Travels in the Mogul Empire (Bernier) 6.7.1

6.7.1

Other Pendets again gave me a more refined interpretation. They said that the incarnations or apparitions mentioned in their books, having a mystic sense, and being intended to explain the various attributes of God, ought not to be understood literally. Some of the most learned of those Doctors frankly acknowledged to me that nothing can be conceived more fabulous than all the incarnations, and that they were only the invention of legislators for the sake of retaining the people in some sort of religion. On the supposition that our souls are portions of the deity, a doctrine common to all Gentiles, must not (observed the Pendets) the reality of those incarnations, instead of being made a mysterious part of religion, be exploded by sound philosophy? for, in respect of our souls, we are God, and therefore it would in fact be ourselves who had imposed upon ourselves a religious worship, and a belief in the transmigration of souls, in paradise, and in hell, — which would be absurd.