origin and true meaning of the legends which they had inherited
from an older race is quite evident. The ignorance of the Greeks
regarding the significance of these legends is shown by the
following: When Solon, wishing to acquaint himself with the
history of the oldest times, inquired of an Egyptian priest
concerning the time of the flood, and the age of Deucalion or
Phroneous or Noah, this functionary replied:
"O Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children, nor is there an
old man among you! Having no ancient traditions nor any
acquaintance with chronology, you are as yet in a state of
intellectual infancy. The true origin of such mutilated fables
as you possess is this. There have been and shall again be in
the course of many revolving ages, numerous destructions of the
human race; the greatest of them by fire and water, but others in
an almost endless succession of shorter intervals."[47]
[47] Quoted by Plato; also by Clement of Alexandria.
We have observed that the symbol of the universe was an egg. The
egg was also the symbol of the earth and of the ark, which meant
universal womanhood. From the mundane egg the triplicated Deity
sprang. There can be little doubt at the present time that Adam,
Noah, Menu, Osiris, and Dionysos all represent the fructifying
power of the sun. In process of time they each came to figure as
male reproductive energy, and during certain periods of the
earth's history they have each in turn been worshipped as the
Deity. That not only the ark was female, but that the god
element or reproductive principle within the ark was both female
and male, is a fact which has been lost sight of during the
historic period, or during those ages of the world in which the
attempt has been made to prove Nature motherless.
All the germs and living creatures which were within the ark, and
which were to reanimate the earth, were in pairs, females and
males; and, besides, the Dove (female), the emblem of peace, was
also present. Even Noah himself was produced from an egg, which,
as we have seen, is the symbol of Venus, or universal womanhood.
In after ages the female principle was not mentioned, but, on the
contrary, was concealed beneath convenient symbols; and as the
philosophical ideas underlying natural religion were lost or
forgotten, and mankind had become too ignorant to perceive that a
