12 Plutarch, _Isis et Osiris_, 21, 22, 38, 61; Diodorus Siculus, i. 27. 4; Dittenberger, _Orientis Graeci inscriptiones selectae_, i. No. 56, p. 102. 13 A. Wiedemann, _Die Religion der alten Aegypter_, pp. 59 _sq._; G. Maspero, _Histoire ancienne des peuples de l’Orient classique: les origines_, pp. 104-108, 150. Indeed it was an article of the Egyptian creed that every god must die after he had begotten a son in his own likeness (A. Wiedemann, _Herodots zweites Buch_, p. 204). Hence the Egyptian deities were commonly arranged in trinities of a simple and natural type, each comprising a father, a mother, and a son. “Speaking generally, two members of such a triad were gods, one old and one young, and the third was a goddess, who was, naturally, the wife, or female counterpart, of the older god. The younger god was the son of the older god and goddess, and he was supposed to possess all the attributes and powers which belonged to his father.... The feminine counterpart or wife of the chief god was usually a local goddess of little or no importance; on the other hand, her son by the chief god was nearly as important as his father, because it was assumed that he would succeed to his rank and throne when the elder god had passed away. The conception of the triad or trinity is, in Egypt, probably as old as the belief in gods, and it seems to be based on the anthropomorphic views which were current in the earliest times about them” (E. A. Wallis Budge, _The Gods of the Egyptians_, London, 1904, i. 113 _sq._). If the Christian doctrine of the Trinity took shape under Egyptian influence, the function originally assigned to the Holy Spirit may have been that of the divine mother. In the apocryphal _Gospel to the Hebrews_, as Mr. F. C. Conybeare was kind enough to point out to me, Christ spoke of the Holy Ghost as his mother. The passage is quoted by Origen (_Comment. in Joan. II._ vol. iv. col. 132, ed. Migne), and runs as follows: “My mother the Holy Spirit took me a moment ago by one of my hairs and carried me away to the great Mount Tabor.” Compare Origen, _In Jeremiam Hom._ XV. 4, vol. iii. col. 433, ed. Migne. In the reign of Trajan a certain Alcibiades, from Apamea in Syria, appeared at Rome with a volume in which the Holy Ghost was described as a stalwart female about ninety-six miles high and broad in proportion. See Hippolytus, _Refut. omnium haeresium_, ix. 13, p. 462, ed. Duncker and Schneidewin. The Ophites represented the Holy Spirit as “the first woman,” “mother of all living,” who was beloved by “the first man” and likewise by “the second man,” and who conceived by one or both of them “the light, which they call Christ.” See H. Usener, _Das Weihnachtsfest_, pp. 116 _sq._, quoting