Philoe. The height is forty-two feet, the width thirty-three, and the depth seventeen. "Advancing along the brick ruins," says Dr. Richardson, "we came to an elegant gateway or propylon, which is also of sandstone, neatly hewn, and completely covered with sculpture and hieroglyphics remarkably well cut. Immediately over the centre of the door-way is the beautiful Egyptian ornament usually called the globe, with serpent and wings, emblematical of the glorious sun poised in the airy firmament of heaven, supported and directed in his course by the eternal wisdom of the Deity. The sublime phraseology of Scripture, 'the Sun of Righteousness shall rise with healing on his wings,' could not be more emphatically or more accurately represented to the human eye than by this elegant device. The temple itself still retains all its original magnificence. The centuries which have elapsed since the era of its foundation have scarcely affected it in any important part, and have impressed upon it no greater appearance of age than serves to render it more venerable and imposing. To Mr. Hamilton, who had seen innumerable monuments of the same kind throughout the Thebaid, it seemed as if he were now witnessing the highest degree of architectural excellence that had ever been attained on the borders of the Nile. Here were concentrated the united labors of ages, and the last effort of human art and industry, in that uniform line of construction which had been adopted in the earliest times.

The portico consists of twenty-four columns, in three rows; each above twenty-two feet in circumference, thirty two feet high, and covered with hieroglyphics. On the front, Isis is in general the principal figure to whom offerings are made. On the architrave are represented two processions of men and women bringing to their goddess, and to Osiris, who is sitting behind her, globes encompassed with cows' horns, mitred snakes, lotus flowers, vases, little boats, graduated staffs, and other instruments of their emblematical worship. The interior

*The knowledge of astronomy leads to the interpretation of hieroglyphical characters, since astronomical signs are often found on the ancient Egyptian monuments, which were probably employed by the priests to record dates. On the ceiling of the portico of the temple among the ruins of Tentyra, there is a long row of figures of men and animals, following each other in the same direction; among these are the twelve signs of the zodiac, placed according to the motion of the sun : it is probable that the first figure in the procession represents the beginning of the year. Now the first is the Lion as if coming out of the temple; and it is well known that the agricultural year of the Egyptians commenced at the solstice of summer, the epoch of the inundation of the Nile: then if the preceding hypothesis be true, the solstice at the time the temple was built must have happened in the constellation of the lion; but, as the solstice now happens 21° 6' north of the constellation of the Twins, it is easy to compute that the zodiac of Tentyra must have been made 4000 years ago.-Diss. on Mech. of the Heav. by Mrs. Somerville.--Edit.

A

of the pronaos is adorned with sculptures, most of them preserving part of the paint with which they have been covered. Those on the ceiling are peculiarly rich and varied, all illustrative of the union between the astronomical and religious creeds of the ancient Egyp tians; yet, though each separate figure is well preserved and perfectly intelligible, we must be more intimately acquainted with the real principles of the sciences, as they were then taught, before we can undertake to explain the signs in which they were embodied.

The sekos, or interior of the temple, consists of several apartments, all the walls and ceilings of which are in the same way covered with religious and astronomical representations.

The rooms have been lighted by small perpendicular holes cut in the ceiling, and, where it was possible to introduce them, by oblique ones in the sides. But some idea might be formed of the perpetual gloom in which the apartments on the ground-floor of the sekos must have been buried, from the fact, that where no sidelight could be intro. duced, all they received was communicated from the apartment above; so that notwithstanding the cloudless sky and the brilliant colors on the walls, the place must have been always well calculated for the mysterious practices of the religion to which it was consecrated. On one corner of the roof there was a chapel or temple twenty feet square, consisting of twelve columns, exactly similar in figure and proportions to those of the pronaos. The use to which it may have been applied must probably remain one of the secrets connected with the mystical and sometimes cruel service in which the priests of Isis were employed.

Towards the eastern end of the roof are two separate sets of apartments, one on the north and the other on the south side of it.

The ceiling of the next room is divided into two compartments by a figure of Isis in very high relief. In one of them is the circular zodiac; in the other a variety of boats with four or five human figures in each; one of whom is in the act of spearing a large egg, while others are stamping with their feet upon the victims of their fury, among which are several human beings. Near this scene a large lion, supported by four dog-headed figures, each carrying a knife, may be regarded as an additional type of the sanguinary purposes for which the apartment was used. The walls of the third room are covered with the several representations of a person,-first at the point of death lying on a couch; then stretched out lifeless upon a bier; and finally, being embalmed.

The western wall of the great temple is particularly interesting for the extreme elegance of the sculpture.

Here are frequent representations of men who seem prepared for slaughter or just going to be put to death. On these occasions one or more appear, with their hands or legs tied to the trunk of a tree, in the most painful and distorted attitudes.

In a small chapel behind the temple, the cow and the hawk seem to have been particularly worshipped, as priests are frequently seen kneeling before them presenting sacrifices and offerings. In the centre of the ceiling is the same front face of Isis in high relief, illumi nated, as it were, by a body of rays issuing from the mouth of the same long figure, which, in the other temples, appears to encircle the heavenly bodies. About two hundred yards eastward from this chapel is a propylon of small dimensions, resembling in form that which conducts to the great temple, and, like it, built in a line with the wall which surrounds the sacred enclosure. Among the sculptures on it which appear of the same style but less finished than those on the large temple, little more is worthy of notice than the frequent exhibition of human slaughter by men or by lions. Still farther towards the east, there is another propylon, equally well preserved with the rest, about forty feet in height, and twenty feet square at the base. Among the sacred figures on this building is an Isis pointing with a reed to a graduated staff held by another figure of the same deity, from which are suspended scales containing water animals, the whole group perhaps being an emblem of her influence over the Nile in regulating its periodical inundations.—Ibid. p. 166.

The signs of the zodiac portrayed in the center of the roof of freemasons' hall, London, it appears, are in accordance with the astronomical decorations of the ancient temples of Egypt. Celestial and terrestrial globes also compose a part of the masonic emblems.

The author seems not to be aware that the Isis, pointing with a reed to a graduated staff, was directing the attention of the Egyptians to the Nilometer or measure of the inundation, so important to their well being. This measure in after times, as before noticed, became an ensign of office, Mercury's wand, and as such has been adopted by masonry.

The cruelty supposed to be connected with the Egyptian mode of worship, as indicated by the appearance of persons under torture, the reader will find in the sequel, were nothing more than sham representations of the punishments said to be inflicted upon the wicked in another life. The contrast displayed in the death of a virtuous character, carefully embalmed, clearly points out the intention of these representations. The appartments where these awful figures were portrayed, were, no doubt, the first into which candidates for initiation into the mysteries were introduced.

CHAPTER II.

ORIGIN, NATURE, AND OBJECT, OF THE ANCIENT MYSTERIES; ABRIDGED FROM BISHOP WARBURTON'S DIVINE LEGATION OF

MOSES; WITH NOTES AND REMARKS, POINTING OUT THEIR IDENTITY WITH FREEMASONRY, ETC.

It is proper to premise, that the author uniformly refers to the works of the writers which he quotes, and generally gives the passages in the original language in which they were written. His quotations from the Eneid, the Metamorphosis of Epuleius, and some other works, given in the Latin language, are here rendered into English. A few Greek passages in his work are also given in translation, and all Greek terms are put in Roman characters for the benefit of the general reader.

An abstract of the author's remarks, introductory to his treatise on the Mysteries, is first given, as follows:

So inseparable, in antiquity, were the ideas of law-giving and religion, that Plutarch, speaking of the preference of atheism to superstition, supposes no other establishment of divine worship than what was the work of the legislator. "How much happier would it have been, says he, for the Carthagenians, had their first law-giver been like Critias or Diogoras, who believed neither gods nor demons, rather than such an one as enjoined their public sacrifices to Saturn."

But here it will be necessary to remind the reader of this previous truth, that there never was in any age of the world, from the most early accounts of time, to this present hour, any civil-policied nation or people who had a religion, of which the chief foundation and support was not the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments; the Jewish people only excepted. This I presume, our adversaries will not deny. Mr. Bayle, the indulgent foster father of infidelity, confesses it in the fullest manner, and with the utmost ingenuity; "all the religions of the world, whether true or false, turn upon this grand pivot, that there is an invisible judge who punishes and rewards after this life, the actions of men, both of thought and deed. From thence it is supposed the principal use of religion is derived," and thinks it was the utility of that doctrine which set the magistrate upon inventing a religion for the state. "It is the principle motive that incited those who invented it." (Dict. Crit. and Hist. Art. Spinoza Rem. E.)

The Egyptians were the first people who perfected civil policy, and established religion: they were the first too, who deified their kings, law-givers and public benefactors. This was a practice invented by them, who in process of time, taught the rest of the world their mystery.