“By means of omen tablets the Babylonian and Assyrian priests from time immemorial predicted events which they believed would happen in the near or in the remote future.  They deduced these omens from the appearance and actions of animals, birds, fish, and reptiles; from the appearance of the entrails of sacrificial victims; from the appearance and condition of human and animal offspring at birth; from the state and condition of various members of the human body.”

In India, where the records of the early ages of civilization go back hundreds of years, omens are considered of great importance.

Later, in Greece, the home of the greatest and highest culture and civilization, we find, too, omens regarded very seriously, while to-day there are vast numbers of persons of intellect, the world over, who place reliance upon omens.

That there is some good ground for belief in some omens seems indisputable.  Whether this has arisen as the result of experience, by the following of some particular event close upon the heels of signs observed, or whether it has been an intuitive science, in which provision has been used to afford an interpretation, is not quite clear.  It seems idle to attempt to dismiss the whole thing as mere superstition, wild guessing, or abject credulity, as some try to do, with astrology and alchemy also, and other occult sciences; the fact remains that omens have, in numberless instances, given good warnings.

To say that these are just coincidences is to beg the question.  For the universe is governed by law.  Things happen because they must, not because they may.  There is no such thing as accident or coincidence.  We may not be able to see the steps and the connections.  But they are there all the same.

In years gone by many signs were deduced from the symptoms of sick men; the events or actions of a man’s life; dreams and visions; the appearance of a man’s shadow; from fire, flame, light, or smoke; the state and condition of cities and their streets, of fields, marshes, rivers, and lands.  From the appearances of the stars and planets, of eclipses, meteors, shooting stars, the direction of winds, the form of clouds, thunder and lightning and other weather incidents, they were able to forecast happenings.  A number of tablets are devoted to these prophecies.

It is conceivable that many of these omens should have found their way into Greece, and it is not unreasonable to believe that India may have derived her knowledge of omens from Babylonia; or it may have been the other way about.  The greatest of scholars are divided in their opinions as to which really is the earlier civilization.

The point to be made here is that in all parts of the world—­in quarters where we may be certain that no trace of Grecian, Indian, or Babylonian science or civilization has appeared—­there are to be found systems of prophecies by omens.