The doctrine of angels is one of the oldest in the world. It preceded that of the immortality of the soul. This is not surprising; philosophy is necessary to the belief that the soul of mortal man is immortal; but imagination and weakness are sufficient for the invention of beings superior to ourselves, protecting or persecuting us. Yet it does not appear that the ancient Egyptians had any notion of these celestial beings, clothed with an ethereal body and administering to the orders of a God. The ancient Babylonians were the first who admitted this theology. The Hebrew books employ the angels from the first book of Genesis downwards: but the Book of Genesis was not written before the Chaldæans had become a powerful nation: nor was it until the captivity of Babylon that the Jews learned the names of _Gabriel_, _Raphael_, _Michael_, _Uriel_, etc., which were given to the angels. The Jewish and Christian religions being founded on the fall of Adam, and this fall being founded on the temptation by the evil angel, the devil, it is very singular that not a word is said in the Pentateuch of the existence of the bad angels, still less of their punishment and abode in hell. The reason of this omission is evident: the evil angels were unknown to the Jews until the Babylonian captivity; then it is that Asmodeus begins to be talked of, whom Raphael went to bind in Upper Egypt; there it is that the Jews first hear of Satan. This word _Satan_ was Chaldæan; and the Book of Job, an inhabitant of Chaldæa, is the first that makes mention of him. The ancient Persians said Satan was an angel or genius who had made war upon the _Dives_ and the _Peris_, that is, the fairest of the East. Thus, according to the ordinary rules of probability, those who are guided by reason alone might be permitted to think that, from this theology, the Jews and Christians at length took the idea that the evil angels had been driven out of heaven, and that their prince had tempted Eve, in the form of a serpent. It has been pretended that Isaiah, in his fourteenth chapter, had this allegory in view when he said: _"Quornodo occidisti de cœlo, Lucifer, qui mane oriebaris?"_ "How hast thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning?" It was this same Latin verse, translated from Isaiah, which procured for the devil the name of Lucifer. It was forgotten that Lucifer signifies "that which sheds light." The words of Isaiah, too, have received a little attention; he is speaking of the dethroned king of Babylon; and by a common figure of speech, he says to him: "How hast thou fallen from heaven, thou brilliant star?"