AND GUEBRE FAITH. 
49 
as the soul does that of man. Under these impressions, when 
they paid their devotions, they always looked towards the planet 
to which they directed their prayers. But when these orbs, in 
the course of their revolutions, became hidden below the hori¬ 
zon, the worshippers were at a loss where to point their 
adorations ; and to remedy this, the priests had recourse to 
the invention of symbolical images, into which they taught 
that these divine intelligences descended; and were as present 
by their influences, as in the planets themselves. Here we see 
the origin of image-worship ; for to these symbols, they gave 
the names of the gods whom they adored in the heavenly host. 
After this, a notion prevailed that eminent men, after death, had 
an interceding power with the divinity; and to propitiate their 
departed spirits, in the same way as was done by the intelli¬ 
gences of the planets, images were graven to their honour, and, 
by similar means, identified with the immortal beings they were 
meant to represent. 
In consecrating these symbols, the most extravagant in¬ 
cantations were used to draw down into them from the stars, 
the influential presence of the benign spirit they were to typify, 
whether it were an actual divinity, or only a deified man. From 
the same wild source of idolatry, we see, sprung all the phrenzy 
of enchantment, witchcraft, and, in one word, magic; the vain 
resort of the magi, (the first magicians,) to support the unstable 
structure of their new and pernicious doctrines. We learn from 
Scripture, how early these perversions were introduced into 
the religious practices of the east; and in consequence of this 
apostacy from the pure faith of Noah, “ worshipping the one 
God in spirit and in truth,” Abraham was called from the land 
of Chaldea, to be in his own person, and that of his descendants, 
VOL. II. 
H 
