The work is the product of more than twenty years of research during which Higgins tried to uncover "a most ancient and universal religion from which all later creeds and doctrines sprang.

Among these was his theory that a secret religious order, which he labeled "Pandeism" (from Pans- or Pandu- referring to a family of Gods, appending with -ism), had continued from ancient times to the present day, stretching at least from Greece to India, and possibly having once covered the entire world.

Among the many theories presented in this book is that both the Celtic Druids and the Jews originated in India – and that the name of the Biblical Abraham is really a variation of the word Brahma, created by shifting the last letter to the beginning: Abrahma.

R. Taylor, A.M., the Deist, now in gaol, persecuted by the Whigs for his religious opinions, in his learned defense of Deism called the Diegesis, has clearly proved all the hierarchical institutions of the Christians to be a close copy of those of the Essenians of Egypt.

Cunti, the wife of Pandu (du or God, Pan), wife of the generative power, mother of the Pandavas or devas, daughter of Sura or Syra the Sun — Pandæa only daughter of Cristna or the Sun — Pandion,[6] who had by Medea a son called Medus, the king of the Medes, who had a cousin, the famous Perseus — surely all this is very mythological — an historical parable!

The term related by Higgins refers to a secret sect of worshipers of these "Pans", which was left in the wake of the collapse of an ancient empire that stretched from Greece (the home of Medea and Perseus) to India (where the Buddhists and the Brahmins coexist).

The exhaustive discussion above comparing "Pandeism" and "Pantheism", while valid, fails to disclose the main emphasis of his effort, which is to show that all religions are the same and from a lost, antediluvian, original source in which all characters are allegoric representations of the zodiac with the primary deity being the sun.

I of 'Anacalypsis': I think it right to warn my reader, that there are more passages than one in the book, which are of that nature, which will be perfectly understood by my Masonic friends, but which my engagements prevent me explaining to the world at large.

One author writes of a contemporary religious group in Bali (which is within the geographic realm of Pandeism described by Higgins): The empu uses a typical pedanda ketu, "crown" which is tall and red, and a ball.

[11]Kersey Graves, author of the 1875 book The World's 16 Crucified Saviours, derived "many of the most important facts collated in [his] work" from the Anacalypsis.