TREATY OF ISIS AND OSIRIS.

ΠΕΡΙ ΙΣΙΔΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΟΣΙΡΙΔΟΣ .

Plutarch

French translation: Victor BÉTOLAUD


[1] Undoubtedly, Cléa, sensible people must implore from the Gods all possible good; but it is principally to the knowledge of the Gods themselves, as far as human intelligence can reach, that we must attach ourselves, and this is what we must ask of them above all things. Man can receive nothing greater, Divinity can bestow nothing more precious than truth. All the rest, God gives it to men to provide for their needs; but reason and prudence are attributes which are proper to him, attributes which he uses exclusively, and which he is willing to share with us. It is, in fact, neither silver nor gold which constitutes the happiness of the master of the Gods, it is neither thunder nor lightning which establish his strength: it is science, it is wisdom;and Homer never spoke of the Immortals with more truth than when he said:

They have the same country, they have the same birth, But the eldest, Jupiter, comes first through science.

The poet proclaims the superiority of Jupiter as more august, because it is based on science and wisdom. I also think that the happiness of immortality, this divine privilege, consists in this, namely that nothing that is escapes the knowledge of God. if he did not know everything, if he were not reason itself, his immortality would not be an existence: it would only be a duration of time.

[2] Thus, it is to aspire to the divine condition to aspire to the truth, and above all to the truth with regard to the Gods. This kind of study and research is a kind of initiation into the mysteries: a way of becoming initiated, more edifying than all the purifications, than all the possible priesthoods. She is also sovereignly approved by the goddess to whom you, Clea, have dedicated a special cult. What distinguishes her indeed is wisdom, and her love for wisdom. Moreover, the name she bears seems to say that to no other more than to her is knowledge and science suited. Indeed Isis is a Greek word as well as the name given to the enemy of this goddess. Typhon, (the Inflated), is so called because he is full of ignorance and error: he seeks to mutilate,to obscure the holy word.

But the Goddess knows how to maintain this word in its unity and as a whole, at the same time as she communicates it to those who devote themselves to her worship. Thanks to a constantly moderate diet, abstinence from many foods and the pleasures of love, it deadens in them the ardor of passions and sensuality. Free from softness, she accustoms them to firmly persist in holy adoration. They experience only one desire: the goal of their vows is the knowledge of the primary Being, of the sovereign Being, of the Being who is a pure intelligence, who lives with the Goddess, who lives in her; and Isis invites him to come and fetch him from her.The very name given to the temple of the Goddess clearly announces that she is the science and the knowledge of what is.

[3] That's not all. Several authorities want Isis to be the daughter of Mercury; others, not less numerous, that it owes the day to Prometheus. Some rely on what the latter passes for having discovered wisdom and foresight; the others, on the fact that Mercury is reputed to be the inventor of writing and music. This is why among the Muses who meet at Hermopolis, the first is named both Isis and Justice, to indicate, as we have said, that she is learned, and that she reveals the divine things to those who by their love of truth and justice deserve to be called Hieraphoros and Hierostoles. The first are those who possess the sacred doctrines relating to the Gods pure of all superstition and all miserable practice,carry them in their soul as in a holy ark. The latter, to indicate that these doctrines are partly obscure and gloomy, partly evident and luminous, don a sacred costume, the whole of which conforms to this allegory. By the care taken to cover the priests of Isis with these garments after their death, it is made clear that the divine word is with them, and that they pass into the next life with this word and nothing else. thing. Because what makes philosophers, O Cléa, is neither the habit of maintaining a long beard, nor the coat. Nor is it the linen robe or the custom of shaving that constitutes the priests of Isis. The true Isiac is he who, after having received, by the legal means of tradition,

[4] Most men do not know where this very common and simple practice originated, namely, why the priests of Egypt stripped their hair and wore linen garments. There are some who do not take the slightest trouble to know anything about it; others believe that it is out of respect for the sheep that the priests abstain from the wool of these animals as well as they reject their flesh; that if they shave their heads, it is as a sign of mourning; that if they wear linen clothes, it is because of the color, because the flower of this plant is of a shade similar to that of the azure vault which surrounds the world. Now all these usages are explained by the same reason, which is the only true one. As Plato says,contact with what is pure is forbidden to all that is not.

The residue of food, and in general all that is secretion, is filthy and impure; and it is a secretion which gives birth and development to wool, to hair, to hair, to nails. It would therefore be ridiculous for the priests of Isis, shaving their hair for the exercise of worship, and keeping their whole bodies perfectly smooth, to wear the skins of animals for clothing. For when Hesiod says somewhere: shaving their hair for the exercise of worship, and keeping their whole body perfectly smooth, wore the skins of animals for clothing. For when Hesiod says somewhere:shaving their hair for the exercise of worship, and keeping their whole body perfectly smooth, wore the skins of animals for clothing. For when Hesiod says somewhere:

In the tree with five branches that the iron does not go
we must see in these words a lesson, which recommends us to be purified from scrolls of this kind by celebrating festivals, and not to use the time of holy ceremonies to clean ourselves and get rid of all our filth. For flax, it is a product of the earth which is immortal; it gives a fruit good to eat; it furnishes a simple and clean garment, which covers without weighing it down, which is comfortable in all seasons, and which, it is said, never breeds vermin. Moreover, this will be the subject of another treaty.

[5] The priests of Isis have such a repugnance for all kinds of secrets, that not only do they almost generally abstain from vegetables, as well as from the flesh of sheep and that of pigs, which give rise to many residues, but that even at the time of their devotions they prohibit salt in food. Among many other reasons they give for it, they claim that salt, which stimulates the appetite, causes overeating and overdrinking. For the opinion expressed by Aristagoras, that salt is considered impure because when it crystallizes a large number of small insects which are caught in it die, this opinion is childish.

It is also said that the Apis ox quenches its thirst at a particular well, and that it is carefully removed from the Nile.It is not that the sojourn of the crocodile in its waters renders the river impure in their eyes, as some think: for nothing is known to be so venerated among the Egyptians as the Nile; but they believe that its water fattens and gives an extraordinary plumpness; and this is what they fear for the Apis beef as for themselves. They want the body, which serves as an envelope for the soul, to be light and free, that it does not overload it, does not crush it, finally that the mortal element has no preponderance by which the divine principle be smothered.

for nothing is known to be so venerated among the Egyptians as the Nile; but they believe that its water fattens and gives an extraordinary plumpness;and this is what they fear for the Apis beef as for themselves. They want the body, which serves as an envelope for the soul, to be light and free, that it does not overload it, does not crush it, finally that the mortal element has no preponderance by which the divine principle be smothered. for nothing is known to be so venerated among the Egyptians as the Nile; but they believe that its water fattens and gives an extraordinary plumpness; and this is what they fear for the Apis beef as for themselves. They want the body, which serves as an envelope for the soul, to be light and free, that it does not overload it, does not crush it, finally that the mortal element has no preponderance by which the divine principle be smothered.

[6] The priests of the sun in Heliopolis never bring wine into the temple. They would regard it as impropriety to drink during the day under the gaze of their lord and king. The other priests use it, but in small quantities. There are a large number of religious meetings where wine does not figure: these are those where they occupy themselves with studying, learning themselves and teaching the divine truths. The kings only drank wine in a proportion determined by their holy writings, according to the historian Hecataeus, and because they were priests.

They began to drink it from Psammeticus; before him they did not take it, nor did they use it for libations.

It is not that they thought they were pleasing the gods;but in their opinion, the blood of those who once fought against the inhabitants of Olympus, and who, having bitten the dust, confounded their corpses with the ground, this blood, they say, produced the vines. This is why, to hear them, drunkenness makes the drinkers mad and furious, because they are gorged with the blood of their ancestors. These details Eudoxus, in the second book of his Voyage Around the Earth, states are told by the priests themselves.

[7] Not all Egyptians abstain from all sea fish; but there are some that they forbid themselves. Thus, the inhabitants of Oxyrynchus do not eat any of those who have been hooked. In their holy horror of the oxyrynchus, they fear that the hook, because one of these inhabitants of the waters will have had occasion to fall on it, has become a polluted object. Those of Syene do not touch the porgy, because it is believed that this fish appears on the Nile when the river is about to overflow, and it is looked upon as a messenger bringing the happy news of the flood. For the priests, they abstain from all species of fish.

On the ninth day of the first month, while every Egyptian in front of his house eats a roast fish, the priests do not taste it,and content themselves with burning it on their doorsteps. They have two reasons for doing so: one is quite religious and of a higher order, since it relates to the philosophical and pious beliefs that we have on Osiris and on Typhoon: I will come back to this elsewhere. But the other reason is obvious and somewhat at hand: it is that, as food, fish on the one hand is not essential, and on the other is nothing exquisite. This is confirmed by the testimony of Homer, when he presents the Phaeacians, an effeminate people, and those of Ithaca, an island nation, as not making use of fish, and when he says that the companions of Odysseus, even on board and during such a long navigation, only ate it after they had come to the last extremity.In short, the Egyptians suppose that the sea was formed by fire, that it is outside of any determined classification, that it is neither a part of the world nor an element: they see in it only a heterogeneous secretion, principle of corruption and disease .

[8] Moreover, this people included in its religious ceremonies nothing unreasonable, nothing fabulous; and superstition, despite what some people think, is foreign to it. Some are based on principles of morality and utility; the others are justified by interesting memories of history, or by physical explanations. Such is the scruple relating to the onion.

Tradition repeats that Dictys, infant of the goddess Isis, fell into the river, and that he drowned there trying to seize onions; this is a tale of the utmost improbability. The religious aversion and the repugnance with which the priests guard themselves against onions, comes from the fact that this vegetable takes on growth and vigor only in the waning of the moon.Besides, it is good neither for those who want to keep abstinence, nor for those who have to celebrate feasts, because in those it provokes thirst and makes them cry when they drink it. eat.

Similarly the Egyptians regard pork as filthy: first because these animals most commonly mate in the waning of the moon, then because their milk is a drink which gives leprosy and other diseases. of skin. To explain this fact, that only once, in the year, and at the full moon, they sacrifice one of these animals and eat its flesh, the Egyptians say that Typhon pursuing a pig during the full moon found the chest of wood in which was enclosed the body of Osiris, and shaded it.

It is said that the ancient inhabitants of Egypt were enemies of luxury, softness and sensuality: so much so that at Thebes, in the temple of Isis, there stood, it is said, a column on which were engraved with curses against King Minis, who had first made them abandon the frugal way of life where they knew neither rich nor money. There is also a trait of Technactis, father of Bocchoris. He was making an expedition against the Arabs; his luggage being late, he ate with pleasure the first food that he found, after which he fell into a deep sleep on a mat. From that day he devoted himself, it is said, to a frugal life; and on this occasion he pronounced imprecations against Minis, which the priests approved, and which he caused to be engraved on a column.

[9] The kings were designated among the priests or among the warriors, because these two classes, one because of its value, the other because of its wisdom, enjoyed a particular esteem and consideration. . If it was among the warriors, the new king immediately belonged to the class of priests; and he was initiated into that mystical philosophy, composed of emblems and allegories, which allowed traces of truth to be seen only under a thick veil.

Moreover, the Egyptians themselves confess this obscurity; and it is because of this, doubtless, that in front of the temples they place sphinxes, to indicate that the wisdom of their philosophy is entirely enigmatic.At Sais, on the pediment of the temple of Minerva, whom they believe to be the same as Isis, one read this inscription: " I am all that has been, all that is, all that will be; and no mortal has yet lifted my day." Moreover, many think that the proper name of Jupiter in the Egyptian language is Amoun, of which by reduplication of letters we Greeks have made Ammon. But Manetho the Sebennite believes that this word means "hidden thing, action of hiding". Hecataeus of Abdera says that the Egyptians use this word to call each other, since it is essentially appellative.Therefore, addressing the first God, the same, according to them, as the Universe, as an invisible and hidden being, they exhort him with supplications, calling him "Amoun", to make himself seen and discover themselves to them.

[10] This is what the most enlightened of the Greeks testify: Solon, Thales, Plato, Eudoxus, Pythagoras, and also, according to some, Lycurgus. They had been to Egypt and had conferences with the priests. Thus Eudoxus, it is said, had conversed with Onupheus of Memphis, Solon, with Sonchis the Saitian; the Heliopolitan Enuphis had spoken to Pythagoras. It is this last Greek, especially, so it seems, who full of admiration for these priests, in whom he had inspired the same feeling, wanted to imitate their symbolic and mysterious language, by wrapping all his dogmas in allegories. Indeed there is no difference between what are called hieroglyphics and most of the precepts of Pythagoras.

Such are these: Do not eat on a trolley.— Do not sit on the bushel. — Do not plant a palm tree. — Do not fan the fire with a sword in your house. Moreover I believe, for my part, that the Pythagoreans by calling Apollo the unit, Diana the number two, Minerva the number seven, Neptune the first cube, wanted to imitate what is practiced in the temples of Egypt; and I find in this a certain resemblance with the consecrations, with the practices used in these temples and the inscriptions which are traced there. Indeed the Egyptians represent their lord and king, Osiris, with an eye and a scepter.

To this very name of Osiris some give the meaning of: "who has many eyes", since "bone" in Egyptian means "many", and Iris "eye".They represent the sky, which, they think, cannot grow old since it is eternal, by a heart placed on a cassolette. Now in Thebes there was a picture which represented judges without hands and their president having his eyes closed: it was to make it understood that Justice should neither accept presents nor allow anyone to approach it.

People of war had a scarab engraved on the seal of their ring. Indeed, there are no female beetles: they are all males; and these insects deposit their sperm in a ball which they prepare and construct, not so much as matter and provision intended to sustain them as a kind of egg in which a birth will take place.

[11] So therefore, whenever you hear what Egyptian mythology says about the Gods: that they were wanderers, that they were cut into pieces, that they suffered a great number of other bad treatments; you will have to remember what we said first, and establish that nothing happened and took place as reported. It is thus that they do not properly give Mercury the name of dog; but as they appreciate the good guard which this animal makes, its vigilance, the sagacity with which, to employ the terms of Plato, it discerns the friends and the enemies by this fact that it knows the first and not the seconds, the Egyptians personify these qualities by attributing them to the most intelligent of all gods. Nor do they suppose that the Sun has come out,newborn child, from the womb of a lotus; but it is a way of representing the rising of this star, and of making it understood that the activity of its rays is maintained by the humid vapours.

Likewise, the most cruel and feared of the kings of Persia, Ochus, the one who committed numerous murders, and ended up slaughtering the Apis beef which he served to his friends in a meal, Ochus, was called "Sword" by Egyptians; and even today he is designated by this name in the enumeration of the kings. Certainly not that they really want to designate its substance in this way, but because they compare its inflexibility and its inhumanity to an instrument of carnage. So it is, dear Clea,that you must hear and welcome the stories told by people who are animated by a religious and philosophical spirit. While practicing and observing the prescriptions of the sacred ceremonies, be convinced that what is most pleasing to the Gods is that we have true ideas about them, and that no sacrifice, no offering could charm them more. . In this way you will avoid an evil no less detestable than atheism, I mean superstition.

[12] Here, then, is the story we are telling, and I will reproduce it as briefly as possible, carefully removing all that is useless and superfluous. Rhea, it is said, having had a secret intercourse with Saturn, the Sun, who knew it, pronounced against her this curse: "May she not give birth either in the course of a month, nor in the course of 'a year! " But Mercury, who was in love with the Goddess and who had also obtained her favors, played dice with the Moon, and won her a seventy-second of each of her lights. From the sum of all these seventy-seconds he formed five days which he added to the three hundred and sixty; it is these five days which the Egyptians call Epagomenes, and which they celebrate as the anniversaries of the birth of the gods.In the first day, they say, was born Osiris; and at the moment of his birth a voice spoke these words:

"He is the master of all things who appears in the light." Some say that a certain Pamyles, at Thebes, having gone to draw water from the temple of Jupiter, heard a voice ordering him to shout with all his might: "The great king, the beneficent Osiris has just been born.; that for this reason Saturn gave him the child in his arms and charged him to bring him up; and that in memory of this event we celebrate the feast of the Pamylies, which resembles our Phalléphories. On the second day Arueris was born, the same one who is generally called Apollo, and whom some call Horus the Elder.On the third day Typhoon came into the world, not at term nor by the ordinary way, but rushing through the mother's flank, that by hitting it he had torn. On the fourth day it was Isis, who was born in the middle of the marshes. The fifth was Nephthys, also called Teleutes and Aphrodite, and by some Victory. It is added that Osiris and Arueris had been conceived from the Sun, that Isis had been from Hermes, Typhon and Nephthys from Saturn. The third of the Epagomene days was regarded by the kings as inauspicious, because of the birth of Typhon. On this day they transacted no business, and took no meals until nightfall. It is also said that Typhon made Nephthys his wife;that Isis and Osiris, in love with each other, had united together before they were born and when they were still hidden from the light in the maternal womb. Even, according to some, from this union was born Arueris,

[13] By ascending the throne Osiris immediately caused the Egyptians to renounce their existence of privations and wild beasts. He showed them how to get the fruits; he gave them laws, and taught them to honor gods. Later he traveled the whole universe, bringing there the benefits of civilization. He only very rarely needed to resort to arms: it was most often by persuasion, and by reason, adding to it the attraction of songs and all sorts of harmony, that he attracted men. .

This is why the Greeks believe he is the same as Bacchus. Typhon, in the absence of Osiris, had innovated nothing, because Isis exercised an active surveillance and vigorously maintained all things in their state. But when Osiris returns,he laid ambushes for the latter, for which he added seventy-two accomplishments. He was further assisted by a queen of Ethiopia, named Aso, who went to Egypt. Typhon had secretly taken the measurement of the body of Osiris, and according to this size he had built a very beautiful and richly decorated chest. The piece of furniture, brought into the hall of the feast, excited transports of joy and admiration. Typhon jokingly promised that he would give it as a gift to whoever filled it exactly by lying in it. All tried the box one after the other; and it was no match for anyone. Osiris entered it in his turn, and lay down there.

Instantly all those who were there sprang forward, and hastily closed the lid.Some fasten it to the outside with nails, the others seal it with molten lead. It is then carried to the river, and it is brought down to the sea by the Tanaitic mouth, which, for this reason, is still execrated by the Egyptians today and called Accursed. These events happened, it is said, on the seventeenth of the month Athyr, which is that in which the Sun passes through the sign of Scorpio, and the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Osiris. Others want this number of years to be that of his existence and not of his reign. which is when the Sun passes through the sign of Scorpio, and the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Osiris. Others want this number of years to be that of his existence and not of his reign.which is when the Sun passes through the sign of Scorpio, and the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Osiris. Others want this number of years to be that of his existence and not of his reign.

[14] The first to learn of this event were the nearby Pans and Satyrs of the city of Chemmis. They spread the news; and then these sudden disturbances and frights of the multitude, frights which are still called panic terrors today. Isis, informed in her turn, cut herself, in the very place where she heard the news, one of her locks of hair, and covered herself with a garment of mourning. It was where the city of Coptos stands today: a name which, according to some, means “deprivation”, because “coptein” means “to deprive”. She wandered about in all directions, a prey to anxiety, and she saw no one pass without multiplying her questions. She came to meet small children from whom she also inquired about the chest.It happened that they had seen it, and they pointed out to him the mouth through which the friends of Typhon had brought this object into the sea. Hence it comes that in Egypt the faculty of divination is attributed to small children: and omens are drawn particularly from the words they utter when they play in the temples and chatter at random. She had occasion to learn that Osiris, in his love affairs, had mistakenly had intercourse with Nephthys, their common sister to both, because he had taken her for Isis; and she saw the proof of it in the wreath of sweet clover which he had left with Nephthys. She went in search of the child, whom the mother, after giving birth to him, had immediately exposed for fear of Typhoon.Isis found him with difficulty and with great difficulty, led by dogs who directed her. She undertook to feed him; he became his guardian and follower under the name of Anubis. He is said to be responsible for the guard of the gods, as dogs are for that of men.

[15] Soon the goddess learned of the fate of the chest. He had been brought by the waves of the sea to the territory of Byblos, and the wave had deposited him limply in the middle of a heather. The heather had in a short time sprouted beautiful and large branches, in the middle of which it enveloped the trunk on all sides, so that it was concealed from view. The king of the country, amazed at the prodigious development of this plantation, ordered the stem which concealed the chest to be cut by its foliage, and made of it a column to support the roof of his palace.

Informed of this incident by a divine wind of fame, Isis went to Byblos. She was seated near a fountain in the most humble attitude; and, her eyes bathed in tears, she spoke to no one,if not to the attendants of the queen; but when these happened to pass, she greeted them, spoke to them affectionately; and she began to please their hair in braids, spreading over their whole person a fragrant odor which was exhaled from her own body. When the queen saw her maids again, she wanted to know who this stranger was, thanks to whom their hair and body gave off a perfume of ambrosia. She therefore sent for her, and immediately made her her closest friend, asking that she become the nurse of her little child. The king was called, it is said, Malcandre; the queen, Astarte, according to some, according to others Saosis, according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse".spoke to them affectionately; and she began to please their hair in braids, spreading over their whole person a fragrant odor which was exhaled from her own body. When the queen saw her maids again, she wanted to know who this stranger was, thanks to whom their hair and body gave off a perfume of ambrosia.

She therefore sent for her, and immediately made her her closest friend, asking that she become the nurse of her little child. The king was called, it is said, Malcandre; the queen, Astarte, according to some, according to others Saosis, according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse". spoke to them affectionately;and she began to please their hair in braids, spreading over their whole person a fragrant odor which was exhaled from her own body. When the queen saw her maids again, she wanted to know who this stranger was, thanks to whom their hair and body gave off a perfume of ambrosia.

She therefore sent for her, and immediately made her her closest friend, asking that she become the nurse of her little child. The king was called, it is said, Malcandre; the queen, Astarte, according to some, according to others Saosis, according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse". she wanted to know who this stranger was, thanks to whom their hair and their body gave off a perfume of ambrosia.She therefore sent for her, and immediately made her her closest friend, asking that she become the nurse of her little child. The king was called, it is said, Malcandre; the queen, Astarte, according to some, according to others Saosis, according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse". she wanted to know who this stranger was, thanks to whom their hair and their body gave off a perfume of ambrosia. She therefore sent for her, and immediately made her her closest friend, asking that she become the nurse of her little child. The king was called, it is said, Malcandre; the queen, Astarte, according to some, according to others Saosis, according to others finally Nemanoun;name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse". according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse". according to others finally Nemanoun; name that the Greeks would translate as "nurse".

[16] To breastfeed the child, Isis, instead of the breast, put her finger in her mouth; and during the night she burned to him what was mortal in his body. She herself became a swallow, and hovered around the wooden pillar moaning. This maneuver lasted until the queen, who had spied on her, began to utter loud cries when she saw her setting fire to the child's body. It was to want to take away from him his pledges of immortality. The goddess made herself known, and demanded the column which supported the roof. With the greatest ease she cut this stem, which she removed. The wood was wrapped by her in a veil; and perfumed with essences, she entrusted it to the hands of kings.This piece is still today an object of adoration for the inhabitants of Byblos, and the wood is deposited in the temple of Isis. As for the chest, she threw herself on it, and she uttered such frenzied sobs that the youngest of the king's sons was left as if dead. Isis, having the eldest with her, placed the chest on a ship, and sailed out to sea. As the river Phedrus had, at daybreak, raised too impetuous a wind, the irritated goddess completely dried up the waters.

[17] In the first remote place where she found herself and when she was all alone, Isis opened the chest. She applied her face to Osiris's face, kissing him and covering him with her tears. The child had approached from behind and was watching him. She noticed it when she turned around; and in her anger she gave him such a terrible look that he could not resist the fright: he died of it. Others, not thus relating the facts, say that he fell into the sea, as has been reported above. He receives honors because of the Goddess; and it is he whom the Egyptians sing at feasts under the name of Maneros. Some claim that the child was called Palestinus or Pelusius, and that from his name was called the city founded by the Goddess.It is said that this Maneros, sung by the Egyptians, was the first inventor of music.

According to others, the name of Maneros does not designate anyone: it is a word used when one drinks and one finds oneself at a feast, to say: "Let everything here be propitious to us!" Such, we are assured, is the meaning of the word Maneros, which the Egyptians constantly have in their mouths. Similarly, it seems, this figure of a dead man shown in a coffin by passing it around is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, like some some suppose it; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is.It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts. the name of Maneros does not designate anyone: it is a word used when one drinks and one finds oneself at a feast, to say: "May everything here be propitious to us!" Such, we are assured, is the meaning of the word Maneros, which the Egyptians constantly have in their mouths. Similarly, it seems, this figure of a dead man shown in a coffin by passing it around is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, like some some suppose it; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts.the name of Maneros does not designate anyone: it is a word used when one drinks and one finds oneself at a feast, to say: "May everything here be propitious to us!" Such, we are assured, is the meaning of the word Maneros, which the Egyptians constantly have in their mouths. Similarly, it seems, this figure of a dead man shown in a coffin by passing it around is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, like some some suppose it; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts. “May everything here be propitious to us!Such, we are assured, is the meaning of the word Maneros, which the Egyptians constantly have in their mouths. Similarly, it seems, this figure of a dead man shown in a coffin by passing it around is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, like some some suppose it; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts. “May everything here be propitious to us! Such, we are assured, is the meaning of the word Maneros, which the Egyptians constantly have in their mouths.Similarly, it seems, this figure of a dead man shown in a coffin by passing it around is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, like some some suppose it; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts. is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, as some suppose; on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts. is not a memory of the tragic end of Osiris, as some suppose;on the contrary, it is an exhortation to profit and enjoy the present, since soon the guests will be what this dead person is. It is claimed that it is for this purpose that such an apparition is introduced into the midst of feasts.

[18] Isis having set out to find her son Horus who was brought up in Butus, had deposited the chest out of sight. Typhoon, one night when he was hunting, discovered it in the moonlight, and he soon recognized the body. He cut it into fourteen pieces, which he scattered on all sides. Isis having known it, began the search for these shreds, and got into a boat made of bark of papyrus with which she began to traverse the marshes.Hence it is that those who sail in skiffs of papyrus are not attacked by crocodiles, because these animals fear them or revere them on account of the Goddess. From this it also happens that several tombs in Egypt are said to be the burial place of Osiris, since the Goddess erected one in each place where she discovered a fragment of the body. This tradition is denied by other narrators. According to them, Isis had images of Osiris reproduced; and she gave them successively to each city, as if it had been the whole body. This was in order that he might receive as much honor as possible, and that if Typhoon, prevailing over Horus, were to discover the true tomb, he would despair of the truth amid contradictory accounts and indications.The only part of Osiris' body that Isis did not find was the virile member: since it had been immediately thrown into the river, and the lepidote, the porgy and the oxyrynchus had devoured it there. : from this comes the particular horror inspired by these fish. To replace the member, Isis made an imitation of it, and she thus consecrated the phallus,

[19] Later Osiris, returning from the other world, made himself seen to Horus in apparitions where he crushed him with fatigue and exercised him in battle. One day he asked her what thing in the world he considered to be the most beautiful of all. Horus answered: "It is to avenge his father and his mother unworthily treated. " He asked him, in the second place, which animal he considered the most useful for which goes to fight: "A horse", answered Horus. Osiris found the answer surprising, not explaining why it would be a horse rather than a lion .This answer filled Osiris with joy, who regarded Horus as sufficiently prepared. It is said that a large part of the Egyptians passed successively as defectors to the side of Horus, and with them Thueris, the concubine of Typhon. A serpent pursuing the latter was torn to pieces by Horus' soldiers; and in remembrance of this fact, they bring to their assemblies a piece of cord which they cut into small pieces. A battle took place, which lasted several days and ended with the victory of Horus.

Isis, having received Typhon garrotted, did not cause him to perish; on the contrary, she untied him and set him free. Horus conceived a lively indignation;and laying his hand on his mother, he tore off the royal bandeau with which she girded her forehead; but Mercury replaced it with a helmet which represented an ox's head. Typhoon sued Horus, claiming he was a bastard. This one, assisted by Mercury, was declared legitimate by the Gods, and Typhon still had the bottom in two other battles. Isis, who, after the death of Osiris, had had dealings with him, gave birth to a son born prematurely and weak in the lower limbs: this is Harpocrates.

[20] These are roughly the key facts of the story; we remove the most odious details, such as the dismemberment of Horus and the decapitation of Isis. If such fables, attributed to a blissful and imperishable nature, such as we imagine must be above all the nature of the Godhead, are believed and repeated by some people as being true, as having been really accomplished, I do not need to tell you , Clea, that according to the expression of Aeschylus,

"You have to spit on it and rinse your mouth."

On your own, moreover, you feel aversion against those who have such strange and barbarous opinions of the gods. However, the story that I have just reproduced does not resemble in the least the fables without consistency, these hollow inventions, which poets and mythologists draw from their brains, like spiders, without resting on any foundation their weft and their fabric. These are seriously contested points and real accidents: as the sequel will prove.

Just as mathematicians say that the rainbow is an image of the sun, and that the variety of colors is the effect of the refraction which the solar rays experience in the cloud,
This is proven by these sacrifices marked in a way with a fierce mourning, these architectural arrangements of the temples, part of which unfolds in wings, in open walks and as far as the eye can see, while the other part hides, hides underground, and is composed only of cells where the statues of the gods are adorned and dressed, cells which rather resemble caverns and tombs. Another no less strong proof is the notoriety enjoyed by the many Osirian tombs. Although the body of the God is said to be buried in several places, a small town is allegedly cited as containing only the actual tomb. So,just as it is in Abydos that the richest and most powerful among the Egyptians are preferably buried because they are jealous of sharing the burial of Osiris, just as it is in Memphis that the 'the ox Apis, the personification of the soul of God, is fed; likewise the little town in question, which some call "the port of good people", is properly called by other Taphosiris. It is also said that there is a small island, near Phyle, which is usually unapproachable and inaccessible to everyone: the birds never descend there; the fish do not approach it. Only there is a fixed time when the priests cross the water to get there. They make expiations there: they crown the tomb,

[21] Eudoxus believes that, notwithstanding the numerous tombs which are claimed to be those of Osiris, it is in Busiris that his body is deposited, since that city is his homeland. But there is no need to plead at length to establish that he is at Taphosiris: this last name alone indicates it. I pass over in silence the custom of splitting wood, of tearing flax, of pouring out libations, because altogether mystical details are mingled with them. Moreover, hear not only the priests of Isis and Osiris, but those of the other divinities who are neither eternal nor imperishable: they will tell you that the bodies of these gods have, after the fatigues of existence, been deposited in their country, where they are given due honors, but let their souls shine in the heavens like so many stars:that the soul of Isis is called by the Greeks the Canicule, by the Egyptians Sothis; that of Horus is Orion, that of Typhoon is the Great Bear. For the food of the animals which are adored in Egypt, all the other tribes of the country contribute by a fixed royalty; the only ones who give nothing are the inhabitants of Thebaid, because they recognize no mortal god; and their god, whom they call Cneph, they hold him to be uncreated and imperishable. because they recognize no mortal god; and their god, whom they call Cneph, they hold him to be uncreated and imperishable. because they recognize no mortal god; and their god, whom they call Cneph, they hold him to be uncreated and imperishable.

[22] Given that the stories and paintings of this kind are very numerous, some authors suppose that they were imagined to preserve in memory the actions and adventures of kings or princes regarded as gods because of their great virtue. or of their great power, and who had afterwards experienced cruel misfortunes. It is a convenient expedient, and by which one escapes the very consequences of these stories. One ingeniously transfers to men what is disagreeable in them, instead of leaving it to the gods: and one finds oneself, if need be, seconded by the traditions of history. The Egyptians, in fact, report that Mercury had one arm shorter than the other; that Typhoon was red, Horus, white, Osiris, black: which would suggest that they were men.They still designate Osiris under the title of general, Canopus under that of pilot; and they say that the latter gave the name to the constellation. Finally they want the nave called by the Greeks Argo to be an imitation of that of Osiris, and that out of honor for Osiris, it should have been fixed to the celestial vault, not far from Orion and the Heatwave, two constellations whose first is dedicated to Horus and the second to Isis, if the Egyptians are to be believed.

[23] But here I am hesitating. I am afraid that to adopt such an explanation would be to stir up what should not be stirred, that it would not only be declaring war on the long series of ages, according to the expression of Simonides, but also attacking a multitude of nations and families which are imbued with the most religious sentiments with regard to these divinities. From there, it is only a short step to bring down from heaven to earth such imposing names, to shake, to uproot a veneration and a belief fixed in almost all minds since the beginning of the world, to open wide doors in front of this people of atheists who reduce the divine beings to human proportions, finally to authorize in a striking fashion the effrontery of this impostor of Messene, who is called Euhemerus.

We know that through a system of opposition, he laid the foundations of an implausible mythology without reality, so as to spread impiety on the earth. With a stroke of his pen he crosses out all the recognized gods indiscriminately, and he replaces their names with those of generals, fleet commanders, kings, who, according to him, once existed and who are inscribed in letters of gold in the island of Panchaeus. Now, there is no Barbarian, no Greek, only Euhemerus, it seems, who had to deal with these Panchaeans and these Triphylls. They did not exist, they do not exist anywhere in the world. and he replaces their names by those of generals, captains of the fleet, kings, who, according to him, existed long ago and who are inscribed in letters of gold on the island of Panchaeus.Now, there is no Barbarian, no Greek, only Euhemerus, it seems, who had to deal with these Panchaeans and these Triphylls. They did not exist, they do not exist anywhere in the world. and he replaces their names by those of generals, captains of the fleet, kings, who, according to him, existed long ago and who are inscribed in letters of gold on the island of Panchaeus. Now, there is no Barbarian, no Greek, only Euhemerus, it seems, who had to deal with these Panchaeans and these Triphylls. They did not exist, they do not exist anywhere in the world.

[24] Certainly the great deeds of Semiramis are praised in Assyria, like those of Sesostris in Egypt. The Phrygians, even today, call Maniques the brilliant and worthy acts of admiration, because formerly there was among them a king named Manis, others say Masdes, who was a heroic and powerful prince. Under the leadership of Cyrus the Persians, the Macedonians under that of Alexander, reached in their victorious races almost to the limits of the earth; and yet these conquerors have left no other name and no other memory than as having been great kings. For those who allow themselves to be puffed up by pride, as Plato says for those who, young, foolish, giving their hearts to the fire of passions, have allowed them to be called gods and have temples built for them,these have only enjoyed a brilliance and a fleeting glory. Later, they paid the penalties due to their vanity, their arrogance, and at the same time their impiety, their disregard of all laws. All of them have disappeared like empty smoke; and today, like fugitive slaves demanded by their masters, they have been violently torn from these temples and sanctuaries: they have nothing left but sepulchers and tombs.

Also, Antigone the Old hearing himself proclaimed, in the poems of a certain Hermodotes as son of the Sun and as God: "It is", he says, "neither my conviction nor that of the bearer of my commode."It is again with good reason that Lysippus the statuary blamed the painter Apelles for having painted a portrait of Alexander, in which he put the thunderbolt in his hand. For him, he armed her with a spear: “It is a glory,” he said, “that time will never take away from her, because it is true and indeed exclusively personal. »

[25] It is therefore better to present what is told about Typhon, Osiris and Isis, as forming a series of adventures experienced not by gods or men, but by powerful Genii, by beings such as Plato, Pythagoras, Xenocrates and Chrysippus, declare , on the faith of the ancient theologians, to have been of a more vigorous nature than is human nature. Their considerable power puts them above our condition. With them the divine principle is neither pure nor unmixed; they partake both of the immortality of the soul and of the senses of the body. They are susceptible of pleasures and pains; and all the changes produced by these different affections bring sometimes more, sometimes less trouble to one or to the other of them.

Because among the geniuses,as among men there are different degrees of virtue and vice. What the Greeks sing about the revolt of the Giants and the Titans, certain unjust acts of Saturn, the struggles of Python against Apollo, the exiles of Bacchus, the wandering races of Ceres, all this in no way differs from the adventures of Osiris, of Typhon, nor of so many other mythological tales that everyone can learn at their leisure. The same must be said of all the facts which are shrouded in mysteries and initiations, and which are carefully concealed from the conversations and gazes of the multitude. all this differs in no way from the adventures of Osiris, of Typhon, nor from so many other mythological stories that everyone can learn at their leisure.The same must be said of all the facts which are shrouded in mysteries and initiations, and which are carefully concealed from the conversations and gazes of the multitude. all this differs in no way from the adventures of Osiris, of Typhon, nor from so many other mythological stories that everyone can learn at their leisure. The same must be said of all the facts which are shrouded in mysteries and initiations, and which are carefully concealed from the conversations and gazes of the multitude.

[26] We hear Homer, when he speaks of mortals of superior merit, declares that they resemble gods, that they rival the Gods. He will say,

"Let them possess profound wisdom from the Gods";
but he uses the word "demon" interchangeably to designate the good and the bad:
"Come hither, demon; what is this dread With which you strike the Greeks?...."
andeven:

"Attempting, like a demon, a fourth assault."
And elsewhere:
"Goddess inspired by the demon, ah! what crimes Has Priam and his sad house committed, That your arm bent on destroying Ilion?"

He wants us to understand that demons obey a mixed nature, and often contradictory motives for action. Also Plato attributes to the gods of Olympus what is on the right and in odd number, to the demons what is on the left and in even number.

Xenocrates thinks that the inauspicious days and feasts when floggings, mournful complaints and fasts are practiced, when ominous words and shameful words are heard, that these are not the days suited to honor the gods or good geniuses; but that in the air which surrounds us there are powerful and strong natures, morose and somber spirits, who love these sinister homages and who do not think of causing harm to men when they are offered a worship of this species. Hesiod quotes, on the other hand,good and favorable Genii, who are chaste and pure. He says that they are protectors of men, and this poet adds: "They give wealth, as kings who possess it". Plato sees in them a particular species of demons, whom he calls interpreters and mediators between the Gods and men, bringing to the Gods the wishes and supplications of humans and reporting to them oracles and donations of wealth and goods. Empedocles says, that the demons also expiate the penalty of faults and offenses committed by them: whom he calls interpreters and mediators between the Gods and men, bringing to the Gods the wishes and supplications of humans and bringing to them the oracles and donations of wealth and goods.Empedocles says, that the demons also expiate the penalty of faults and offenses committed by them: whom he calls interpreters and mediators between the Gods and men, bringing to the Gods the wishes and supplications of humans and bringing to them the oracles and donations of wealth and goods. Empedocles says, that the demons also expiate the penalty of faults and offenses committed by them:

"The influence of the heavens pushes them into the sea; The sea brings them to the ground; from there, launched into the air, They go to the sun, then higher into space, Tossed endlessly from disgrace to disgrace,"

until thus punished and purified, they resume again the place and rank assigned to them by nature.

[27] These particularities and others like them recall, it is said, all those which are told of Typhoon. His jealousy and his malignity inspired him, it is reported, the greatest crimes. Spreading disorder everywhere, he fills both land and sea with horror; and then he was punished for it. The sister of Osiris, who was at the same time his wife, took charge of the revenge. After having smothered and compressed the madness and rage of Typhoon, she did not want so many struggles and fights sustained by her, the multiplied races, the numerous acts of wisdom and courage that she had accomplished, to remain in the dark. oblivion and silence. By images, allusions, imitations, she linked to the holiest ceremonies the memory of the sufferings she had endured,devoting both a lesson in piety and an encouragement to men and women who would come to be struck by similar adversities.

Isis and Osiris, good geniuses that they were, finding themselves changed into gods because of their virtue, as were later Hercules and Bacchus, receive the honors which are given both to the gods and to the geniuses. But this is not without reason, since they exercise everywhere, and mainly on earth and in the underworld, a very considerable power. Indeed, it is claimed that Sarapis is none other than Pluto, that Isis is none other than Proserpina. So say the Archemachus of Euboea, Heraclides of Pontus; and the latter believes that the oracle of Canopus is that of Pluto.

[28] Ptolemy Soter saw in a dream the colossus of Pluto, who was at Sinope. He didn't suspect its shape or even its existence, and hadn't seen it before. The God ordered him to transport this gigantic image as soon as possible to Alexandria. Ptolemy, not knowing where she was placed, found herself in a great embarrassment; and as he related the vision to his friends, he met a man who had traveled widely.

His name was Sosibius. He declared that he had seen in Sinope a colossus similar to that which had appeared to the king. Ptolemy therefore sent Soteles and Dionysius, who after much time and difficulty, but not without the aid of divine providence, stole the colossus and brought it back with them.As soon as this reported image was seen, Timothy the interpreter and Manetho the Sebennite conjectured, according to his Cerberus and his dragon, that it was a statue of Pluto, and they persuaded Ptolemy that it could not be any other statue than that of Sarapis . Where she came from, she didn't have that name; but on arriving at Alexandria, it was thus designated, because it is under this name that the Egyptians adore Sarapis. What Heraclitus the physicist says, that Hades and Bacchus are the same god when they both go into delirium and rage, serves to confirm this opinion. To say that the word Hades designates the soul chained to a body and delivered in this body to a kind of madness and intoxication is to resort to an allegory of very little significance.It is more reasonable to make only one character of Osiris and Bacchus, Sarapis and Osiris, which received this last name when it changed its nature. This is why Sarapis is a name common to all, as well as that of Osiris, as those who have been initiated into these mysteries know.

[29] We must not stop at the books of the Phrygians, where it is written that a certain Charops was the daughter of Hercules and that another son of this hero, Isæacus, was born Typhon. Nor will we add belief to the story of Phylarchus, who writes that Bacchus was the first to bring two oxen from India to Egypt, one of which was called Apis, and the other, Osiris; that Sarapis is the name of the one who maintains order in the universe, from the word "saireein", which according to some means "to beautify", "to order". These assertions of Phylarch are absurd; and more absurd still, those of the authors who claim that Sarapis is not the name of a god; that this word designates the tomb of Apis; that there are in Memphis certain gates of brass,called the gates of Lethe and Cocyte, which are opened when the funeral of Apis is celebrated, that they make a dull and rough noise; that it is for this that all the noise of the resounding brass sixteens our faculties. More reasonable are those who think that the word Sarapis derives from "Sevesthai" or "Susthai", and that it expresses the general movement of the universe. Most priests want this name to be a compound of the word Osiris and the word Apis: thus establishing and wanting to teach us, that we must see in Apis a figurative image of the soul of Osiris. For me, if the name Sarapis is Egyptian, I think it means pleasure and cheerfulness; and I rely on what the Egyptians call "Sairei" their days of rejoicing.Indeed Plato assures that Hades means son of modesty (g-aidou g-huion), because this god is gentle and easy for those who address him. Moreover, in the Egyptian language there are many words which are equivalent to whole sentences. Thus, to designate the subterranean stay in which they think the souls migrate after death, they have the word Amenthès, which means receiving and giving. Is this word still one of those which, formerly issued from Greece, were transported to Egypt? This is what we will examine later: at this moment, it is a question of pursuing the explanation which occupies us. to designate the subterranean abode into which they think souls emigrate after death, they have the word Amenthès, which means receiving and giving.Is this word still one of those which, formerly issued from Greece, were transported to Egypt? This is what we will examine later: at this moment, it is a question of pursuing the explanation which occupies us. to designate the subterranean abode into which they think souls emigrate after death, they have the word Amenthès, which means receiving and giving. Is this word still one of those which, formerly issued from Greece, were transported to Egypt? This is what we will examine later: at this moment, it is a question of pursuing the explanation which occupies us.

[30] Osiris and Isis passed from the class of good geniuses to that of the gods. For Typhon, whose eclipsed and diminished power resembles a dying man who is about to give up the ghost and who struggles in the convulsions of agony, sometimes we console him and calm him with sacrifices, sometimes, on the contrary, we lower him. and they humiliate him at certain feasts. Thus, one insults the men who have the red hair, and one throws a donkey in a precipice. This is what the Coptites in particular do, because Typhon was red-haired and he shared this color with donkeys. The inhabitants of Busiris and those of Lycopolis never use trumpets, finding that the sound of these instruments bears similarity to the cry of the donkey. In general they regard this last animal as unclean,as demonic because of its resemblance to Typhon. In the sacrifices they celebrate in the month of payni and in the month of phaophi, they make cakes to which they give the shape of a tied donkey; and in the sacrifice which they offer to the Sun, they recommend to those who worship the God not to wear gold on their person, and not to feed an ass. It is evident, on the other hand, that the Pythagoreans attribute to Typhon the power of a Genius. that the triangle represents the power of Pluto, Bacchus and Mars; the square, that of Rhea, Venus, Ceres, Vesta and Juno; the dodecagon that of Jupiter, and the polygon of fifty-six sides, that of Typhoon. Such, at least, are the historical traditions recorded by Eudoxus.

[31] The Egyptians, because they believe that Typhoon was red, immolate the red-colored oxen; and they observe this condition so scrupulously, that if the animal has a single black or white hair, they think it cannot be slain. According to them, it is not what the gods love that we must sacrifice to them: it is, on the contrary, all the animals which have received, following metamorphoses, the souls of unjust and impious men. This is why, after pronouncing curses on the heads of the victims and cutting them off, they used to throw them into the Nile, and why today they abandon them to strangers. The ox which was to be slain was marked with a seal by priests called Sphragists; and this seal, if the historian Castor is to be believed,represented a man on his knees, his hands brought behind his back, and a sword held to his throat. The ass suffers in the same way, as we have said, the pains of the resemblance to Typhon which its stupidity and insolence give it, no less than the color of its hair. Also, as the king of Persia whom they hate the most is Ochus because of his impiety and his defilements, they gave him the name Donkey. Ochus, moreover, did not hesitate to answer them: "Well, this donkey will feast on your beef"; and he slew Apis. Such is the story of the historian Dinon. But those who say that Typhoon, abandoning the battle, rode on an ass;that his flight lasted seven days, and that after having escaped he had two sons, Hierosolymus and Judaeus, evidently involving, as this proves,

[32] Such are the allegories contained in this explanation. But let us go back to other origins, which are justified by better reasoned conjectures; and let's look at the simpler ones first. Their authors are those who say, like the Greeks, that Saturn is the allegorical figure of Time, and Juno, that of Air; that the birth of Vulcan is the symbol of the change of air into fire. Likewise among the Egyptians, Osiris is the Nile which units with Isis, or the earth; Typhoon is the sea, in which the Nile disappears and disperses by throwing itself into it; however, there is a reserve of the portion of its waters which, received and preserved by the earth, serves to fertilize it.There exists in honor of Osiris a religious lament, and in this lament it is said that being born on the left, Osiris perishes on the right. For the Egyptians regard the East as the face of the world, the North as being its right, and the South the left. Now the Nile, which flows from the south, is absorbed in the north by the sea; and it is easy to conceive that one says that it originates on the left and that it is going to be lost on the right. This is why the priests abhor the sea, and call the salt "Typhon's foam". One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. the North as being the right, and the South, the left.Now the Nile, which flows from the south, is absorbed in the north by the sea; and it is easy to conceive that one says that it originates on the left and that it is going to be lost on the right. This is why the priests abhor the sea, and call the salt "Typhon's foam". One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. the North as being the right, and the South, the left. Now the Nile, which flows from the south, is absorbed in the north by the sea; and it is easy to conceive that one says that it originates on the left and that it is going to be lost on the right.This is why the priests abhor the sea, and call the salt "Typhon's foam". One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. is absorbed in the North by the sea; and it is easy to conceive that one says that it originates on the left and that it is going to be lost on the right. This is why the priests abhor the sea, and call the salt "Typhon's foam". One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. is absorbed in the North by the sea;and it is easy to conceive that one says that it originates on the left and that it is going to be lost on the right. This is why the priests abhor the sea, and call the salt "Typhon's foam". One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish. One of the prohibitions imposed on them is not to put salt on the table. They never speak to pilots, because they practice the sea and live off the sea. figure of a fish.

Thus at Sais, in the vestibule of the temple of Athena, one saw engraved a child, an old man, a hawk; immediately after was drawn a fish, and following all these figures, a hippopotamus. They were a series of symbols which meant: “O you who are born into life, O you who are about to come out of it, God hates impudence.

Indeed, the child designates birth, the old man, the approaching cessation of life; the hawk is God; the fish is hatred, because of the sea, as we have said, and the hippopotamus marks impudence: for it is said that this animal, after having killed its father, mates with its mother.

Moreover, this saying of the Pythagoreans: "the sea is a tear of Saturn", also suggests that the sea is an impure element which does not associate with the other parts of creation. These are explanations drawn in a way from outside and borrowed from vulgar traditions.

[33] But the more enlightened among the priests are not content to say that Osiris is the Nile, and that Typhon is the sea. They think that Osiris is the principle and the power from which the moist is formed, that it is the author of all that has life, that it is the essence of germs. Typhoon, on the contrary, is, according to them, all igneous heat, all that is dry, all that combats humidity; and as they suppose, therefore, that he was red in hair and sallow in complexion, they do not at all like to show themselves with men of that color; they feel, on the contrary, a great repugnance to be in their company. But Osiris, according to the traditions of mythology, is black in skin, since the water gives a black tint to all the objects with which it mixes, to the earth,to clothes, to clouds, and because in young people it is the abundance of humor which makes the hair black; while the whiteness of the hair is a kind of pallor produced by the dryness of the humors, as is seen in old people. Spring is the season when everything grows, develops, is smiling; autumn, for lack of humidity, is hostile to vegetation and causes disease in animals. The ox which is fed at Heliopolis, and which is called Mnevis (it is consecrated to Osiris, and some even believe him to be the father of Apis), this ox is black, and it is after Apis that which is honors second. Another fact: as the land of Egypt is of a very black color and as dark as the apple of the eye, they give this region the name of Chemia.

[34] They say that the sun and the moon travel their perpetual course not on chariots, but on ships of navigation: signifying by this, that it is the moist principle which maintains them and which gave them birth. They also believe that it was from the Egyptians that Homer, and after him Thales, learned to establish water as the generative principle of all beings. They want Osiris to be the Ocean, Isis to be Tethys, which nourishes and maintains all that exists. And indeed, the Greeks give to the emission of sperm the name of Apusia, to coitus that of synusia. The word "hyios" (son) comes from "hydor", water, and "hysai", to rain.

Bacchus is called Hyes, as sovereign of the wet power, and he is none other than Osiris.For it seems that Hellanicus heard the name of Osiris pronounced Hysiris by the Egyptian priests; it is always thus that he himself persists in naming the God, and that, obviously, because of the word hysis "humidities".

[35] This identity of Osiris and Bacchus, who must know better than you, Clea, since you preside over the Thyades of Delphi, since your father and your mother initiated you into the mysteries of Osiris? If for others than for you it is necessary to produce testimonies, let us leave in their place the explanations which it is forbidden to reveal. Aren't there some that are indisputably obvious? Do the formalities with which the priests bury the Apis ox when they bring its body in a boat differ in any way from what is observed at the feasts of Bacchus? They cover themselves with fawn skins, they wear thyrses, they utter cries, they move about like those who are possessed with a holy fury at the orgies of the Bacchanalia. Also,in most of the works composed by Greek artists the statues of Bacchus bear the head of a bull; and the women of Elea, when in their prayers they invoke his presence, invite him to come to them "with the foot of a bull." Among the Argives, Bacchus has the surname of Bugène. He is evoked, to the sound of the trumpets, from the midst of the waters, by throwing a lamb into the abyss for the gatekeeper of the Underworld. The trumpets are hidden under thyrses, as Socrates said in his book "Holy Ceremonies". What is reported about the Titans and the nocturnal feasts of Bacchus also has a sensitive relationship with Osiris, who is cut to pieces, who comes back to life, who takes on a new existence. The same is true for his graves.The Egyptians show in several places, as we said before, of the tombs of Osiris. The Delphians believe, on their side, that the remains of Bacchus are collected at their place, near the place where the oracles go; and the Hosies offer a secret sacrifice in the temple of Apollo, whenever the Thyiades awaken the Licnite. Now, that Bacchus is in the eyes of the Greeks the god and the father not only of wine, but also of every moist substance, is what Pindar's testimony suffices to prove, when he says:

"Also increase the fruits that Pomone offers us, O beneficent Bacchus, holy brilliance of autumn".

This is why the worshipers of Osiris are forbidden to destroy any fruit tree and to obstruct any source.

[36] But it is not only the Nile, it is also any kind of water that is generally considered as flowing from Osiris; and in honor of this God, the processions of the priests are always preceded by an ewer. One also indicates by a leaf of fig tree the king Osiris and the climate of the South, and one explains this emblem by saying that the leaf of the fig tree contains a principle of humidity and generation, and that it seems to have some resemblance to a male member. When we celebrate the feast of the Pamylies, which, as we have already said, is that of the Phallus, we expose to view and walk around a statue whose virile member is three times the ordinary size. For God is the principle par excellence, and every principle multiplies, by generation, what comes from him.Rest,

"Triples were these knots...".

Unless, by Jupiter, the word "triple" was used by the ancients in its proper sense. Indeed, the moist substance which from the beginning was the generative principle of all things, first produced three elements, earth, air and fire. What has been added to the tenor of the mythological story, namely that Typhon threw the sexual parts of Osiris into the Nile, that Isis could not find them, but that she made and erected an image in their likeness by ordering to honor them and to carry a Phallus in pomp, this added detail is intended to teach us that the generative and reproductive faculty in God takes its first principle from humidity, and is communicated by the virtue of this humidity to all what is capable of producing. Another tradition has course in Egypt: it is that Apopis,who was brother to the Sun, had declared war on Jupiter. Osiris came to the aid of the master of the gods, and put the enemy to flight with him. Jupiter then adopted him for his son, and called him Dionysus. But it is easy to show that the fabulousness of this story hides an entirely physical truth. Indeed the Egyptians give to the wind the name of Jupiter, and the wind has as enemies dryness and fire, which, without being precisely the sun, have some affinity with the sun. Now the humidity, neutralizing the excess of dryness, increases and strengthens the exhalations which feed the wind and give it strength. But it is easy to show that the fabulousness of this story hides an entirely physical truth.Indeed the Egyptians give to the wind the name of Jupiter, and the wind has as enemies dryness and fire, which, without being precisely the sun, have some affinity with the sun. Now the humidity, neutralizing the excess of dryness, increases and strengthens the exhalations which feed the wind and give it strength. But it is easy to show that the fabulousness of this story hides an entirely physical truth.

Indeed the Egyptians give to the wind the name of Jupiter, and the wind has as enemies dryness and fire, which, without being precisely the sun, have some affinity with the sun. Now the humidity, neutralizing the excess of dryness, increases and strengthens the exhalations which feed the wind and give it strength.

[37] Another thing still: the ivy is consecrated to Bacchus by the Greeks; and this plant is called in Egyptian "chenosiris", a word whose meaning is "plant of Osiris". Ariston, who wrote the history of an Athenian emigration, had occasion to take cognizance of a certain letter from Alexarch; and in this letter it was said that Bacchus, son of Jupiter and Isis, is called by the Egyptians not Osiris, but Asiris (with an alpha), which means in their language strength and power This is confirmed by the testimony of Hermeus, who in his first book on the Egyptians gives us a similar explanation of the word Osiris. I could produce, as proof, the testimony of Mnaseas, who claims that Bacchus, Osiris and Sarapis are different names of Epaphus. I also omitted Anticlide,which affirms that Isis was daughter of Prometheus, and that she was married to Bacchus. But the likenesses which we have pointed out in their feasts and their sacrifices are of a nature to convince more clearly than all the testimonies.

[38] Between the stars Sirius is consecrated by the Egyptians to Isis, because it brings humidity. They also adore the Lion, and they adorn the doors of the temples with open lion's mouths, because the Nile overflows "When the sun already approaches the Lion". As the Nile, in their eyes, flows from Osiris, so they are convinced that the body of Isis is the earth; not the whole earth, but the part that the Nile invades by fertilizing it and mixing with it. It is from this union that they give birth to Horus. Horus is nothing but the temperature and disposition of the surrounding air, by which all things are maintained and nourished. This Horus was, it is said, brought up by Latona in the marshes around Butus;for a very humid earth, deeply soaked with water, nourishes better than any other the exhalations which neutralize or temper the drought and the heat. They designate under the name of Nephthys the extreme parts of the land of Egypt, those which are close to the sea and which are bathed in it. So they also give this Nephthys the name of Teleutean, and they say that she is married to Typhon. When the Nile, in its immense overflows, reaches these extreme parts, this is called the adultery of Osiris with Nephthys, a rapprochement which is revealed by the plants which we see then grow. Among them is sweet clover; and it is said that it is by stealing this fallen plant and left there, that Typhoon recognized the outrage done to his rights as husband.So Isis was the legitimate mother of Horus, but Anubis was born of clandestine adultery committed by Nephthys. Be that as it may, in the enumeration of the kings it is reported that Nephthys, after marrying Typhoon, remained at first barren. If it is a question, not of the sterility of a woman, but of that of the Goddess, we wanted to designate a sterility of the soil and a complete infertility caused by the neighborhood of the sea, an essentially infertile neighborhood.

[39] The pitfalls set up by Typhoon and his tyranny represented nothing other than the intensity of the drought, which neutralizes and absorbs the humidity which gives birth to the Nile and produces its overflows. The Queen of Ethiopia, who comes to the aid of Typhoon, allegorically points to the southern winds, blowing from Ethiopia. Because when these winds are stronger than the Etesians, which push the clouds on the side of Ethiopia, and they stop the cataracts of rains intended to swell the Nile, then Typhon is master. It burns everything, it completely masters the Nile which, on the contrary, flows weak and constricted: it is nothing more than a trickle of water hidden at the bottom of the land and very humble, that Typhon throws back into the sea. Indeed,what is said of the body of Osiris enclosed in the coffin does not seem to designate anything other than the subsidence of the waters of the Nile and their disappearance. Also it is said that Osiris disappeared in the month of Athyr, because it is the time when, the Etesian winds no longer blowing at all, the Nile withdraws and leaves the country uncovered. It is then that the nights become longer, that the darkness increases and prevails over the light which it triumphs over. The priests engage in several mournful ceremonies. Among other things, they have a golden ox, which they cover with a linen garment dyed black. It is a symbol of mourning for the Goddess: for they regard both the ox and the earth as being the image of Isis;then they show this ox to the public for four days, beginning on the seventeenth of this month. These four days of mourning each have their purpose. The first, we deplore the failure and retreat of the Nile; the second, the extinction of the north winds, completely suppressed by the superiority of those from the south; the third, the diminution of the days, the duration of which is shorter than that of the nights; finally, on the last day, we lament the bareness of the ground and the puny appearance of the trees, which at this moment are stripped of all their leaves.On the nineteenth day, when darkness came, we went to the seaside. There the stolists and the priests drew from its recess the sacred chest containing a small golden vase into which they poured fresh water. Then the audience utters a loud cry, as if to make it understood that Osiris has been found. After that they soak topsoil with water, by mixing in it the most precious aromatics and perfumes; and from this earth they knead a small figure which has the shape of a crescent. They dress her in a robe, they adorn her, and thus make it clear that they regard these two divinities as being the essence, one of the earth, the other of water.

[40] When Isis reconquers Osiris and hastens the development of the forces of Horus by means of the exhalations, vapors and clouds which make him vigorous, she has triumphed over Typhoon, but she does not cause him to perish. In her capacity as sovereign mistress of the earth, she is careful not to allow the complete annihilation of the substance contrary to humidity: she is content to release and relax it, because she wants to leave a kind of temperament, and that she knows that the universe would not be complete if the igneous principle were to be lacking and to disappear. Although such an interpretation does not lack plausibility, we should not reject this other statement either, namely that Typhon was formerly master of what constitutes the share of Osiris.Indeed Egypt was a sea. That is why in the mines and in the mountains we still find today a large number of shells. All the fountains, all the wells, and there are many of them, contain bitter and salty water, a sort of remnant, or residue, of the sea which once dwelt in these places. Horus, in time, triumphed over Typhoon. This means that a happy abundance of rains having occurred, the Nile drove back the sea, laid bare the plain, and successively filled it with new heaps of earth. A proof which comes in support of this opinion is that even now, when the river brings fresh silt and adds new beds of earth, we see the sea receding imperceptibly back, and its waves receding before the lower parts of the ground, which acquire height as a result of the alluvium.Thus Pharos, which is sung by Homer as being a day's march from Egypt, is today part of this same Egypt. Does this mean that the island has moved, that it has risen closer to land? No, it's because the intermediate sea space has been filled in thanks to the fact that the river has created and maintained a new continent. But these explanations resemble the theological interpretations given by the Stoics. They say that the generating and nourishing spirit is Bacchus; that the spirit that strikes and divides is Hercules; that he who has the property of receiving, is Ammon; that the spirit which insinuates itself through the earth and into the fruits is Ceres; that finally the one who circulates in the bosom of the sea is Neptune.

[41] Other mingle with these ideas of physics some considerations drawn from the knowledge of astronomy. They want Typhon to be the solar world, and Osiris the lunar world; that the moon, whose light has the property of producing and humidifying, favors the generation of animals and the vegetation of plants; that the sun, thanks to its devouring fire, has the mission of heating and drying up beings and plants; let it be he who, by his extreme heat, renders the greater part of the earth quite uninhabitable, most often prevailing over the moon itself. This is why the Egyptians always give Typhon the name Seth, which means "predominant force", "violence exerted". According to their mythology, Hercules, installed in the sun, rotates with this star,and Mercury rotates with the moon. The influences of the latter indeed resemble works of reason and wisdom, those of the sun are like blows, and have a character of force and violence. Thus the Stoics say, that the fires of the sun were kindled by the sea and are nourished by it, while the fountains and the lakes send to the moon sweet and soft exhalations.

[42] It is on the seventeenth day of the month of Athyr that Egyptian mythology places the death of Osiris: this is the time when the full moon is especially visible. So the Pythagoreans call this day "interposition," and have complete repugnance for the number seventeen. Indeed, between the square sixteen and the rectangle eighteen, which are the only planar numbers whose perimeters happen to be equal to their areas, comes the number seventeen, which disjoints these two numbers, is interposed between them, and divides their ratio, which is sesqui-octave, into two unequal parts. Osiris, according to some, lived, according to others, reigned, twenty-eight years;and it is precisely during twenty-eight days that we see the light of the moon: it is this lapse of time that it takes to operate its revolution. When the ceremony called the funeral of Osiris comes, wood is cut with which to make a chest in the shape of a crescent, because the moon has this figure when it approaches the sun to the point of being hidden from our eyes.

The fourteen parts into which Osiris is cut mark, it is supposed, the number of days during which the moon wanes, from its full to its renewal. The day on which it reappears for the first time after having freed itself from the glare of the sun and having passed this star, is called “good which is not perfect”.For Osiris is essentially beneficent, and his name, which has several meanings, expresses no less strongly the idea of ​​activity and benevolence. Besides, the other name they give to this god,

[43] They think that the phases of the moon correspond up to a certain point to the increases of the Nile. The greatest height of its waters at Elephantine is twenty-eight cubits; and it is the correct number of days that the moon takes to complete its luminous revolution each month. The least height, at Mendes and at Xois, is six cubits, and corresponds to the six days during which the moon gains its first quarter. The mean height, which occurs at Memphis, and which is fourteen cubits when regular, relates to the full moon. Apis is, they say, the living image of Osiris; he is born at the moment when a fertilizing light leaves the moon and comes to touch the heifer whose desires are excited.This is also why Apis has several features of resemblance to the shapes of the moon: the whiteness of his body being blackened here and there with dark spots. Moreover, at the new moon of the month Phamenoth, a festival is celebrated which is called “the entry of Osiris into the moon” it is at the beginning of spring. Thus they place the power of Osiris in this star, and give him Isis as his wife, who is the generative faculty.

It is also for this reason that they call the moon "mother of the world", and that they suppose her to have two sexes, because fertilized and made mother by the sun, she penetrates the air in her turn and spreads fertility principles. Indeed, they say, the destructive influence enjoyed by Typhoon does not always dominate.Often it is overcome, chained by the generative faculty; then she regains the upper hand, and makes war on Horus. Now this is the earthly world,

[44] Others believe that these fictions cryptically point to eclipses. According to them the moon eclipses when it is at its full; and the sun being with it in opposition, it falls into the shadow of the earth, as we say that Osiris fell into the coffer. In turn the moon, on the thirtieth day of the month, hides and obscures the sun without however completely annihilating it, just as Isis does not kill Typhon either. When Nephthys brings Anubis into the world, Isis happens to be below; for Nephthys designates that which is underground and which is not seen; Isis, which is above the earth and can be seen. The circle which divides these two hemispheres, which is called horizon, and which is common to both, receives the name of Anubis.It is compared to the face of a dog, because the dog sees during the night as well as during the day. Anubis appears to have among the Egyptians the same attributions as Hecate among the Greeks, since he is both terrestrial and Olympian. There are people to whom it seems that Anubis is Saturn; and, therefore, as he engenders everything from himself, as he conceives everything in his own bosom, he has received the name of dogs. It is still because of this that for the worshipers of Anubis the word "dog" is one of those that they must not pronounce.

Formerly this animal received the highest honors in Egypt.Subsequently, Cambyses having killed the ox Apis and having had it thrown into the garbage, no other animal approached it and would not taste it: the dog alone touched it. From then on he lost the privilege he had of being the first and most honored among all the animals. There are some who give the name Typhoon to the shadow of the earth when the moon sinks into that shadow and eclipses it.

[45] As a result of all this, it does not seem unreasonable to say that if in particular each of these explanations is inadmissible, taken all together they become correct. Indeed it is not the drought, the wind, the sea, the darkness, but all that nature contains of harmful and destructive parts, that Typhoon represents. The first principles of the universe must not reside in inanimate bodies, as Democritus and Epicurus wanted. Nor should we suppose, with the Stoics, a reason, a single providence, which, having created matter without properties, dominates and masters all the worlds. It is impossible indeed that there is anything bad if God is the author of all things, or that there is anything good if God is the author of nothing.The harmony of the world is, according to Heraclitus, the result of contrary movements, like a lyre or a bow unwinding and stretching. Euripides said the same:

“Good from evil cannot be separated: It is the union of the two that makes everything prosper”.

Also there exists an opinion which is connected with the highest antiquity, and which from the founders of religions and legislators has descended to poets and philosophers. The first author remains unknown; but it is a belief which has gained strength and which it would be difficult to uproot, seeing that it is found not only in conversations and in traditions, but also in religious ceremonies, and in sacrifices among the Barbarians, as among the Greeks. This opinion teaches, that the universe does not float haphazardly in a vacuum, without intelligence and without direction; that it is not, either, a single reason which commands and directs it as with a rudder or as by a brake which it obeys; but that the greater part of it is a compound of evil and good;or rather, that nothing, indeed, in nature there is no mixing. It is not the same sommelier who, drawing two different wines from two casks, combines them and distributes them to everyone like an innkeeper: and the wines, here, are the various events. No: there are two opposing principles, two contrary forces, one of which goes to the right and in a direct line, the other of which pulls to the left and in broken lines. Hence this mixture, which characterizes life and which characterizes the world, if not as a whole, at least as far as our terrestrial and sublunary globe is concerned. Is there anything more irregular than this globe, more diverse, more subject to a thousand changes?For if nothing must originally happen without a cause, and if, on the other hand, a good being cannot produce anything bad,

[46] This is an opinion adopted by the greatest number and by the wisest. Some think that there are two somehow rival deities, one of which produces goods and the second, evils. Others call God the best of these principles, and Demon the worst. This is the doctrine of Zoroaster, who lived, it is said, five thousand years before the Trojan War. He gave the God the name of Oromasius, and the Demon that of Arimane. He added, that among sensible things it was light that the first most resembled, the second, on the contrary, darkness and ignorance; that Mithra held the middle between these two principles; whence comes, that the Persians also give to Mithras the name of Mesites.For one Zoroaster taught sacrifices of prayers and thanksgiving, for the other, lugubrious ceremonies intended to avert evils.

And indeed, the Persians pound in a mortar a certain herb called "omômi", and they invoke Hades and darkness at the same time. Then, having mixed the blood of a slaughtered wolf with this herb, they take the mixture away and throw it in a place where the sun never penetrates. Because they think that among the plants, some belong to the good God, others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter.mournful ceremonies intended to avert evils. And indeed, the Persians pound in a mortar a certain herb called "omômi", and they invoke Hades and darkness at the same time. Then, having mixed the blood of a slaughtered wolf with this herb, they take the mixture away and throw it in a place where the sun never penetrates. Because they think that among the plants, some belong to the good God, others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter. mournful ceremonies intended to avert evils.And indeed, the Persians pound in a mortar a certain herb called "omômi", and they invoke Hades and darkness at the same time. Then, having mixed the blood of a slaughtered wolf with this herb, they take the mixture away and throw it in a place where the sun never penetrates. Because they think that among the plants, some belong to the good God, others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter. and they invoke Hades and darkness at the same time.Then, having mixed the blood of a slaughtered wolf with this herb, they take the mixture away and throw it in a place where the sun never penetrates. Because they think that among the plants, some belong to the good God, others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter. and they invoke Hades and darkness at the same time. Then, having mixed the blood of a slaughtered wolf with this herb, they take the mixture away and throw it in a place where the sun never penetrates.Because they think that among the plants, some belong to the good God, others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter. the others to the wicked Demon. Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter. the others to the wicked Demon.Likewise among the animals, they regard the dogs, the birds and the hedgehogs of the earth as belonging to the good God, and the river hedgehogs to the wicked Demon. That is why they consider happy the one who puts to death the greatest number of the latter.

[47] Moreover, they too spout many fables about the Gods. Here is one of them. Oromase born of the purest light, and Arimane born of darkness are at war with each other. Oromasius produced six gods, the first of which is that of benevolence; the second, that of truth; the third, of legality; the fourth, wisdom; the fifth, wealth; finally the sixth is the god who has the privilege of creating the enjoyments attached to good deeds. Arimane produced an equal number of them, as if destined to be their antagonists. Then Oromasius, having given himself a triple increase, went and placed himself at as great a distance from the sun as that which separates this star from the earth,and he adorned the sky with constellations; but he gave to one of them the pre-eminence over all the others, constituting her as their guardian and their inspector: it is Sirius. He made another twenty-four gods, and he put them in an egg. But those that Arimanes created in his turn, and who were likewise twenty-four in number, pierced the egg: as a result of which took place the mixture of evils with goods. A time will come, and it is determined, when Arimane, they say, introducing pestilence and famine, will perish entirely from all necessity, and will disappear in consequence of the ravages which these plagues will wield. The earth will be nothing more than a vast flat surface; there will be only one life, only one form of government;all men will enjoy perfect happiness, and speak the same language. Theopompus says, according to the Magi, that during three thousand years one and the other of these gods is by turns dominating and dominated; that for another three thousand years they will fight and make war against each other, mutually destroying their respective works. In the end it is Hades who will have the bottom: men will be in possession of happiness; they will not need food, nor will they cast a shadow. The god who has produced such effects will rest, and will cease to act for a period of time which would be considerable, if it were a question of the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi.that for three thousand years one and the other of these gods is by turns dominating and dominated; that for another three thousand years they will fight and make war against each other, mutually destroying their respective works. In the end it is Hades who will have the bottom: men will be in possession of happiness; they will not need food, nor will they cast a shadow. The god who has produced such effects will rest, and will cease to act for a period of time which would be considerable, if it were a question of the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi.

that for three thousand years one and the other of these gods is by turns dominating and dominated;that for another three thousand years they will fight and make war against each other, mutually destroying their respective works. In the end it is Hades who will have the bottom: men will be in possession of happiness; they will not need food, nor will they cast a shadow. The god who has produced such effects will rest, and will cease to act for a period of time which would be considerable, if it were a question of the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi. they will fight and make war against each other, mutually destroying their respective works. In the end it is Hades who will have the bottom: men will be in possession of happiness;they will not need food, nor will they cast a shadow. The god who has produced such effects will rest, and will cease to act for a period of time which would be considerable, if it were a question of the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi. they will fight and make war against each other, mutually destroying their respective works. In the end it is Hades who will have the bottom: men will be in possession of happiness; they will not need food, nor will they cast a shadow. The god who has produced such effects will rest, and will cease to act for a period of time which would be considerable, if it were a question of the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long.Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi. and will cease to act for a time which would be considerable, if it were the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi. and will cease to act for a time which would be considerable, if it were the sleep of a man, but which for a god is only moderately long. Here is an overview of the mythology of the Magi.

[48] ​​The Chaldeans think that the planets have gods, among whom they designate two as beneficent, two as malevolent; the three others are intermediate and participate in one and the other provision. For the doctrine of the Greeks it is almost known to everyone: they give Jupiter Olympian the role of benefactor. Hades, on the contrary, is a divinity whose influence must be feared. They say in their fables that from Venus and Mars was born the goddess Harmony, Mars being cruel and quarrelsome, Venus being gentle and fruitful. See how philosophers conform to these traditions. Heraclitus openly says of war that it is the mother, the queen, the sovereign of everything; and that when Homer wishes to see "From earth and heaven Discord banned",this poet no longer remembers that this is an imprecation directed against all existing beings as a whole, since they are the product of a struggle and an opposition. Heraclitus adds, that the sun will never cross the limits assigned to it; that otherwise he would find vengeful furies willing to facilitate the punishment of his disobedience. Empedocles gives to the principle which produces the good the name of love and friendship: he often still calls it "serious harmony"; and the worst principle he names he would find vengeful furies willing to facilitate the punishment of his disobedience.

Empedocles gives to the principle which produces the good the name of love and friendship: he often still calls it "serious harmony";and the worst principle he names he would find vengeful furies willing to facilitate the punishment of his disobedience. Empedocles gives to the principle which produces the good the name of love and friendship: he often still calls it "serious harmony"; and the worst principle he names

"Rix fruitful in evils, and bloody discord".

The Pythagoreans proceed by employing a greater number of denominations. The principle of good they call unity, finite, stable, direct, odd, square, equal, right side, luminous. The principle of evil is the dyad, the infinite, the moved, the curved, the even, the oblong, the unequal, the left, the tenebrous: so that these are all the principles of birth. Anaxagoras recognizes only intelligence and infinity; Aristotle, that form and deprivation. Plato, who often speaks in a sort of enigmatic and veiled way, gives to these two contrary principles the name of "always the same" and "sometimes one, sometimes the other". But in his Laws, a work written by him in a more advanced age, he renounces enigma and allegory to use proper words;and he says, that the world is not ruled by one soul, that it has perhaps many, and certainly two at least, one of which creates good, and one of which other, being opposed to it, also produces opposite effects. He still leaves a third intermediate nature, which is deprived neither of soul, nor of reason, nor of a movement of its own, as some have thought, but which is subject to the two other principles of which we we talked. Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy.that the world is not ruled by a single soul, that there are perhaps a large number of them, and certainly two at least, one of which creates good, and the other of which, being itself opposite, also produces opposite effects. He still leaves a third intermediate nature, which is deprived neither of soul, nor of reason, nor of a movement of its own, as some have thought, but which is subject to the two other principles of which we we talked. Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy.that the world is not ruled by a single soul, that there are perhaps a large number of them, and certainly two at least, one of which creates good, and the other of which, being itself opposite, also produces opposite effects. He still leaves a third intermediate nature, which is deprived neither of soul, nor of reason, nor of a movement of its own, as some have thought, but which is subject to the two other principles of which we we talked.

Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy. one of which creates good, and the other, being opposed to it, also produces opposite effects.He still leaves a third intermediate nature, which is deprived neither of soul, nor of reason, nor of a movement of its own, as some have thought, but which is subject to the two other principles of which we we talked. Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy. one of which creates good, and the other, being opposed to it, also produces opposite effects. He still leaves a third intermediate nature, which is deprived neither of soul, nor of reason, nor of a movement of its own, as some have thought, but which is subject to the two other principles of which we we talked.Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy. but which is subject to the two other principles of which we have spoken. Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it. This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy. but which is subject to the two other principles of which we have spoken. Only this nature always tends towards the best of them: it aspires to it, it pursues it.This will be shown in the rest of our discourse, where we will bring Egyptian theology into harmony with this philosophy.

[49] Indeed the birth and composition of the world in which we are is the product of a mixture of contrary forces, which, in truth, are not equally powerful, but the best of which prevails. It is impossible for the bad element to disappear completely, since it is inherent in a host of points in the body, in a host of points in the soul of the universe, and constantly is in stubborn struggle with the principle of good. In this soul of the world, intelligence and reason, which is the guide and the master of all that is good, is Osiris. And in the earth, in the wind, in the water, in the stars, what is regulated, constant, salutary, in relation to the seasons, the temperatures and the periodicities, all this stems from Osiris: it is a sensitive image of him .Typhoon, on the contrary, is all that in the soul of the world is passionate, titanic, unreasonable, stricken with stupidity, and all that in this same body is perishable, sickly. The disorders to which the irregularities and bad weather of the seasons give rise, the eclipses of the sun and the moon, are in a way deviations and outbursts of Typhoon. This is originated by the name of Seth, given to Typhoon: a term which means domination, violence, and which also means abrupt and frequent return, immoderate leaps. There is still the word Bébon, which, according to some, designates one of the satellites of Typhoon; but Manetho claims it is another name for Typhon himself.

This word has the meaning of obstacle, impediment:

[50] Also, among the private animals, he has been allocated the most stupid, the donkey, and among the savages, those who are the most ferocious, the crocodile and the hippopotamus. We have previously exposed what is relative to the donkey. As for the hippopotamus, an image of Typhon is shown in Hermopolis in the form of this animal. He has on his back a hawk fighting a snake. The hippopotamus designating Typhon, the sparrowhawk marks the power and authority that this bad genius often acquires through violence: authority which he never tires of abusing, in his malice, to trouble others as he is troubled himself. -even. This is why in the sacrifices made to her on the seventh day of the month Tybi, a day called "return of Isis from Phenicia",a hippopotamus laden with chains is depicted on the sacred cakes. In Apollonopolis a law obliges every citizen, without exception, to eat crocodile. On a fixed day, they hunt as many as they can, and after having killed them they throw them in front of the temple of the God. They give the reason that Typhoon escaped Horus by taking the form of a crocodile. Thus, all that is bad in the animals, in the plants, in the passions, they regard as the work of Typhon, as part of his being, and as being the product of his movements.

and after having killed them they throw them before the temple of the God. They give the reason that Typhoon escaped Horus by taking the form of a crocodile.Thus, all that is bad in the animals, in the plants, in the passions, they regard as the work of Typhon, as part of his being, and as being the product of his movements. and after having killed them they throw them before the temple of the God. They give the reason that Typhoon escaped Horus by taking the form of a crocodile. Thus, all that is bad in the animals, in the plants, in the passions, they regard as the work of Typhon, as part of his being, and as being the product of his movements.

[51] Osiris is, in turn, represented by an eye and a scepter: the first of these emblems indicating foresight, and the second, authority;
just as Homer, in giving to Jupiter, master and king of all things, the name of "supreme adviser", seems to allude by the word "supreme" to the power of God, and by the word "advisor" to his high wisdom and caution. Often also they represent Osiris under the image of a sparrowhawk: given that this bird prevails over the others by the vivacity of its look, the speed of its flight, and the small quantity of food which it needs to support itself. . It is said, moreover, that on the unburied bodies the hawk throws earth while hovering above them; that when he descends on the Nile to drink there he holds his wing straight, and that after drinking, he lowers it: a maneuver by which he shows that he is saved and that he has escaped the crocodile;for when the latter has seized it, the bird's wing remains straight as it was. But everywhere one also finds Osiris represented in a human form, having the erect virile member, because of his productive and nourishing virtue. They cover his images with a veil of the color of fire, because they regard the sun as the body of beneficial power, as the visible expression of the intellectual essence. There is therefore reason to reject the opinion of those who assign to Typhon the sphere of the sun, since to Typhon could belong nothing brilliant, salutary, nor regularity, nor creation, nor orderly and reasonable movement, and that it is the opposite that composes its attributes.Excessive heat, which kills many animals and plants, should not be regarded as the effect of the sun; it is, on the contrary, produced by the winds and the waters, which mingle out of season on earth and in the air, whenever the power of the irregular principle, the power of disorder, happens to commit excesses and to stifle the exhalations.

[52] In their sacred hymns in honor of Osiris, the Egyptians invoke "He who is hidden in the arms of the sun"; and on the thirtieth day of the month Epiphi, the day when the moon and the sun are in conjunction, they celebrate "the birth of the eyes of Horus", because they regard not only the moon, but also the sun as being the eye and the light of Horus. On the twenty-second of the month phaophi, after the autumnal equinox, we celebrate the birth of "the rods of the sun", to indicate that this star needs to be supported and strengthened, because the heat and the light have come to fail him and that he moves obliquely away from us. Moreover, at the winter solstice they carry in procession a cow with which one goes around the temple seven times.This allusion to the movement of the sun is called "the search for Osiris", because in the winter season the Goddess is desirous of water; and this number of seven evolutions is due to the fact that the sun does not arrive from the winter solstice to the summer solstice until the seventh month. It is also said that Horus, son of Isis, was the first who on the fourth day of the month sacrificed to the Sun, as recorded in the book entitled Anniversaries of the Birth of Horus. Moreover, three times a day they burn perfumes in honor of the Sun, resin at daybreak, myrrh at noon, and in the evening an aromatic called "Kyphi": each of these three offerings having a which I will explain later. They believe by all these practices to make the Sun auspicious and to honor it.But is it necessary to collect a lot of details like this? Some, indeed, openly say that Osiris is the Sun, called Sirius by the Greeks, and that the addition which the Egyptians made of the article O before this last name is the cause of all the difficulties. For Isis they declare that she is none other than the moon; that of her images where she wears horns designate the moon in its crescent, that those where she is veiled in black represent her eclipses and the darkness into which she falls while seeking the Sun and pursuing it. Also in their loves they invoke the moon, and Eudoxus claims that it is Isis who decides love conflicts. It is an opinion which, after all, is not devoid of plausibility. For those who want Typhoon to be the Sun,
Let us return to the subject with which we are specially concerned.

[53] Of the nature fit to receive any generation Isis is the female part. It is in this sense that Plato calls it "nurse" and "universal container". Generally it is called "Myrionym", because reason makes it capable of taking all kinds of forms and appearances. She has an innate love for the primitive being, for the being who has the supreme power over all things, and who is the same as the absolute Good.

She desires it, she pursues it, on the contrary fleeing and rejecting any participation with the principle of evil.Although it is for one and for the other a matter, and like a soil delivered to them, nevertheless a natural inclination always carries it towards the principle of good: it is to this that it offers itself so that he fertilizes it, so that he pours into it his influences and his sympathies. She is happy, she quivers, when she feels that she is pregnant with these generative germs and that she is filled with them. For in all matter the production of beings is the image of the fertilized substance, and the creature is made in imitation of the being who gives it life.

[54] It is therefore not out of place that in their mythology the Egyptians say that the soul of Osiris is eternal and incorruptible, although his body is often torn by Typhon, who makes the shreds disappear, and well that Isis, wandering in search of them, strives to adjust them. For Being in essence, the purely intelligible, supremely good substance, is above all destruction and all change.

It is true that through this Being sensible and corporeal matter is kneaded in some way into images, that he imprints ideas, forms, resemblances on it, as wax receives the mark of seals; but these are not imprints that last forever. These forms, these images are seized by the disordered and tumultuous principle, which, relegated here below far from the superior regions,fight against Horus; and Horus is engendered by Isis to be the sensible image of the intellectual world. So Typhon does not fail, it is said, to dispute the legitimacy of the birth of Horus, claiming that the latter is neither pure nor sincere. It is quite true that the verb, his father, is essentially simple, free from passion, whereas the union of Horus with corporeal nature has given his birth a kind of illegitimacy. But he triumphs and becomes victorious by the help of Mercury, that is to say, of reason, which attests and proves that nature has formed the world in the image of purely intelligible substance. Indeed, by saying that Isis and Osiris were still in Rhea's womb when these two deities gave birth to Apollo,the Egyptians make it understood that before our world had become visible, before reason had given an accomplished form to matter, the latter, whose native imperfection is evident, received its first birth. Also they say that this god was born in the bosom of darkness without having all his members; and they call him old Horus, seeing that he was not the world, but an image and appearance of the world which was one day to be formed.

[55] As for the younger Horus, who is the determined, definite and perfect Horus, he did not entirely destroy Typhon, but he took away his strength and activity. It is for this reason, they say, that at Coptos the statue of Horus holds in one of his hands the virile member of Typhon. Their fables also tell that Mercury, having deprived Typhon of his nerves, made him strings for the lyre. It is a way of teaching that when reason organized the universe it established harmony there, making it succeed discordances. It did not annihilate the destructive principle, but it contented itself with counterbalancing it.Also this principle is weakened on earth, and it does not have all its efficacy, mixed as it is, and as it were linked to substances susceptible of various affections and changes. It produces none the less here below tremors and tremors, and above our heads droughts, disorderly winds, hurricanes mingled with lightning and thunderbolts, Its pestilential influence extends over the waters and on the air we breathe. It leaps and rushes to the lunar globe, disturbing and obscuring more than once the brightness of this star. At least the Egyptians think so;and this is what they express by saying, that Typhoon sometimes struck Horus on the eye with a blow, and sometimes tore it from him, swallowed it, then returned this same eye to the sun: for by this blow they enigmatically hear the monthly waning of the moon; and by the entire deprivation of the eye, they hear the total eclipse of this planet,

[56] But a more perfect and divine nature is composed of three principles, which are, the understanding, matter, and the product of their combination, namely the world, as the Greeks call it. Plato is accused of giving the understanding the names of idea, model, father; to matter, those of mother, nurse, seat and base of generation; and the product of these two principles, it is customary to say that it is "the begotten, the begotten".

It seems probable that it is to the most beautiful of triangles, to the right-angled triangle, that the Egyptians especially assimilate the nature of the Universe; and, moreover, it is this triangle that Plato seems to have used in his Republic, to represent marriage in a rectilinear form. In this right-angled triangle, one of the sides of the right angle is represented by 3; the base is by 4, and the hypotenuse by 5. Now the square of the latter is equal to the sum of the squares made on the two sides which contain the right angle. We must therefore conceive that the side of the right angle represents the male, that the base of the triangle represents the female, and that the hypotenuse is the product of the two;that thus Osiris is the first principle, that Isis receives its influences, and that Horus is the result of the operation of both. Indeed 3 is the first odd and perfect number; 4 is the square of 2, the first even number; and 5, which is composed of 3 and 2, comes from both its father and its mother. From the word slope (five) is derived the word "panta" "universe", as well as the verb "pempazô", which means "to count with the five fingers". Moreover, 5 squared gives a number equal to that of the letters of their alphabet and that of the years that the Apis ox lived. The Egyptians are therefore accustomed to calling Horus Caimin, which corresponds to "seen", because this world is sensitive and visible.For Isis, she is sometimes called Muth, sometimes Athyri, sometimes Methyer. The first of these names means mother, the second, habitation of Horus in this world (in the same sense as Plato said “space is the vessel of generation”); the third is composed of two words which mean full and cause: for the matter of the world is full, and it is attached to an essentially pure and well-ordered cause.

[57] It may be that Hesiod does not suppose any other principles than these, when he gives as creators of all things Chaos, Earth, Tartarus and Love, if however we substitute and attribute , according to this datum, the name of Isis to Earth, of Osiris to Love, of Typhoon to Tartarus. For Chaos, it seems that Hesiod wanted to designate by this some place and some place in the universe. The subject itself recalls to a certain point here the fable that Socrates, in the Symposium, tells about the birth of Love. Poverty, says Socrates, wanting to have children, came to lie down beside the God of abundance while he slept. From the works of this god she became pregnant, and gave birth to Love, whose nature is mixed and multiple,given that he was born of an honest, skilful father who knew how to be self-sufficient in everything, while his mother lacks expedients, resources, and that in her destitution she always feels the need to attach herself obstinately to some protective. Indeed the God of abundance is nothing other than the first good worthy of being loved and sought after, the first good which is perfect and sufficient unto itself. By Poverty, Socrates designates matter, which by its nature particularly experiences the need for good, and which even when it has been fertilized with it, always desires and receives its influences. The being born of these two principles, namely the world or Horus, is neither eternal, nor free from affections, nor incorruptible; but he is always reborn;and thanks to the changes of state,

[58] Moreover, it is necessary to make use of these fables, not to see in them lessons that have all the necessary scope, but to take in each of them the traits of resemblance that are reconciled with our subject. When, therefore, we speak of matter, we must not, in accordance with the opinion of certain philosophers, picture to us a body deprived of soul, incapable of producing anything, without movement and without activity of its own. Indeed, we say of oil that it is a matter of perfume, of gold that it is a matter of statues; but neither oil nor gold is void of all quality. The soul and the understanding in man are in some way matters of science and virtue: we entrust them to reason, for it to shape and direct them;and some philosophers have declared that the soul is the seat of ideas, and, so to speak, the mold of intelligible things. There are even those who believe that the sperm in the woman has no power, no fertilizing property, and that it only serves as matter and food for the fetus. Those who adopt this opinion must also think that the goddess Isis, uniting herself in continual intercourse with the supreme God, and being imbued with love for so much excellence and perfection, is far from ever manifesting the least resistance to him. . Their relationship is that of a legitimate and conscientious husband who loves his other half, and an honest woman who, even when she still enjoys her husband, does not stop being in love with him.

[59] But when Typhon suddenly seizes the extremities of matter, then Isis is said to appear in the darkest affliction. She searches for the remains, the smallest shreds of Osiris; she collects them in the folds of her dress. This is how she receives and hides perishable substances, to bring them out again by a second birth and reproduce them from her womb. For the reasons, the images, the emanations of the Divinity which shine in the sky and in the stars preserve a permanent state; but there are others which are disseminated in the parts of matter subject to modification, namely on the earth, in the sea, in plants, in animals. All these decompose, annihilate, bury themselves,to reappear often again and show itself in the light of day, thanks to a second birth. This is why the fable says that Typhon approached Nephthys, and that Osiris also had a secret commerce with her: for the last parts of matter which the Egyptians call Nephthys and Teleute, are more than the others. dominated by the destructive principle. But the principle which spawns and preserves spreads over these parts only a weak and languishing germ, neutralized by Typhoon. The portions collected by Isis are the only ones that are preserved, because she nourishes them and gives them consistency. for the last parts of matter, which the Egyptians call Nephthys and Teleutes, are more than the others dominated by the destructive principle.But the principle which spawns and preserves spreads over these parts only a weak and languishing germ, neutralized by Typhoon. The portions collected by Isis are the only ones that are preserved, because she nourishes them and gives them consistency. for the last parts of matter, which the Egyptians call Nephthys and Teleutes, are more than the others dominated by the destructive principle. But the principle which spawns and preserves spreads over these parts only a weak and languishing germ, neutralized by Typhoon. The portions collected by Isis are the only ones that are preserved, because she nourishes them and gives them consistency.

[60] But in general the best thing is to think, like Plato and Aristotle, that towards Horus tends the generative and preserving faculty, to ensure the existence of beings, while the faculty that corrupts and destroys is repelled by this same Horus to go into nothingness. The name of Isis is therefore given to the Goddess, because of the word "iesthai" (to come forward), because she proceeds and acts with science, because she represents a movement animated and directed by reflection. It is not a name of barbarian origin; but just as the appellation common to all the gods, "theos", was formed from the two words "theasthai," "to look at" and "teas", "to run:she is called Isis. Plato also says that to designate substance ("ousia"), the ancients used the word "Isia", and that the words "noesis" "intelligence", "phronesis" "prudence", composed of "we" "intelligence", from "phora" "impetus" and from "kinesis" movement, indicate that these faculties are produced by the impetus, the movement, the flight of the soul; that finally the words "synienai" "to understand", "to agathon" "the good", "aretê" "virtue", come from the words "ienai" "to go", "thêo" "to run", "rhéô ", "to flow"; and that, reciprocally, the contrary words designate, with an insulting meaning, the evil which stops nature, which hinders it, chains it and prevents it from springing up and walking: these are the words "Kakia" "vice"; "aporia" "indigence";"deilia" "cowardice"; "ania" "discouragement, bread".

[61] As for the name of Osiris, it is composed of the two words “Osios” “holy”, and “hieros” “consecrated”. Indeed, there is a common relationship between the substances which are in heaven and those which are in hell. Now these were called by the ancients "consecrated," and the former were usually called "holy." The God who makes known the celestial substances, and who is the reason for what happens in the regions above, is called Anubis and sometimes Hermanubis. The first name designates the relations of God with the upper world, the second, his relations with the lower. So they sometimes sacrifice a white rooster, sometimes a yellow rooster, emblems one of purity, and the other of mixture and diversity. Rest,we should not be surprised at these names formed in the Greek fashion. There are a large number of others who left Greece with emigrants, and who, having become naturalized among foreign nations, still exist there today. Some have been reminded by poets of this proscription; but they are accused as introducers of barbarisms by those who give these words the name of glosses, or foreign terms. In the books called "books of Mercury" it is said to be written concerning the sacred names, that the Power appointed to the revolutions of the sun is called Horus by the Egyptians, and Apollo by the Greeks; that she who presides over the air is called by some Osiris, by others Sarapis, by others Sothi, which is the Egyptian name. Now this last word means "pregnancy",or "to be fat". In Greek its equivalent is "kuésis, kuein", from which, by alteration of the word, we called in Greek "kuôn" "dog", the constellation which we regard as specially consecrated to Isis. Undoubtedly, one should not insist on having one's opinion triumph in matters of etymologies; however, I would rather attribute to the Egyptian language this word Sarapis than that of Osiris. The first is foreign, the second is Greek; but I think that both designate a single god, a single faculty. one should not insist on having one's opinion prevail in matters of etymology; however, I would rather attribute to the Egyptian language this word Sarapis than that of Osiris. The first is foreign,but I think that both designate a single god, a single faculty. one should not insist on having one's opinion prevail in matters of etymology; however, I would rather attribute to the Egyptian language this word Sarapis than that of Osiris. The first is foreign, the second is Greek; but I think that both designate a single god, a single faculty.

[63] The sistrum also indicates that all beings must be agitated without anything stopping their movement, and that they must in some way be shaken, awakened from their state of sluggishness and torpor. They claim in fact that at the noise of the sistrums Typhon is diverted and put to flight. It is meant by this that the principle of corruption hinders and arrests the course of nature, whereas the generating cause, by means of movement, releases it and restores to it all its strength. The upper part of the sistrum is of a convex shape, and at this top are fixed the four things which shake each other. For the portion of the world which is begotten and which must perish is contained within the sphere of the moon;and in this portion all the movements, all the variations experienced are the effect of the combination of the four elements, fire, land, air and water. At the top of the convexity of the sistrum is chiseled a cat with a human face; and at the bottom of the instrument, below the things being shaken, are seen on one side the face of Isis, and on the other that of Nephthys. By these two emblems we designate birth and death, which are the various mutations and movements undergone by the four elements. The cat represents the moon, because of its variety of colors, its activity during the night and its fecundity. For this animal, it is said, bears the first time a young, then two, then three, then four, then five, and up to seven;so that in all it amounts to twenty-eight, a number equal to that of the days of the moon. This is perhaps too fabulous; but it seems, however, that in the eyes of the cat the pupils fill and dilate at the full moon, while they contract and diminish at the waning of this star. As for the human figure given to this cat, it indicates the intelligence and the reason which governs the changes of the moon.

[64] To sum up in a few words, it is unfounded to believe that the water, the sun, the earth, the sky are Osiris and Isis; and, on the other hand, let the fire, the drought and the sea be Typhoon. There is a simple explanation. Whatever lacks of measure and regularity in these substances, either by excess or by default, must be attributed to Typhoon; but what is ordered, what is good and useful, let us regard it as the work of Isis: let us honor it, venerate it as the image, the representation, the idea of ​​Osiris, and we cannot make a mistake. There is better: we will put an end to the incredulity and the uncertainties of Eudoxus, who cannot explain why it is not to Ceres that the care of presiding over lovemaking is attributed, but to Isis ;why Bacchus does not have the power to overflow the Nile, nor that of reigning over the dead. According to us, it is one and the same, a common intelligence that makes Isis and Osiris presides over what is the share of good. Everything in nature that is beautiful and perfect exists through them: Osiris gives the generating principles, Isis receives and distributes them.

[65] This is how we will attack still other beliefs, as ridiculous as they are multiplied. With the variations experienced by the air in the different seasons, with the production of fruits, with the sowing, with the plowing, there are some who want to associate everything that concerns Isis and Osiris. They say that Osiris is buried when the seed that is sown is hidden under the ground;that Osiris is reborn to life and light, when the seeds begin to grow. This is why, hearing them, Isis, having recognized that she was pregnant, attached an amulet to her neck. On the sixth day of the month of phaophi, towards the winter solstice, she gave birth to Harpocrates, an incomplete creature, recently sketched out like the germs which are about to flower and develop. So we bring to this God the first fruits of the nascent beans; and after the spring equinox we celebrate the festival of the relevailles. The vulgar like to hear these explanations, they believe in them; and what he has before his eyes, what usually happens around him, makes him willing to accept the likelihood of it.

66. There would be no harm if first we maintained these two divinities as being common to us too, and if we did not attribute them exclusively to Egypt. Why is it only to the Nile and to the country watered by this river, with its marshes, with its lotuses, with its birth from the gods, that we apply the name of Isis and Osiris? It is to deprive the rest of men of two powerful deities, who have no Nile, no Butus, no Memphis, and who, however, all accept and recognize Isis, as they recognize the gods who accompany her. . Some peoples, for a short time indeed, have learned to call these by the names given to them by the Egyptians; but we knew from the beginning the power of each of them, and we paid them homage.

Secondly,and here the consequence is more serious, one will come, if one does not display extreme attention and fear, to fall without knowing it into a singular confusion. The winds, the streams, the sowing, the ploughing, the modifications of the soil, the changes of seasons replace the Divinities, who are thereby reduced to no longer existing. So do those who call Bacchus wine, Vulcan fire. Cleanthes gives somewhere the name of Proserpina to the air which penetrates the fruits of the earth. A poet said, speaking of the reapers: "When their strong arms tear Ceres to pieces". It is in no way different from those who in the sails, in the cables, in the anchor of a ship want to see its pilot; who in the threads and weft see the weaver; in beverages,in mead and herbal teas, the doctor. It is giving rise to disastrous and impious opinions to apply the names of the gods to natures, to insensible, inanimate objects, and necessarily destroyed by the men who need them and who make use of them. It is not possible to regard such things as gods.

[67] God, indeed, is not a being deprived of life and reason, that men can have at hand. But from the things which the Immortals provide for our needs, and which they lavish on us with as much assiduity as abundance, we recognize them as divine creatures, and we do not believe them to be different in different nations; we do not wish to believe them by preference either Barbarians or Greeks, or inhabitants of the South, or inhabitants of the North. No: just as the sun, the moon, the sky, the earth, the sea, are common to all, although called differently among different peoples, so this unique reason which rules the universe, this supreme Providence which directs it, these secondary forces applied to all parts,are the object of various tributes and names according to whether the legislators have settled it. All of this constitutes symbols that religion has consecrated, some more obscure, others more sensitive, but all leading to the knowledge of divine things.

Moreover, this path is not without danger: for some, having taken the wrong road, have fallen completely into superstition as into a muddy swamp, others have not seen that they were throwing themselves into the abyss of 'atheism.

[68] It is therefore necessary, in these questions in particular, to take as a guide reason aided by the lights of philosophy, if we want to initiate ourselves into the mysteries and have only pious thoughts on all that is said and done there. Theodore said that the speeches he presented with his right hand were received with the left by some of his listeners. We likewise, if we take otherwise than is appropriate what the laws have wisely established concerning sacrifices and festivals, we will not fail to fall into error. It is according to the analogies of reason that everything must be explained; and by the following examples one can have the proof of it. Indeed, on the nineteenth of the first month the Egyptians celebrate a feast in honor of Mercury;they eat honey and figs there, saying: "Sweet is the truth". The amulet of Isis, which she puts on herself, says the fable, around her neck, means "true word". For Harpocrates, one should not see in him an incomplete and barely born god; neither is it a vegetable. He should rather be regarded as the one who directs and rectifies the rough, imperfect, inexact traditions spread among men on the account of the gods.

So he holds his finger to his mouth, as a symbol of discretion and silence. In the Mesori month, he is offered vegetables saying: "Language is fortune, language is genius".Of all the plants which grow in Egypt, the persea is said to be the one most consecrated to this God, because its fruit resembles a heart, and its leaf resembles a tongue. No attribute, indeed, among those which man has received from nature, no one is more divine than speech, especially when he applies it to the knowledge of the gods: none contributes to his happiness in a more effective manner. Also, when a person, among us, enters the sanctuary, we recommend him to have pure thoughts, a decent language. But most of them behave in a ridiculous manner in the midst of ceremonies and festivals; they loudly proclaim that auspicious words are needed, and after that it is not impropriety that they debit and think to the account of these very gods.when a person with us enters the sanctuary, we recommend him to have pure thoughts, a decent language. But most of them behave in a ridiculous manner in the midst of ceremonies and festivals; they loudly proclaim that auspicious words are needed, and after that it is not impropriety that they debit and think to the account of these very gods. when a person with us enters the sanctuary, we recommend him to have pure thoughts, a decent language. But most of them behave in a ridiculous manner in the midst of ceremonies and festivals; they loudly proclaim that auspicious words are needed, and after that it is not impropriety that they debit and think to the account of these very gods.

[69] How, then, should one perform dark, serious, and lugubrious sacrifices, if on the one hand it is proper not to neglect the established prescriptions, and if on the other hand it is not permissible to alter religious opinions nor to trouble them with absurd conjectures? Among the Greeks also, several ceremonies are celebrated at the same time as they are accomplished among the Egyptians, and there is a great analogy between the sacred practices which are observed on both sides. Thus, in Athens, women who celebrate Thesmophoria fast while sitting on the ground. In Boeotia, certain chapels of Achma are moved when the festival called Epachthe (desolation) is celebrated, because the descent of Proserpina into hell caused the desolation of Ceres.This festival falls at the time of the rising of the Pleiades, in the month of sowing, a month which is called Athyr by the Egyptians, Pyanepsion by the Athenians, and Damatrius by the Boeotians. Theopompus reports that the peoples who live at sunset designate, as a result of their belief, winter under the name of Saturn, summer under that of Venus, spring under that of Proserpina; and these people think that all beings proceed from Saturn and Venus. The Phrygians, who believe that God sleeps in winter and wakes in summer, celebrate in the first of these two seasons bacchanals which they call "the slumbers", and in the second others which they call "awakenings”. Finally, the Paphlagonians often say that God is tightly chained and bound during the winter,

[70] The very season in which these essentially gloomy festivals are celebrated, gives reason to believe that they were instituted because it is the time when everything is hidden in the earth. The fruits were regarded by the ancients, if not as gods, at least as gifts from the gods; they were of great importance, and necessary so that men would not live a life of savages and beasts. In the season when one saw the fruits disappear completely from the trees and fail, as well as those which one had sown oneself under conditions of scarcity and sterility, one opened the ground with one's own hands, and one then brought it closer, after having deposited there germs of which one hoped only very weakly for maturity.We also did a lot of things that are practiced in funerals and in mourning. Thus, as we say of someone, when he buys the works of Plato, that he bought Plato, when he plays the comedies of Menander, that he plays Menander, in the same way these people did not hesitate to give the name of the Gods to divine productions and largesse, honoring and sanctifying these because of the need they had of them.

Their descendants did not know how to accept this tradition in an intelligent way: they awkwardly transferred to the gods the modifications which the fruits undergo, among which we see those which are indispensable to us appear and disappear in turn. Not only did they call these phenomena, births and deaths of the Gods, but they also believed in these births, to these deaths;they thus filled themselves with absurd, impious dogmas, which were nothing but confusion. The inconsistency of such errors was, however, of a nature to strike the eye. Thus, we know the dilemma of Xenophanes the Colophonian: "Either the Egyptians believe in the divinity of their Gods, and then they must not mourn them; or they mourn them, and then they must not believe in their divinity". Indeed, it is ridiculous to ask the sky with tears that the fruits reappear and become ripe, to mourn them again when they are consumed. "Either the Egyptians believe in the divinity of their Gods, and then they must not mourn them; or they mourn them, and then they must not believe in their divinity".Indeed, it is ridiculous to ask the sky with tears that the fruits reappear and become ripe, to mourn them again when they are consumed.

"Either the Egyptians believe in the divinity of their Gods, and then they must not mourn them; or they mourn them, and then they must not believe in their divinity". Indeed, it is ridiculous to ask the sky with tears that the fruits reappear and become ripe, to mourn them again when they are consumed.

[71] Moreover, this is not how things work. We cry, it is true, the loss of fruits, but we pray those who give birth to them and who give them to us, namely the Gods, to produce still new ones and to bring them to birth to replace those who are no longer there. . It is from this that philosophers have every reason to say that when we do not know how to understand the meaning of words, we are also mistaken about the use of things. Thus, among the Greeks, those who, seeing the reproductions of the Gods on bronze, on canvas or on stone, called, for lack of instruction or habit, such effigies not images or religious emblems, but of the gods themselves, those went so far as to dare to say, that Lacharès had despoiled Minerva,that Dionysius had cut Apollo's golden locks from his hair, that Capitoline Jupiter had been devoured by the flames and consumed in the horrors of civil war. They did not notice that the abuse of words led them to take out perverse beliefs and adopt them. This is an error which the Egyptians in no way avoided in their worship of animals. The Greeks, at least in this, think and express themselves in an exact manner, when they say that the dove is consecrated to Venus, the dragon to Minerva, the raven to Apollo, and the dog to Diana, as we read in Euripides: "You will become a statue and Hecate's bitch". But the greatest number of Egyptians, worshiping the animals themselves, surrounding them with homage as if they were gods,have not only burdened their liturgy with ridiculous and buffoonish practices, which is the lesser evil of all these absurdities: they have also given rise to disastrous opinions, which have made weak and without malice, and who have developed atheism, with its fiercest theories, among energetic and daring men. This is why it is not out of place to expose what is plausible in these matters. in energetic and daring men. This is why it is not out of place to expose what is plausible in these matters. in energetic and daring men. This is why it is not out of place to expose what is plausible in these matters.

[72] It has been claimed that the Gods, for fear of Typhon, were metamorphosed into these various animals, hiding in some way in the bodies of ibises, dogs, hawks. These kinds of tales go beyond all monstrosities, all possible fables. Nor should it be believed that among the souls of the dead those to whom it is given to survive their earthly remains, only come back to life in the bodies of these animals alone. There are, however, those who want to give this belief a wholly political explanation. According to some, Osiris, having a very considerable army, divided his forces into several bands, or, as we would say, into cohorts and companies; to each of them he gave a sign representing an animal,and the species of this animal became for all the soldiers united under the same banner an object of worship and veneration. According to others, the kings who came later, wanting to frighten their enemies, presented themselves to them covered with figures of ferocious beasts, simulated in gold or silver. There are others who relate what one of their kings did, full of skill and cunning. He knew the Egyptians for light spirits and strong disposition to change and revolutions. On the other hand this king understood that because of their great numbers, resistance by them to anyone who tried to break their coalition for evil would be an invincible obstacle.He therefore wanted to sow among them an eternal seed of discord, and he inspired them with superstition, the cause of perpetual conflict. The different animals proposed by him to their worship and veneration being those which hate each other, which make war on each other, and which mutually eat each other, it followed that each army corps defended its own and could not bear to be insulted. It turned out that by this very fact they had, without realizing it, espoused the hatreds of these animals and were constantly at war with each other. Thus, even today, the Lycopolitans are the only ones in Egypt who eat sheep in imitation of the wolf, which they adore as a god.We have seen the Oxyrynchites, because they had known that those of Cynopolis ate oxyrynchus, take dogs, immolate them and eat them as the flesh of victims. From this arose a war in which the two peoples mutually abused each other very much; and later it took a vigorous repression from the Romans to put them back in order.

[73] Several authors claim that the soul of Typhon was divided between all these animals. This fable would give to hear, that all the raw and wild natures constitute a part of this bad Genie, and that it is to soften it, to calm it, that one respects and that one honors these various animals. When there supervenes an excessive and pernicious drought, which brings with it in frightful proportions fatal diseases or other unforeseen and strange calamities, the priests choose some of these sacred animals; then they lead them into the midst of darkness, surrounding themselves with calm and silence. They first seek to frighten them with threats. If the scourge persists, they offer them as victims and cut their throats, either to punish the evil Genius in this way,or to consume in one way or another a great atonement in connection with a great misfortune. There is more: Manethos relates that in the city of Ilythia men were burned alive, to whom they gave the name of Typhonians; their ashes were then passed through a sieve to make it disappear and sow it in the wind. But this was practiced in public at a fixed time, namely during the days of the heat wave. On the contrary, the immolations of sacred animals take place secretly, at irregular times, and according to such and such circumstances. The vulgar are not informed of this, except when their funerals are celebrated.Then the priests designate a certain number of the other species, and in the presence of everyone they throw them into the same grave as the animals whose funerals are held: they imagine that we thus afflict Typhoon, and that we diminish the joy he experiences. Apis, along with a few others, seems to be devoted to Osiris; but the largest number of animals is attributed to Typhoon. If this statement is true, I think that the fact with which we are concerned takes place at the funerals of all the animals recognized and honored in common, such as the ibis, the hawk, the cynocephalus, Apis himself, and Pan: for they give this last name to the goat that is kept at Mendes.

[74] It remains to explain the usefulness of these animals, and their symbolic significance. Some have one or the other of these characteristics, many possess them both. The ox, for example, the sheep, the ichneumon, have obviously been revered because of their usefulness and the services obtained from them. It is thus that at Lemnos the larks are honored, because they discover the eggs of grasshoppers and break them. In Thessaly it is the storks: because, having appeared at the moment when the earth had produced on its surface a great number of reptiles, they had caused them all to perish. So a law has been passed banishing anyone who kills a stork.The Egyptians adore the asp, the weasel, the snail, seeing in them traits of obscure similarity to divine power, like the sun is reproduced in drops of water. As for the weasel, many people still think and say that this animal conceives by the ear and gives birth by the mouth: which, according to them, represents the generation of speech. They claim that there are no female snails: that all are male, and deposit their seed in a kind of rounded material in a ball and that they roll pushing it with their hind legs. We see there an imitation of the course of the sun which, going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky.Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star. many people still think and say that this animal conceives by the ear and gives birth by the mouth: which, according to them, represents the generation of speech. They claim that there are no female snails: that all are male, and deposit their seed in a kind of rounded material in a ball and that they roll pushing it with their hind legs. We see there an imitation of the course of the sun which, going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky.Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star. many people still think and say that this animal conceives by the ear and gives birth by the mouth: which, according to them, represents the generation of speech. They claim that there are no female snails: that all are male, and deposit their seed in a kind of rounded material in a ball and that they roll pushing it with their hind legs. We see there an imitation of the course of the sun which, going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky.Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star. represents speech generation. They claim that there are no female snails: that all are male, and deposit their seed in a kind of rounded material in a ball and that they roll pushing it with their hind legs. We see there an imitation of the course of the sun which, going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky. Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star. represents speech generation.They claim that there are no female snails: that all are male, and deposit their seed in a kind of rounded material in a ball and that they roll pushing it with their hind legs. We see there an imitation of the course of the sun which, going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky. Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star. going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky. Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star.going from west to east, seems to follow a direction contrary to that of the sky. Finally, as the asp does not age, and since, without having the organs of movement, it moves with great agility and facility, it has been compared to a star.

[75] The crocodile itself is not revered without a plausible motive. They say he is an image of God, in that he is the only animal that has no tongue. For divine reason does not need words to manifest itself:

"By led equity she walks voiceless, And the whole universe is ruled by her laws".
It is, it is said, the only animal which, living in the middle of the water, has its eyes covered with a light and transparent membrane starting from the forehead, so that it sees without being seen; which is the privilege of the first of the gods. The place in the country where the female lays her eggs is always the point at which the overflow of the Nile stops. Mothers unable to lay in water and fearing, on the other hand, to lay too far away, have a marvelous presentiment of the future. While remaining, after their laying and during their brooding, in the vicinity of the river, the waters of which increase, they nevertheless keep their eggs dry and sheltered from flooding. They produce sixty of them, which they take as many days to hatch.The same is also the number of years that crocodiles live the longest. Now the number sixty is the first that astronomers use in their calculations.

To speak now of animals honored with a double title, we mentioned above the dog. But the ibis, besides destroying reptiles whose wound is fatal, was the first to teach us the use of enemas by showing us how it purges and washes its own entrails. The most scrupulous priests in matters of rites take for lustral water, in purifications, that which the ibis has quenched its thirst: for it never drinks any that is unhealthy or corrupt; he doesn't even come close. With the trace of its two feet separated from each other and that of its beak, it determines an equilateral triangle. Finally, the variety and the mixture of the black feathers which merge on him with the white feathers, represent the moon rounded to three quarters. You shouldn't be surprised,moreover, if the Egyptians were thus content with these faint traits of resemblance. The Greeks also, in the images, whether painted or sculpted, of their gods, more than once made comparisons of the same kind. In Crete there was a statue of Jupiter without ears: whereas the master and ruler of all men must not listen to any particular mortal. At the feet of the statue of Athena Phidias placed the dragon, and the turtle at the feet of the Venus of Elis: to signify that young girls need to be guarded and that married women should be sedentary and observe silence. The trident of Neptune is the symbol of the third region: that which the sea, in the assigned place, occupies after the sky and the air; and from this come the names given to Tritons and Amphitrite.

The Pythagoreans, similarly, honored with appellations of gods and numbers and figures of geometry. Indeed they gave to the equilateral triangle the name of Minerva, born from the brain of Jupiter and called Tritogenia, because the perpendiculars lowered from the three angles on the bases divide them into equal parts. Unity is Apollo, because this last name is the denial of plurality and the expression of the monad; The Two is quarrel and audacity; the Three is justice: for between the damage brought and the damage received, between the excess of weakness and between the excess of strength, Justice holds the middle and establishes equality.The number called quaternary, namely thirty-six, constituted, as everyone repeats, their most sacred oath, and it bears the name of the world. It is made up of the sum of the first four even numbers and that of the first four odd numbers added together.

[76] If, then, the most estimable among philosophers, as soon as they noticed in inanimate substances deprived of body some traits recalling the Divinity, they did not think it their duty to neglect and despise them, with all the more reason we must be scrupulous when in beings endowed with senses, life and affections we find moral resemblances with the Divinity. We must approve not those who adore these beings in themselves, but those for whom these beings become an occasion to adore God. They are like faithful mirrors offered to us by nature. All that has life must be in our eyes an instrument of this Divinity which presides over the harmony of the Universe; and besides, let us say it as a general principle: one must never admit that what is inanimate, insensitive,may outweigh what has life and feeling, even when all the gold and emeralds in the world are gathered together. Indeed it is neither in the brilliance of the colors, nor in the elegance of the forms, nor in the smoothness of the surfaces that Divinity is imprinted; and even that which had no life, that which was not created to have life, is of a lower condition than that which is dead. On the contrary, a substance which lives, which sees, which has in itself a principle of movement, which discerns what suits it and what is foreign to it, has received, without a doubt, apart, an emanation from this Providence by which , according to the expression of Heraclitus, the great All is governed.So the Divinity has not less noticeably imprinted its resemblance in such natures than in the works of bronze and stone. It is true that the latter can also reproduce the mixture of tints and the combination of colors, but they are, by nature, deprived of feeling and intelligence. Of all that has been said about animal worship, this is what I consider to be the most reasonable.

[77] Isis' clothes are dyed in variegated colors, because her power extends over matter, which receives all forms, which is susceptible to undergoing all possible modifications, since it becomes light, darkness; day Night; fire, water; life, death; beginning, end.But the dress of Osiris presents neither shade nor variety: it is of a single color, and it has the brilliance of the day, since the principle of everything is unmixed, that the primitive and intelligible being is essentially pure. . Also, after this garment has been exposed once, we put it aside and we keep it religiously: like everything that is pure intelligence, we want it to escape sight and touch. But we often use the dresses of Isis: because material things, being of daily use and within our reach, we have occasion to handle them, to see them at every moment, and they present themselves in forms which change in turn.But the perception of the being which is only intelligence, only light, only holiness, seems like a flash which shines and which the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. we have occasion to handle them, to see them at every moment, and they present themselves under forms which change in turn.But the perception of the being which is only intelligence, only light, only holiness, seems like a flash which shines and which the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. we have occasion to handle them, to see them at every moment, and they present themselves under forms which change in turn.But the perception of the being which is only intelligence, only light, only holiness, seems like a flash which shines and which the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. and they come in forms that change from turn to turn.But the perception of the being which is only intelligence, only light, only holiness, seems like a flash which shines and which the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. and they come in forms that change from turn to turn.But the perception of the being which is only intelligence, only light, only holiness, seems like a flash which shines and which the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. seems like a lightning flash that the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics.They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. seems like a lightning flash that the soul can see and grasp only once. This is why Plato and Aristotle give this part of philosophy the name of epoptics. They want to make people understand that when we have crossed with the help of reason the confused mixture of opinions of all kinds, we rush up to this first simple and immaterial being, we touch without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being;one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. one rushes to this first simple and immaterial being, one touches without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy. one rushes to this first simple and immaterial being, one touches without intermediary the pure truth which circulates around this being; one is as if initiated, and one reaches the limits of all philosophy.

[78] There is another dogma that inspires priests today with religious horror. They make it a mystery, and reveal it only with extreme reserve: it is the dogma by which it is taught that Osiris is master and king of the dead, and that he is none other than Hades and the Pluto of the Greeks. This point of doctrine, on which we do not know the truth, disturbs the vulgar. We imagine that Osiris, this holy and pure God, actually lives underground, where the bodies of those who are considered to have ceased to exist are buried. But he, on the contrary, is as far as possible from the earth. Pure and spotless, it remains foreign to all corruptible and mortal matter.The souls of men, as long as they are here below in the bonds of the body and under the influence of various affections, have no communication with the Divinity, except those which the intelligence can realize by the help of philosophy and as in the confused visions of a dream. But when, freed from their bonds, the souls exchange the earth for an immaterial, invisible and mysterious abode, a center of purity, which no passion disturbs, this same God then becomes their leader and their king. Souls attach themselves closely to him, and contemplate with joy, with insatiable desire this beauty which escapes all contact, all human gaze.It is this same beauty with which Isis, according to ancient mythology, is always in love, which she pursues unceasingly, with which she unites herself, spreading here below all the goods and all the advantages on the beings who are the product of such a union.

[79] Should we also speak, as I promised, of the perfumes that are burned every day? A first observation to note in this respect is that the Egyptians have always taken great account of prescriptions useful to health. In religious practices, especially in purifications and in the regime of each day, if they are preoccupied with holiness, they do not think less of salubrity. They have always believed that it was not appropriate for souls or bodies stained with secret impurities and diseases to devote themselves to the worship of a being essentially pure and free from any alteration, from any stain. Thus, as the air that we breathe most often and in the middle of which we live does not always have the same atmospheric conditions and the same temperature:that at night it condenses, weighing on the body and communicating a kind of discouragement and uneasiness to the soul which becomes in some way dark and heavy; because of this, the priests, as soon as they get up, burn resin. They think it is renewing the air and purifying it of all mixture; that it is to awaken from its state of numbness the soul which is united to the body, and that such effects are due to the active and penetrating virtue of this odor. They think it is renewing the air and purifying it of all mixture; that it is to awaken from its state of numbness the soul which is united to the body, and that such effects are due to the active and penetrating virtue of this odor.

They think it is renewing the air and purifying it of all mixture;that it is to awaken from its state of numbness the soul which is united to the body, and that such effects are due to the active and penetrating virtue of this odor. Later, at noon, at the hour when they suppose that the sun draws from the bosom of the earth thick and heavy vapors which it mixes with the air, they burn myrrh. For the heat of this perfume dissolves and dissipates the coarse and impure exhalations which condense around us.

Indeed, doctors believe that an excellent remedy against epidemic diseases is to light large fires, as if to rarefy the air; and this last result is still better attained when burning odoriferous woods, such as cypress, juniper, and pine. It is thus, it is said, that in the violent plague which ravaged Athens, the doctor Acron acquired fame by ordering that fires be lit near the sick: he thus cured a great number of them. Aristotle says that the pleasant odor which is exhaled from perfumes, flowers and meadows contributes no less to good health than to pleasure; because these emanations produce a gentle heat which gradually relaxes the brain, which is naturally cold and inclined to thicken. If it is true, moreover,

[80] Kyphi is a perfume composed of sixteen species of substances: honey, wine, raisins, tiger nut, resin, myrrh, aspalath, seseli, lentisk, asphalt, henbane, patience, large juniper, small juniper (because there are two species ), cardamom and calamus. These ingredients do not smell mixed at random, but according to a formula indicated by the holy books and which are read, during the operation, to those who are responsible for composing this perfume. It remains to explain the number sixteen. It is quite true that it seems to be the object of a reasoned preference, since it is the square of a square, since it is the only rectilinear figure in which, all the sides being perfectly equal to each other , the sum of the perimeter is the same as the area.But it must be said, however, that geometry is of no importance here. As most of the materials used have aromatic virtues, a sweet and beneficial vapor is exhaled, which changes the conditions of the air.

This vapor, insinuating itself into the body by means of the breath, lulls it in a gentle and imperceptible manner, invites it to sleep, and spreads around it a delicious influence. The daily cares, which are like so many painful chains, lose their pain and their intensity; they weaken and relax, without the help of intoxication. Acting also on the imagination, a faculty so powerful in dreams, these exhalations render it in a way clear, like the smoothest mirror. The effect obtained is no less marvelous than that of the sounds of the lyre,which the Pythagoreans used before enjoying sleep. In this way the troubles and disorders of the soul are charmed and softened. Moreover, odors have more than once revived the feeling which was vanishing; more than once also they have calmed and soothed the nervous system by the subtlety of their influence: just as, according to certain doctors, sleep occurs after the stomach has received food. It is supposed, in fact, that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. In this way the troubles and disorders of the soul are charmed and softened.Moreover, odors have more than once revived the feeling which was vanishing; more than once also they have calmed and soothed the nervous system by the subtlety of their influence: just as, according to certain doctors, sleep occurs after the stomach has received food. It is supposed, in fact, that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. In this way the troubles and disorders of the soul are charmed and softened. Moreover, odors have more than once revived the feeling which was vanishing;more than once also they have calmed and soothed the nervous system by the subtlety of their influence: just as, according to certain doctors, sleep occurs after the stomach has received food. It is supposed, in fact, that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. Moreover, odors have more than once revived the feeling which was vanishing; more than once also they have calmed and soothed the nervous system by the subtlety of their influence: just as, according to certain doctors, sleep occurs after the stomach has received food.It is supposed, in fact, that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. Moreover, odors have more than once revived the feeling which was vanishing; more than once also they have calmed and soothed the nervous system by the subtlety of their influence: just as, according to certain doctors, sleep occurs after the stomach has received food. It is supposed, in fact, that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink;and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink. that from these is given off a vapor which spreads gently around the intestines and causes there a kind of tickling. Be that as it may, the Egyptians still use Kyphi as a mixed drink; and it seems to be a purgative and emollient drink.

Leaving aside these considerations, we may remark that the resin and the myrrh are the work of the sun, since they are the product of the tears which the heat of the day causes the plants to shed. On the other hand, among the ingredients there are some which adapt better to the night, like all the substances which are made to be nourished by the cool winds, by the shade, by the dew and the humidity: expected that the light of day is one, and simple; and Pindar said of the sun,
"Let it be seen through the deserts of space".

On the contrary, the air of the night is a compound and a mixture of several lights, of several influences, which, like so many germs, start from each star and combine in the atmosphere. It is therefore with reason that the first two substances are burned during the day, as being simple and as having their birth from the sun, while all the others, which present the mixture of a host of different properties, are burned at the beginning. of the night.