The Two Babylons
by Alexander Hislop

 

The Two Babylons or The Papal Worship Proved to be the Worship of Nimrod and His Wife
By the Late Rev. Alexander Hislop

First published as a pamphlet in 1853--greatly expanded in 1858

Contents

Introduction

Chapter I
Distinctive Character of the Two Systems

Chapter II
Objects of Worship
Section I. Trinity in Unity
Section II. The Mother and Child, and the Original of the Child

Sub-Section I. The Child in Assyria
Sub-Section II. The Child in Egypt
Sub-Section III. The Child in Greece
Sub-Section IV. The Death of the Child
Sub-Section V. The Deification of the Child

Section III. The Mother of the Child

Chapter III
Festivals
Section I. Christmas and Lady-day
Section II. Easter
Section III. The Nativity of St. John
Section IV. The Feast of the Assumption
See Chapter V, Section IV regarding Cupid (St. Valentine's Day)

Chapter IV
Doctrine and Discipline
Section I. Baptismal Regeneration
Section II. Justification by Works
Section III. The Sacrifice of the Mass
Section IV. Extreme Unction
Section V. Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead

Chapter V
Rites and Ceremonies
Section I. Idol Procession
Section II. Relic Worship
Section III. The Clothing and Crowning of Images
Section IV. The Rosary and the Worship of the Sacred Heart
Section V. Lamps and Wax-Candles
Section VI. The Sign of the Cross

Chapter VI
Religious Orders
Section I. The Sovereign Pontiff
Section II. Priests, Monks, and Nuns

Chapter VII
The Two Developments Historically and Prophetically Considered
Section I. The Great Red Dragon
Section II. The Beast from the Sea
Section III. The Beast from the Earth
Section IV. The Image of the Beast
Section V. The Name of the Beast, the Number of His Name--the Invisible Head of the Papacy

Conclusion

Introduction

"And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH."–Revelation 17:5

There is this great difference between the works of men and the works of God, that the same minute and searching investigation, which displays the defects and imperfections of the one, brings out also the beauties of the other. If the most finely polished needle on which the art of man has been expended be subjected to a microscope, many inequalities, much roughness and clumsiness, will be seen. But if the microscope be brought to bear on the flowers of the field, no such result appears. Instead of their beauty diminishing, new beauties and still more delicate, that have escaped the naked eye, are forthwith discovered; beauties that make us appreciate, in a way which otherwise we could have had little conception of, the full force of the Lord's saying, "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these." The same law appears also in comparing the Word of God and the most finished productions of men. There are spots and blemishes in the most admired productions of human genius. But the more the Scriptures are searched, the more minutely they are studied, the more their perfection appears; new beauties are brought into light every day; and the discoveries of science, the researches of the learned, and the labours of infidels, all alike conspire to illustrate the wonderful harmony of all the parts, and the Divine beauty that clothes the whole.

If this be the case with Scripture in general, it is especially the case with prophetic Scripture. As every spoke in the wheel of Providence revolves, the prophetic symbols start into still more bold and beautiful relief. This is very strikingly the case with the prophetic language that forms the groundwork and corner-stone of the present work. There never has been any difficulty in the mind of any enlightened Protestant in identifying the woman "sitting on seven mountains," and having on her forehead the name written, "Mystery, Babylon the Great," with the Roman apostacy. "No other city in the world has ever been celebrated, as the city of Rome has, for its situation on seven hills. Pagan poets and orators, who had not thought of elucidating prophecy, have alike characterised it as 'the seven hilled city.'" Thus Virgil refers to it: "Rome has both become the most beautiful (city) in the world, and alone has surrounded for herself seven heights with a wall." Propertius, in the same strain, speaks of it (only adding another trait, which completes the Apocalyptic picture) as "The lofty city on seven hills, which governs the whole world." Its "governing the whole world" is just the counterpart of the Divine statement--"which reigneth over the kings of the earth" (Rev 17:18). To call Rome the city "of the seven hills" was by its citizens held to be as descriptive as to call it by its own proper name. Hence Horace speaks of it by reference to its seven hills alone, when he addresses, "The gods who have set their affections on the seven hills." Martial, in like manner, speaks of "The seven dominating mountains." In times long subsequent, the same kind of language was in current use; for when Symmachus, the prefect of the city, and the last acting Pagan Pontifex Maximus, as the Imperial substitute, introduces by letter one friend of his to another, he calls him "De septem montibus virum"--"a man from the seven mountains," meaning thereby, as the commentators interpret it, "Civem Romanum, "A Roman Citizen." Now, while this characteristic of Rome has ever been well marked and defined, it has always been easy to show, that the Church which has its seat and headquarters on the seven hills of Rome might most appropriately be called "Babylon," inasmuch as it is the chief seat of idolatry under the New Testament, as the ancient Babylon was the chief seat of idolatry under the Old. But recent discoveries in Assyria, taken in connection with the previously well-known but ill-understood history and mythology of the ancient world, demonstrate that there is a vast deal more significance in the name Babylon the Great than this. It has been known all along that Popery was baptised Paganism; but God is now making it manifest, that the Paganism which Rome has baptised is, in all its essential elements, the very Paganism which prevailed in the ancient literal Babylon, when Jehovah opened before Cyrus the two-leaved gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron.

That new and unexpected light, in some way or other, should be cast, about this very period, on the Church of the grand Apostacy, the very language and symbols of the Apocalypse might have prepared us to anticipate. In the Apocalyptic visions, it is just before the judgment upon her that, for the first time, John sees the Apostate Church with the name Babylon the Great "written upon her forehead" (Rev 17:5). What means the writing of that name "on the forehead"? Does it not naturally indicate that, just before judgment overtakes her, her real character was to be so thoroughly developed, that everyone who has eyes to see, who has the least spiritual discernment, would be compelled, as it were, on ocular demonstration, to recognise the wonderful fitness of the title which the Spirit of God had affixed to her. Her judgment is now evidently hastening on; and just as it approaches, the Providence of God, conspiring with the Word of God, by light pouring in from all quarters, makes it more and more evident that Rome is in very deed the Babylon of the Apocalypse; that the essential character of her system, the grand objects of her worship, her festivals, her doctrine and discipline, her rites and ceremonies, her priesthood and their orders, have all been derived from ancient Babylon; and, finally, that the Pope himself is truly and properly the lineal representative of Belshazzar. In the warfare that has been waged against the domineering pretensions of Rome, it has too often been counted enough merely to meet and set aside her presumptuous boast, that she is the mother and mistress of all churches--the one Catholic Church, out of whose pale there is no salvation. If ever there was excuse for such a mode of dealing with her, that excuse will hold no longer. If the position I have laid down can be maintained, she must be stripped of the name of a Christian Church altogether; for if it was a Church of Christ that was convened on that night, when the pontiff-king of Babylon, in the midst of his thousand lords, "praised the gods of gold, and of silver, and of wood, and of stone" (Dan 5:4), then the Church of Rome is entitled to the name of a Christian Church; but not otherwise. This to some, no doubt, will appear a very startling position; but it is one which it is the object of this work to establish; and let the reader judge for himself, whether I do not bring ample evidence to substantiate my position.

Chapter I
Distinctive Character of the Two Systems

In leading proof of the Babylonian character of the Papal Church the first point to which I solicit the reader's attention, is the character of MYSTERY which attaches alike to the modern Roman and the ancient Babylonian systems. The gigantic system of moral corruption and idolatry described in this passage under the emblem of a woman with a "GOLDEN CUP IN HER HAND" (Rev 17:4), "making all nations DRUNK with the wine of her fornication" (Rev 17:2; 18:3), is divinely called "MYSTERY, Babylon the Great" (Rev 17:5). That Paul's "MYSTERY of iniquity," as described in 2 Thessalonians 2:7, has its counterpart in the Church of Rome, no man of candid mind, who has carefully examined the subject, can easily doubt. Such was the impression made by that account on the mind of the great Sir Matthew Hale, no mean judge of evidence, that he used to say, that if the apostolic description were inserted in the public "Hue and Cry" any constable in the realm would be warranted in seizing, wherever he found him, the bishop of Rome as the head of that "MYSTERY of iniquity." Now, as the system here described is equally characterised by the name of "MYSTERY," it may be presumed that both passages refer to the same system. But the language applied to the New Testament Babylon, as the reader cannot fail to see, naturally leads us back to the Babylon of the ancient world. As the Apocalyptic woman has in her hand A CUP, wherewith she intoxicates the nations, so was it with the Babylon of old. Of that Babylon, while in all its glory, the Lord thus spake, in denouncing its doom by the prophet Jeremiah: "Babylon hath been a GOLDEN CUP in the Lord's hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad" (Jer 51:7). Why this exact similarity of language in regard to the two systems? The natural inference surely is, that the one stands to the other in the relation of type and antitype. Now, as the Babylon of the Apocalypse is characterised by the name of "MYSTERY," so the grand distinguishing feature of the ancient Babylonian system was the Chaldean "MYSTERIES," that formed so essential a part of that system. And to these mysteries, the very language of the Hebrew prophet, symbolical though of course it is, distinctly alludes, when he speaks of Babylon as a "golden CUP." To drink of "mysterious beverages," says Salverte, was indispensable on the part of all who sought initiation in these Mysteries. These "mysterious beverages" were composed of "wine, honey, water, and flour." From the ingredients avowedly used, and from the nature of others not avowed, but certainly used, there can be no doubt that they were of an intoxicating nature; and till the aspirants had come under their power, till their understandings had been dimmed, and their passions excited by the medicated draught, they were not duly prepared for what they were either to hear or to see. If it be inquired what was the object and design of these ancient "Mysteries," it will be found that there was a wonderful analogy between them and that "Mystery of iniquity" which is embodied in the Church of Rome. Their primary object was to introduce privately, by little and little, under the seal of secrecy and the sanction of an oath, what it would not have been safe all at once and openly to propound. The time at which they were instituted proved that this must have been the case. The Chaldean Mysteries can be traced up to the days of Semiramis, who lived only a few centuries after the flood, and who is known to have impressed upon them the image of her own depraved and polluted mind. *

* AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS compared with JUSTINUS, Historia and EUSEBIUS' Chronicle. Eusebius says that Ninus and Semiramis reigned in the time of Abraham.

That beautiful but abandoned queen of Babylon was not only herself a paragon of unbridled lust and licentiousness, but in the Mysteries which she had a chief hand in forming, she was worshipped as Rhea, the great "MOTHER" of the gods, with such atrocious rites as identified her with Venus, the MOTHER of all impurity, and raised the very city where she had reigned to a bad eminence among the nations, as the grand seat at once of idolatry and consecrated prostitution. *

* A correspondent has pointed out a reference by Pliny to the cup of Semiramis, which fell into the hands of the victorious Cyrus. Its gigantic proportions must have made it famous among the Babylonians and the nations with whom they had intercourse. It weighed fifteen talents, or 1200 pounds. PLINII, Hist. Nat.

** The shape of the cup in the woman's hand is the same as that of the cup held in the hand of the Assyrian kings; and it is held also in the very same manner. - See VAUX, pp. 243, 284.

[A correspondent has pointed out a reference by Pliney to the cup of Semiramis, which fell into the hands of the victorius Cyrus. Its gigantic proportions must have made it famous among the Babylonians and the nations with whom they had intercourse. It weight fifteen talents, or 1200 pounds. - Plinii, Hist. Nat., lib. xxxiii. cap. 15]

Thus was this Chaldean queen a fit and remarkable prototype of the "Woman" in the Apocalypse, with the golden cup in her hand, and the name on her forehead, "Mystery, Babylon the Great, the MOTHER of harlots and abominations of the earth." (Fig. 1) The Apocalyptic emblem of the Harlot woman with the cup in her hand was even embodied in the symbols of idolatry, derived from ancient Babylon, as they were exhibited in Greece; for thus was the Greek Venus originally represented,[1] and it is singular that in our own day, and so far as appears for the first time, the Roman Church has actually taken this very symbol as her own chosen emblem. In 1825, on occasion of the jubilee, Pope Leo XII struck a medal, bearing on the one side his own image, and on the other, that of the Church of Rome symbolised as a "Woman," holding in her left hand a cross, and in her right a CUP, with the legend around her, "Sedet super universum," "The whole world is her seat." (Fig. 2) Now the period when Semiramis lived,--a period when the patriarchal faith was still fresh in the minds of men, when Shem was still alive, * to rouse the minds of the faithful to rally around the banner for the truth and cause of God, made it hazardous all at once and publicly to set up such a system as was inaugurated by the Babylonian queen.

Elliott's Horae, vol. iv. p. 30

* For the age of Shem see Genesis 11:10, 11. According to this, Shem lived 502 years after the flood, that is, according to the Hebrew chronology, till BC 1846. The age of Ninus, the husband of Semiramis, as stated in a former note, according to Eusebius, synchronised with that of Abraham, who was born BC 1996. It was only about nine years, however, before the end of the reign of Ninus, that the birth of Abraham is said to have taken place. (SYNCELLUS) Consequently, on this view, the reign of Ninus must have terminated, according to the usual chronology, about BC 1987. Clinton, who is of high authority in chronology, places the reign of Ninus somewhat earlier. In his Fasti Hellenici he makes his age to have been BC 2182. Layard (in his Nineveh and its Remains) subscribes to this opinion. Semiramis is said to have survived her husband forty-two years. (SYNCELL) Whatever view, therefore, be adopted in regard to the age of Ninus, whether that of Eusebius, or that at which Clinton and Layard have arrived, it is evident that Shem long survived both Ninus and his wife. Of course, this argument proceeds on the supposition of the correctness of the Hebrew chronology. For conclusive evidence on that subject.[2]

We know, from the statements in Job, that among patriarchal tribes that had nothing whatever to do with Mosaic institutions, but which adhered to the pure faith of the patriarchs, idolatry in any shape was held to be a crime, to be visited with signal and summary punishment on the heads of those who practised it. "If I beheld the sun," said Job, "when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness; and my heart hath been secretly enticed, and * my mouth hath kissed my hand; this also were an iniquity to be punished by the judge; for I should have denied the God that is above" (Job 31:26-28).

* That which I have rendered "and" is in the authorised version "or," but there is no reason for such a rendering, for the word in the original is the very same as that which connects the previous clause, "and my heart," &c.

Now if this was the case in Job's day, much more must it have been the case at the earlier period when the Mysteries were instituted. It was a matter, therefore, of necessity, if idolatry were to be brought in, and especially such foul idolatry as the Babylonian system contained in its bosom, that it should be done stealthily and in secret. *

* It will be seen by-and-by what cogent reason there was, in point of fact, for the profoundest secrecy in the matter. See Chapter II

Even though introduced by the hand of power, it might have produced a revulsion, and violent attempts might have been made by the uncorrupted portion of mankind to put it down; and at all events, if it had appeared at once in all its hideousness, it would have alarmed the consciences of men, and defeated the very object in view. That object was to bind all mankind in blind and absolute submission to a hierarchy entirely dependent on the sovereigns of Babylon. In the carrying out of this scheme, all knowledge, sacred and profane, came to be monopolised by the priesthood, who dealt it out to those who were initiated in the "Mysteries" exactly as they saw fit, according as the interests of the grand system of spiritual despotism they had to administer might seem to require. Thus the people, wherever the Babylonian system spread, were bound neck and heel to the priests. The priests were the only depositaries of religious knowledge; they only had the true tradition by which the writs and symbols of the public religion could be interpreted; and without blind and implicit submission to them, what was necessary for salvation could not be known. Now compare this with the early history of the Papacy, and with its spirit and modus operandi throughout, and how exact was the coincidence! Was it in a period of patriarchal light that the corrupt system of the Babylonian "Mysteries" began? It was in a period of still greater light that that unholy and unscriptural system commenced, that has found such rank development in the Church of Rome. It began in the very age of the apostles, when the primitive Church was in its flower, when the glorious fruits of Pentecost were everywhere to be seen, when martyrs were sealing their testimony for the truth with their blood. Even then, when the Gospel shone so brightly, the Spirit of God bore this clear and distinct testimony by Paul: "THE MYSTERY OF INIQUITY DOTH ALREADY WORK" (2 Thess 2:7). That system of iniquity which then began it was divinely foretold was to issue in a portentous apostacy, that in due time would be awfully "revealed," and would continue until it should be destroyed "by the breath of the Lord's mouth, and consumed by the brightness of His coming." But at its first introduction into the Church, it came in secretly and by stealth, with "all DECEIVABLENESS of unrighteousness." It wrought "mysteriously" under fair but false pretences, leading men away from the simplicity of the truth as it is in Jesus. And it did so secretly, for the very same reason that idolatry was secretly introduced in the ancient Mysteries of Babylon; it was not safe, it was not prudent to do otherwise. The zeal of the true Church, though destitute of civil power, would have aroused itself, to put the false system and all its abettors beyond the pale of Christianity, if it had appeared openly and all at once in all its grossness; and this would have arrested its progress. Therefore it was brought in secretly, and by little and little, one corruption being introduced after another, as apostacy proceeded, and the backsliding Church became prepared to tolerate it, till it has reached the gigantic height we now see, when in almost every particular the system of the Papacy is the very antipodes of the system of the primitive Church. Of the gradual introduction of all that is now most characteristic of Rome, through the working of the "Mystery of iniquity," we have very striking evidence, preserved even by Rome itself, in the inscriptions copied from the Roman catacombs. These catacombs are extensive excavations underground in the neighbourhood of Rome, in which the Christians, in times of persecution during the first three centuries, celebrated their worship, and also buried their dead. On some of the tombstones there are inscriptions still to be found, which are directly in the teeth of the now well-known principles and practices of Rome. Take only one example: What, for instance, at this day is a more distinguishing mark of the Papacy than the enforced celibacy of the clergy? Yet from these inscriptions we have most decisive evidence, that even in Rome, there was a time when no such system of clerical celibacy was known. Witness the following, found on different tombs:

1. "To Basilius, the presbyter, and Felicitas, his wife. They made this for themselves."

2. "Petronia, a priest's wife, the type of modesty. In this place I lay my bones. Spare your tears, dear husband and daughter, and believe that it is forbidden to weep for one who lives in God." (DR. MAITLAND'S Church in the Catacombs) A prayer here and there for the dead: "May God refresh thy spirit," proves that even then the Mystery of iniquity had begun to work; but inscriptions such as the above equally show that it had been slowly and cautiously working,--that up to the period to which they refer, the Roman Church had not proceeded the length it has done now, of absolutely "forbidding its priests to 'marry.'" Craftily and gradually did Rome lay the foundation of its system of priestcraft, on which it was afterwards to rear so vast a superstructure. At its commencement, "Mystery" was stamped upon its system.

But this feature of "Mystery" has adhered to it throughout its whole course. When it had once succeeded in dimming the light of the Gospel, obscuring the fulness and freeness of the grace of God, and drawing away the souls of men from direct and immediate dealings with the One Grand Prophet and High Priest of our profession, a mysterious power was attributed to the clergy, which gave them "dominion over the faith" of the people--a dominion directly disclaimed by apostolic men (2 Cor 1:24), but which, in connection with the confessional, has become at least as absolute and complete as was ever possessed by Babylonian priest over those initiated in the ancient Mysteries. The clerical power of the Roman priesthood culminated in the erection of the confessional. That confessional was itself borrowed from Babylon. The confession required of the votaries of Rome is entirely different from the confession prescribed in the Word of God. The dictate of Scripture in regard to confession is, "Confess your faults one to another" (James 5:16), which implies that the priest should confess to the people, as well as the people to the priest, if either should sin against the other. This could never have served any purpose of spiritual despotism; and therefore, Rome, leaving the Word of God, has had recourse to the Babylonian system. In that system, secret confession to the priest, according to a prescribed form, was required of all who were admitted to the "Mysteries"; and till such confession had been made, no complete initiation could take place. Thus does Salverte refer to this confession as observed in Greece, in rites that can be clearly traced to a Babylonian origin: "All the Greeks, from Delphi to Thermopylae, were initiated in the Mysteries of the temple of Delphi. Their silence in regard to everything they were commanded to keep secret was secured both by the fear of the penalties threatened to a perjured revelation, and by the general CONFESSION exacted of the aspirants after initiation--a confession which caused them greater dread of the indiscretion of the priest, than gave him reason to dread their indiscretion." This confession is also referred to by Potter, in his "Greek Antiquities," though it has been generally overlooked. In his account of the Eleusinian mysteries, after describing the preliminary ceremonies and instructions before the admission of the candidates for initiation into the immediate presence of the divinities, he thus proceeds: "Then the priest that initiated them called the Hierophant, proposed certain QUESTIONs, as, whether they were fasting, &c., to which they returned answers in a set form." The etcetera here might not strike a casual reader; but it is a pregnant etcetera, and contains a great deal. It means, Are you free from every violation of chastity? and that not merely in the sense of moral impurity, but in that factitious sense of chastity which Paganism always cherishes. Are you free from the guilt of murder?--for no one guilty of slaughter, even accidentally, could be admitted till he was purged from blood, and there were certain priests, called Koes, who "heard confessions" in such cases, and purged the guilt away. The strictness of the inquiries in the Pagan confessional is evidently implied in certain licentious poems of Propertius, Tibullus, and Juvenal. Wilkinson, in his chapter on "Private Fasts and Penance," which, he says, "were strictly enforced," in connection with "certain regulations at fixed periods," has several classical quotations, which clearly prove whence Popery derived the kind of questions which have stamped that character of obscenity on its confessional, as exhibited in the notorious pages of Peter Dens. The pretence under which this auricular confession was required, was, that the solemnities to which the initiated were to be admitted were so high, so heavenly, so holy, that no man with guilt lying on his conscience, and sin unpurged, could lawfully be admitted to them. For the safety, therefore of those who were to be initiated, it was held to be indispensable that the officiating priest should thoroughly probe their consciences, lest coming without due purgation from previous guilt contracted, the wrath of the gods should be provoked against the profane intruders. This was the pretence; but when we know the essentially unholy nature, both of the gods and their worship, who can fail to see that this was nothing more than a pretence; that the grand object in requiring the candidates for initiation to make confession to the priest of all their secret faults and shortcomings and sins, was just to put them entirely in the power of those to whom the inmost feelings of their souls and their most important secrets were confided? Now, exactly in the same way, and for the very same purposes, has Rome erected the confessional. Instead of requiring priests and people alike, as the Scripture does, to "confess their faults one to another," when either have offended the other, it commands all, on pain of perdition, to confess to the priest, * whether they have transgressed against him or no, while the priest is under no obligation to confess to the people at all.

* BISHOP HAY'S Sincere Christian. In this work, the following question and answer occur: "Q. Is this confession of our sins necessary for obtaining absolution? A. It is ordained by Jesus Christ as absolutely necessary for this purpose." See also Poor Man's Manual, a work in use in Ireland.

Without such confession, in the Church of Rome, there can be no admission to the Sacraments, any more than in the days of Paganism there could be admission without confession to the benefit of the Mysteries. Now, this confession is made by every individual, in SECRECY AND IN SOLITUDE, to the priest sitting in the name and clothed with the authority of God, invested with the power to examine the conscience, to judge the life, to absolve or condemn according to his mere arbitrary will and pleasure. This is the grand pivot on which the whole "Mystery of iniquity," as embodied in the Papacy, is made to turn; and wherever it is submitted to, admirably does it serve the design of binding men in abject subjection to the priesthood.

In conformity with the principle out of which the confessional grew, the Church, that is, the clergy, claimed to be the sole depositaries of the true faith of Christianity. As the Chaldean priests were believed alone to possess the key to the understanding of the Mythology of Babylon, a key handed down to them from primeval antiquity, so the priests of Rome set up to be the sole interpreters of Scripture; they only had the true tradition, transmitted from age to age, without which it was impossible to arrive at its true meaning. They, therefore, require implicit faith in their dogmas; all men were bound to believe as the Church believed, while the Church in this way could shape its faith as it pleased. As possessing supreme authority, also, over the faith, they could let out little or much, as they judged most expedient; and "RESERVE" in teaching the great truths of religion was as essential a principle in the system of Babylon, as it is in Romanism or Tractariansim at this day. * It was this priestly claim to dominion over the faith of men, that "imprisoned the truth in unrighteousness" ** in the ancient world, so that "darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people." It was the very same claim, in the hands of the Roman priests, that ushered in the dark ages, when, through many a dreary century, the Gospel was unknown, and the Bible a sealed book to millions who bore the name of Christ. In every respect, then, we see how justly Rome bears on its forehead the name, "Mystery, Babylon the Great."

* Even among the initiated there was a difference. Some were admitted only to the "Lesser Mysteries"; the "Greater" were for a favoured few. WILKINSON'S Ancient Egyptians

** Romans 1:18. The best interpreters render the passage as given above. It will be observed Paul is expressly speaking of the heathen.

Chapter II
Objects of Worship

Section I
Trinity in Unity

If there be this general coincidence between the systems of Babylon and Rome, the question arises, Does the coincidence stop here? To this the answer is, Far otherwise. We have only to bring the ancient Babylonian Mysteries to bear on the whole system of Rome, and then it will be seen how immensely the one has borrowed from the other. These Mysteries were long shrouded in darkness, but now the thick darkness begins to pass away. All who have paid the least attention to the literature of Greece, Egypt, Phoenicia, or Rome are aware of the place which the "Mysteries" occupied in these countries, and that, whatever circumstantial diversities there might be, in all essential respects these "Mysteries" in the different countries were the same. Now, as the language of Jeremiah, already quoted, would indicate that Babylon was the primal source from which all these systems of idolatry flowed, so the deductions of the most learned historians, on mere historical grounds have led to the same conclusion. From Zonaras we find that the concurrent testimony of the ancient authors he had consulted was to this effect; for, speaking of arithmetic and astronomy, he says: "It is said that these came from the Chaldees to the Egyptians, and thence to the Greeks." If the Egyptians and Greeks derived their arithmetic and astronomy from Chaldea, seeing these in Chaldea were sacred sciences, and monopolised by the priests, that is sufficient evidence that they must have derived their religion from the same quarter. Both Bunsen and Layard in their researches have come to substantially the same result. The statement of Bunsen is to the effect that the religious system of Egypt was derived from Asia, and "the primitive empire in Babel." Layard, again, though taking a somewhat more favourable view of the system of the Chaldean Magi, than, I am persuaded, the facts of history warrant, nevertheless thus speaks of that system: "Of the great antiquity of this primitive worship there is abundant evidence, and that it originated among the inhabitants of the Assyrian plains, we have the united testimony of sacred and profane history. It obtained the epithet of perfect, and was believed to be the most ancient of religious systems, having preceded that of the Egyptians." "The identity," he adds, "of many of the Assyrian doctrines with those of Egypt is alluded to by Porphyry and Clemens"; and, in connection with the same subject, he quotes the following from Birch on Babylonian cylinders and monuments: "The zodiacal signs...show unequivocally that the Greeks derived their notions and arrangements of the zodiac [and consequently their Mythology, that was intertwined with it] from the Chaldees. The identity of Nimrod with the constellation Orion is not to be rejected." Ouvaroff, also, in his learned work on the Eleusinian mysteries, has come to the same conclusion. After referring to the fact that the Egyptian priests claimed the honour of having transmitted to the Greeks the first elements of Polytheism, he thus concludes: "These positive facts would sufficiently prove, even without the conformity of ideas, that the Mysteries transplanted into Greece, and there united with a certain number of local notions, never lost the character of their origin derived from the cradle of the moral and religious ideas of the universe. All these separate facts--all these scattered testimonies, recur to that fruitful principle which places in the East the centre of science and civilisation." If thus we have evidence that Egypt and Greece derived their religion from Babylon, we have equal evidence that the religious system of the Phoenicians came from the same source. Macrobius shows that the distinguishing feature of the Phoenician idolatry must have been imported from Assyria, which, in classic writers, included Babylonia. "The worship of the Architic Venus," says he, "formerly flourished as much among the Assyrians as it does now among the Phenicians."

Now to establish the identity between the systems of ancient Babylon and Papal Rome, we have just to inquire in how far does the system of the Papacy agree with the system established in these Babylonian Mysteries. In prosecuting such an inquiry there are considerable difficulties to be overcome; for, as in geology, it is impossible at all points to reach the deep, underlying strata of the earth's surface, so it is not to be expected that in any one country we should find a complete and connected account of the system established in that country. But yet, even as the geologist, by examining the contents of a fissure here, an upheaval there, and what "crops out" of itself on the surface elsewhere, is enabled to determine, with wonderful certainty, the order and general contents of the different strata over all the earth, so is it with the subject of the Chaldean Mysteries. What is wanted in one country is supplemented in another; and what actually "crops out" in different directions, to a large extent necessarily determines the character of much that does not directly appear on the surface. Taking, then, the admitted unity and Babylonian character of the ancient Mysteries of Egypt, Greece, Phoenicia, and Rome, as the clue to guide us in our researches, let us go on from step to step in our comparison of the doctrine and practice of the two Babylons--the Babylon of the Old Testament and the Babylon of the New.

And here I have to notice, first, the identity of the objects of worship in Babylon and Rome. The ancient Babylonians, just as the modern Romans, recognised in words the unity of the Godhead; and, while worshipping innumerable minor deities, as possessed of certain influence on human affairs, they distinctly acknowledged that there was ONE infinite and almighty Creator, supreme over all. Most other nations did the same. "In the early ages of mankind," says Wilkinson in his "Ancient Egyptians," "The existence of a sole and omnipotent Deity, who created all things, seems to have been the universal belief; and tradition taught men the same notions on this subject, which, in later times, have been adopted by all civilised nations." "The Gothic religion," says Mallet, "taught the being of a supreme God, Master of the Universe, to whom all things were submissive and obedient." (Tacti. de Morib. Germ.) The ancient Icelandic mythology calls him "the Author of every thing that existeth, the eternal, the living, and awful Being; the searcher into concealed things, the Being that never changeth." It attributeth to this deity "an infinite power, a boundless knowledge, and incorruptible justice." We have evidence of the same having been the faith of ancient Hindostan. Though modern Hinduism recognises millions of gods, yet the Indian sacred books show that originally it had been far otherwise. Major Moor, speaking of Brahm, the supreme God of the Hindoos, says: "Of Him whose Glory is so great, there is no image" (Veda). He "illumines all, delights all, whence all proceeded; that by which they live when born, and that to which all must return" (Veda). In the "Institutes of Menu," he is characterised as "He whom the mind alone can perceive; whose essence eludes the external organs, who has no visible parts, who exists from eternity...the soul of all beings, whom no being can comprehend." In these passages, there is a trace of the existence of Pantheism; but the very language employed bears testimony to the existence among the Hindoos at one period of a far purer faith.

Nay, not merely had the ancient Hindoos exalted ideas of the natural perfections of God, but there is evidence that they were well aware of the gracious character of God, as revealed in His dealings with a lost and guilty world. This is manifest from the very name Brahm, appropriated by them to the one infinite and eternal God. There has been a great deal of unsatisfactory speculation in regard to the meaning of this name, but when the different statements in regard to Brahm are carefully considered, it becomes evident that the name Brahm is just the Hebrew Rahm, with the digamma prefixed, which is very frequent in Sanscrit words derived from Hebrew or Chaldee. Rahm in Hebrew signifies "The merciful or compassionate one." But Rahm also signifies the WOMB or the bowels; as the seat of compassion. Now we find such language applied to Brahm, the one supreme God, as cannot be accounted for, except on the supposition that Brahm had the very same meaning as the Hebrew Rahm. Thus, we find the God Crishna, in one of the Hindoo sacred books, when asserting his high dignity as a divinity and his identity with the Supreme, using the following words: "The great Brahm is my WOMB, and in it I place my foetus, and from it is the procreation of all nature. The great Brahm is the WOMB of all the various forms which are conceived in every natural womb." How could such language ever have been applied to "The supreme Brahm, the most holy, the most high God, the Divine being, before all other gods; without birth, the mighty Lord, God of gods, the universal Lord," but from the connection between Rahm "the womb" and Rahm "the merciful one"? Here, then, we find that Brahm is just the same as "Er-Rahman," "The all-merciful one,"--a title applied by the Turks to the Most High, and that the Hindoos, notwithstanding their deep religious degradation now, had once known that "the most holy, most high God," is also "The God of Mercy," in other words, that he is "a just God and a Saviour." And proceeding on this interpretation of the name Brahm, we see how exactly their religious knowledge as to the creation had coincided with the account of the origin of all things, as given in Genesis. It is well known that the Brahmins, to exalt themselves as a priestly, half-divine caste, to whom all others ought to bow down, have for many ages taught that, while the other castes came from the arms, and body and feet of Brahma--the visible representative and manifestation of the invisible Brahm, and identified with him--they alone came from the mouth of the creative God. Now we find statements in their sacred books which prove that once a very different doctrine must have been taught. Thus, in one of the Vedas, speaking of Brahma, it is expressly stated that "ALL beings" "are created from his MOUTH." In the passage in question an attempt is made to mystify the matter; but, taken in connection with the meaning of the name Brahm, as already given, who can doubt what was the real meaning of the statement, opposed though it be to the lofty and exclusive pretensions of the Brahmins? It evidently meant that He who, ever since the fall, has been revealed to man as the "Merciful and Gracious One" (Exo 34:6), was known at the same time as the Almighty One, who in the beginning "spake and it was done," "commanded and all things stood fast," who made all things by the "Word of His power." After what has now been said, any one who consults the "Asiatic Researches," may see that it is in a great measure from a wicked perversion of this Divine title of the One Living and True God, a title that ought to have been so dear to sinful men, that all those moral abominations have come that make the symbols of the pagan temples of India so offensive to the eye of purity. *

* While such is the meaning of Brahm, the meaning of Deva, the generic name for "God" in India, is near akin to it. That name is commonly derived from the Sanscrit, Div, "to shine,"--only a different form of Shiv, which has the same meaning, which again comes from the Chaldee Ziv, "brightness or splendour" (Dan 2:31); and, no doubt, when sun-worship was engrafted on the Patriarchal faith, the visible splendour of the deified luminary might be suggested by the name. But there is reason to believe that "Deva" has a much more honourable origin, and that it really came originally from the Chaldee, Thav, "good," which is also legitimately pronounced Thev, and in the emphatic form is Theva or Thevo, "The Good." The first letter, represented by Th, as shown by Donaldson in his New Cratylus, is frequently pronounced Dh. Hence, from Dheva or Theva, "The Good," naturally comes the Sanscrit, Deva, or, without the digamma, as it frequently is, Deo, "God," the Latin, Deus, and the Greek, Theos, the digamma in the original Thevo-s being also dropped, as novus in Latin is neos in Greek. This view of the matter gives an emphasis to the saying of our Lord (Matt 19:17): "There is none good but One, that is (Theos) God"--"The Good."

So utterly idolatrous was the Babylonian recognition of the Divine unity, that Jehovah, the Living God, severely condemned His own people for giving any countenance to it: "They that sanctify themselves, and purify themselves in the gardens, after the rites of the ONLY ONE, * eating swine's flesh, and the abomination, and the mouse, shall be consumed together" (Isa 66:17).

* The words in our translation are, "behind one tree," but there is no word in the original for "tree"; and it is admitted by Lowth, and the best orientalists, that the rendering should be, "after the rites of Achad," i.e. "The Only One." I am aware that some object to making "Achad" signify, "The Only One," on the ground that it wants the article. But how little weight is in this, may be seen from the fact that it is this very term "Achad," and that without the article, that is used in Deuteronomy, when the Unity of the Godhead is asserted in the most emphatic manner, "Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our God is one Jehovah," i.e., "only Jehovah." When it is intended to assert the Unity of the Godhead in the strongest possible manner, the Babylonians used the term "Adad." Macrobii Saturnalia.

In the unity of that one Only God of the Babylonians, there were three persons, and to symbolise that doctrine of the Trinity, they employed, as the discoveries of Layard prove, the equilateral triangle, just as it is well known the Romish Church does at this day. *

* LAYARD's Babylon and Nineveh. The Egyptians also used the triangle as a symbol of their "triform divinity."

In both cases such a comparison is most degrading to the King Eternal, and is fitted utterly to pervert the minds of those who contemplate it, as if there was or could be any similitude between such a figure and Him who hath said, "To whom will ye liken God, and what likeness will ye compare unto Him?"

The Papacy has in some of its churches, as, for instance, in the monastery of the so-called Trinitarians of Madrid, an image of the Triune God, with three heads on one body. * The Babylonians had something of the same. Mr. Layard, in his last work, has given a specimen of such a triune divinity, worshipped in ancient Assyria. (Fig. 3) **    The accompanying cut (Fig. 4) of such another divinity, worshipped among the Pagans of Siberia, is taken from a medal in the Imperial Cabinet of St. Petersburg, and given in Parson's "Japhet." ***   The three heads are differently arranged in Layard's specimen, but both alike are evidently intended to symbolise the same great truth, although all such representation of the Trinity necessarily and utterly debase the conceptions of those, among whom such images prevail, in regard to that sublime mystery of our faith.

* PARKHURST'S Hebrew Lexicon, "Cherubim." From the following extract from the Dublin Catholic Layman, a very able Protestant paper, describing a Popish picture of the Trinity, recently published in that city, it will be seen that something akin to this mode of representing the Godhead is appearing nearer home: "At the top of the picture is a representation of the Holy Trinity. We beg to speak of it with due reverence. God the Father and God the Son are represented as a MAN with two heads, one body, and two arms. One of the heads is like the ordinary pictures of our Saviour. The other is the head of an old man, surmounted by a triangle. Out of the middle of this figure is proceeding the Holy Ghost in the form of a dove. We think it must be painful to any Christian mind, and repugnant to Christian feeling, to look at this figure." (17th July, 1856)

** Babylon and Nineveh. Some have said that the plural form of the name of God, in the Hebrew of Genesis, affords no argument of the doctrine of plurality of persons in the Godhead, because the same word in the plural is applied to heathen divinities. But if the supreme divinity in almost all ancient heathen nations was triune, the futility of this objection must be manifest.

*** Japhet, p. 184.

In India, the supreme divinity, in like manner, in one of the most ancient cave-temples, is represented with three heads on one body, under the name of "Eko Deva Trimurtti," "One God, three forms." *

* Col. KENNEDY'S Hindoo Mythology. Col. Kennedy objects to the application of the name "Eko Deva" to the triform image in the cave-temple at Elephanta, on the ground that that name belongs only to the supreme Brahm. But in so doing he is entirely inconsistent, for he admits that Brahma, the first person in that triform image, is identified with the supreme Brahm; and further, that a curse is pronounced upon all who distinguish between Brahma, Vishnu, and Seva, the three divinities represented by that image.

In Japan, the Buddhists worship their great divinity, Buddha, with three heads, in the very same form, under the name of "San Pao Fuh." All these have existed from ancient times. While overlaid with idolatry, the recognition of a Trinity was universal in all the ancient nations of the world, proving how deep-rooted in the human race was the primeval doctrine on this subject, which comes out so distinctly in Genesis. *

* The threefold invocation of the sacred name in the blessing of Jacob bestowed on the sons of Joseph is very striking: "And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk the God which fed me all my life long unto this day, the Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads" (Gen 48:15,16). If the angel here referred to had not been God, Jacob could never have invoked him as on an equality with God. In Hosea 12:3-5, "The Angel who redeemed" Jacob is expressly called God: "He (Jacob) had power with God: yea, he had power over the Angel, and prevailed; he wept and made supplication unto him: he found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us; even the Lord God of Hosts; The Lord is his memorial."

When we look at the symbols in the triune figure of Layard, already referred to, and minutely examine them, they are very instructive. Layard regards the circle in that figure as signifying "Time without bounds." But the hieroglyphic meaning of the circle is evidently different. A circle in Chaldea was zero; * and zero also signified "the seed."

* In our own language we have evidence that Zero had signified a circle among the Chaldeans; for what is Zero, the name of the cypher, but just a circle? And whence can we have derived this term but from the Arabians, as they, without doubt, had themselves derived it from the Chaldees, the grand original cultivators at once of arithmetic, geometry, and idolatry? Zero, in this sense, had evidently come from the Chaldee, zer, "to encompass," from which, also, no doubt, was derived the Babylonian name for a great cycle of time, called a "saros." (BUNSEN) As he, who by the Chaldeans was regarded as the great "Seed," was looked upon as the sun incarnate, and as the emblem of the sun was a circle (BUNSEN), the hieroglyphical relation between zero, "the circle," and zero, "the seed," was easily established.

Therefore, according to the genius of the mystic system of Chaldea, which was to a large extent founded on double meanings, that which, to the eyes of men in general, was only zero, "a circle," was understood by the initiated to signify zero, "the seed." Now, viewed in this light, the triune emblem of the supreme Assyrian divinity shows clearly what had been the original patriarchal faith. First, there is the head of the old man; next, there is the zero, or circle, for "the seed"; and lastly, the wings and tail of the bird or dove; * showing, though blasphemously, the unity of Father, Seed, or Son, and Holy Ghost.

* From the statement in Genesis 1:2, that "the Spirit of God fluttered on the face of the deep" (for that is the expression in the original), it is evident that the dove had very early been a Divine emblem for the Holy Spirit.

While this had been the original way in which Pagan idolatry had represented the Triune God, and though this kind of representation had survived to Sennacherib's time, yet there is evidence that, at a very early period, an important change had taken place in the Babylonian notions in regard to the divinity; and that the three persons had come to be, the Eternal Father, the Spirit of God incarnate in a human mother, and a Divine Son, the fruit of that incarnation.

Section II
The Mother and Child, and the Original of the Child

While this was the theory, the first perons in the Godhead was practically overlooked. As the Great Invisible, taking no immediate concern in human affairs, he was "to be worshipped through silence alone," that is, in point of fact, he was not worshipped by the multitude at all.

* From Kitto's Illustrated Commentary, vol. iv. p. 31

** Indrani, the wife of the Indian god Indra, from Asiatic Researches, vol. vi. p. 393.The same thing is strikingly illustrated in India at this day. Though Brahma, according to the sacred books, is the first person of the Hindoo Triad, and the religiion of Hindostan is callec by his name, yet he is never worshipped, and there is scarcely a single Temple in all India now in existence of those that were formerly erected to his honour. So also is it in those countries of Europe where the Papal system is most completely developed. In Papal Italy, as travellers universally admit (except where the Gospel has recently entered), all appearance of worshipping the King Eternal and Invisible is almost extinct, while the Mother and the Child are the grand objects of worship. Exactly so, in this latter respect, also was it in ancient Babylon. The Babylonians, in their popular religion, supremely worshipped a Goddess Mother and a Son, who was represented in pictures and in images as an infant or child in his mother's arms. (Figs. 5 and 6) From Babylon, this worship of the Mother and the Child spread to the ends of the earth. In Egypt, the Mother and the Child were worshipped under the names of Isis and Osiris. * In India, even to this day, as Isi and Iswara; ** in Asia, as Cybele and Deoius; in Pagan Rome, as Fortuna and Jupiter-puer, or Jupiter, the boy; in Greece, as Ceres, the Great Mother, with the babe at her breast, or as Irene, the goddess of Peace, with the boy Plutus in her arms; and even in Thibet, in China, and Japan, the Jesuit missionaries were astronished to find the counterpart of Madonna *** and her child as devoutly worshipped as in Papal Rome itself; Shing Moo, the Holy Mother in China, being represented with a child in her arms, and a glory around her, exactly as if a Roman Catholic artist had been employed to set her up. ****

* Osiris, as the child called most frequently Horus. BUNSEN.

** KENNEDY'S Hindoo Mythology. Though Iswara is the husband of Isi, he is also represnted as an infant at her breast.

*** The very name by which the Italians commonly designate the Virgin, is just the translation of one of the titles of the Babylonian goddess. As Baal or Belus was the name of the great male divinity of Babylon, so the female divinity was called Beltis. (HESYCHIUS, Lexicon) This name has been found in Nineveh applied to the "Mother of the gods" (VAUX'S Nineveh and Persepolis); and in a speech attributed to Nebuchadnezzar, preserved in EUSEBII Proeparatio Evangelii, both titles "Belus and Beltis" are conjoined as the titles of the great Babylonian god and goddess. The Greek Belus, as representing the highest title of the Babylonian god, was undoubtedly Baal, "The Lord." Beltis, therefore, as the title of the female divinity, was equivalent to "Baalti," which, in English, is "My Lady," in Latin, "Mea Domina," and, in Italina, is corrupted into the well known "Madonna." In connection with this, it may be observed, that the name of Juno, the classical "Queen of Heaven," which, in Greek, was Hera, also signified "The Lady"; and that the peculiar title of Cybele or Rhea at Rome, was Domina or "The Lady." (OVID, Fasti) Further, there is strong reason to believe, that Athena, the well known name of Minerva at Athens, had the very same meaning. The Hebrew Adon, "The Lord," is, with the points, pronounced Athon. We have evidence that this name was known to the Asiatic Greeks, from whom idolatry, in a large measure, came into European Greece, as a name of God under the form of "Athan." Eustathius, in a note on the Periergesis of Dionysius, speaking of local names in the district of Laodicea, says the "Athan is god." The feminine of Athan, "The Lord," is Athan, "The Lady," which in the Attic dialect, is Athena. No doubt, Minerva is commonly represented as a virgin; but, for all that, we learn from Strabo that at Hierapytna in Crete (the coins of which city, says Muller, Dorians have the Athenian symbols of Minerva upon them), she was said to be the mother of the Corybantes by Helius, or "The Sun." It is certain that the Egyptian Minerva, who was the prototype of the Athenian goddess, was a mother, and was styled "Goddess Mother," or "Mother of the Gods."

**** CRABB'S Mythology. Gutzlaff thought that Shing Moo must have been borrowed from a Popish source; and there can be no doubt, that in the individual case to which he refers, the Pagan and the Christian stories had been amalgamated. But Sir. J. F. Davis shows that the Chinese of Canton find such an analogy between their own Pagan goddess Kuanyin and the Popish Madonna, that, in conversing with Europeans, they frequently call either of them indifferently by the same title. DAVIS' China. The first Jesuit missionaries to China also wrote home to Europe, that they found mention in the Chinese sacred books--books unequivocally Pagan--of a mother and child, very similar to their own Madonna and child at home.

One of the names of the Chinese Holy Mother is Ma Tsoopo; in regard to which, see[3] below.

Sub-Section I
The Child in Assyria

The original of that mother, so widely worshipped, there is reason to believe, was Semiramis, * already referred to, who, it is well known, was worshipped by the Babylonians, and other eastern nations, and that under the name of Rhea, the great Goddess "Mother."

* Sir H. Rawlinson having found evidence at Nineveh, of the existence of a Semiramis about six or seven centuries before the Christian era, seems inclined to regard her as the only Semiramis that ever existed. But this is subversive of all history. The fact that there was a Semiramis in the primeval ages of the world, is beyond all doubt, although some of the exploits of the latter queen have evidently been attributed to her predecessor. Mr. Layard dissents from Sir. H. Rawlinson's opinion.

It was from the son, however, that she derived all her glory and her claims to deification. That son, though represented as a child in his mother's arms, was a person of great stature and immense bodily powers, as well as most fascinating manners. In Scripture he is referred to (Eze 8:14) under the name of Tammuz, but he is commonly known among classical writers under the name of Bacchus, that is, "The Lamented one." *

* From Bakhah "to weep" or "lament." Among the Phoenicians, says Hesychius, "Bacchos means weeping." As the women wept for Tammuz, so did they for Bacchus.

To the ordinary reader the name of Bacchus suggests nothing more than revelry and drunkenness, but it is now well known, that amid all the abominations that attended his orgies, their grand design was professedly "the purification of souls," and that from the guilt and defilement of sin. This lamented one, exhibited and adored as a little child in his mother's arms, seems, in point of fact, to have been the husband of Semiramis, whose name, Ninus, by which he is commonly known in classical history, literally signified "The Son." As Semiramis, the wife, was worshipped as Rhea, whose grand distinguishing character was that of the great goddess "Mother," * the conjunction with her of her husband, under the name of Ninus, or "The Son," was sufficient to originate the peculiar worship of the "Mother and Son," so extensively diffused among the nations of antiquity; and this, no doubt, is the explanation of the fact which has so much puzzled the inquirers into ancient history, that Ninus is sometimes called the husband, and sometimes the son of Semiramis.

* As such Rhea was called by the Greeks, Ammas. Ammas is evidently the Greek form of the Chaldee Ama, "Mother."

This also accounts for the origin of the very same confusion of relationship between Isis and Osiris, the mother and child of the Egyptians; for as Bunsen shows, Osiris was represented in Egypt as at once the son and husband of his mother; and actually bore, as one of his titles of dignity and honour, the name "Husband of the Mother." * This still further casts light on the fact already noticed, that the Indian God Iswara is represented as a babe at the breast of his own wife Isi, or Parvati.

* BUNSEN. It may be observed that this very name "Husband of the Mother," given to Osiris, seems even at this day to be in common use among ourselves, although there is not the least suspicion of the meaning of the term, or whence it has come. Herodotus mentions that when in Egypt, he was astonished to hear the very same mournful but ravishing "Song of Linus," sung by the Egyptians (although under another name), which he had been accustomed to hear in his own native land of Greece. Linus was the same god as the Bacchus of Greece, or Osiris of Egypt; for Homer introduces a boy singing the song of Linus, while the vintage is going on (Ilias), and the Scholiast says that this son was sung in memory of Linus, who was torn in pieces by dogs. The epithet "dogs," applied to those who tore Linus in pieces, is evidently used in a mystical sense, and it will afterwards been seen how thoroughly the other name by which he is known--Narcissus--identifies him with the Greek Bacchus and Egyptian Osiris. In some places in Egypt, for the song of Linus or Osiris, a peculiar melody seems to have been used. Savary says that, in the temple of Abydos, "the priest repeated the seven vowels in the form of hymns, and that musicians were forbid to enter it." (Letters) Strabo, whom Savary refers to, calls the god of that temple Memnon, but we learn from Wilkinson that Osiris was the great god of Abydos, whence it is evident that Memnon and Osiris were only different names of the same divinity. Now the name of Linus or Osiris, as the "husband of his mother," in Egypt, was Kamut (BUNSEN). When Gregory the Great introduced into the Church of Rome what are now called the Gregorian Chants, he got them from the Chaldean mysteries, which had long been established in Rome; for the Roman Catholic priest, Eustace, admits that these chants were largely composed of "Lydian and Phrygian tunes" (Classical Tour), Lydia and Phrygia being among the chief seats in later times of those mysteries, of which the Egyptian mysteries were only a branch. These tunes were sacred--the music of the great god, and in introducing them Gregory introduced the music of Kamut. And thus, to all appearance, has it come to pass, that the name of Osiris or Kamut, "the husband of the mother," is in every-day use among ourselves as the name of the musical scale; for what is the melody of Osiris, consisting of the "seven vowels" formed into a hymn, but--the Gamut?

Now, this Ninus, or "Son," borne in the arms of the Babylonian Madonna, is so described as very clearly to identify him with Nimrod. "Ninus, king of the Assyrians," * says Trogus Pompeius, epitomised by Justin, "first of all changed the contented moderation of the ancient manners, incited by a new passion, the desire of conquest. He was the first who carried on war against his neighbours, and he conquered all nations from Assyria to Lybia, as they were yet unacquainted with the arts of war."

* The name, "Assyrians," as has already been noticed, has a wide latitude of meaning among the classic authors, taking in the Babylonians as well as the Assyrians proper.

This account points directly to Nimrod, and can apply to no other. The account of Diodorus Siculus entirely agrees with it, and adds another trait that goes still further to determine the identity. That account is as follows: "Ninus, the most ancient of the Assyrian kings mentioned in history, performed great actions. Being naturally of a warlike disposition, and ambitious of glory that results from valour, he armed a considerable number of young men that were brave and vigorous like himself, trained them up a long time in laborious exercises and hardships, and by that means accustomed them to bear the fatigues of war, and to face dangers with intrepidity." As Diodorus makes Ninus "the most ancient of the Assyrian kings," and represents him as beginning those wars which raised his power to an extraordinary height by bringing the people of Babylonia under subjection to him, while as yet the city of Babylon was not in existence, this shows that he occupied the very position of Nimrod, of whom the Scriptural account is, that he first "began to be mighty on the earth," and that the "beginning of his kingdom was Babylon." As the Babel builders, when their speech was confounded, were scattered abroad on the face of the earth, and therefore deserted both the city and the tower which they had commenced to build, Babylon as a city, could not properly be said to exist till Nimrod, by establishing his power there, made it the foundation and starting-point of his greatness. In this respect, then, the story of Ninus and of Nimrod exactly harmonise. The way, too, in which Ninus gained his power is the very way in which Nimrod erected his. There can be no doubt that it was by inuring his followers to the toils and dangers of the chase, that he gradually formed them to the use of arms, and so prepared them for aiding him in establishing his dominions; just as Ninus, by training his companions for a long time "in laborious exercises and hardships," qualified them for making him the first of the Assyrian kings.

The conclusions deduced from these testimonies of ancient history are greatly strengthened by many additional considerations. In Genesis 10:11, we find a passage, which, when its meaning is properly understood, casts a very steady light on the subject. That passage, as given in the authorised version, runs thus: "Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh." This speaks of it as something remarkable, that Asshur went out of the land of Shinar, while yet the human race in general went forth from the same land. It goes upon the supposition that Asshur had some sort of divine right to that land, and that he had been, in a manner, expelled from it by Nimrod, while no divine right is elsewhere hinted at in the context, or seems capable of proof. Moreover, it represents Asshur as setting up in the IMMEDIATE NEIGHBOURHOOD of Nimrod as mighty a kingdom as Nimrod himself, Asshur building four cities, one of which is emphatically said to have been "great" (v 12); while Nimrod, on this interpretation, built just the same number of cities, of which none is specially characterised as "great." Now, it is in the last degree improbable that Nimrod would have quietly borne so mighty a rival so near him. To obviate such difficulties as these, it has been proposed to render the words, "out of that land he (Nimrod) went forth into Asshur, or Assyria." But then, according to ordinary usage of grammar, the word in the original should have been "Ashurah," with the sign of motion to a place affixed to it, whereas it is simply Asshur, without any such sign of motion affixed. I am persuaded that the whole perplexity that commentators have hitherto felt in considering this passage, has arisen from supposing that there is a proper name in the passage, where in reality no proper name exists. Asshur is the passive participle of a verb, which, in its Chaldee sense, signifies "to make strong," and, consequently, signifies "being strengthened," or "made strong." Read thus, the whole passage is natural and easy (v 10), "And the beginning of his (Nimrod's) kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh." A beginning naturally implies something to succeed, and here we find it (v 11): "Out of that land he went forth, being made strong, or when he had been made strong (Ashur), and builded Nineveh," &c. Now, this exactly agrees with the statement in the ancient history of Justin: "Ninus strengthened the greatness of his acquired dominion by continued possession. Having subdued, therefore, his neighbours, when, by an accession of forces, being still further strengthened, he went forth against other tribes, and every new victory paved the way for another, he subdued all the peoples of the East." Thus, then, Nimrod, or Ninus, was the builder of Nineveh; and the origin of the name of that city, as "the habitation of Ninus," is accounted for, * and light is thereby, at the same time, cast on the fact, that the name of the chief part of the ruins of Nineveh is Nimroud at this day.

* Nin-neveh, "The habitation of Ninus."

Now, assuming that Ninus is Nimrod, the way in which that assumption explains what is otherwise inexplicable in the statements of ancient history greatly confirms the truth of that assumption itself. Ninus is said to have been the son of Belus or Bel, and Bel is said to have been the founder of Babylon. If Ninus was in reality the first king of Babylon, how could Belus or Bel, his father, be said to be the founder of it? Both might very well be, as will appear if we consider who was Bel, and what we can trace of his doings. If Ninus was Nimrod, who was the historical Bel? He must have been Cush; for "Cush begat Nimrod" (Gen 10:8); and Cush is generally represented as having been a ringleader in the great apostacy. * But again, Cush, as the son of Ham, was Her-mes or Mercury; for Hermes is just an Egyptian synonym for the "son of Ham." **

* See GREGORIUS TURONENSIS, De rerum Franc. Gregory attributes to Cush what was said more generally to have befallen his son; but his statement shows the belief in his day, which is amply confirmed from other sources, that Cush had a pre-eminent share in leading mankind away from the true worship of God.

** The composition of Her-mes is, first, from "Her," which, in Chaldee, is synonymous with Ham, or Khem, "the burnt one." As "her" also, like Ham, signified "The hot or burning one," this name formed a foundation for covertly identifying Ham with the "Sun," and so deifying the great patriarch, after whose name the land of Egypt was called, in connection with the sun. Khem, or Ham, in his own name was openly worshipped in later ages in the land of Ham (BUNSEN); but this would have been too daring at first. By means of "Her," the synonym, however, the way was paved for this. "Her" is the name of Horus, who is identified with the sun (BUNSEN), which shows the real etymology of the name to be from the verb to which I have traced it. Then, secondly, "Mes," is from Mesheh (or, without the last radical, which is omissible), Mesh, "to draw forth." In Egyptian, we have Ms in the sense of "to bring forth" (BUNSEN, Hieroglyphical Signs), which is evidently a different form of the same word. In the passive sense, also, we find Ms used (BUNSEN, Vocabulary). The radical meaning of Mesheh in Stockii Lexicon, is given in Latin "Extraxit," and our English word "extraction," as applied to birth or descent, shows that there is a connection between the generic meaning of this word and birth. This derivation will be found to explain the meaning of the names of the Egyptian kings, Ramesses and Thothmes, the former evidently being "The son of Ra," or the Sun; the latter in like manner, being "The son of Thoth." For the very same reason Her-mes is the "Son of Her, or Ham," the burnt one--that is, Cush.

Now, Hermes was the great original prophet of idolatry; for he was recognised by the pagans as the author of their religious rites, and the interpreter of the gods. The distinguished Gesenius identifies him with the Babylonian Nebo, as the prophetic god; and a statement of Hyginus shows that he was known as the grand agent in that movement which produced the division of tongues. His words are these: "For many ages men lived under the government of Jove [evidently not the Roman Jupiter, but the Jehovah of the Hebrews], without cities and without laws, and all speaking one language. But after that Mercury interpreted the speeches of men (whence an interpreter is called Hermeneutes), the same individual distributed the nations. Then discord began." *

* HYGINUS, Fab. Phoroneus is represented as king at this time.

Here there is a manifest enigma. How could Mercury or Hermes have any need to interpret the speeches of mankind when they "all spake one language"? To find out the meaning of this, we must go to the language of the Mysteries. Peresh, in Chaldee, signifies "to interpret"; but was pronounced by old Egyptians and by Greeks, and often by the Chaldees themselves, in the same way as "Peres," to "divide." Mercury, then, or Hermes, or Cush, "the son of Ham," was the "DIVIDER of the speeches of men." He, it would seem, had been the ringleader in the scheme for building the great city and tower of Babel; and, as the well known title of Hermes,--"the interpreter of the gods," would indicate, had encouraged them, in the name of God, to proceed in their presumptuous enterprise, and so had caused the language of men to be divided, and themselves to be scattered abroad on the face of the earth. Now look at the name of Belus or Bel, given to the father of Ninus, or Nimrod, in connection with this. While the Greek name Belus represented both the Baal and Bel of the Chaldees, these were nevertheless two entirely distinct titles. These titles were both alike often given to the same god, but they had totally different meanings. Baal, as we have already seen, signified "The Lord"; but Bel signified "The Confounder." When, then, we read that Belus, the father of Ninus, was he that built or founded Babylon, can there be a doubt, in what sense it was that the title of Belus was given to him? It must have been in the sense of Bel the "Confounder." And to this meaning of the name of the Babylonian Bel, there is a very distinct allusion in Jeremiah 50:2, where it is said "Bel is confounded," that is, "The Confounder is brought to confusion." That Cush was known to Pagan antiquity under the very character of Bel, "The Confounder," a statement of Ovid very clearly proves. The statement to which I refer is that in which Janus "the god of gods," * from whom all the other gods had their origin, is made to say of himself: "The ancients...called me Chaos."

* Janus was so called in the most ancient hymns of the Salii. (MACROB, Saturn.)

Now, first this decisively shows that Chaos was known not merely as a state of confusion, but as the "god of Confusion." But, secondly, who that is at all acquainted with the laws of Chaldaic pronunciation, does not know that Chaos is just one of the established forms of the name of Chus or Cush? * Then, look at the symbol of Janus, **  (see Fig. 7) whom "the ancients called Chaos," and it will be seen how exactly it tallies with the doings of Cush, when he is identified with Bel, "The Confounder." That symbol is a club; and the name of "a club" in Chaldee comes from the very word which signifies "to break in pieces, or scatter abroad." ***

Janus and his Club

* The name of Cush is also Khus, for sh frequently passes in Chaldee into s; and Khus, in pronunciation, legitimately becomes Khawos, or, without the digamma, Khaos.

** From Sir WM. BETHAM'S Etruscan Literature and Antiquities Investigated, 1842. The Etruscan name on the reverse of a medal--Bel-athri, "Lord of spies," is probably given to Janus, in allusion to his well known title "Janus Tuens," which may be rendered "Janus the Seer," or "All-seeing Janus."

*** In Proverbs 25:18, a maul or club is "Mephaitz." In Jeremiah 51:20, the same word, without the Jod, is evidently used for a club (though, in our version, it is rendered battle-axe); for the use of it is not to cut asunder, but to "break in pieces." See the whole passage.

He who caused the confusion of tongues was he who "broke" the previously united earth (Gen 11:1) "in pieces," and "scattered" the fragments abroad. How significant, then, as a symbol, is the club, as commemorating the work of Cush, as Bel, the "Confounder"? And that significance will be all the more apparent when the reader turns to the Hebrew of Genesis 11:9, and finds that the very word from which a club derives its name is that which is employed when it is said, that in consequence of the confusion of tongues, the children of men were "scattered abroad on the face of all the earth." The word there used for scattering abroad is Hephaitz, which, in the Greek form becomes Hephaizt, * and hence the origin of the well known but little understood name of Hephaistos, as applied to Vulcan, "The father of the gods." **

* There are many instances of a similar change. Thus Botzra becomes in Greek, Bostra; and Mitzraim, Mestraim.

** Vulcan, in the classical Pantheon, had not commonly so high a place, but in Egypt Hephaistos, or Vulcan, was called "Father of the gods." (AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS)

Hephaistos is the name of the ringleader in the first rebellion, as "The Scatterer abroad," as Bel is the name of the same individual as the "Confounder of tongues." Here, then, the reader may see the real origin of Vulcan's Hammer, which is just another name for the club of Janus or Chaos, "The god of Confusion"; and to this, as breaking the earth in pieces, there is a covert allusion in Jeremiah 50:23, where Babylon, as identified with its primeval god, is thus apostrophised: "How is the hammer of the whole earth cut asunder and broken"! Now, as the tower-building was the first act of open rebellion after the flood, and Cush, as Bel, was the ringleader in it, he was, of course, the first to whom the name Merodach, "The great Rebel," * must have been given, and, therefore, according to the usual parallelism of the prophetic language, we find both names of the Babylonian god referred to together, when the judgment on Babylon is predicted: "Bel is confounded: Merodach is broken in pieces" (Jer 1:2).

* Merodach comes from Mered, to rebel; and Dakh, the demonstrative pronoun affixed, which makes it emphatic, signifying "That" or "The great."

The judgment comes upon the Babylonian god according to what he had done. As Bel, he had "confounded" the whole earth, therefore he is "confounded." As Merodach, by the rebellion he had stirred up, he had "broken" the united world in pieces; therefore he himself is "broken in pieces."

So much for the historical character of Bel, as identified with Janus or Chaos, the god of confusion, with his symbolical club. *

* While the names Bel and Hephaistos had the origin above referred to, they were not inappropriate names also, though in a different sense, for the war-gods descending from Cush, from whom Babylon derived its glory among the nations. The warlike deified kings of the line of Cush gloried in their power to carry confusion among their enemies, to scatter their armies, and to "break the earth in pieces" by their resistless power. To this, no doubt, as well as to the acts of the primeval Bel, there is allusion in the inspired denunciations of Jeremiah on Babylon. The physical sense also of these names was embodied in the club given to the Grecian Hercules--the very club of Janus--when, in a character quite different from that of the original Hercules, he was set up as the great reformer of the world, by mere physical force. When two-headed Janus with the club is represented, the two-fold representation was probably intended to represent old Cush, and young Cush or Nimrod, as combined. But the two-fold representation with other attributes, had reference also to another "Father of the gods," afterwards to be noticed, who had specially to do with water.

Proceeding, then, on these deductions, it is not difficult to see how it might be said that Bel or Belus, the father of Ninus, founded Babylon, while, nevertheless, Ninus or Nimrod was properly the builder of it. Now, though Bel or Cush, as being specially concerned in laying the first foundations of Babylon, might be looked upon as the first king, as in some of the copies of "Eusebius' Chronicle" he is represented, yet it is evident, from both sacred history and profane, that he could never have reigned as king of the Babylonian monarchy, properly so called; and accordingly, in the Armenian version of the "Chronicle of Eusebius," which bears the undisputed palm for correctness and authority, his name is entirely omitted in the list of Assyrian kings, and that of Ninus stands first, in such terms as exactly correspond with the Scriptural account of Nimrod. Thus, then, looking at the fact that Ninus is currently made by antiquity the son of Belus, or Bel, when we have seen that the historical Bel is Cush, the identity of Ninus and Nimrod is still further confirmed.

But when we look at what is said of Semiramis, the wife of Ninus, the evidence receives an additional development. That evidence goes conclusively to show that the wife of Ninus could be none other than the wife of Nimrod, and, further, to bring out one of the grand characters in which Nimrod, when deified, was adored. In Daniel 11:38, we read of a god called Ala Mahozine *--i.e., the "god of fortifications."

* In our version, Ala Mahozim is rendered alternatively "god of forces," or "gods protectors." To the latter interpretation, there is this insuperable objection, that Ala is in the singular. Neither can the former be admitted; for Mahozim, or Mauzzim, does not signify "forces," or "armies," but "munitions," as it is also given in the margin--that is "fortifications." Stockius, in his Lexicon, gives us the definition of Mahoz in the singular, rober, arx, locus munitus, and in proof of the definition, the following examples:--Judges 6:26, "And build an altar to the Lord thy God upon the top of this rock" (Mahoz, in the margin "strong place"); and Daniel 11:19, "Then shall he turn his face to the fort (Mahoz) of his own land."

Who this god of fortifications could be, commentators have found themselves at a loss to determine. In the records of antiquity the existence of any god of fortifications has been commonly overlooked; and it must be confessed that no such god stands forth there with any prominence to the ordinary reader. But of the existence of a goddess of fortifications, every one knows that there is the amplest evidence. That goddess is Cybele, who is universally represented with a mural or turreted crown, or with a fortification, on her head. Why was Rhea or Cybele thus represented? Ovid asks the question and answers it himself; and the answer is this: The reason he says, why the statue of Cybele wore a crown of towers was, "because she first erected them in cities." The first city in the world after the flood (from whence the commencement of the world itself was often dated) that had towers and encompassing walls, was Babylon; and Ovid himself tells us that it was Semiramis, the first queen of that city, who was believed to have "surrounded Babylon with a wall of brick." Semiramis, then, the first deified queen of that city and tower whose top was intended to reach to heaven, must have been the prototype of the goddess who "first made towers in cities." When we look at the Ephesian Diana, we find evidence to the very same effect. In general, Diana was depicted as a virgin, and the patroness of virginity; but the Ephesian Diana was quite different. She was represented with all the attributes of the Mother of the gods (see Fig. 8), and, as the Mother of the gods, she wore a turreted crown, such as no one can contemplate without being forcibly reminded of the tower of Babel. Now this tower-bearing Diana is by an ancient scholiast expressly identified with Semiramis.*

* A scholiast on the Periergesis of Dionysius, says Layard (Nineveh and its Remains), makes Semiramis the same as the goddess Artemis or Despoina. Now, Artemis was Diana, and the title of Despoina given to her, shows that it was in the character of the Ephesian Diana she was identified with Semiramis; for Despoina is the Greek for Domina, "The Lady," the peculiar title of Rhea or Cybele, the tower-bearing goddess, in ancient Rome. (OVID, Fasti)

*  From Kitto's Illustrated Commentary, vol. v. p. 205.

When, therefore, we remember that Rhea or Cybele, the tower-bearing goddess, was, in point of fact, a Babylonian goddess, and that Semiramis, when deified, was worshipped under the name of Rhea, there will remain, I think, no doubt as to the personal identity of the "goddess of fortifications."

Now there is no reason to believe that Semiramis alone (though some have represented the matter so) built the battlements of Babylon. We have the express testimony of the ancient historian, Megasthenes, as preserved by Abydenus, that it was "Belus" who "surrounded Babylon with a wall." As "Bel," the Confounder, who began the city and tower of Babel, had to leave both unfinished, this could not refer to him. It could refer only to his son Ninus, who inherited his father's title, and who was the first actual king of the Babylonian empire, and, consequently Nimrod. The real reason that Semiramis, the wife of Ninus, gained the glory of finishing the fortifications of Babylon, was, that she came in the esteem of the ancient idolaters to hold a preponderating position, and to have attributed to her all the different characters that belonged, or were supposed to belong, to her husband. Having ascertained, then, one of the characters in which the deified wife was worshipped, we may from that conclude what was the corresponding character of the deified husband. Layard distinctly indicates his belief that Rhea or Cybele, the "tower-crown" goddess, was just the female counterpart of the "deity presiding over bulwarks or fortresses" and that this deity was Ninus, or Nimrod, we have still further evidence from what the scattered notices of antiquity say of the first deified king of Babylon, under a name that identifies him as the husband of Rhea, the "tower-bearing" goddess. That name is Kronos or Saturn. *

* In the Greek mythology, Kronos and Rhea are commonly brother and sister. Ninus and Semiramis, according to history, are not represented as standing in any such relation to one another; but this is no objection to the real identity of Ninus and Kronos; for, 1st, the relationships of the divinities, in most countries, are peculiarly conflicting--Osiris, in Egypt, is represented at different times, not only as the son and husband of Isis, but also as her father and brother (BUNSEN); then, secondly, whatever the deified mortals might be before deification, on being deified they came into new relationships. On the apotheosis of husband and wife, it was necessary for the dignity of both that both alike should be represented as of the same celestial origin--as both supernaturally the children of God. Before the flood, the great sin that brought ruin on the human race was, that the "Sons of God" married others than the daughters of God,--in other words, those who were not spiritually their "sisters." (Gen 6:2,3) In the new world, while the influence of Noah prevailed, the opposite practice must have been strongly inculcated; for a "son of God" to marry any one but a daughter of God, or his own "sister" in the faith, must have been a misalliance and a disgrace. Hence, from a perversion of a spiritual idea, came, doubtless, the notion of the dignity and purity of the royal line being preserved the more intact through the marriage of royal brothers and sisters. This was the case in Peru (PRESCOTT), in India (HARDY), and in Egypt (WILKINSON). Hence the relation of Jupiter to Juno, who gloried that she was "soror et conjux"--"sister and wife"--of her husband. Hence the same relation between Isis and her husband Osiris, the former of whom is represented as "lamenting her brother Osiris." (BUNSEN) For the same reason, no doubt, was Rhea, made the sister of her husband Kronos, to show her divine dignity and equality.

It is well known that Kronos, or Saturn, was Rhea's husband; but it is not so well known who was Kronos himself. Traced back to his original, that divinity is proved to have been the first king of Babylon. Theophilus of Antioch shows that Kronos in the east was worshipped under the names of Bel and Bal; and from Eusebius we learn that the first of the Assyrian kings, whose name was Belus, was also by the Assyrians called Kronos. As the genuine copies of Eusebius do not admit of any Belus, as an actual king of Assyria, prior to Ninus, king of the Babylonians, and distinct from him, that shows that Ninus, the first king of Babylon, was Kronos. But, further, we find that Kronos was king of the Cyclops, who were his brethren, and who derived that name from him, * and that the Cyclops were known as "the inventors of tower-building."

* The scholiast upon EURIPIDES, Orest, says that "the Cyclops were so called from Cyclops their king." By this scholiast the Cyclops are regarded as a Thracian nation, for the Thracians had localised the tradition, and applied it to themselves; but the following statement of the scholiast on the Prometheus of Aeschylus, shows that they stood in such a relation to Kronos as proves that he was their king: "The Cyclops...were the brethren of Kronos, the father of Jupiter."

The king of the Cyclops, "the inventors of tower-building," occupied a position exactly correspondent to that of Rhea, who "first erected (towers) in cities." If, therefore, Rhea, the wife of Kronos, was the goddess of fortifications, Kronos or Saturn, the husband of Rhea, that is, Ninus or Nimrod, the first king of Babylon, must have been Ala mahozin, "the god of fortifications."[4]

From HYDE'S Religio Veterum Persarum, cap. 4, p. 116.

The name Kronos itself goes not a little to confirm the argument. Kronos signifies "The Horned one." As a horn is a well known Oriental emblem for power or might, Kronos, "The Horned one," was, according to the mystic system, just a synonym for the Scriptural epithet applied to Nimrod--viz., Gheber, "The mighty one" (Gen 10:8), "He began to be mighty on the earth." The name Kronos, as the classical reader is well aware, is applied to Saturn as the "Father of the gods." We have already had another "father of the gods" brought under our notice, even Cush in his character of Bel the Confounder, or Hephaistos, "The Scatterer abroad"; and it is easy to understand how, when the deification of mortals began, and the "mighty" Son of Cush was deified, the father, especially considering the part which he seems to have had in concocting the whole idolatrous system, would have to be deified too, and of course, in his character as the Father of the "Mighty one," and of all the "immortals" that succeeded him. But, in point of fact, we shall find, in the course of our inquiry, that Nimrod was the actual Father of the gods, as being the first of deified mortals; and that, therefore, it is in exact accordance with historical fact that Kronos, the Horned, or Mighty one, is, in the classic Pantheon, known by that title.

The meaning of this name Kronos, "The Horned one," as applied to Nimrod, fully explains the origin of the remarkable symbol, so frequently occurring among the Nineveh sculptures, the gigantic HORNED man-bull, as representing the great divinities in Assyria. The same word that signified a bull, signified also a ruler or prince. *

* The name for a bull or ruler, is in Hebrew without points, Shur, which in Chaldee becomes Tur. From Tur, in the sense of a bull, comes the Latin Taurus; and from the same word, in the sense of a ruler, Turannus, which originally had no evil meaning. Thus, in these well known classical words, we have evidence of the operation of the very principle which caused the deified Assyrian kings to be represented under the form of the man-bull.

Figure 10: Assyrian Hercules, or Zernebogus*

* From LAYARD'S Nineveh and Babylon, p. 605.

Hence the "Horned bull" signified "The Mighty Prince," thereby pointing back to the first of those "Mighty ones," who, under the name of Guebres, Gabrs, or Cabiri, occupied so conspicuous a place in the ancient world, and to whom the deified Assyrian monarchs covertly traced back the origin of their greatness and might. This explains the reason why the Bacchus of the Greeks was represented as wearing horns, and why he was frequently addressed by the epithet "Bull-horned," as one of the high titles of his dignity. Even in comparatively recent times, Togrul Begh, the leader of the Seljukian Turks, who came from the neighbourhood of the Euphrates, was in a similar manner represented with three horns growing out of his head, as the emblem of his sovereignty (Fig. 9).  This, also, in a remarkable way accounts for the origin of one of the divinities worshipped by our Pagan Anglo-Saxon ancestors under the name of Zernebogus. This Zernebogus was "the black, malevolent, ill-omened divinity," in other words, the exact counterpart of the popular idea of the Devil, as supposed to be black, and equipped with horns and hoofs. This name analysed and compared with the accompanying woodcut (Fig. 10), from Layard, casts a very singular light on the source from whence has come the popular superstition in regard to the grand Adversary. The name Zer-Nebo-Gus is almost pure Chaldee, and seems to unfold itself as denoting "The seed of the prophet Cush." We have seen reason already to conclude that, under the name Bel, as distinguished from Baal, Cush was the great soothsayer or false prophet worshipped at Babylon. But independent inquirers have been led to the conclusion that Bel and Nebo were just two different titles for the same god, and that a prophetic god. Thus does Kitto comment on the words of Isaiah 46:1 "Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth," with reference to the latter name: "The word seems to come from Nibba, to deliver an oracle, or to prophesy; and hence would mean an 'oracle,' and may thus, as Calmet suggests ('Commentaire Literal'), be no more than another name for Bel himself, or a characterising epithet applied to him; it being not unusual to repeat the same thing, in the same verse, in equivalent terms." "Zer-Nebo-Gus," the great "seed of the prophet Cush," was, of course, Nimrod; for Cush was Nimrod's father. Turn now to Layard, and see how this land of ours and Assyria are thus brought into intimate connection. In a woodcut, first we find "the Assyrian Hercules," that is "Nimrod the giant," as he is called in the Septuagint version of Genesis, without club, spear, or weapons of any kind, attacking a bull. Having overcome it, he sets the bull's horns on his head, as a trophy of victory and a symbol of power; and thenceforth the hero is represented, not only with the horns and hoofs above, but from the middle downwards, with the legs and cloven feet of the bull. Thus equipped he is represented as turning next to encounter a lion. This, in all likelihood, is intended to commemorate some event in the life of him who first began to be mighty in the chase and in war, and who, according to all ancient traditions, was remarkable also for bodily power, as being the leader of the Giants that rebelled against heaven. Now Nimrod, as the son of Cush, was black, in other words, was a Negro. "Can the Ethiopian change his skin?" is in the original, "Can the Cushite" do so? Keeping this, then, in mind, it will be seen that in that figure disentombed from Nineveh, we have both the prototype of the Anglo-Saxon Zer-Nebo-Gus, "the seed of the prophet Cush," and the real original of the black Adversary of mankind, with horns and hoofs. It was in a different character from that of the Adversary that Nimrod was originally worshipped; but among a people of a fair complexion, as the Anglo-Saxons, it was inevitable that, if worshipped at all, it must generally be simply as an object of fear; and so Kronos, "The Horned one," who wore the "horns," as the emblem both of his physical might and sovereign power, has come to be, in popular superstition, the recognised representative of the Devil.

Fig. 11: Horned Head-Dresses

See KITTO'S Illustrated Commentary, vol. iv. pp. 280-282

In many and far-severed countries, horns became the symbols of sovereign power. The corona or crown, that still encircles the brows of European monarchs, seems remotely to be derived from the emblem of might adopted by Kronos, or Saturn, who, according to Pherecydes, was "the first before all others that ever wore a crown." The first regal crown appears to have been only a band, in which the horns were set. From the idea of power contained in the "horn," even subordinate rulers seem to have worn a circlet adorned with a single horn, in token of their derived authority. Bruce, the Abyssinian traveller gives examples of Abyssinian chiefs thus decorated (Fig. 11), in regard to whom he states that the horn attracted his particular attention, when he perceived that the governors of provinces were distinguished by this head-dress.*

* See KITTO'S Illustrated Commentary, vol. iv. pp. 280-282. In Fig. 11, the two male figures are Abyssinian Chiefs. The two females, whom Kitto has grouped along with them, are ladies of Mount Lebanon, whose horned head-dresses Walpole regards as relics of the ancient worship of Astarte. (See above - and WALPOLE'S Ansayri, vol. iii. p. 16)

Fig 12: Three-Horned Cap of Vishnu

MAURICE, vol. iii. p. 353. London, 1793.

In the case of sovereign powers, the royal head-band was adorned sometimes with a double, sometimes with a triple horn. The double horn had evidently been the original symbol of power or might on the part of sovereigns; for, on the Egyptian monuments, the heads of the deified royal personages have generally no more than the two horns to shadow forth their power. As sovereignty in Nimrod's case was founded on physical force, so the two horns of the bull were the symbols of that physical force. And, in accordance with this, we read in Sanchuniathon that "Astarte put on her own head a bull's head as the ensign of royalty." By-and-by, however, another and a higher idea came in, and the expression of that idea was seen in the symbol of the three horns. A cap seems in course of time to have come to be associated with the regal horns. In Assyria the three-horned cap was one of the "sacred emblems," in token that the power c