The heathen gods may he all reduced to the following classes: ( Created spirits, angels, or demons, whence good and evil gods ; Genii, Lares, Lemures, Typhones, gttardian gods, in fernal gods, etc. (2) Heavenly bodies ; as the sun, moon, and other planets ; also, the fixed stars, constellations, etc. (3) Elements ; as air, earth, ocean, Ops, Vesta ; the riverc, fountains, etc. (4) Meteors. Thus the Persians adored the wind; thunder and lightning were honored under the name of Geryon ; and several nations of India and America have made themselves gods of the same. Castor, Pollux, Helena, and Iris, have also been preferred from tneteors to be gods; and the like has been practiced in regard to comets ; witness that which appeared at the mur der of Cxsar. (5) They fashioned minerals or fossils into deities. Such was the bmtylus.. The Finlanders adored stones; the Scythians, iron ; and many nations, silver and gold. (6) Plants have been made gods. Thus leeks and onions were deities in• Egypt ; the Sclavi, Lithuanians, Celtm, Vandals, and Peruvians, adored trees and forests; the ancient Gauls, Britons, and Druids, paid a particular devotion to the oak; and it was no other than wheat, corn, seed, etc., that the ancients adored under the names of Ceres and Proserpina. (7) They took themselves gods from among the waters. The Syrians and Egyptians adored fishes; and what were the Tritons, the Nereids, Syrens, etc., but fishes? Several nations have adored serpents; particularly the Egyptians, Prussians, Lithuanians, Samogitians, etc. (8) In sects, as flies and ants, had their priests and votaries. (9) Among birds, the stork, raven, sparrowhawk, ibis, eagle, grison, and lapwing, have had Divine honors ; the last in Mexico, the rest in Egypt and at Thebes. (to) Fourfooted beasts have had their altars ; as the bull-dog, cat, wolf, baboon, lion, and crocodile, in Egypt and elsewhere ; the hog in the island of Crete; rats and mice in the Troas, and at Tenedos; weasels at Thebes; and the porcupine throughout all Zoroaster's school. (11) Nothing was more com mon than to place men among the number of deities; and from Belus or Baal, to the Roman emperors before Constantine, the instances of this kind are innumerable; frequently they did not wait so long as their deaths for the apotheosis. Nebuchadnezzar procured his statue to be wor shiped while living; and Virgil shows that Au gustus had altars and sacrifices offered to him ; as we learn from other hands that he had priests, called Augustales, and temples at Lyons, Narbona, and several other places ; and he must be allowed the first of the Romans in whose behalf idolatry was carried to such a pitch. The Ethiopians
deemed all their kings gods; the Velleda of the Germans, the Janos of the Hungarians, and the Thaut, Woden, and Assa, of the northern nations, were indisputably men. (12) Not men only, but every thing that relates to man, has also been deified ; as labor, rest, sleep, youth, age, death, virtues, vices, occasion, time, place, numbers, among the Pythagoreans ; the generative power, under the name of Priapus. Infancy alone had a cloud of deities ; as Vagitanus, Levana, Rumina, Edula, Potina, Cuba, Cumina, Carna, Ossilago, Statulinus, Fabulinus, etc. They also adored the gods Health, Fever, Fear, Love, Pain, Indigna tion, Shame, Impudence, Opinion, Renown, Pru dence, Science, Art, Fidelity, Felicity, Calumny, Liberty, Money, War, Peace, Victory, Triumph, etc. Lastly, Nature, the universe, or Pan, was reputed a great god.
Hesiod has a poem under the title of Theogonia, that is, "The Generation of the Gods," in which he explains their genealogy and descent, sets forth who was the first and principal, who next descended from him, and what issue each had ; the whole making a sort of system of heathen theology. Beside this popular theology, each philosopher had his system, as may be seen from the "Timxus" of Plato, and Cicero "De N'atura Deorion." Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Arnobius, Minutius Felix, Lactantius, Eusebius, Augustine, and Theodoret, show the vanity of the heathen gods. It is very difficult to discover the real sentiments of the heathens with respect to 'heir gods ; they are exceedingly intricate and confused, and even frequently contradictory. They admitted so many superior and inferior gods, who shared the empire, that every place was full of gods. Varro reckons up no less than thirty thnu sand adored within a small extent of ground, and yet their number was every day increasing. In modern Oriental paganism, as in India, China, etc., they amount to many_ millions, and are, in fact, innumerable.