Godfrey Higgins

“ I beg my reader to attend to the beings of the animal creation. He cannot suppose man, though inferior to them in many respects, to be much inferior to them in those which we are considering. How long is it before the dove or the partridge learns to call its mate with the voice of love, or its young about it, when it has found a nest of ants? Has man any language more significant than that which these birds possess? When the hen chucks her first chickens around her, can any language be more intelligible? ”

“ Very certain I am that if we are not willing to receive the learning of the ancients through the medium of etymology, and a comparison of the words of one language with another, we must remain in ignorance. The early historical accounts are all little better than fables. Every word, in every language, has, no doubt, originally had a meaning, whether a nation has it by inheritance, by importation, or by composition. ”

“ Although the pretended worship of Heroes appears at first sight plausible, very little depth of thought or learning is requisite to discover that it has not much foundation in truth. It was not in the infant state of society, that men were worshiped; it was not, on the contrary, until they arrived at a very high and advanced state of civilization. It was not Moses, Zoroaster, Confucius, Socrates, Solon, Lycurgus, Plato, Pythagoras, or Numa, that were objects of worship; the benefactors of mankind in all ages have been oftener persecuted than worshiped. ”

“ But why should not the Hebrew language have a feminine to the word אל al, as the English have a feminine to the word God, in Goddess, or the Romans in the words Deus and Dea? And why should not God be of the feminine gender as easily as of the masculine? Who knows what gender God is of? Who at this day is so foolish as to fancy that God is of any gender? We have seen that all the Gods of the Gentiles were of both genders. We find God called Al, Ale, Alue, Alim, and Aleim—more frequently Aleim than any other name. ”

“ By vilifying and running down the religion of the ancients, they have thought they could persuade their votaries that their new religion was necessary for the good of mankind: a religion which, in consequence of their corruptions, has been found to be in practice much worse and more injurious to the interests of society than the old one. For, from these corruptions the Christian religion—the religion of purity and truth when uncorrupted—has not brought peace but a sword. ”

“ In great numbers of places, authors will be found quoted as authority, but whose authority my reader may be inclined to dispute. In every case, evidence of this kind must go for no more than it is worth. It is like interested evidence, which is worth something in every case, though, perhaps, very little. But in many cases, an author of little authority, quoted by me as evidence in favour of my hypothesis, will be found to have come to his conclusion, perhaps, when advocating doctrines directly in opposition to mine, or in absolute ignorance of my theory. ”

“ I can be of no religion which does not appear to be consistent with sound reason, and I cannot stoop, with the advocates of priestcraft and idiotism, to lend my hand to continue the degradation of my fellow-creatures. Since the priests and their abettors have thought proper to convert the exercise of the highest gift of God to man reason into a term of reproach—rationalism—I know not how to return the compliment, though I do not like to render evil for evil, better than by designating their attempted opposition to reason, idiotism. ”

“ In self-defence, I can only say, that in my search for the origin of ancient science, I constantly found myself impeded by my ignorance of the Hebrew; and, in order to remove this impediment, I applied myself to the study of it. I very early discovered that no translation of the ancient book of Genesis, either by Jew or Christian, could be depended on. Every one has the prejudices instilled into him in his youth to combat, or his prejudged dogma to support. ”

“ When, after ages of ignorance and error, man became in some degree civilized, and he turned his mind to a close contemplation of the fountain of light and life—of the celestial fire—he would observe among the earliest discoveries which he would make, that by its powerful agency all nature was called into action; that to its return in the spring season the animal and vegetable creation were indebted for their increase as well as for their existence. It is probable that for this reason chiefly the sun, in early times, was believed to be the creator, and became the first object of adoration. ”

“ But if I had neglected the study of Greek and Latin, I had applied myself to the study of such works as those of Euclid, and of Locke on the Understanding, the tendency of which is to form the mind to a habit of investigation and close reasoning and thinking, and in a peculiar manner to fit it for such inquiries as mine; for want of which habit, a person may possess a considerable knowledge of the Classics, while his mind may be almost incapable of comprehending the demonstration of a common proposition in geometry. ”

“ When a translator finds a word with several meanings, than which nothing is more common, it is his duty to compare it with the context and to consider all the circumstances under which it is placed, and his prudence and judgment are displayed, or his want of them, in the selection which he makes. It is precisely the same with etymology. There is no argument which can be brought against etymology which may not be advanced with equal force against translations. ”

“ How to reconcile this apparent blot in the creation to the beneficence of an all-powerful Creator, would be a matter of great difficulty: he had probably recourse to the only contrivance which was open to him, a contrivance to which he seems to have been driven by a wise dispensation of Providence, the doctrine of a future state of existence, where the ills of this world would find a remedy, and the accounts of good and evil be balanced; where the good man would receive his reward, and the bad one his punishment. ”

“ All this I expect, and of it I have no right to complain, unless I have a right to complain that a profound subject is attended with difficulties, or that superficial people are not deep thinkers, or that the nature of the human animal is not of a different construction from what I know it to be. The same lot befel the works of General Vallancey, which contain more profound and correct learning on the origin of nations and languages than all the books which were ever written. ”

“ Some years ago a fraud was attempted by a Brahmin on Sir William Jones and Major Wilford. These two gentlemen being totally void of any suspicion were deceived, but in a very little time the latter detected the fraud, and instantly published it to the world in the most candid and honourable manner. This has afforded a handle to certain persons, who dread discoveries from India, to run down every thing which Wilford wrote, not only up to that time, but in a long and industrious life afterward. ”

“ AGE OF THE WORLD.—FLOOD.—PLANETS AND DAYS OF THE WEEK.—THE MOON.
1. On looking back into antiquity, the circle of vision terminates in a thick and impenetrable mist. No end can be distinguished. There seems reason to believe that this is an effect of that cause, whatever it may be, which first produced and gave law to the revolving motions of the planets, or other phenomena of nature, and therefore cannot be impugned, perhaps ought not to regretted. At all events, if this obscurity be regretted, it is pretty evident that there is little hope of its being removed. ”

“ Every succeeding generation has added to the mass of nonsense, until the enormity is beginning to cure itself, and to prove that the whole, as a system, is false: it is beginning to convince most persons that some new system must be had recourse to, if one can be devised, which may at least have the good quality of containing within itself the possibility of being true, a quality which the present old system most certainly wants. ”

“ Socrates, Pythagoras, Plato, Zoroaster or Zeradust, &c., and all those initiated in the most secret mysteries, acknowledged one supreme God, the Lord and First Cause of all. And perhaps, though it can never be certainly known, those who only received the lesser mysteries, [1] might confine their worship to the sun and the host of heaven; but it was only the vulgar and ignorant who bent the knee to the stone, wood, or metal idols of the gods, perhaps only a little more numerous than the images of the Christian saints. ”

“ And, above all things, my reader must always bear in mind, that he is in search of a system, the meaning of which its professors and those initiated into its mysteries have constantly endeavoured in all ages and nations to conceal, and the proofs of the existence of which, the most influential body of men in the world, the priests, have endeavoured, and yet endeavour, by every honest and dishonest means in their power, to destroy.
The following work will be said to be a theory: it is given as a theory. But what is a Theory? Darwin says, “To theorise is to think.” ”

“ The ancients may have reasoned from analogy. They may have said, Our experience teaches that every thing which we perceive has pre-existed before the moment we perceive it, therefore it is fair to conclude that it must always have existed. A most hasty conclusion. All that they could fairly conclude was, that, for any thing which they knew to the contrary, it may have existed from eternity, not that it must have existed. But this amounts not to knowledge.
Are the modern priests any wiser than the ancient philosophers? ”

“ Few persons have exhibited more learning or ingenuity on the subject of the ancient worship than Mr. Bryant and M. Dupuis: and whatever opinion people may entertain of different parts of their works, or of some of their hypotheses, yet they can scarcely refuse assent to their general assertions, that all the religions of antiquity, at least in their origin, are found to centre in the worship of the Sun, either as God the Creator himself, or as the seat of, or as the emblem of Creator. ”

“ The great age of the world must be admitted; but the great age of man is a different thing. The latter may admit of doubt, and it is man with whom, in the following treatise, I propose to concern myself, and not his habitation. On man, his folly, his weakness, and, I am sorry I must add, his wickedness, I propose to treat: his habitation I leave to the geologists.
In the most early history of mankind I find all nations endeavouring to indulge a contemptible vanity, by tracing their origin to the most remote periods ”

“ But founding my opinion on a thorough conviction that I have solved the great problem and have discovered the long-lost truths of antiquity which have been so long sought for in vain, I feel no doubt that the time will come when my discovery will be adopted, when the errors in the work or in the system will be corrected, and the truth it contains will be duly appreciated, and that, if I have succeeded in developing the origin of religions, nations, and languages, it will by degrees make its way. ”

“ How is it possible for a person who, like me, is a sincere friend of religion, not to be indignant at an order which has, by its frauds, rendered the history of all religions, and of every thing connected with them, doubtful—by frauds systematically practised in all ages, and continued even to the present day, and in our own country? ”

“ From similar trains of reasoning arose the opinion that every thing in nature, even the world itself, was subject to periodical changes, to alternate destructions and renovations—an opinion, perhaps, for sublimity not to be equalled in the history of the different philosophical systems of the world, the only doctrine which seemed, in the opinion of the ancients, to be capable of reconciling the existence of evil with the goodness of God. ”

“ All nations have a tradition of the destruction of the world by a flood, [1] and of the preservation of man from its effects. Here are two questions. Of the affirmative of the former no person who uses his eyes can doubt. But the latter is in a different predicament. A question may arise whether man existed before the flood above spoken of, or not. If the universality of a tradition of a fact of this nature would prove its truth, there would be scarcely room for doubt, and the previous creation of man would be established. ”

“ Aristotle supposed the souls of mankind to be portions or emanations of the divine spirit; which at death quit the body, and, like a drop of water falling into the ocean, are absorbed into the divinity. ”

“ To guard myself against being accused of the disgusting practice of using abusive epithets, I beg that the term devotee, which will often occur, as of course it conveys no meaning against any one’s moral character, may not be considered to mean a bigot, but merely a person very much, or rather more than usually religious, which is its true and correct meaning. ”

“ I found the שמים smim, called the disposers of the affairs of men, and by mistake, if it were a mistake, I quoted it as from Parkhurst in my Celtic Druids. It is of little consequence where I got the quotation, as the fact itself is true. The planets in ancient times were always taken to be the superintendants and regulators of the affairs of mankind, and this is the meaning of Genesis. This idea, too, was the foundation of all judicial astrology: which is as visible as the noonday sun in every part of the Old and New Testament. ”