AN EXPOSITION

OF THE

MYSTERIES, &c.

CHAPTER I.

DOGMAS AND CUSTOMS OF THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS.

Ir will be attempted in this work to show that the mysteries and ceremonies of the celebrated order of Freemasons are derived from the religious dogmas and customs of ancient nations, particularly those of Egypt, where the foundation of the whole machinery of religious mysteries, as far as is known, was first laid.

In order, therefore, to attain a comprehensive view of (this subject, it becomes necessary to be well informed of the rites, customs, and ceremonies of the ancient inhabitants of that famous country. And as the Abbe Pluche, in his History of the Heavens, has treated more minutely of these topics, and explained them more satisfactorily, than any other author that has fallen under my observation, I shall com mence this volume with extracts from his work.

Critical histories of the fabulous gods of paganism, under the semblance of truth, have been transmitted from age to age, and been generally received as narratives of real facts. Pluche has unveiled many of these poetical fictions, and pointed out the source from which they were derived.

My limits will not permit me to give the whole of his expositions ; but on account of the great merit of the work, with which, it is presumed, but few American readers are acquainted, I have not confined the selections merely to such parts as have a particular bearing upon the subject in hand.

As the author is little known in America, I will give an abstract of 8 sketch of his life and writings, contained in La Biographie Universelle, Paris, 1830.

Anthony Pluche, a celebrated writer, was born at Reims, in 1688; and obtained the appointment of Professor of Languages in the University of that city. Two years afterwards he passed to the chair of Rhetoric, and was raised to holy orders. The Bishop of Laon, (Cler

mont,) becoming acquainted with his talents, gave him the presidency of the College of his diocese. By his assiduity and science the institution was much improved; when particular circumstances occurred that troubled his tranquillity, and obliged him to relinquish his employ. The Intendant of Rouen confided to him the education of his son, at the request of the celebrated Rollin. The Abbe Pluche having fulfilled this trust with success, left Rouen for Paris, where he gave, at first, lessons on Geography and History. Through the notice of distinguished authors, his name soon became celebrated, and he sustained that celebrity by his works.

He gave successively to the public,—first, the Spectacle de la Nature, (Nature Displayed), in 9 volumes, 12mo. This work, equally instructive as agreeable, is written with much clearness and elegance. Second, The Histoire du Ciel, (History of the Heavens,) in 2 vols. 12mo. In this work is to be found two parts, almost independent of each other. The first contains learned researches upon the origin of the poetical heavens. This is nearly a complete mythology, founded upon new and ingenious ideas. The second is the history of the opinions of philosophers on the formation of the world. The author here shows the uncertainty of systems the most accredited. Besides a diction noble and well turned, one here finds an erudition that does not fatigue. As to the ground of the system exposed in the first part, Voltaire calls it, probably with reason, the Fable of Heaven. Third, La Mécanique des Langues, Paris, 1735, in 12mo. He here proposes a means more short for learning languages. Fourth, Concorde de la Geographie des differens Ages; Paris, 1764, in 12mo.

Plan of the Work.

I find myself under the necessity of oversetting, or unravelling, fables, in order to establish truth. The men most celebrated who have treated of the formation of the heavens and of the earth, or of their mutual relations, were pagans, philosophers of different nations, and sacred writers. Those systems which have been given by the Egyptians, Phenicians, the Greeks, and Romans, are obscured by fabulous recitals, and by metamorphoses full of absurdity. Although they were the most ingenious and polished of all people, they formed ideas so strange on the government of the heavens, and on the powers which sustain the human species, that there is no need to combat them with argument; they carry their own refutation with them. But, from the depth of this frightful darkness it is possible to elicit light. Through these fictions I find a fact, the explication of which shows us what has given birth to fables; it is the development of them. The first fixed point is the signification of the names and figures which have served, from the highest antiquity, to characterize the sun, the moon, and the stars, according to their different situations. The usages of the ancients,

and the inspection of nature, will aid us in discovering the sense, the knowledge of which will lead us immediately to perceive the enormous abuse that has been made of the institutions of the first men, and place in sufficient light the origin of the idolatry of our fathers.

Another effect of this research is to teach as that the same mistake which has peopled the heavens with chimerical divinities, has given birth to a multitude of false pretensions on the influences of the heavenly bodies, and the errors which still tyrannise over most minds. If our history of the heavens produce no other benefit than the discovery of the mistakes which have precipitated the human race into errors that disgrace it-the consequences of which still disturb the repose of society-this will undoubtedly be an advantage sufficiently satisfactory.

My remarks may be useful to youth, by unveiling to them those fabulous personages which they hear so often mentioned. I have still greater hopes, perhaps with too much presumption, that this small essay might be of some use to teachers themselves. I should think myself happy to have assisted their work, by some views which they might afterwards improve and proportion to the wants of their disciples. Teachers, however well qualified, generally want leisure to undertake researches of any considerable length; and the more judicious they are, the more disagreeable is it to them to be for a long series of years handling fables almost always absurd or scandalous, without being recompensed for the tiresomeness of these ridiculous stories, by the satisfaction of being able at least to find out the origin of them. I here derive all the branches of idolatry from one and the same root. I endeavour to show that the same mistake has given birth to the gods, goddesses, metamorphoses, auguries, and oracles. The fables, thus reduced to their true value, will amuse without danger; and the masters possibly will like and adopt a principle whose great simplicity puts it within the reach of children themselves.

The chief benefit I should be glad to reap from my labour would be the facilitating the study of nature, and even that of religion, in restraining the said study within the bounds of possibility and necessity, both which are still of no small extent.

The engravings accompanying the work are all drawn from the monuments of antiquity. They are marked as follows:-all those found in Antiquity Explained, by Montfaucon, with an M; those collected by Cartari, with a C; those which are on the vase of agate of St Denys, with a V; and those which are taken from the table of Isis, published by Pignorius, with a T.

Usages Common to All Nations.

We are sometimes amazed at the conformity found in many respects between the practices of the Hebrews and those of the nations given

over to the grossest idolatry. Most of the learned, in order to account for such a similitude of usages, say that false religions only copied and mimicked the true; and from the conformity of some particulars of mythology with sacred history, they think themselves authorized to affirm that the heathens had the communication of the holy scriptures, or must have frequented the company of and imitated the Hebrews.

Other learned men, and among the rest Sir John Marsham, in his Rule of Times, being sensible how much unknown to, and as it were, separated from other nations, the Hebrews were,-how much disliked by those that knew them,-and of course how little fit they were to serve them as models, and finding, moreover, from a multitude of evident proofs, that the sacrifices, the ceremonial, and the very objects themselves, of idolatry, were prior to Moses and the holy scriptures, they have maintained that the laws and the ceremonies of the Hebrews were an imitation of the customs of Egypt and the neighbouring nations, but adapted to the worship of one God.*

Symbolical Writing.

THE Egyptians, even the most ancient of them, were acquainted with the signs of the Zodiac. Their monuments, which are known to be of the earliest antiquity, are covered with figures, among which those of the crab and the wild goat, of the balance and the scorpion, of the ram and the bull, of the kid, the lion, the virgin, and the rest, are frequently found.

The twelve symbolical names, which signify the twelve portions, both of the year and the heavens, were a prodigious help towards regulating the beginnings of sowing, mowing, harvest, and the other works of mankind.

It was found very convenient, to expose in public a small figure, or a single letter, to notify the exact time which certain general works were to be begun in common, and when certain feasts were to be celebrated. The use of these figures appeared so convenient, that they by degrees extended it to more things than the order of the calender. Several symbols, fit to inform the people of certain truths, by some analogy or relation between the figure and the thing they have a mind to have understood, were devised.

This method of saying or showing one thing, to intimate others, is what induced among the eastern nations the taste of allegories. They preserved, for a long time, the method of teaching everything under symbols, calculated, by a mysterious outside, to excite curiosity, which

• Great use is made of the Bible, in the ceremonies of masonry: which may be accounted for by the conformity in the customs of the Hebrews with those of more ancient nations, from which the masonic order is derived.EDIT.

was afterwards recompenced by the satisfaction of having discovered the truths which they concealed. Pythagoras, who had travelled among the eastern nations, thence brought that custom to Italy.

Ham, and those of his descendants who came to inhabit the banks of the Nile, and the whole Lower Egypt, first tried to cultivate the earth according to the order of the year, and in the manner used in other countries; but no sooner were they ready to cut down their harvest, in the driest season of the year, and without the least appearance of rain, but the river swelled, to their great amazement: it flowed on a sudden over its banks, and took from them those provisions which they thought themselves already sure of. The waters continued to rise to the height of twelve, fourteen, or even sixteen cubits,† covered all the plains, carried away their cattle, and even the inhabitants themselves. The inundation lasted ten or eleven weeks, and oftentimes more.

It is true, the overflowing left on the land a mud which improved it; but, the difficulty of obtaining a harvest, since the summer the only time proper for it, brought the storm and the inundation, caused Ham to quit both the lower and the middle Egypt, and retire to the higher. He there founded the city of Thebes, originally called Ammun-no, Ammon's abode. But many, finding it inconvenient to remove from lower Egypt, which after the retiring of the waters, was throughout the remaining part of the year like a beautiful garden, and a delightful place to dwell in, endeavoured to fortify themselves against the return of the waters.

They observed from one year to another, that the overflowing was always preceded by an Etesian (annual) wind, which blowing from north to south, about the time of the passage of the sun under the stars of the crab, drove the vapours towards the south, and gathered them in the middle of the country, (Ethiopia, now Nubia and Abysinia) whence the Nile came; which there caused plentiful rains, that swelled the waters of the river, and brought on the inundation of lower Egypt.

But they wanted the means of knowing exactly the time when it should be necessary for them to be prepared for the inundation. The flowing of the river beyond its banks happened some days sooner or later, when the sun was under the stars of the lion. Near the stars of Cancer, though pretty far from the band of the zodiac towards the

Never does it rain in the Delta, (Lower Egypt,) in the summer, and but rarely and in small quantities during the whole course of the yearVOLNEY'S TRAVELS.-EDIT.

In the time of Herodotus, sixteen cubits were necessary, or at least fifteen, to overflow the Delta. The same number was sufficient in the time of the Romans. Before the time of Petronius, says Strabo, plenty was not known in the Delta, unless the Nile rose to fourteen cubits.-Ibid. (EDIT.)