Forlong - Rivers of Life

464
Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
were likewise symbols of Sol, long before that emblematic horn of Jupiter’s goat, which
he presented to his nurses as an infallible cure for all the ills of life.
From Ilioun proceeded all “Hot airs,” “Breaths,” “Holy Spirits,” and what the
Hebrew called Nep-esh. He was the “Bread of Life,” or “Loaf-afforder,” our Sar, Sir, or
Lord; and in Sarah—“the Lady”—we have his “Loaf-server,” or “the distributor of Sol’s
gifts.” In Sanskrit Sol is Soor, or Soor-ya, hardened by Greeks as in Kur, Kuros
(Cyrus) and in Kurious, “Lord”—the Solar term applied to Christ. The Latinized forms
were Cur, Curia, hence Quiritis, but even Greeks softened this initial into S, C, or S, as
in Suria, Seirioj, or Suria qea, the Dea Cœlestis or Dea Syria. 1 From Sar the Egyptian
probably got his Sait, Set, and Sais, and the tribe known as the Saitæ; so the Latins their Sol,
and old Romans their Sal and Sator, whom Germans made Seatur, and placed on a
fish with a wheel in one hand, and a vessel of water, fruit, and flowers in the other.
He whom Gaelic Kelts called Seul or Su-il, Welshmen and Armorikans said was Haul, a
name akin to the Hebrew Halal, “Resplendent one:” as well as to Helel a name for
Lucifer. Goths called him the Skainand, or Scheinend—shining or burning one, words
which rather describe than name him, like Helios from Heli, and Selas, meaning
splendour. Solos is “the round disk one.” 2 Sar-On, the lord of light, Hebrew srh
Harus, Horus, and such-like terms, having the meaning of light, splendour, golden, &c.,
are but combinations of Or, On, Ur, Ar, Ar, Aur, 3 &c. From the Amonian term Al-As,
or reversed and written As-El, the Greeks would readily write Alos, 4 Halos, or
Helos; Arabians called him Al-ak-or, or Ala-char; and the Latins named Sal,
Salum, Sanctuary, and all things salutary and sanatory 5 after him, for the earth and
its waters only gave forth to early man its most salutary alkali, when spread
out to bask in his rays. Sal, says Valpy, comes from the same Greek roots-Hals,
gen. Halos, as yielded Helios, and is a word of Amonian extraction. S seems the true
root of all the Sun’s names, to which are joined Rs, Ls, Jas or Js, Ms, or AMs, &c.; as
in S-ar, S-l, S-oor-ja, S-ms, and S-ams, which describe him as “lord of power,” heat, &c.
The Amonians of Crete, who founded the celebrated temple to the Sun at Salentium—
remarkable for spontaneous fires—were, as well as their town, called after him whom
they worshipped, as Man-Zan, or Menes-Sol, 6 for S and Z are interchangeable, and
Zan or Zon is the Akad Ze-an and the Aryan Z-e-us and Deus. 7 Babylonians called him
Za-On, and Ionians usually preferred Z to S. Hamites or Amites were called Za-Anim
after their deity, and thus Zanim are the Chus, Kus, Kooths, or Ethiopes. One
inscription to the Sun calls him “Semon (Sem-On, Cælestis Sol), and Sanctus; as in
“SANCTO. SACNO. SEMONI. DEO. FIDIO. SACRUM.” 8 Semo was Priapus, Janus, and
Vertumnus, that Sabine or Etruskan god of the seasons, and of gardeners—he who won
Pomona the fruitful one, but only after he had changed himself into a beautiful youth,
1 Bryant and Holwell, pp. 135, 136, 384. Ancient
Syria was called Shem’s land, that is Sham’s
land which the Greek recognise in Semnoj. Suroj
gar Ð `Hlioj. Copyists who took to writing C for
S, and C for K, have here complicated matters,
and perhaps infringed laws, but I am here only
concerned with facts.
2
Valpy’s Lat. Etym. Dict.
3
Holwell, p. 367 for Soter, p. 369.
4
P. 35.
5
Holwell, p. 365.
8
P. 365.
6
P. 365.
7
P. 364.