So far as heathenism is concerned, the following extracts from Potter and Athenæus speak distinctly enough: ‘Every person,’ says the former, ‘who came to the solemn sacrifices [of the Greeks] was purified by water. To which end, at the entrance of the temples, there was commonly placed a vessel full of holy water.’ How did this water get its holiness? This water ‘was consecrated,’ says Athenæus, ‘by putting into it a Burning Torch taken from the Altar.’ The _burning torch_ was the express symbol of the god of fire; and by the light of this torch, so indispensable for consecrating the ‘holy water,’ we may easily see whence came one great part of the purifying virtue of ‘the water of the loud resounding sea,’ which was held to be so efficacious in purging away the guilt and stain of sin,--even from the sun-god having taken refuge in its waters. Now this very same method is used in the Romish Church for consecrating the water for baptism. The unsuspicious testimony of Bishop Hay leaves no doubt on this point. ‘It,’ [the water kept in the baptismal font] says he, ‘is blessed on the eve of Pentecost, because it is the Holy Ghost who gives to the waters of baptism the power and efficacy of sanctifying our souls, and because the baptism of Christ is with the Holy Ghost and with fire.’[141] In blessing the waters a Lighted Torch is put into the font. “Here, then, it is manifest that the baptismal _regenerating_ water of Rome is consecrated just as the _regenerating_ and _purifying_ water of the pagans was. Of what avail is it for Bishop Hay to say, with a view of sanctifying superstition and ‘making apostasy plausible,’ that this is done ‘to represent the fire of divine love, which is communicated to the soul by baptism and the light of good example, which all who are baptized ought to give.’ This is the fair face put on the matter; but the fact still remains that while the Romish doctrine in regard to baptism is purely pagan, in the ceremonies connected with the papal baptism one of the essential rites of the ancient fire-worship is still practised at this day, just as it was practised by the worshippers of Bacchus, the Babylonian Messiah. As Rome keeps up the remembrance of the fire-god passing through the waters and giving virtue to them, so when it speaks of the ‘Holy Ghost _suffering_ for us in baptism,’ it in like manner commemorates the part which paganism assigned to the Babylonian goddess when she plunged into the waters. The sorrows of Nimrod, or Bacchus, when in the waters, were meritorious sorrows. The sorrows of his wife, in whom the Holy Ghost miraculously dwelt, were the same. The sorrows of the Madonna, then, when in these waters, fleeing from Typhon’s rage, were the birth-throes by which children were born to God. And thus, even in the Far West, Chalchivitlycue, the Mexican ‘goddess of the waters’ and ‘mother’ of