INTO HADES : A STUDY IN COMPARATIVE RELIGEON. 229 



purgatorial pains which from early days has clouded over the faith 

 of the Church of God. 



As to myths and mythological legends, they were perversions of 

 Patriarchal faith by those who changed the truth of God into a lie, 

 and who altered the true teaching of the Zodiacal Constellations in 

 which were figured the victory over Satan by Death and Resurrec- 

 tion of the Seed of the Woman. His risen glories are now the joy 

 of His redeemed and the earnest of still brighter glories to come. 



These are daj^s when a true scientific comparative study of 

 " religious origins " reveals the undoubted fact that nearly all the 

 supposed " anticipations " of Christian faith in the religions of 

 Assyria, Babylon, Egypt and India were corruptions of truth 

 revealed to the Patriarchs and especially perversions of those 

 Constellation Figures to which I have referred in my recent paper 

 on Theosophy and about which Mr. E. W. Maunder, of the Eoyal 

 Observatory, Greenwich, has written in so interesting a manner in 

 his Astronomy of the Bible. (Sealy Clark, Publisher.) 



A comparative study of religious beliefs has resulted in demon- 

 strating how impregnable is the Rock of Holy Scripture, and how 

 unassailable is the position of one who defends his Christian position 

 by a faithful use of the Sword of the Spirit which is the Word of 

 God. 



The Rev. Dugald MacFadyen said : Anything that I say will 

 be mainly on the valuable paper which has been read to us this 

 evening. I feel that it will be a great pity if we should part with- 

 out having expressed our appreciation of the value of the paper. 

 Its value to myself was in the happy combination of scientific study 

 and the working of a religious mind on facts scientifically studied. 

 At one of the first of the congresses on comparative religion, some- 

 body got up and asked the question whether the reader of a certain 

 paper was a religious man. The reply came from the Chairman that 

 he could not answer for that, but that he would say he was a " com- 

 paratively religious " man. I felt to-day that Canon MacCuUoch was 

 giving us the working of a student of religion, and also of a religious 

 man. One felt also that it very greatly confirmed a feeling which has 

 constantly come to my own mind in reading such papers, that men 

 came in the first century as they do now to the religion of Christian- 

 ity, to the teaching of the word of Christ, with certain ideas already 

 in their minds, and certain great questions waiting to be answered. 



