Forlong - Rivers of Life

Sun Worship.
the outward expression of their inmoſt and holieſt feelings; hence to me have
men offered their beſt—the firſt fruit of the earth and of marriage; and afterwards,
as ‘knowledge increased,’ prayers and praises, the higheſt devotional
thoughts of their nature.
But enough, we now know the claims which the Solar Deity makes for himself
and his adherents, and probably most persons who steadily read these volumes through,
will acknowledge, that though there is here necessarily assertion, there is little hyperbole,
much curious parallelism, and a great number of strong facts and ideas capable of being
powerfully sustained, though here condensed into as small a compass as possible.
To get at the history of my first six streams, I have been obliged to write this
work backwards as it were, taking the clearly known facts regarding peoples and nations,
and sifting these minutely in order to reach my six early Roots. The task has therefore
been heavy, and I am conscious of many shortcomings, for which, however, I ask
no quarter. History and truth are too precious to permit of our tolerating untruth,
and I have no doubt my errors will be ruthlessly exposed, and Truth—the object we
all have in view, however imperfect our idea of such may be—furthered. I have endeavoured
by careful deductions from the names of sacred places, deities and myths;
from all prayers and hymns addressed to gods, demi-gods, and heroes; from all the
symbolism we find in worship, rites, and insignia of worship; from all the books,
priests, and learned men I have ever come across, to get at the original roots of faiths, as
these were excogitated by untutored man. The result, however defective, is now placed
before my fellows, simply as a contribution in aid of Truth. It seems a false idea of
our cosmogony, and a debasing one of the Almighty, to imagine that He made man
perfect in all moral purity, and then permitted him to become debased and vile, thus
purposely marring His own beauteous work. Can it be reasonably imagined that the
Omniscient created this world, and other far-off Solar systems, only for man—whether
represented by a rude tribe of wandering Arabs, or by the great nations of antiquity?
These have all passed away, leaving behind them only the faintest traces of their existence,
and giving no sign or whisper whatever from that dread shore beyond the grave;
whilst He, His works, and celestial systems, remain as of old, mute, constant, and
incomprehensible.
Most of my readers will readily acknowledge that Sun-worhip is but one
of the phases or sects of the great family of Phallic Faiths. Sol is the fire of
heaven which lighteth the generative fires of earth, the genial parent who reneweth in
its season all nature, and giveth fertility to both animal and vegetal creation,
and which therefore came to be worshipped as the giver of procreative power. In
all countries advanced beyond the rudest fetishism, the Sun has been more or
less identified with the Great Creator, and the creating organs—things the rudest
people were deeply cognisant of before they could read the heavens, or grasp
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