They did not at first tell it to the people; for whosoever should have spoken ill of onions and cats before priests and old women, would have been stoned; whosoever should have reproached certain of the Egyptians with eating their gods would himself have been eaten--as Juvenal relates that an Egyptian was in reality killed and eaten quite raw in a controversial dispute. What then did they do? Orpheus and others established mysteries, which the initiated swore by oaths of execration not to reveal--of which mysteries the principal was the adoration of a supreme God. This great truth made its way through half the world, and the number of the initiated became immense. It is true that the ancient religion still existed; but as it was not contrary to the dogma of the unity of God, it was allowed to exist. And why should it have been abolished? The Romans acknowledged the "_Deus optimus maximus_" and the Greeks had their Zeus--their supreme god. All the other divinities were only intermediate beings; heroes and emperors were ranked with the gods, i.e., with the blessed; but it is certain that Claudius, Octavius, Tiberius, and Caligula, were not regarded as the creators of heaven and earth. In short, it seems proved that, in the time of Augustus, all who had a religion acknowledged a superior, eternal God, with several orders of secondary gods, whose worship was called idolatry. The laws of the Jews never favored idolatry; for, although they admitted the Malachim, angels and celestial beings of an inferior order, their law did not ordain that they should worship these secondary divinities. They adored the angels, it is true; that is, they prostrated themselves when they saw them; but as this did not often happen, there was no ceremonial nor legal worship established for them. The cherubim of the ark received no homage. It is beyond a doubt that the Jews, from Alexander's time at least, openly adored one only God, as the innumerable multitude of the initiated secretly adored Him in their mysteries. THIRD QUESTION. It was at the time when the worship of a Supreme God was universally established among all the wise in Asia, in Europe, and in Africa, that the Christian religion took its birth. Platonism assisted materially the understanding of its dogmas. The "_Logos_," which with Plato meant the "wisdom," the reason of the Supreme Being, became with us the "word," and a second person of God. Profound metaphysics, above human intelligence, were an inaccessible sanctuary in which religion was enveloped.