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ter Amun, gravely informs us that there was an Omphalus there, and that the deity was represented in the form of a Navel, set around with precious stones.*

In like manner the Egyptian Cahen-Caph-El, meaning the "priests of the temple of the god" (the sun), was, from a rude similarity of sound, trans-. formed into Cyno-ceph-al-oi, i. e., "beings with dogs' heads;" and the absurd story invented that the Egyptians kept in their temples baboons with dogs' heads, who were wonderfully skilled in the motions of the heavenly bodies, who could read and write, and "whenever one of them was introduced into the sacred apartments for probation, the priest presented him with a tablet, and with a pen and ink, and, by his writing, could immediately find out if he were of the true intelligent breed," † the latter circumstance referring to the examination to which novices were subjected before they were admitted to the priesthood. ‡

These illustrations we deem very valuable, as throwing a flood of light on the whole subject of the heathen mythology, enabling us to account for many

Umbilico maxime similis est habitus, smaragdo et gemmis coagmentus, l. 4, c. 7.

† Horapollo, 1. 1, c. 14, p. 28.

Bryant, Anc. Myth., vol. ii. pp. 20–23.

of its wildest absurdities. Not that we are able to trace the rise and progress of every myth, but we can easily imagine, after these examples, modern as well as ancient, how they may have risen and run a wild course to the shape in which we now find them. If the name of an old brew-house can be so changed as to become a brazen nose, if three drains for conducting off the waters of a lake can become, even on the very spot, Three Goats, if the pious expression of confidence in the divine care can be transformed into the Goat and Compasses, and all this in recent historic times, and near the very seats of modern science, what might we not expect among the ignorant and superstitious peoples of other lands and other times?

The views thus exhibited of the nature of myths, and the origin and growth of mythology in general, will prepare the way for the proposition which will bring the subject into connection with our present discussion, viz., That all the systems of ancient mythology had a common origin, and that origin was in the persons and events described in the Mosaic account of the primeval ages of man, in the first chapters of Genesis.

I. The first part of this proposition, that all the systems of ancient mythology had a common origin, need not detain us long.

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That the Roman mythology was essentially the same as the Greek is familiar to every classical scholar. The names of the gods were, indeed, for the most part, different; but their characters and histories were sufficiently alike to cause them to be recognized by the writers of both countries as substantially the same. I speak now of the chief deities only, for there were numerous local and subordinate divinities, both in Greece and Italy, who were not known elsewhere. Nor are we to understand that the Roman mythology, except partially, in later times, when intercourse between the two countries became frequent, was borrowed from the Greek. Rather, the two mythologies, like the two languages, were sisters, being each derived from a common source, in a period antecedent to the settlement of either country.

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In like manner the Greek mythology, in its main elements, was the same as that of Egypt. The Grecian writers, from Herodotus down, represent that the names and characters of the principal gods and goddesses were derived from the East, mostly from Egypt. Herodotus (ii. 52) says this expressly, and Diodorus Siculus dwells upon it at great length. All that was peculiarly Grecian was the localizing and modifying of the names in the manner already described, with the invention of new fictions to cor

respond to those alterations. I think it a mistake, however, to affirm that the Greek mythology was derived from Egypt, and would prefer to say that both the Egyptian and the Grecian were originally from a common source, and owe to this their mutual resemblance to each other.

This resemblance, again, is found between the Egyptian, Phoenician, and Chaldean or Babylonian systems. Bunsen expressly says, "All Egypt's roots are in Asia," and he gives very conclusive examples of such derivation. The Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury of the West, and the Amun, Muntru, Athor, and Thoth of Egypt, are at Nineveḥ and Babylon, Bel-Merodach, Nergal, Ishtar, and Nebo.

And so in numerous other instances. There is some reason to think that the gods of the Assyrian and Babylonian mythologies, as deciphered from the cuneiform inscriptions, are nearer the common source from which all are derived, than any other.

In the Hindu mythology, we are met again by striking points of resemblance to those already mentioned. It is, says M. Müller, a "fact which can not be doubted, and which, if fully appreciated, will be felt to be pregnant with the most startling and the most instructive lessons of antiquity- the fact, I mean, that Zeus, the most sacred name in Greek mythology, is the same word as Dyaus, or Dyu

in Sanskrit, Jovis or fu in Jupiter in Latin, Tiw in Anglo-Saxon (preserved in Tiwsdæg, Tuesday, the day of the Eddic god Tyr), Zio in old High German," and, he might have added, Ti in Chinese, and Teo in Mexican. And a writer in the Christian Examiner,† reviewing this work of Müller, remarks further, "As the Sanskrit has, in most cases, preserved its roots in a more primitive form than the other Aryan languages, so in the Rig-Veda we find the same mythic phraseology as in Homer and Hesiod, but in a far more rudimentary and unintelligible condition. Zeus, Eros, Helena, Ouranos, and Cerberus reappear as Dyaus, Arusha, Sarameias, Sarama, Varuna, and Sawara; but instead of completely developed personalities, they are presented to us only as vague powers, with their nature and attributes dimly defined, and their relations to each other fluctuating, and often contradictory. There is no theogony, no mythologic system. The same pair of divinities appear now as father and daughter, now as brother and sister, now as husband and wife; now they entirely lose their personality, and become undifferentiated Forces. In the Vedas, the early significancy of myths has not faded, but continually recurs to the mind of the

* Science of Lang., second series, p. 444.

† May, 1865, p. 380.

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