The Chaldaean religion even here is far from being mere Sabaeanism--the simple worship of the "host of heaven." The aether, the sun, the moon, and still more the five planetary gods, are something above and beyond those parts of nature.

Like the classical Apollo and Diana, Mars and Venus, they are real persons, with a life and a history, a power and an influence, which no ingenuity can translate into a metaphorical representation of phenomena attaching to the air and to the heavenly bodies.

It is doubtful, indeed, whether the gods of this class are really of astronomical origin, and not rather primitive deities, whose character and attributes were, to a great extent, fixed and settled before the notion arose of connecting them with certain parts of nature.

Occasionally they seem to represent heroes rather than celestial bodies; and they have all attributes quite distinct from their physical or astronomical character.
Secondly, the striking resemblance of the Chaldaean system to that of the Classical Mythology seems worthy of particular attention.

This resemblance is too general, and too close in some respects, to allow of the supposition that mere accident has produced the coincidence.