er, the male power, in opposition to that of the Mother, or the
female power, constituted the religion of Moses. In the religion of the
Jews, Jehovah came to be regarded as wholly male and as spirit, while
Edam (translated "downward tending"), the female principle, was matter,
or woman, which finally became identified with the Devil.

The philosophical doctrine that spirit is evolved through matter, or
that matter must be raised to a certain dynamical power before spirit
can manifest itself through it, was no longer understood; only the husks
of this doctrine--the myths and symbols of Nature-worship--remained;
these were taken literally, and thus man's religion was made to conform
to his lowered estate.

When man had so far gained the ascendancy over woman as to assert that
he is the sole Creator of their joint offspring, he was no longer of the
earth earthy, but at once became the child of heaven. He was, however,
bound to earth through his association with matter, or with woman, from
whom he was unable to free himself. The "sons of God" were united "to
the daughters of man." Jahvah, the "God of hosts," who was revengeful,
weak, jealous, and cruel, was worshipped in the place of Aleim the
great dual force throughout Nature. The ethereal, spiritual male essence
resided somewhere in the heavens and created from afar, while the earth
(female) furnished only the body or material substance.

In the history of the god Seth is to be found a clue to the way in which
the sublime and philosophical doctrines of the ancients, after their
true meaning was forgotten, were finally changed so as to conform to the
enforced humiliation and degradation of women.

Seth or Typhon was for ages worshipped throughout Egypt, and as she
comprehended the powers of Nature, or the creative energy residing in
the sun and earth, little is heard of any other god. Strange it is,
however, that Seth is worshipped more in her capacity as Destroyer than
as Regenerator. So soon as we understand the origin and character of the
Devil, and so soon as we divest ourselves of the false ideas which under
a state of ignorance and gross sensuality came to prevail relative to
the "powers of darkness," we shall perceive that his (or her) Satanic
majesty was once a very respectable personage and a powerful Divinity--a
Divinity which was worshipped by a people whose superior intelligence
can scarcely be questioned. Regarding this subject Higgins remarks:

"Persons