The earliest departures from the straight and narrow path to the lives that are eternal, appear to have been made in Chaldea and Egypt. In the former land, Nimrod was one of the first leaders in apostacy and wickedness.[A] These evils so rapidly spread, that as early as the days of Melchizedec and Abraham, the worship of false deities and idols seems to have become almost universal; and even those who did not worship graven images, the starry hosts of heaven, or the forces of nature, had so far perverted the principles of the Gospel, that they taught numerous soul destroying errors, totally inconsistent with the plan devised by heaven. In Egypt the apostacy began, and an unauthorized priesthood was established as early as the days of the grandson of Ham. The origin of this defection is explained in the Book of Abraham, as follows: [Footnote A: Josephus' Antiquities, Book I, Chap. 4.] "Now the first government of Egypt was established by Pharaoh, the eldest son of Egyptus, the daughter of Ham, and it was after the manner of the government of Ham, which was Patriarchal. Pharaoh being a righteous man, established his kingdom and judged his people wisely and justly all his days, seeking earnestly to imitate that order established by the fathers in the first generations, in the days of the first Patriarchal reign, even in the reign of Adam, and also of Noah, his father, who blessed him with the blessings of the earth, and with the blessings of wisdom, but cursed him as pertaining to the Priesthood. "Now, Pharaoh being of that lineage by which he could not have the right of Priesthood, notwithstanding the Pharaohs would fain claim it from Noah, through Ham." As the idolatries of Chaldea and Egypt gave marked tone and color to the mythologies of the dominant races of antiquity on the eastern hemisphere, we shall not trace the growth and development of the religions of Persia, Greece, Rome, etc., through their various branches and ramifications. Such an effort would require a volume; but we shall confine ourselves simply to a brief consideration of the doctrine of the atonement, as understood by the ancient Gentile nations; referring only to such other theories and ideas as have naturally a bearing on that doctrine.