Since then, the epidemic has reached the apex of the sacerdotal hierarchy. From the day when the founder of Christianity uttered the warning, that he who shall say to his brother, “Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell-fire,” all who have passed as its leaders, beginning with the ragged fishermen of Galilee, and ending with the jewelled pontiffs, have seemed to vie with each other in the invention of opprobrious epithets for their opponents. So we find Luther passing a final sentence on the Catholics, and exclaiming that “The Papists are all asses, put them in whatever form you like; whether they are boiled, roasted, baked, fried, skinned, hashed, they will be always the same asses.” Calvin called the victims he persecuted, and occasionally burned, “malicious barking dogs, full of bestiality and insolence, base corrupters of the sacred writings,” etc. Dr. Warburton terms the Popish religion “an impious farce,” and Monseigneur Dupanloup asserts that the Protestant Sabbath service is the “Devil’s mass,” and all clergymen are “thieves and ministers of the Devil.” The same spirit of incomplete inquiry and ignorance has led the Christian Church to bestow on its most holy apostles, titles assumed by their most desperate opponents, the “Hæretics” and Gnostics. So we find, for instance, Paul termed the vase of election “_Vas Electionis_,” a title chosen by _Manes_,[389] the greatest heretic of his day in the eyes of the Church, Manes meaning, in the Babylonian language, the chosen vessel or receptacle.[390] So with the Virgin Mary. They were so little gifted with originality, that they copied from the Egyptian and Hindu religions their several apostrophes to their respective Virgin-mothers. The juxtaposition of a few examples will make this clear. HINDU. _Litany of our Lady Nari: Virgin._ (_Also Devanaki._) 1. Holy Nari--Mariāma, Mother of perpetual fecundity. 2. Mother of an incarnated God--Vishnu (Devanaki). 3. Mother of Christna. 4. Eternal Virginity--Kanyabâva. 5. Mother--Pure Essence, Akasa. 6. Virgin most chaste--Kanya. 7. Mother Taumatra, of the _five_ virtues or elements. 8. Virgin Trigana (of the three elements, power or richness, love, and mercy). 9. Mirror of Supreme Conscience--Ahancara. 10. Wise Mother--Saraswati. 11. Virgin of the white Lotos, Pedma or Kamala. 12. Womb of Gold--Hyrania. 13. Celestial Light--Lakshmi. 14. Ditto. 15. Queen of Heaven, and of the universe--Sakti. 16. Mother soul of all beings--Paramatma. 17. Devanaki is conceived without sin, and immaculate herself. (According to the Brahmanic fancy.) EGYPTIAN. _Litany of our Lady Isis: Virgin._