The very earliest literature of the Scandinavian people, preserved on the island of Iceland, adds many testimonies to the Scandinavians' Israelitish origin. On this point, the Encyclopaedia Britannica says: "On entering on these ancient books, we are immediately struck with the corroborative evidence which they furnish of the eastern origin of the Goths, the fathers of the Scandinavians. As all languages, so all mythologies run in lines, which converge in one common center, * * * Central Asia. And little as we might expect it, no sooner do we open the ancient religious books of Scandinavia than we are carried back thither. Our northern people are a people of eastern origin. Odin [C] and his Asar, are Asiatics, declare themselves to be from the great Svithiod, a country which appears to have been the present Circassia, lying between the Black and Caspian Seas. The whole of their memoirs abounded with the proofs of it. They brought with them abundant eastern customs, those of burning the dead, and burying under mounds. They practiced polygamy, looked back with imperishable affection to the great Svithiod, to the primitive district of Asgord and the city of Gudahem, or the home of the gods. They transferred a religion bearing the primal features of those of Persia, India and Greece, to the snowy mountains of Scandinavia." In reading the above we were strongly impressed with the geographical idea there expressed. Without any great stretch of the imagination we could easily consider the traditions regarding the great Svithiod, to refer to Media, the primitive district of Asgord, to be the dim remembrance of their first home in the land of promise, and Gudahem, the home of the gods, to be Jerusalem, the city of the great King. The parallel we consider to be very significant. [Footnote C: Rev. A. B. Grimaldi, M. A., states; "The Saxon kings traced themselves back to Odin, who was traced back in his descent from David, as may be seen in a very ancient MSS. in the Herald's College, London, and in Sharon Turner."] CHAPTER VI. _The Numerous Identifications Considered--Religion and Laws of the Ancient Northern Races--Free Masonry--Language_.