wisdom incarnate; in this sense he is really the Sun or the solar power incarnate, and to him everything applicable to the Sun will apply.

Fig. No. 37, taken from Mr. Lundy's "Monumental Christianity," is evidently a representation of the Christian Saviour crucified in the heavens. Mr. Lundy calls it "Crucifixion in Space," and believes that it was intended for the Hindoo Saviour Crishna, who is also represented crucified in space (See Fig. No. 8, Ch. XX.). This (Fig. 37) is exactly in the form of a Romish crucifix, but not fixed to a piece of wood, though the legs and feet are put together in the usual way. There is a glory over it, coming from above, not shining from the figure, as is generally seen in a Roman crucifix. It has a pointed Parthian coronet instead of a crown of thorns. All the avatars, or incarnations of Vishnu, are painted with Ethiopian or Parthian coronets. For these reasons the Christian author will not own that it is a representa

T

FIG: 37

tion of the "True Son of Justice," for he was not crucified in space; but whether it was intended to represent Crishna, Wittoba, or Jesus,' it tells a secret: it shows that some one was represented crucified in the heavens, and undoubtedly has something to do with "The next power to the Supreme God," who, according to Plato, "was decussated or figured in the shape of a cross on the universe."

Who was the crucified god whom the ancient Romans worshiped, and whom they, according to Justin Martyr, represented as a man on a cross? Can we doubt, after what we have seen, that he was this same crucified Sol, whose birthday they annually celebrated on the 25th of December?

In the poetical tales of the ancient Scandinavians, the same legend is found. Frey, the Deity of the Sun, was fabled to have been killed, at the time of the winter solstice, by the same boar who put the god Adonis to death, therefore a boar was annually offered

The Sun-gods Apollo, Indra, Wittoba or Aryan Mytho., vol. ii. p. 23, and Moor's Hindo Crishna, and Christ Jesus, are represented as Pantheon.) having their feet pierced with nails (See Cox:/

to him at the great feast of Yule.' "Baldur the Good," son of the supreme god Odin, and the virgin-goddess Frigga, was also put to death by the sharp thorn of winter.

The ancient Mexican crucified Saviour, Quetzalcoatle, another personification of the Sun, was sometimes represented as crucified in space, in the heavens, in a circle of nineteen figures, the number of the metonic cycle. A serpent (the emblem of evil, darkness, and winter) is depriving him of the organs of generation.'

We have seen in Chapter XXXIII. that Christ Jesus, and many of the heathen saviours, healers, and preserving gods, were represented in the form of a Serpent. This is owing to the fact that, in one of its attributes, the Serpent was an emblem of the Sun. It may, at first, appear strange that the Serpent should be an emblem of evil, and yet also an emblem of the beneficent divinity; but, as Prof. Renouf remarks, in his Hibbert Lectures, "The moment we understand the nature of a myth, all impossibilities, contradictions, and immoralities disappear." The serpent is an emblem of evil when represented with his deadly sting; he is the emblem of eternity when represented casting off his skin; and an emblem of the Sun when represented with his tail in his mouth, thus forming a circle.* Thus there came to be, not only good, but also bad, serpents, both of which are referred to in the narrative of the Hebrew exodus, but still more clearly in the struggle between the good and the bad serpents of Persian mythology, which symbolized Ormuzd, or Mithra, and the evil spirit Ahriman.*

As the Dove and the Rose, emblems of the Sun, were represented on the cross, so was the Serpent." The famous "Brazen Serpent," said to have been "set up" by Moses in the wilderness, is called in the Targum (the general term for the Aramaic versions of the Old

1 Knight: Anct. Art and Mytho., pp. 87, 88. 2 Anacalypsis, vol. ii. p. 32.

"This notion is quite consistent with the ideas entertained by the Phenicians as to the Serpent, which they supposed to have the quality of putting off its old age, and assuming a second youth." Sanchoniathon : Quoted by Wake: Phallism, &c., p. 43.)

Une serpent qui tient sa queue dans sa gueule et dans le circle qu'il decrit, ces trois lettres Greques TEE, qui sont le nombre 365. Le Serpent, qui est d'ordinaire un emblème de l'eternetè est ici celui de Soleil et des ses revolutions. (Beausobre: Hist. de Manich. tom. ii. p. 55. Quoted by Lardner, vol. viii. p. 379.)

"This idea existed even in America. The great century of the Aztecs was encircled by a serpent grasping its own tail, and the great

calendar stone is entwined by serpents bearing human heads in their distended jaws."

"The annual passage of the Sun, through the signs of the zodiac, being in an oblique path, resembles, or at least the ancients thought so, the tortuous movements of the Serpent, and the facility possessed by this reptile of casting off his skin and producing out of itself a new covering every year, bore some analogy to the termination of the old year and the commencement of the new one. Accordingly, all the ancient spheres-the Persian, Indian, Egyptian, Barbaric, and Mexicanwere surrounded by the figure of a serpent holding its tail in its mouth." (Squire Serpent Symbol, p. 249.)

Wake: Phallism, p. 42.

* See Cox: Aryan Mytho., vol. ii. p. 128.

Testament) the SAVIOUR. It was probably a serpentine crucifix, as it is called a cross by Justin Martyr. The crucified serpent (Fig. No. 38) denoted the quiescent Phallos, or the Sun after it had lost its power. It is the Sun in winter, crucified on the tree, which denoted its fructifying power.' As Mr. Wake remarks, "There can be no doubt that both the Pillar (Phallus) and the Serpent were associated with many of the Sun-gods of antiquity."

This is seen in Fig. No. 39, taken from an ancient medal, which represents the serpent with rays of glory surrounding his head. The Ophites, who venerated the serpent as an emblem of Christ

Jesus, are said to have maintained that the serpent of Genesis who brought wisdom into the world-was Christ Jesus. The brazen serpent was called the WORD by the Chaldee paraphrast. The Word, or Logos, was Divine Wisdom, which was crucified; thus we have the cross, or Linga, or Phallus, with the serpent upon it. Besides considering the serpent as the emblem of Christ Jesus, or of the Logos, the Ophites are said to have revered it as the cause of all the arts of civilized life. In Chapter XII. we saw that several illustrious females were believed to have been selected and impregnated by the Holy Ghost. In some cases, a serpent was supposed to be the form which it assumed. Logos.

1 Being the most intimately connected with the reproduction of life on earth, the Linga became the symbol under which the Sun, invoked with a thousand names, has been worshiped throughout the world as the restorer of the powers of nature after the long sleep or

death of Winter. In the brazen Serpent of the Pentateuch, the two emblems of the Cross and Serpent, the quiescent and energizing Phallos, are united. (Cox: Aryan Mytho., vo. ii. pp. 113-118.)

2 Wake: Phallism, &c., p. 60.

The serpent was held in great veneration by the ancients, who, as we have seen, considered it as the symbol of the beneficent Deity, and an emblem of eternity. As such it has been variously expressed on ancient sculptures and medals in various parts of the globe.

Although generally, it did not always, symbolize the god Sun, or the power of which the Sun is an emblem; but, invested with various meanings, it entered widely into the primitive mythologies. As Mr. Squire observes:

"It typified wisdom, power, duration, the good and evil principles, life, reproduction in short, in Egypt, Syria, Greece, India, China, Scandinavia, America, everywhere on the globe, it has been a prominent emblem."’1

The serpent was the symbol of Vishnu, the preserving god, the Saviour, the Sun. It was an emblem of the Sun-god Buddha, the Angel-Messiah. The Egyptian Sun-god Osiris, the Saviour, is associated with the snake. The Persian Mithra, the Mediator, Redeemer, and Saviour, was symbolized by the serpent. The Phenicians represented their beneficent Sun-god, Agathodemon, by a serpent. The serpent was, among the Greeks and Romans, the emblem of a beneficent genius. Antipator of Sidon, calls the god Ammon, the "Renowned Serpent." The Grecian Hercules---the Sun-god-was symbolized as a serpent; and so was Esculapius and Apollo. The Hebrews, who, as we have seen in Chapter XI., worshiped the god Sol, represented him in the form of a serpent. This is the seraph-spoken of above-as set up by Moses (Num. xxi. 3) and worshiped by the children of Israel. SE RA PH is the singular of seraphim, meaning Semilicé-splendor, fire, light – emblematic of the fiery disk of the Sun, and which, under the name of Nehush-tan, "Serpent-dragon," was broken up by the reforming Hezekiah.

The principal god of the Aztecs was Tonac-atlcoatl, which means the Serpent Sun."

The Mexican virgin-born Lord and Saviour, Quetzalcoatle, was represented in the form of a serpent. In fact, his name signifies "Feathered Serpent." Quetzalcoatle was a personification of the Sun.

195.

Under the aspect of the active principle, we may rationally

1 Squire Serpent Symbol, p. 155.
Wake: Phallism in Anct. Religs., p. 72.
Ibid. p. 73. Squire Serpent Symbol, p.

Faber Orig. Pagan Idol., in Squire, p.

• Ibid.

Kenrick's Egypt, vol. i. p. 375.
7 Ibid.

8 Squire: p. 161.
Ibid. p. 185.

connect the Serpent and the Sun, as corresponding symbols of the reproductive or creative power. Figure No. 40 is a symbolical sign, representing the disk of the Sun encircled by the serpent Uraeus, meaning the "KING SUN," or " ROYAL SUN," as it often surmounts the persons of Egyptian monarchs, confirmed by the emblem of LIFE depending from the serpent's neck.'

The mysteries of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, in Egypt; Atys and Cybele, in Phrygia; Ceres and Proserpine, at Eleusis; of Venus and Adonis, in Phenicia; of Bona Dea and Priapus, in Rome, are all susceptible of one explanation. They all set forth and illustrated,

a

FIG NO 40

by solemn and impressive rites, and mystical symbols, the grand phenomenon of nature, especially as connected with the creation of things and the perpetuation of life. In all, it is worthy of remark, the SERPENT was more or less conspicuously introduced, and always as symbolical of the invigorating or active energy of nature, the SUN.

We have seen (in Chapter XX.) that in early Christian art Christ Jesus also was represented as a crucified Lamb. This crucified lamb is "the Lamb of God taking away the sins of the world, and slain from the foundation of the world." In other words, the crucified lamb typifies the crucified Sun, for the lamb was another symbol of the Sun, as we shall presently see.

We find, then, that the stories of the crucifixions of the different so-called SAVIOURS of mankind all melt into ONE, and that they are allegorical, for "Saviour" was only a title of the Sun,' and his being put to death on the cross, signifies no more than the restriction of the power of the Sun in the winter quarter. With Justin Martyr, then, we can say:

66

There exists not a people, whether Greek or barbarian, or any other race of men, by whatsoever appellation or manners they may be distinguished, however ignorant of arts or agriculture, whether they dwell under the tents, or wan

1 Squire p. 169.

2 Lundy Monumental Christianity, p. 185. 3. SAVIOUR was a common title of the SUNgods of antiquity." (Wake: Phailism in Anct. Religs., p. 55.)

The ancient Greek writers speak of the Sun, as the "Generator and Nourisher of all Things;" the "Ruler of the World;" the "First of the Gods," and the "Supreme Lord of all Beings." (Knight: Ancient Art and Mytho., p. 37.)

Pausanias (500 B. C.) speaks of "The Sun

"There is a very remarkable figure copied in Payne Knight's Work, in which we see on a man's shoulders a cock's head, whilst on the pediment are placed the words: "THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD." (Inman: Anct. Faiths, vol. i. p. 537.) This refers to the SUN. The cock being the natural herald of the day, he was therefore sacred, among the ancients, to the Sun." (See Knight: Anct. Art and Mytho., p. 70, and Lardner: vol. viii. p. 377.)