distinctives, not of the Jewish, but of the Scythian | in the fourth year of the reign of Thothmes III. (Mat. tribes. It was under a king of the eighteenth dynasty Hierog., p. 4.-Manners and Customs, &c., vol. 1, p. that the Israelites went out from Egypt, namely, Ram- 54.) Vast, however, as was the glory of this line of ses V., the 16th monarch of the line. We have here, kings, it was eclipsed by the greater reputation of the in this eighteenth dynasty, the commencement of what chief of the next, or nineteenth dynasty, Ramses VI., may be properly termed the second period of Egyptian the famed Sesostris (called also Sesoosis or Sethos history. The names of the monarchs are given as fol- and likewise Egyptus, or Ramesses the Great.-Com lows by the aid of Champollion's discoveries: 1. pare Champollion, Syst. Hierogl., p. 224, seqq.). Se. Thoutmosis I., of whom there is a colossal statue in sostris regenerated, in some sense, his country and na the museum at Turin. 2. Thoutmosis II. (Amon- tion, by chasing from it the last remnant of the stran Mat), whose name appears on the most ancient parts ger-races which had dwelt within the borders of Egypt, of the palace of Karnac. 3. His daughter Amensi, by giving to the Egyptian territory certain fixed limits, who governed Egypt for the space of twenty-one years, by dividing it into nomes, and by giving a powerful and erected the greatest of the obelisks of Karnac. impulse to arts, to commerce, and to the spirit of conThis vast monolith is erected in her name to the god quest. One may see in Herodotus and Diodorus what Ammon, and the memory of her father. 4. Thout a strong remembrance his various exploits in Africa, mosis III., surnamed Meri, the Moeris of the Greeks. Asia, and perhaps even Europe, had left behind them. The remaining monuments of his reign are the pilaster His labours in Egypt are attested by numerous monuand granite halls of Karnac, several temples in Nubia, ments, not only from the Mediterranean to Syene, but the great Sphinx of the Pyramids, and the colossal ob- far beyond, in Ethiopia, which at this time probably elisk now in front of the church of St. John Lateran formed a portion of Egypt. (Champollion, Syst. Hieat Rome. 5. His successor was Amenophis I., who rogl., p. 239, 391.) The result of his military expewas succeeded by, 6. Thoutmosis IV. This king ditions was to enrich his country with the treasures of finished the temples of the Wady Alfa and Arnada, in Ethiopia, Arabia Felix, and India, and to establish a Nubia, which Amenoph had begun. 7. Amenophis communication with the countries of the East by means II., whose vocal statue, of colossus size, attracted the of fleets which he equipped on the Red Sea. That notice of the Greeks and Romans. (Vid. Memnon, the history of his conquests has been exaggerated by and Memnonium.) The most ancient parts of the pal- the priests of Egypt, whose interests he favoured, canace at Luxor, the temple of Cnouphis at Elephantine, not be denied. Equally apparent is it that his history the Memnonium, and a palace at Sohled, in Nubia, are bears some resemblance to the legends of Osiris. monuments of the splendour and piety of this monarch. These assimilations, however, of their heroes to their 8. Horus, who built the grand colonnade of the palace gods, were familiar to the priests of the land. (Vid. at Luxor. 9. Queen Amencheres, or Tmau-Mot, com- Sesostris.) This nineteenth dynasty, at the head of memorated in an inscription preserved in the museum which stands Sesostris, consisted of six kings, all of at Turin. 10. Ramses I., who built the hypostyle whom bear, upon monuments, the naine of Ramses, hall at Karnac, and excavated a sepulchre for himself with various distinguishing epithets. The last of these at Beban-el-Moulouk. 11 and 12. Two brothers is supposed to have been contemporary with the TroMandoueli and Ousirei. They have left monuments jan war, and to be the one called Polybus by Homer. of their existence, the last in the grand obelisk now in The twentieth dynasty of Manetho also took its title the Piazza del Popolo at Rome; the first, in the beau- from Thebes. Their names may still be read upon tiful palace at Kourna, and the splendid tomb discov- the temples of Egypt; but the extracts from Manetho ered by Belzoni. 13. Their successor caused the two do not give their epithets. In the failure of his testigreat obelisks at Luxor to be erected. This was the mony, Champollion Figeac has had recourse to the list second Ramses. 14. Ramses III. Of this king dedi- given by Syncellus. The chief of this dynasty is celcatory inscriptions are found in the second court of ebrated, under the name of Remphis, or Rempsinitus, the palace of Karnac, and his tomb still exists at for his great riches. Herodotus gives him, for his sucThebes. 15. Ramses IV., surnamed Mei-Amoun, cessor, Cheops, the builder of the largest of the Pyrabuilt the great palace of Medinet- Abou, and a temple mids. The same authority places Cephrenes, the buildnear the southern gate of Karnac. The magnificent er of the second Pyramid, next in order; and, after sarcophagus which formerly enclosed the body of this him, Mycerinus, for whom is claimed the erection of king, has been removed from the catacombs of Beban- the third Pyramid. The researches of the two Chamel-Moulouk, and is now in the Museum of the Louvre. pollions have not discovered any confirmation of He was succeeded by his son, 16. Ramses V., sur- this statement of the father of profane history. The named Amenophis, who is considered as the last of next dynasty, the twenty-first of Manetho, derived its this dynasty, and who was the father of Sesostris. name from Tanis, a city of Lower Egypt. It was The acts of none of the kings of this dynasty are com- composed of seven kings, the first of whom was the Menmemorated by the Greek historians, with the exception des of the Greek historians, the Smendis of Manetho, of Moeris. He is celebrated by them for a variety of whose name Champollion reads, upon the monument useful labours, and appears to have done much to pro- of his reign, Mandoutheph. He was the builder of the mote the prosperity of Egypt, particularly by form- fabric known in antiquity by the name of the labyrinth. ing a lake to receive the surplus waters of the Nile The other kings of this family are also commemorated. during the inundation, and to distribute them for ag- The account which has reached us of the building of ricultural purposes during its fall. (Vid. Moeris.) the labyrinth, throws great light upon the state of the The reign of Ramses Amenophis is the era of the Ex-government of Egypt during the reign of Mendes and odus. The Scripture narrative describes this event as connected with the destruction of a Pharaoh, and the chronological calculation adopted by Rossellini would make it coincide with the last year of this monarch's reign. Wilkinson and Greppo, however, maintain that we need not necessarily suppose the death of a king to coincide with the exit from Egypt, as the Scripture speaks, with the exception of one poetical passage, of the destruction of Pharaoh's host rather than of the monarch's own death. But in Rossellini's scheme, this departure from the received interpretation is not wanted. Wilkinson makes the exodus to have taken place

his successors. It was divided into as many separate compartments as there were nomes in Egypt, and in them, at fixed periods, assembled deputations, from each of these districts, to decide upon the most important questions. Hence we may infer, that, in the change of dynasty, the Egyptians had succeeded in the establishment of a limited monarchy, controlled like the constitutional governments of Europe, if not by the immediate representatives of the people, at least by the expression of the opinion of the notables. The ruins of Bubastis, in turn, present memorials of the reigns of the Bubastite kings. (Bulletin des Sciences Hist.

7, 472.) These succeeded the first dynasty of Ta- | Sphinges in the Louvre bear the legend of Nephereus nites; and we find Egypt again immediately connect- and his successor Achoris, who are also commemorated ed with Judea, and its history with that of the Scrip- by the sculptures of the temple of Elythya. In the Intures. Sesonchis, the head of this dynasty, was the stitute of Bologna there is a statue of the Mendesian conqueror of Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, and the Nepherites; and the names of the two Nectanebi, who plunderer of the treasures of David. This king, the succeeded him in the conduct of this national war, are Sesak of the second Book of Kings, built the great still extant on several buildings of the isle of Philæ, and temple of Bubastis, which is described by Herodotus, at Karnac, Kourna, and Saft. Darius Ochus, in spite and likewise the first court of the palace of Karnac at of the valiant resistance of these last kings, again reThebes. His son Osorchon (Zoroch), who also led duced Egypt to the condition of a Persian province; an army into Syria, continued the important works com- but his name is nowhere to be found among the remenced by his father. But their successor Takelliothis, mains yet discovered in Egypt. Thus, then, the reis only known to us by a simple funereal picture, con- searches of Champollion have brought to our view an secrated to the memory of one of his sons. This paint- almost complete succession of the kings of Egypt, from ing has been broken, and one half is preserved in the the invasion of the Hycsos to the final conquest by the Vatican, while the other forms a part of the royal col- Persians, whose empire fell to Alexander in 332 B.C. lection at Turin. Various buildings are found among It tallies throughout, in a remarkable manner, with the the ruins of Heliopolis, and still more among those of remains of the historian Manetho; and, by the aid of Tanis, constructed in the reigns of the Pharaohs of his series of dynasties, the gaps still left by hieroglyphic the second Tanite dynasty. (Bulletin des Sciences discoveries may be legitimately filled up. Before the Hist., 7, 472.) Upon these the names of three of them former era all is dark and obscure; in the next part have been deciphered, Petubastes, Osorthos, and we have little but a list of names; but, from the reign Psammos Champollion considers them as having of Psammiticus I., ample materials exist in the histoimmediately preceded the great Ethiopian invasion, ries of Herodotus and Diodorus; and from the reign which gave to Egypt a race of kings from that country. of Darius Ochus, the annals of Egypt become incorpoManetho, however, places Bocchoris between these two rated with those of Greece. Any farther reference, races, forming his twenty-fourth dynasty of one Saite. therefore, to the history of Egypt becomes superfluous The yoke of these foreign conquerors does not appear in this place. (Vid. Ptolemæus.) With regard, howto have been oppressive, as is evident from the number ever, to the discoveries of Champollion, the following of monuments that exist, not only in Ethiopia, but in interesting particulars may be stated. Philip AridaEgypt, bearing dedications made in the name of the us, the brother of Alexander, is commemorated at Karkings of this race, who ruled at the same time in both nac, and on the columns of the temple at Aschmouneim. countries. The names inscribed on these monuments The name of the other Alexander, the son of the conare Schabak, Sevekotheph, Tahrak, and Amenasa, all queror by Roxana, is engraved on the granite propylæa of whom are mentioned, either by Greek or sacred his- at Elephantine. Ptolemy Soter, and his son Ptolemy torians, under the names of Sabacon, Sevechus, Tha- | Philadelphus, have left the remembrance of their prosraca, and Ammeris. (Bulletin des Sciences Hist., ubi perous reigns in various important works. Euergetes supra.) No more than three of these kings are men- I. not only ruled over Egypt, but rendered his name tioned in the list of Manetho as belonging to this dy- celebrated by his military expeditions, both in Africa nasty, the last being included in that which follows. and Asia. His titles are, therefore, not only inscribed On the departure of the Ethiopians, the affairs of Egypt on the edifices constructed during his reign in Egypt, appear to have fallen into great disorder. This civil but are to be met with in Nubia, particularly on the discord was at last composed by Psammiticus I. Me-temple of Dakkhé; and the basso relievos, on a trimorials of his reign are found in the obelisk now on umphal gate constructed by him at Thebes, may be adMonte Litorio at Rome, and in the enormous columns mired even among the ancient relics of the magnifiof the first court of the palace of Karnac at Thebes. cence of the eighteenth dynasty. The temple of An(Bulletin des Sciences Hist., vol. 7, p. 471.) The topolis dates from the reign of Ptolemy Philopator and rule of Nechao II. is commemorated by several stela Arsinoë his wife. In his reign, too, the ancient palaces and statues. It was this monarch that took Jerusalem, of Karnac and Luxor, at Thebes, were repaired. Ptoleand carried King Jehoahaz into captivity. On the isle my Epiphanes, and his wife Cleopatra of Syria, dediof Phile are found buildings bearing the legend of cated one of the many temples of Philæ, as well as the Psammiticus II., as well as of Apries (the Hophra of temple of Edfou. Of the Roman emperors we find inScripture). An obelisk of his reign also exists at Rome. scribed in hieroglyphics the names and titles of AuThe greater part of the fragments of sculpture, scatter-gustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Vespaed among the ruins of Sais, bear the royal legend of sian, Titus, Domitian, Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, Marthe celebrated Amasis, and a monolith chapel of rose cus Aurelius, Lucius Verus, and Commodus. This granite, dedicated by him to the Egyptian Minerva, is last name is to be read four times among the inscripin the museum of the Louvre. Psammenitus was the tions of the temple of Esné; which, before this discovlast of this dynasty of Saites. Few tokens of his short ery, was considered to have been erected in an age far reign are extant, besides the inscription of a statue in more remote than is reached by any of our histories. the Vatican. He was defeated and dethroned by Cam- So far from this, it is, in truth, with but one exception, byses: nor did he long survive his misfortune. With the most modern of all the edifices yet discovered in him fell the splendour of the kingdom of Egypt; and the Egyptian style of architecture. Thus, then, as far from this date (525 B.C.), the edifices and monu- down as the year 180 of our present era, the worship ments assume a character of far less importance. Still, of the ancient Egyptian deities was publicly exercised, however, we find materials for history. Even the fe- and preserved all its external splendour; for the temrocious Cambyses is commemorated in an inscription ples of Dendera, Esné, and others constructed under on the statue of a priest of Sais, now in the Vatican. the Roman rule, are, for size and labour, if not for their The name of Darius is sculptured on the columns of style of art, well worthy of the ages of Egyptian indethe great temple of the Oasis; and in Egypt we still pendence. Previous to these discoveries, it had beread inscriptions dated in different years of the reigns come a matter of almost universal belief, that the arts, of Xerxes and Artaxerxes. (Bulletin des Sciences the writing, and even the ancient religion of Egypt, Hist., 7, 471.) During the reigns of the last three had ceased to be used from the time of the Persian conkings, a constant struggle was kept up by the Egyptians quest. (American Quarterly Rev., No. 7, p. 34, seqq. for their independence. The Persian yoke was for a Quarterly Journal of Science, &c., New Series, 1, moment shaken off by Amyrtæus and Nephereus. Two | 183, seqq.)

9. Egyptian Writing.

scholar of England, the late Dr. Young; the key found by him has been greatly improved, and applied with indefatigable perseverance, ingenuity, and skill to the monuments of Egypt, by the celebrated Champollion. (Quarterly Journal of Science, &c., New Series, vol. 1, p. 176, seqq.-Compare Edinburgh Review, Nos. 89 and 90.-American Quarterly Review, No. 2, p. 438, seqq.-Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 8, p. 438, seqq., and the Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 4, pt. 1, s. v. Egypt.-Wiseman's Lec

writing which they formed, became entirely lost, such notices on the subject as existed in the early historiIn writing their language, the ancient Egyptians em- ans being either too imperfect, or appearing too vague, ployed three different kinds of characters. First: fig- to furnish a clew, although frequently and carefully urative; or representations of the objects themselves. studied for the purpose. The repossession of this Secondly: symbolic; or representations of certain knowledge will form, in literary history, one of the most physical or material objects, expressing metaphorically, remarkable distinctions, if not the principal one, of the or conventionally, certain ideas; such as, a people age in which we live. It is due primarily to the disobedient to their king, figured, metaphorically, by a covery by the French, during their possession of Egypt, bee; the universe, conventionally, by a beetle. Third- of the since well-known monument, called the Rosetta ly: phonetic, or representative of sounds, that is to say, Stone, which, on their defeat and expulsion by the strictly alphabetical characters. The phonetic signs British troops, remained in the hands of the victors, were also portraits of physical and material objects; was conveyed to England, and deposited in the Britand each stood for the initial sound of the word in the ish Museum. On this monument the same inscription Egyptian language which expressed the object por- is repeated in the Greek and in the Egyptian language, trayed: thus a lion was the sound L, because a lion being written in the latter both in hieroglyphics and in was called Labo; and a hand a T, because a hand the demotic or enchorial character. The words Ptolewas called Tot. The form in which these objects my and Cleopatra, written in hieroglyphics, and recogwere presented, when employed as phonetic charac- nised by means of the corresponding Greek of the ters, was conventional and definite, to distinguish Rosetta inscription, and by a Greek inscription on the them from the same objects used either figuratively or base of an obelisk at Philæ, gave the phonetic characsymbolically. Thus, the conventional form of the ters of the letters which form those words: by their phonetic T was the hand open and outstretched. In means the names were discovered, in hieroglyphic wriany other form the hand would be either a figurative or ting, on the monuments of all the Grecian kings and a symbolic sign. The number of distinct characters Grecian queens of Egypt, and by the comparison of employed as phonetic signs appears to have been about these names one with another, the value of all the pho120; consequently, many were homophones, or hav-netic characters was finally ascertained. The first step ing the same signification. The three kinds of char-in this great discovery was made by a distinguished acters were used indiscriminately in the same writing, and occasionally in the composition of the same word. The formal Egyptian writing, therefore, such as we see it still existing on the monuments of the country, was a series of portraits of physical and material objects, of which a small proportion had a symbolical meaning, a still smaller proportion a figurative meaning, but the great body were phonetic or alphabetical signs and to these portraits, sculptured or painted with sufficient fidelity to leave no doubt of the object represented, the name of hieroglyphics or sacred char-tures, p. 255, seqq.) acters has been attached from their earliest historic notice. The manuscripts of the same ancient period make us acquainted with two other forms of writing practised by the ancient Egyptians, both apparently distinct from the hieroglyphic, but which, on careful examination, are found to be its immediate derivatives; every hieroglyphic having its corresponding sign in the hieratic, or writing of the priests, in which the funeral rituals, forming a large portion of the manuscripts, are principally composed; and in the demotic, called also the enchorial, which was employed for all more ordinary and popular usages. The characters of the hieratic are, for the most part, obvious running imitations or abridgments of the corresponding hieroglyphics; but in the demotic, which is still farther removed from the original type, the derivation is less frequently and less obviously traceable. In the hieratic, fewer figurative or symbolic signs are employed than in the hieroglyphic; their absence being supplied by means of the phonetic or alphabetical characters, the words being spelt instead of figured; and this is still more the case in the demotic, which is, in consequence, almost entirely alphabetical. After the conversion of the Egyptians to Christianity, the ancient mode of writing their language fell into disuse; and an alphabet was adopted in substitution, consisting of the twenty-five Greek letters, with six additional signs expressing articulations and aspirations unknown to the Greeks, the characters for which were retained from the demotic. This is the Coptic alphabet, in which the Egyptian appears as a written language in the Coptic books and manuscripts preserved in our libraries; and in which, consequently, the language of the inscriptions on the monuments may be studied. The original mode in which the language was written having thus fallen into disuse, it happened at length that the signification of the characters, and even the nature of the system of

10. Animal Worship.

There was no single feature in the character and customs of the ancient Egyptians which appeared to foreigners so strange and portentous as the religious worship paid to animals. The pompous processions and grotesque ceremonies of this celebrated people excited the admiration of all spectators, and their admiration was turned into ridicule on beholding the object of their devotions. It was remarked by Clemens (Pædag. lib. 3) and Origen (adv. Cels. 3, p. 121), that those who visited Egypt approached with delight its sacred groves, and splendid temples, adorned with superb vestibules and lofty porticoes, the scenes of many solemn and mysterious rites. "The walls," says Clemens," shine with gold and silver, and with amber, and sparkle with the various gems of India and Ethiopia; and the recesses are concealed by splendid curtains. But if you enter the penetralia, and inquire for the image of the god for whose sake the fane was built, one of the Pastophori, or some other attendant on the temple, approaches with a solemn and mysterious aspect, and, putting aside the veil, suffers you to peep in and obtain a glimpse of the divinity. There you behold a snake, a crocodile, or a cat, or some other beast, a fitter inhabitant of a cavern or a bog than a temple." The devotion with which their sacred animals were regarded by the Egyptians, displayed itself in the most whimsical absurdities. It was a capital crime to kill any of them voluntarily (Herod. 2, 65); but if an ibis or a hawk were accidentally destroyed, the unfortunate author of the deed was often put to death by the multitude, without form of law. In order to avoid suspicion of such an impious act, and the speedy fate which often ensued, a man who chanced to meet with the carcass of such a bird began immediately to wail and lament with the utmost vociferation, and to protest

that he found it already dead. (Diodorus Siculus, 1, 83.) When a house happened to be set on fire, the chief alarm of the Egyptians arose from the propensity of the cats to rush into the flames over the heads or between the legs of the spectators: if this catastrophe took place, it excited a general lamentation. At the death of a cat, every inmate of the house cut off his eyebrows; but at the funeral of a dog, he shaved his head and whole body. (Herod. 2, 66.) The carcasses of all the cats were salted, and carried to Bubastus to be interred (Herod. 2, 67); and it is said that many Egyptians, arriving from warlike expeditions to foreign countries, were known to bring with them dead cats and hawks, which they had met with accidentally, and had salted and prepared for sepulture with much pious grief and lamentation. (Diod. Sic. 1, 83.) In the extremity of famine, when they were driven by hunger to devour each other, the Egyptians were never accused of touching the sacred animals. Every nome in Egypt paid a particular worship to the animal that was consecrated to its tutelar god; but there were certain species which the whole nation held in great reverence. These were the ox (vid. Apis), the dog, and the cat; the hawk and the ibis; and the fishes termed oxyrhynchus and lepidotus. (Strabo, 812.) In each nome the whole species of animals, to the worship of which it was dedicated, was held in great respect; but one favoured individual was selected to receive the adoration of the multitude, and supply the place of an image of the god. Perhaps this is not far from the sense in which Strabo distinguishes the sacred from the divine animals. Thus, in the nome of Arsinoë, where crocodiles were sacred, one of this species was kept in the temple and worshipped as a god. He was tamed and watched with great care by the priests, who called him "Suchos," and he ate meat and cakes which were of fered to him by strangers. (Strabo, 811.) In the same neighbourhood there was a pond appropriated to the feeding of crocodiles, with which it was filled, the Arsinoites carefully abstaining from hunting any of them. Sacred bulls were kept in several towns and villages, and nothing was spared that seemed to contribute to the enjoyment of these horned gods, which were pampered in the utmost luxury. Among insects, the cantharus, scarabæus, or beetle, was very celebra-imal worship to the policy of kings, and to their seekted as an object of worship. Plutarch says it was an ing to divide their subjects by giving them different emblem of the sun; but Horapollo is more particu- objects of religious veneration, is an awkward applicalar, and informs us that there were three species of tion of the system of Euhemerus, according to which sacred beetles, of which one was dedicated to the god all religions were nothing in effect but civil instituof Heliopolis, or the Sun; another was sacred to the tions, the offspring of skilful legislators. Fetichism Moon; and a third to Hermes or Thoth. The reasons has been anterior to all positive law. Favoured by the he assigns for the consecration of this insect are de- interests of a particular class, it has been enabled, it is rived from the notions entertained respecting its mode true, to prolong itself during a state of civilization and of reproduction and its habits, in which the Egyptians by the force of authority; but it must spring originally traced analogies to the movements of the heavenly and freely from the very bosom of barbarism. Equally bodies. It was believed that all these insects were of untenable is the position, which supposes, that the the male sex. The beetle was said to fecundate a Egyptians were induced to pay divine honours to aniround ball of earth, which it formed for the purpose. mals, out of gratitude for the benefits which they deIn this they saw a type of the sun, in the office of dem-rived from them; to the cow and the sheep, for the iurgus, or as forming and fecundating the lower world. (Horapoll. Hieroglyph. 1, 10.-Plut. de Is. et Os., p. 355.-Porphyr. de Abstin., lib. 4.-Euseb. Prop. Evang. 3, 4.) Nor was the adoration of the Egyptians confined to animals merely. Many plants were regarded as mystical or sacred, and none more so than the lotus, of which mention has already been made, in the section that treats of the fertility of Egypt. In the lotus, or nymphæa nelumbo, which throws its flow-mankind, received their appropriate honours, and were ers above the surface of the water, the Egyptians found an allusion to the sun rising from the surface of the ocean, and it is on the blossom of this plant that the infant Harpocrates is represented as reposing. The peach-tree was also sacred to Harpocrates; and to him the first fruits of lentils and other plants were of fered, in the month Mesori. It is well known, too, that the Egyptians worshipped the onion. Plutarch refers

this superstition to a fancied relation between this plant and the moon. Leeks also, and various legumina, were held in similar veneration. (Minutius Felix, p. 278.) The acacia and the heliotrope are said to have been among the number of those plants that were consecrated to the sun. (Compare Kircher's Edipus, 3, 2.) The laurel was regarded as the most noble of all plants. We learn from Clemens Alexandrinus that there were thirty-six plants dedicated to the thirty-six genii, or decans, who presided over their portions of the twelve signs of the zodiac. (Prichard's Analysis of Egyptian Mythology, p. 301, seqq.)

11. Explanation of Animal Worship. The origin of animal worship, and the reasons or motives which induced the Egyptians to represent their gods under such strange forms, or to pay divine honours to irrational brutes, and even to the meanest objects in nature, is an inquiry which has occupied the attention of the learned in various times. Herodotus pretended to be in possession of more information on this subject than he chose to make public. It has been conjectured that he was desirous of concealing his ignorance under a cloak of mystery. The later Greek writers seem to have been more intent on offering excuses for the follies of the Egyptians, than on unfolding the real principles of their mythology; and we find various and contradictory opinions maintained with equal confidence. It appears, indeed, that the Egyptian priests themselves, in the time of the Ptolemies, and at the era of the Roman conquest, were by no means agreed on this subject. To endeavour to explain it by a reference to the metamorphoses which the gods underwent, when they fled from Typhon and sought concealment under the forms of animals, is to account for an absurdity by a fable. To go back, as some do, to the standards, or banners, borne by the different tribes or communities that formed the component parts of the earlier population, is to invert the order of ideas. A people may choose for a standard the representation of an object which they adore; but they will not be found to adore any particular object because they may have chosen it for a standard or banner. The opinion, on the other hand, which refers an

clothing and sustenance which they afford; to the dog, for his care in protecting their houses against thieves; to the ibis, for delivering their country from serpents; and to the ichneumon, for destroying the eggs of the crocodile. This conjecture is refuted by the wellknown fact, that a variety of animals which are of no apparent utility, and even several species which are noxious and destructive, and the natural enemies of

regarded with as much reverence as the more obviously useful members of the animal creation. The shrewmouse, the pike, the beetle, the crow, the hawk, the hippopotamus, can claim no particular regard for the benefits they are known to confer on the human race; still less can the crocodile, the lion, the wolf, or the venomous asp urge any such pretension. Yet we have seen that all these creatures, and others of a sim

tal corporations will never seek to change the objects of vulgar adoration; on the contrary, they will consecrate the worship that is paid them, and will give that worship more of pomp and regularity. They will seek, above all, to make the intervention of the sacerdotal caste a necessary requisite in every ceremony; they will then attach, in a mystic sense, these material obsult will be a system of religion precisely similar to that of Egypt, with Fetichism for its basis, the worship of the heavenly bodies for its outward characteristic, and within, a science founded on astronomy, and by the operation of which the fetichs, that serve as gods for the people, become merely symbols for the priests. It was thus that the priests of Meroë, in sending forth their sacerdotal colonies, carefully observed the rule of attaching to themselves the natives among whom they chanced to come, by adopting a part of their external worship, and by assigning to the animals which these natives adored a place in the temples erected by them, which thence became the common sanctuaries and the centres of religion for all. To invert the order to which we have just alluded is a palpable error. What had been for a long time acknowledged for a sign or symbol, could not, on a sudden, be transformed into a god; but it is easy to conceive how that which passes for a god with the mass of the people may become an allegory or emblem with a more enlightened caste. Apis, for example, owed to certain spots, at first fortuitous, afterward renewed by art, the honour of being one of the signs of the zodiac. The salacity of the goat made it a type of the great productive power in nature. The cat was indebted to its glossy fur, and the ibis to its equivocal colour, which appeared, as it were, something intermediate between the night and the day, for being symbols of the moon; the falcon became one of the year, and the scarabæus of the sun. The case was the same with trees and plants, fetichs no less highly revered than animals. The leaves of the palm, the longevity of which tree seemed a special privilege from on high, adorned the couches of the priests, because this tree, putting forth branches every month, marks the renewal of the lunar cycle. (Diod. Sic. 1, 34.-Plin. 13, 17.) The lotus, known also as a sacred plant to the people of India, the cradle of Brahma (Maurice, Hist. of Indost. 1, 60), as well as that of Harpocrates; the persea, brought from Ethiopia by a sacerdotal colony (Diod. Sic. I. c.--Schol. in Nicandr. Therapeut. v. 764); the amoglossum, whose seven sides recall to mind the seven planets; and which was styled, on this account, the glory of the skies (Kircher, Ed. Egypt. 3, 2); the onion, whose pellicles were thought to resemble so many concentric spheres, and which was therefore viewed as a vegetable image of the universe, always different and yet always the same, and where each part served as the rep

ilar description, were worshipped by the Egyptians | perceive, remarks Heeren (Ideen, vol. 2, p. 664), the with the most profound devotion: nay, mothers even worship of animals from Ethiopia to Senegal, among rejoiced when their children were devoured by croco-nations completely uncivilized. Why, then, seek for a diles. It may be farther observed, that some of those different origin among the Egyptians? Place among animals which afford us food and raiment, and which the African negroes of the present day corporations of are, on that account, among the most serviceable, were priests arrived at the knowledge of the movement of rendered of little or no utility to the Egyptians on ac- the heavenly bodies, and preserving in their sanctuary count of this very superstition. They regarded it as un- this branch of human science screened from the curilawful to kill oxen for the sake of food, and not only ab-osity of the uninitiated and profane. These sacerdostained from slaughtering the sheep, but likewise, under a variety of circumstances, from wearing any garment made of its wool, which was regarded as impure, and defiling the body that was clothed with it. These considerations seem to prove, that the adoration of animals among the Egyptians was not founded on the advantages which mankind derive from them. Another attempt at explaining this mystery, which re-jects of worship to their hidden science; and the receives greater countenance from the general character of the Egyptian manners and superstition, is the conjecture of Lucian. (De Astrolog-ed. Bip., vol. 5, p. 218.) This writer pretends, that the sacred animals were only types or emblems of the asterisms, or of those imaginary figures or groups into which the ancients had, at a very early period, distributed the stars; distinguishing them by the names of living creatures and other terrestrial objects. According to Lucian, the worshippers of the bull Apis adored a living image of the celestial Taurus; and Anubis represented the Dog-star or the constellation of Sirius. This hypothesis has received more attention than any other among modern writers. Dupuis has made it the basis of a very ingenious attempt to explain the mythologue of Isis and Osiris, and several other fables of antiquity, which this author resolves into astronomical figments, or figurative accounts of certain changes in the positions of the heavenly bodies. (Origine de tous les Cultes, 2, 270, seqq., ed. 1822.) The hypothesis of Lucian, however, will not endure the test of a rigid scrutiny. For if we examine the constellations of the most ancient spheres, we find but few coincidences between the zodia or celestial images, and that extensive catalogue of brute creatures which were adored as divinities on the banks of the Nile. Where, for example, shall we discover the ibis, the cat, the hippopotamus, or the crocodile? Besides, if we could trace the whole series of deified brutes in the heavens, it would still remain doubtful, whether the Egyptian animals were consecrated subsequently to the formation of the sphere, as types or images of the constellations; or the stars distributed into groups, and these groups named with reference to the quadrupeds, birds, and fishes that were already regarded as sacred. There are, indeed, many circumstances which might render the latter alternative the more probable. But the relation between the animals of the sphere and those of the Egyptian temples are by far too limited to warrant any such speculation; and Lucian, moreover, is an author who is by no means deserving of much credit on a subject of this nature. Porphyry, in his conjectures, approaches nearer the truth. The divinity, according to him, embraces all beings; he resides, therefore, in animals also, and man adores him wherever he is found. In other words, the worship of animals was intimately connected, according to this writer, with the doctrine of emanation. (Porphyr. de Abstinentia, 4, 9.-Compare Eusebius, Prap. Evang. 3, 4.) This explana-resentative of the whole; all these became so many tion, however, does not go far enough. It takes no notice of that peculiar combination by which the worship of animals is made to assume a regular form, and to continue itself long after man has placed the deity far above the limits of physical existence.-The discovery of a mode of worship among certain savage tribes in our own days, perfectly analogous to the system of animal adoration which prevailed among the Egyptians, furnishes us with a certain clew amid these conflicting hypotheses, and that clew is Fetichism. We

symbols having more or less connexion with astronomical science. In them the people beheld the objects of ancient adoration, and the priests characteristics that enabled them to mark out and perpetuate their scientific discoveries. To these elements of worship was added, without doubt, the influence of localities, that at one time disturbed by partial differences the uniformity which the sacred caste were desirous of establishing, and at another associated with the rites, that had reference to the general principles of astronomical