritual Sun, the godhead, who illuminates all, who re-creates all, from whom all proceed, to whom all must return; whom we invoke to direct our undertakings aright in our progress toward his holy seat." With Seneca (a Roman philosopher, born at Cordova, Spain, 61 B. C.) then, we can say: "You may call the Creator of all things by different names (Bacchus, Hercules, Mercury, etc.), but they are only different names of the same divine being, the Sun." 14. He is to be Judge of the quick and the dead. Who is better able than the Sun to be the judge of man's deeds, seeing, as he does, from his throne in heaven, all that is done on earth? The Vedas speak of SÛrya—the pervading, irresistible luminary—as seeing all things and hearing all things, noting the good and evil deeds of men. According to Hindoo mythology, says Prof. Max MÜller: "The Sun sees everything, both what is good and what is evil; and how natural therefore that (in the Indian Veda) both the evil-doer should be told that the sun sees what no human eye may have seen, and that the innocent, when all other help fails him, should appeal to the sun to attest his guiltlessness." "Frequent allusion is made (in the Rig-Veda), to the sun's power of seeing everything. The stars flee before the all-seeing sun, like thieves. He sees the right and the wrong among men. He who looks upon the world knows also the thoughts in all men. As the sun sees everything and knows everything, he is asked to forget and forgive what he alone has seen and knows." On the most ancient Egyptian monuments, Osiris, the Sun personified, is represented as Judge of the dead. The Egyptian "Book of the Dead," the oldest Bible in the world, speaks of Osiris as "seeing all things, and hearing all things, noting the good and evil deeds of men." 15. He will come again sitting on a white horse. The "second coming" of Vishnu (Crishna), Christ Jesus, and other Sun-gods, are also astronomical allegories. The white horse, Throughout the whole legend, Christ Jesus is the toiling Sun, laboring for the benefit of others, not his own, and doing hard service for a mean and cruel generation. Watch his sun-like career of brilliant conquest, checked with intervals of storm, and declining to a death clouded with sorrow and derision. He is in constant company with his twelve apostles, the twelve signs of the zodiac. Christ Jesus, then, is the Sun, in his short career and early death. He is the child of the Dawn, whose soft, violet hues tint According to the Christian calendar, the birthday of John the Baptist is on the day of the summer solstice, when the sun begins to decrease. How true to nature then are the words attributed to him in the fourth Gospel, when he says that he must decrease, and Jesus increase. Among the ancient Teutonic nations, fires were lighted, on the tops of hills, on the 24th of June, in honor of the wending Sun. This custom is still kept up in Southern Germany and the Scotch highlands, and it is the day selected by the Roman Catholic church to celebrate the nativity of John the Baptist. Mosheim, the ecclesiastical historian, speaking of the uncertainty of the time when Christ Jesus was born, says: "The uncertainty of this point is of no great consequence. We know that the Sun of Righteousness has shone upon the world; and although we cannot fix the precise period in which he arose, this will not preclude us from enjoying the direction and influence of his vital and salutary beams." These sacred legends abound with such expressions as can have no possible or conceivable application to any other than to the "God of day." He is "a light to lighten the Gentiles, and to be the glory (or brightness) of his people." "Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, Adonai, and by thy great mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night."—Collect, in Evening Service. God of God, light of light, very God of very God."—Nicene Creed. "To thee all angels cry aloud, the heavens, and all the powers therein." "Heaven and earth are full of the majesty of thy glory" (or brightness). "The glorious company of the (twelve months, or) apostles praise thee." "Thou art the King of Glory, O Christ!" "When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man, thou passest through the constellation, or zodiacal sign—the Virgin." "When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of winter, thou didst open the kingdom of heaven (i. e., bring on the reign of the summer months) to all believers." "All are agreed," says Cicero, "that Apollo is none other than the Sun, because the attributes which are commonly ascribed to Apollo do so wonderfully agree thereto." Just so surely as Apollo is the Sun, so is the Lord Christ Jesus the Sun. That which is so conclusive respecting the Pagan deities, applies also to the God of the Christians; but, like the Psalmist of old, they cry, "Touch not MY Christ, and do my prophets no harm." Many Christian writers have seen that the history of their Lord and Saviour is simply the history of the Sun, but they either say nothing, or, like Dr. Parkhurst and the Rev. J. P. Lundy, claim that the Sun is a type of the true Sun of Righteousness. Mr. Lundy, in his "Monumental Christianity," says: "Is there no bright Sun of Righteousness—no personal and loving Son of God, of whom the material Sun has been the type or symbol, in all ages and among all nations? What power is it that comes from the Sun to give light and heat to all created things? If the symbolical Sun leads such a great earthly and heavenly flock, what must be said to the true and only begotten Son of God? If Apollo was adopted by early Christian art as a type of the Good Shepherd of the New Testament, then this interpretation of the Sun-god among all nations must be the solution of the universal mythos, or what other solution can it have? To what other historical personage but Christ can it apply? If this mythos has no spiritual meaning, then all religion becomes mere idolatry, or the worship of material things." Mr. Lundy, who seems to adhere to this once-upon-a-time favorite theory, illustrates it as follows: "The young Isaac is his (Christ's) Hebrew type, bending under the wood, as Christ fainted under the cross; Daniel is his type, stripped of all earthly fame and greatness, and cast naked into the deepest danger, shame and humiliation." "Noah is his type, in saving men from utter destruction, and bringing them across the sea of death to a new world and a new life." "Orpheus is a type of Christ. Agni and Crishna of India; Mithra of Persia; Horus and Apollo of Egypt, are all types of Christ." "Samson carrying off the gates of Gaza and defeating the Philistines by his own death, was considered as a type of Christ According to this theory, the whole Pagan religion was typical of Christ and Christianity. Why then were not the Pagans the Lord's chosen people instead of the children of Israel? The early Christians were charged with being a sect of Sun worshipers. "There can be no doubt that the head of Serapis, marked as the face is by a grave and pensive majesty, supplied the first idea for the conventional portraits of the Saviour." The Imperial Russian Collection boasts of a head of Christ Jesus which is said to be very ancient. It is a fine intaglio on emerald. Mr. King says of it: "It is in reality a head of Serapis, seen in front and crowned with Persia boughs, easily mistaken for thorns, though the bushel on the head leaves no doubt as to the real personage intended." It must not be forgotten, in connection with this, that the worshipers of Serapis, or the Sun, were called Christians. Mrs. Jameson, speaking on this subject, says: "We search in vain for the lightest evidence of his (Christ's) human, individual semblance, in the writing of those disciples who knew him so well. In this instance the instincts of earthly affection seem to have been mysteriously overruled. He whom all races of men were to call brother, was not to be too closely associated with the particular lineaments of any one. St. John, the beloved disciple, could lie on the breast of Jesus with all the freedom of fellowship, but not even he has left a word to indicate what manner of man was the Divine Master after the flesh.... Legend has, in various form, supplied this natural craving, but it is hardly necessary to add, that all accounts of pictures of our Lord taken from Himself are without historical foundation. We are therefore left to imagine the expression most befitting the character of him who took upon himself our likeness, and looked at the woes and sins of mankind through the eyes of our mortality." The Rev. Mr. Geikie says, in his "Life of Christ": "No hint is given in the New Testament of Christ's appearance; and the early Church, in the absence of all guiding facts, had to fall back on imagination." One of the favorite ways finally, of depicting him, was, as Mr. Lundy remarks: "Under the figure of a beautiful and adorable youth, of about fifteen or eighteen years of age, beardless, with a sweet expression of countenance, and long and abundant hair flowing in curls over his shoulders. His brow is sometimes encircled by a diadem or bandeau, like a young priest of the Pagan gods; that is, in fact, the favorite figure. On sculptured sarcophagi, in fresco paintings and Mosaics, Christ is thus represented as a graceful youth, just as Apollo was figured by the Pagans, and as angels are represented by Christians." Thus we see that the Christians took the paintings and statues of the Sun-gods Serapis and Apollo as models, when they wished to represent their Saviour. That the former is the favorite at the present day need not be doubted when we glance at Fig. No. 11, page 194. Mr. King, speaking of this god, and his worshipers, says: "There is very good reason to believe that in the East the worship of Serapis was at first combined with Christianity, and gradually merged into it with an entire change of name, not substance, carrying with it many of its ancient notions and rites." Again he says: "In the second century the syncretistic sects that had sprung up in Alexandria, the very hotbed of Gnosticism, found out in Serapis a prophetic type of Christ, or the Lord and Creator of all." The early Christians, or worshipers of the Sun, under the name of "Christ," had, as all Sun-worshipers, a peculiar regard to the East—the quarter in which their god rose—to which point they ordinarily directed their prayers. The followers of Mithra always turned towards the East, when they worshiped; the same was done by the Brahmans of the East, and the Christians of the West. In the ceremony of baptism, the catechumen was placed with his face to the West, the symbolical representation of the prince of darkness, in opposition to the East, and made to spit towards it at the evil one, and renounce his works. Tertullian says, that Christians were taken for worshipers of the Sun because they prayed towards the East, after the manner of those who adored the Sun. The Essenes—whom Eusebius calls Christians—always turned to the east to pray. The Essenes met once a week, and spent the night in singing hymns, &c., which lasted till sun-rising. As soon as dawn appeared, they retired to their cells, after saluting one another. Pliny says the Christians of Bithynia met before it was light, and sang hymns to Christ, as to a God. After their service they saluted one another. Surely the circumstances of the two classes of people meeting before daylight, is a very remarkable coincidence. It is just what the Persian Magi, who were Sun worshipers, were in the habit of doing. When a ManichÆan Christian came over to the orthodox Christians, he was required to curse his former friends in the following terms: "I curse Zarades (Zoroaster?) who, Manes said, had appeared as a god before his time among the Indians and Persians, and whom he calls the Sun. I curse those who say Christ is the Sun, and who make prayers to the Sun, and who do not pray to the true God, only towards the East, but who turn themselves round, following the motions of the Sun with their innumerable supplications. I curse those person who say that Zarades and Budas and Christ and the Sun are all one and the same." There are not many circumstances more striking than that of Christ Jesus being originally worshiped under the form of a Lamb—the actual "Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world." As we have already seen (in Chap. XX.), it was not till the Council of Constantinople, called In Trullo, held so late as the year 707, that pictures of Christ Jesus were ordered to be drawn in the form of a man. It was ordained that, in the place of the figure of a Lamb, the symbol used to that time, the figure of a man nailed to a cross, should in future be used. The worship of the constellation of Aries was the worship of the Sun in his passage through that sign. "This constellation was On an ancient medal of the Phenicians, brought by Dr. Clark from Citium (and described in his "Travels," vol. ii. ch. xi.) this Lamb of God is described with the Cross and the Rosary, which shows that they were both used in his worship. Yearly the Sun-god, as the zodiacal horse (Aries) was supposed by the Vedic Aryans to die to save all flesh. Hence the practice of sacrificing horses. The "guardian spirits" of the prince Sakya Buddha sing the following hymn: "Once when thou wast the white horse, In pity for the suffering of man, Thou didst fly across heaven to the region of the evil demons, To secure the happiness of mankind. Persecutions without end, Revilings and many prisons, Death and murder; These hast thou suffered with love and patience, Forgiving thine executioners." We have seen, in Chapter XXXIII., that Christ Jesus was also symbolized as a Fish, and that it is to be seen on all the ancient Christian monuments. But what has the Christian Saviour to do with a Fish? Why was he called a Fish? The answer is, because the fish was another emblem of the Sun. Abarbanel says: "The sign of his (Christ's) coming is the junction of Saturn and Jupiter, in the Sign Pisces." Applying the astronomical emblem of Pisces to Jesus, does not seem more absurd than applying the astronomical emblem of the Lamb. They applied to him the monogram of the Sun, IHS, the astronomical and alchemical sign of Aries, or the ram, or Lamb Aries symbol; and, in short, what was there that was Heathenish that they have not applied to him? The preserving god Vishnu, the Sun, was represented as a fish, and so was the Syrian Sun-god Dagon, who was also a Preserver or Saviour. The Fish was sacred among many nations of antiquity, Constantine, the first Christian emperor, had on his coins the figure of the Sun, with the legend: "To the Invincible Sun, my companion and guardian," as being a representation, says Mr. King, "either of the ancient Phoebus, or the new Sun of Righteousness, equally acceptable to both Christian and Gentile, from the double interpretation of which the type was susceptible." The worship of the Sun, under the name of Mithra, "long survived in Rome, under the Christian emperors, and, doubtless, much longer in the remoter districts of the semi-independent provinces." Christ Jesus is represented with a halo of glory surrounding his head, a florid complexion, long golden locks of hair, and a flowing robe. Now, all Sun-gods, from Crishna of India (Fig. No. 41) to Baldur of Scandinavia, are represented with a halo of glory surrounding their heads, and the flowing locks of golden hair, and the flowing robe, are not wanting. We see, then, that Christ Jesus, like Christ Buddha, "Latium invokes thee, Sol, because thou alone art in honor, after the Father, the centre of light; and they affirm that thy sacred head bears a golden brightness in twelve rays, because thou formest that number of months and that number of hours. They say that thou guidest four winged steeds, because thou alone rulest the chariot of the elements. For, dispelling the darkness, thou revealest the shining heavens. Hence they esteem thee, Phoebus, the discoverer of the secrets of the future; or, because thou preventest nocturnal crimes. Egypt worships thee as Serapis, and Memphis as Osiris. Thou art worshiped by different rites as Mithra, Dis, and the cruel Typhon. Thou art alone the beautiful Atys, and the fostering son of the bent plough. Thou art the Ammon of arid Libya, and the Adonis of Byblos. Thus under a varied appellation the whole world worship thee. Hail! thou true image of the gods, and of thy father's face! thou whose sacred name, surname, and omen, three letters make to agree with the number 608. FOOTNOTES:"We have in the first decade the Sign of the Virgin, following the most ancient tradition of the Persians, the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, Hermes and Æsculapius, a young woman called in the Persian language, Seclinidos de Darzama; in the Arabic, Aderenedesa—that is to say, a chaste, pure, immaculate virgin, suckling an infant, which some nations call Jesus (i. e., Saviour), but which we in Greek call Christ." (Abulmazer.) "In the first decade of the Virgin, rises a maid, called in Arabic, 'Aderenedesa,' that is: 'pure immaculate virgin,' graceful in person, charming in countenance, modest in habit, with loosened hair, holding in her hands two ears of wheat, sitting upon an embroidered throne, nursing a BOY, and rightly feeding him in the place called Hebraea. A boy, I say, names Iessus by certain nations, which signifies Issa, whom they also call Christ in Greek." (Kircher, Œdipus Ægypticus.) The Moon was called by the ancients, "The Queen;" "The Highest Princess;" "The Queen of Heaven;" "The Princess and Queen of Heaven;" &c. She was Istar, Ashera, Diana, Artemis, Isis, Juno, Lucina, AstartÊ. (Goldzhier, pp. 158. Knight, pp. 99, 100.) In the beginning of the eleventh book of Apuleius' Metamorphosis, Isis is represented as addressing him thus: "I am present; I who am Nature, the parent of things, queen of all the elements, &c., &c. The primitive Phrygians called me Pressinuntica, the mother of the gods; the native Athenians, Ceropian Minerva; the floating Cyprians, Paphian Venus; the arrow-bearing Cretans, Dictymian Diana; the three-tongued Sicilians, Stygian Proserpine; and the inhabitants of Eleusis, the ancient goddess Ceres. Some again have invoked me as Juno, others as Beliona, others as Hecate, and others as Rhamnusia: and those who are enlightened by the emerging rays of the rising Sun, the Ethiopians, Ariians and Egyptians, powerful in ancient learning, who reverence my divinity with ceremonies perfectly proper, call me by a true appellation, 'Queen Isis.'" (Taylor's Mysteries, p. 76.) In one of the Chinese sacred books—the Shu-king—Heaven and Earth are called "Father and Mother of all things." Heaven being the Father, and Earth the Mother. (Taylor: Primitive Culture, pp. 294-296.) The "God the Father" of the Indians is Dyaus, that is, the Sky. (Williams' Hinduism, p. 24.) Ormuzd, the god of the ancient Persians, was a personification of the sky. Herodotus, speaking of the Persians, says: "They are accustomed to ascend the highest part of the mountains, and offer sacrifice to Jupiter (Ormuzd), and they call the whole circle of the heavens by the name of Jupiter." (Herodotus, book 1, ch. 131.) In Greek iconography Zeus is the Heaven. As Cicero says: "The refulgent Heaven above is that which all men call, unanimously, Jove." The Christian God supreme of the nineteenth century is still Dyaus Pitar, the "Heavenly Father." The Sun-hero Paris is exposed on the slopes of Ida, Oidipous on the slopes of Kithairon, and Æsculapius on that of the mountain of Myrtles. This is the rays of the newly-born sun resting on the mountain-side. (Cox: Aryan Myths, vol. i. pp. 64 and 80.) In Sanscrit Ida is the Earth, and so we have the mythical phrase, the Sun at its birth is exposed on Ida—the hill-side. The light of the sun must rest on the hill-side long before it reaches the dells beneath. (See Cox: vol. i. p. 221, and Fiske: p. 114.) Buddha, the Lord and Saviour, was described as a superhuman organ of light, to whom a superhuman organ of darkness, Mara, the Evil Serpent, was opposed. He, like Christ Jesus, resisted the temptations of this evil one, and is represented sitting on a serpent, as if its conqueror. (See Bunsen's Angel-Messiah, p. 39.) Crishna also overcame the evil one, and is represented "bruising the head of the serpent," and standing upon it. (See vol. i. of Asiatic Researches, and vol. ii. of Higgins' Anacalypsis.) In Egyptian Mythology, one of the names of the god-Sun was RÂ. He had an adversary who was called Apap, represented in the form of a serpent. (See Renouf's Hibbert Lectures, p. 109.) Horus, the Egyptian incarnate god, the Mediator, Redeemer and Saviour, is represented in Egyptian art as overcoming the Evil Serpent, and standing triumphantly upon him. (See Bonwick's Egyptian Belief, p. 158, and Monumental Christianity, p. 402.) Osiris, Ormuzd, Mithras, Apollo, Bacchus, Hercules, Indra, Œdipus, Quetzalcoatle, and many other Sun-gods, overcame the Evil One, and are represented in the above described manner. (See Cox's Tales of Ancient Greece, p. xxvii. and Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 129. Baring-Gould's Curious Myths, p. 256. Bulfinch's Age of Fable, p. 34. Bunsen's Angel-Messiah, p. x., and Kingsborough's Mexican Antiquities, vol. vi. p. 176.) Other versions of the same myth tell us of Eurydike stung to death by the hidden serpent, of Sifrit smitten by Hagene (the Thorn), of Isfendiyar slain by the thorn or arrow of Rustem, of Achilleus vulnerable only in the heel, of Brynhild enfolded within the dragon's coils, of Meleagros dying as the torch of doom is burnt out, of Baldur, the brave and pure, smitten by the fatal mistletoe, and of Crishna and others being crucified. In Egyptian mythology, Set, the destroyer, triumphs in the West. He is the personification of Darkness and Winter, and the Sun-god whom he puts to death, is Horus the Saviour. (See Renouf's Hibbert Lectures, pp. 112-115.) A great number of the Solar heroes or Sun-gods are forced to endure being bound, which indicates the tied-up power of the sun in winter. (Goldzhier: Hebrew Mythology, p. 406.) "Thee thy blest mother bore, and pleased assign'd The willing Saviour of distressed mankind." "This idea existed even in America. The great century of the Aztecs was encircled by a serpent grasping its own tail, and the great calendar stone is entwined by serpents bearing human heads in their distended jaws." "The annual passage of the Sun, through the signs of the zodiac, being in an oblique path, resembles, or at least the ancients thought so, the tortuous movements of the Serpent, and the facility possessed by this reptile of casting off his skin and producing out of itself a new covering every year, bore some analogy to the termination of the old year and the commencement of the new one. Accordingly, all the ancient spheres—the Persian, Indian, Egyptian, Barbaric, and Mexican—were surrounded by the figure of a serpent holding its tail in its mouth." (Squire: Serpent Symbol, p. 249.) The ancient Greek writers speak of the Sun, as the "Generator and Nourisher of all Things;" the "Ruler of the World;" the "First of the Gods," and the "Supreme Lord of all Beings." (Knight: Ancient Art and Mytho., p. 37.) Pausanias (500 B. C.) speaks of "The Sun having the surname of Saviour." (Ibid. p. 98, note.) "There is a very remarkable figure copied in Payne Knight's Work, in which we see on a man's shoulders a cock's head, whilst on the pediment are placed the words: "The Saviour of the World." (Inman: Anct. Faiths, vol. i. p. 537.) This refers to the Sun. The cock being the natural herald of the day, he was therefore sacred, among the ancients, to the Sun." (See Knight: Anct. Art and Mytho., p. 70, and Lardner: vol. viii. p. 377.) "The mighty Lord appeared in the form of a man, and enlightened those places which had ever before been in darkness; and broke asunder the fetters which before could not be broken; and with his invincible power visited those who sat in the deep darkness by iniquity, and the shadow of death by sin. Then the King of Glory trampled upon Death, seized the Prince of Hell, and deprived him of all his power." (Description of Christ's Descent into Hell. Nicodemus: Apoc.) After remaining for three days and three nights in the lowest regions, the Sun begins to ascend, thus he "rises from the dead," as it were, and "ascends into heaven." Osiris, the Egyptian Saviour, had twelve apostles. (Bonwick, p. 175.) In all religions of antiquity the number twelve, which applies to the twelve signs of the zodiac, are reproduced in all kinds and sorts of forms. For instance: such are the twelve great gods; the twelve apostles of Osiris; the twelve apostles of Jesus; the twelve sons of Jacob, or the twelve tribes; the twelve altars of James; the twelve labors of Hercules; the twelve shields of Mars; the twelve brothers Arvaux; the twelve gods Consents; the twelve governors in the Manichean System; the adectyas of the East Indies; the twelve asses of the Scandinavians; the city of the twelve gates in the Apocalypse; the twelve wards of the city; the twelve sacred cushions, on which the Creator sits in the cosmogony of the Japanese; the twelve precious stones of the rational, or the ornament worn by the high priest of the Jews, &c., &c. (See Dupuis, pp. 39, 40.) Mithras, the Persian Saviour, was represented with long flowing locks. Izdubar, the god and hero of the Chaldeans, was represented with long flowing locks of hair (Smith: Chaldean Account of Genesis, p. 193), and so was his counterpart, the Hebrew Samson. "The SÂkya-prince (Buddha) is described as an Aryan by Buddhistic tradition; his face was reddish, his hair of light color and curly, his general appearance of great beauty." (Bunsen: The Angel-Messiah, p. 15.) "Serapis has, in some instances, long hair formally turned back, and disposed in ringlets hanging down upon his breast and shoulders like that of a woman. His whole person, too, is always enveloped in drapery reaching to his feet." (Knight: Ancient Art and Mythology, p. 104.) "As for yellow hair, there is no evidence that Greeks have ever commonly possessed it; but no other color would do for a solar hero, and it accordingly characterizes the entire company of them, wherever found." (Fiske: Myths and Mythmakers, p. 202.) Helios (the Sun) is called by the Greeks the "yellow-haired." (Goldzhier: Hebrew Mytho., p. 137.) The Sun's rays is signified by the flowing golden locks which stream from the head of Kephalos, and fall over the shoulders of Bellerophon. (Cox: Aryan Mytho., vol. i. p. 107.) Perseus, son of the virgin Danae, was called the "Golden Child." (Ibid. vol. ii. p. 58.) "The light of early morning is not more pure than was the color on his fair cheeks, and the golden locks streamed bright over his shoulders, like the rays of the sun when they rest on the hills at midday." (Tales of Ancient Greece, p. 83.) The Saviour Dionysus wore a long flowing robe, and had long golden hair, which streamed from his head over his shoulders. (Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 293.) Ixion was the "Beautiful and Mighty," with golden hair flashing a glory from his head, dazzling as the rays which stream from Helios, when he drives his chariot up the heights of heaven; and his flowing robe glistened as he moved, like the vesture which the Sun-god gave to the wise maiden Medeia, who dwelt in Kolchis. (Tales of Ancient Greece, p. 47.) Theseus enters the city of Athens, as Christ Jesus is said to have entered Jerusalem, with a long flowing robe, and with his golden hair tied gracefully behind his head. His "soft beauty" excites the mockery of the populace, who pause in their work to jest with him. (Cox: Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 63.) Thus we see that long locks of golden hair, and a flowing robe, are mythological attributes of the Sun. |