28 THEOPHILUS G. PINCHES, LL.D., M.R.A.S., ON THE 
reconcile that belief with the account of the creation. ‘Then, 
again, in the third part of the first paragraph, ought it not 
to be proved that the ancient Jews believed that God had 
no beginning, before we go on to compare that belief with 
the beliefs of the ancient Babylonians? In saying this I 
take it that the admitted existence of God before the creation 
of the universe does not prove that the Jews of early times 
believed that He had no beginning. Upon the premises 
themselves interesting papers might be written. 
And go it happened that, in the combined Semitic and 
Egyptian sections, no serious attempt was made to carry out 
the programme placed before the Congress. In all proba- 
bility the writers of papers gave such material as they had 
available, not having time to work up the special papers 
which would be necessary in most cases to treat properly the 
subjects of a very special nature set out for their examination. 
In any case, this was the difficulty which | wyself experienced, 
but 1 was fortunate enough to find, in the course of writing 
the paper which I thought of giving, references to one of the 
points touched upon, namely, the beliefs of the ancient 
Chaldeans (they would be better described as Babylonians) 
as to the fate and destination of the soul after death, and I 
felt that this circumstance gave my paper compliance, as it 
were, with the aims of the Congress as set forth in the 
circular giving the programme of the work which it had 
to do. 
The opening session was held at the Exhibition, in the 
Congress Palace—a building the severity of whose lines was 
emblematic of the work performed therein. There M. Albert 
Réville, the renowned President of the Religious Science 
Section of the Ecole des Hautes Etudes, President of the 
Congress, set forth, in an eloquent speech, the nature and 
special interest of the science of religion, indicating the 
place which it ought to occupy in the body corporate of 
contemporary science. The representative of the Minister 
of Public Instruction then welcomed the members of the 
Congress in the name of the Minister, and Mr. Paul Carus, 
secretary of the Religious Parliament Extension, Chicago, 
the official delegate of the United States, also saluted the 
Congress in the name of his fellow-countrymen, and brought 
the good wishes of “the Religious Parliament Extension,” 
the outcome of the Chicago Parliament of Religions, to 
which reference has already been made. 
In the second general sitting at the Sorbonne, September 
