and as he is the sun, or the incarnation of the sun, the rising
and setting of this luminary depict the constantly dying and
regenerating God of Nature, the same as do the changing seasons.
A similar idea reappears in their system of the renewal of worlds
and reincarnation.

Regarding the doctrine of the eternity of matter held by the
ancients, Origen mentions a belief of the Egyptians that the

"world or its substance was never produced, but that it has
existed from all eternity. Neither is there any such thing as
death. Those who perish about us every day are simply changed,
either they take on other forms or are removed to some other
place. God cannot be destroyed, and as all things are parts of
the Deity everything lives and has always lived, seeming death
being simply change. Remnants of these doctrines are found in
every portion of the globe; among the Mexicans of the west as
well as among the rude mountaineers of the Burman Empire."

While contemplating the philosophical speculations of an ancient
race Bailly gave expression to the belief, that a "profoundly
learned race of people existed previous to the formation of any
of our systems." The wiser among the Greek philosophers, those
who, it is believed, borrowed their philosophical doctrines from
the East, declare that "there is no production of anything which
was not before; no new substance made which did not really
pre-exist." Equally with matter was spirit indestructible. "Our
soul," says Plato, "was somewhere, before it came to exist in
this present form; whence it appears to be immortal. . . .
Who knows whether that which is demonstrated living, be not