Note XI-21 — Chapter XI · GODS, SUPERNATURAL BEINGS, AND WORSHIP.

Mr Godfrey Higgins, in his Celtic Druids, p. 126, says: 'Few causes have been more powerful in producing mistakes in ancient history, than the idea, hastily taken up by Christians in all ages, that every monument of antiquity marked with a cross, or with any of those symbols which they conceived to be monograms of Christ, were of Christian origin.... The cross is as common in India as in Egypt, and Europe,' Mr Maurice, in his Indian Antiquities, vol. ii., p. 361, writes: 'Let not the piety of the Catholic Christian be offended at the preceding assertion that the cross was one of the most usual symbols among the hieroglyphics of Egypt and India.' The emblem of universal nature is equally honored in the Gentile and Christian world. 'In the cave at Elephanta, in India, over the head of the principal figure, again may be seen this figure (the cross), and a little in the front the huge Lingham (phallus).'