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where, though often changing its place. He considered this as a 

 proof that civilization is the natural state of man, and must have 

 been his original state, or the state which he derived from God. 



Dr. Bethune also considered that nations were distinctly charac- 

 terised by their moral peculiarities, and especially by the supersti- 

 tions prevalent among them. Every form of superstition is of very 

 remote origin, and the several classes can be traced backward through 

 successive periods to a common source ; the form prevalent among 

 any nation marking the period when it broke off from the main 

 stem. Thus the northern Indians of America (if their faith be pro- 

 perly ascertained), are the only savage people known to us who wor- 

 ship a pure Spirit as God ; and hence they must be the oldest, having 

 left the main family before idolatry became prevalent. Fire being 

 originally the sign of the divine Presence, the worship of fire as a 

 representative of Diety was the earliest form of idolatry, and marks 

 a people among whom it prevails as very ancient in their separation. 

 Angels in the visible shape of supernatural man, being employed 

 by the invisible God as his messengers, gave rise to the second form 

 of idolatry, that of images resembling man, though variously ex- 

 aggerated, according to the taste of the people. The tJiird form was 

 the result of more philosophical refinement, being the worship of em- 

 blems, representing the various providence of the Divine Being; as 

 the ox in agriculture; the trident or fish-spear for maritime affairs, 

 &c. Next to the emblematic came the symbolical ; as the egg, the 

 serpent-circle, &c. This was carried to the highest pitch in the Bac- 

 chic mysteries, where, under forms revolting to modern refinement, 

 the most subtle doctrines were concealed. It is remarkable that 

 wherever history (other than sacred) leads us, we find traces of the 

 Bacchic or Phallic superstition, from India to ultima Thule; from the 

 date of the Shastres down to the present time. 



Dr. Bethune inferred from this that the superstitions and tradition- 

 ary moral notions of a people, should be studied as much as the form 

 of their heads or the radical of their language, to discover their 

 origin. The bale (or Baal) fires still lighted in Ireland, and the 

 image of the sun on the ruined temples of the Mexicans, mark 

 an original consanguinity of the long separated nations. So, dis- 

 tinct traces of the Phallic worship (as late as the middle of the last 

 century), prove the source from which Marseilles was colonized, 

 after that mysticism had been invented by the Egyptian hierophants. 



All these considerations, leading us backward to a unity or com- 

 mon origin of the race, as well as to a state of high morals and civi- 



