not grieved the spirits of the gods, I have not committed adultery, I have not forged signet rings, I have not falsified the weights of the balance, I have not withheld milk from the mouths of my children." The offences that follow are peculiar to the climate and to the idolatry of Egypt. "I have not pierced the banks of the Nile in its annual increase, I have not separated to myself an arm of the Nile in its advance." These passages render it probable that in ancient as in modern times, an important part of the revenue of Egypt was raised by imposing a tribute upon the lands overflowed by the annual inundation; so that to obtain any portion of these fertilizing waters secretly was to defraud the state. This singular disavowal concludes thus: "I have not disturbed the gazelles of the gods in their pasturage, I have not netted the waterfowl of the gods, I have not caught the sacred fishes." It may be inferred from this and other passages, that there were parks or preserves around the Egyptian temples, where the sacred animals were kept; and that it was sacrilege to take them. "I have not despised the gods in their offerings;" in other words, "I have not offered to the gods that which is imperfect," I have not bound the cattle of the gods, I have not pierced the god in his manifestation," as a sacred animal. The prayer concludes with petitions for purification and illumination.

The deceased then entered the great hall of judgment, and, kneeling before the forty-two avengers, protested to each his innocence of the sin of which he was the minister of vengeance. The names of these terrible beings are descriptive of their appearance or qualities. The soul says to the first of them, "O thou that hast long legs, (art swift to pursue,) I have not sinned." To the second, "O thou that

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dost try with fire, I have not been gluttonous." To the fourth, "O thou that devourest tranquillity, (that is, with whom there is no peace,) I have not stolen." To the fifth, "O thou that smitest the heart, I have done no murder." To the sixth, "O thou with the two lions, (heads,) I have not falsified measures." To the seventh, "O thou that hast piercing eyes, I have not acted the hypocrite." To the ninth, “O thou that dost make limbs to tremble, I have not lied." To the sixteenth, "O thou that dost delight in blood, I have not slain the cattle of the gods." To the twenty-second, "O thou that dost consume creation, I have not been drunken." The foregoing may suffice as specimens of what has generally been termed the negative confession. Some parts of it remain still in much obscurity as to their import; others allude to offences of which it is a shame even to speak.* The declaration of the apostle regarding the ancient world was perfectly true,

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They knew the judgment of God, that they who did such things were worthy of death."

The perusal of this most ancient code of morals accords with the inspired declaration, that the heathen of old were a law unto themselves. The moral law of God, which was written on their hearts, evidently embraced the entire compass of the duties of social relation? Or who shall dare to charge God foolishly, in that the heathen who sinned without the law of Moses also perished without it?

The judgment hall in which this great scene occurs, which terminates the third section of the ritual, is the palace

*The author has to express his deep obligations to Samuel Birch, Esq., the senior assistant of the British Museum, for the kind and very efficient aid afforded him in these translations.

of Osiris, the supreme judge of souls. It is situated in Amenti, the west. The god himself appears to the left of the picture. He is enthroned on a magnificent shrine, and wears a head-dress composed of the upper part of the diadem

called Sent, which denotes dominion in the upper region, that is, in heaven; it is adorned with two ostrich feathers, (the symbols of justice,) and with the disc of the sun, and

the horns of a goat, signifying light and

fertility. He has in his hands a scourge, and a sceptre bent at one end in the form of a crook, the symbol of dominion. This, as the accompanying legend informs us, is Osiris, , the very beneficent ttt, the lord of life the great god 1, the eternal mediator ?, president of Amenti, and eternal king, king of many days

10. Immediately before the throne, and within the shrine, is a kind of stand, upon which is hung the skin of a panther the meaning of this is unknown. An altar stands in front of the shrine laden with offerings, consisting of flowers, fruit, bread, and flesh, with wine and milk in vases; probably representing the acts of piety performed on behalf of the deceased by his surviving relatives. On a pedestal in the immediate vicinity of the throne a monster reposes, having the paws of a lion, the body of a female hippopotamus, and the head of a crocodile. Her name, "the devourer of Amenti,"

as well as her appearance, at

once point her out as another of the ministers of vengeance executing the judgments of the divinity before whom she crouches.

At the opposite extremity of the picture, to the right, is

a group of three persons. That in the centre is clothed in, the ordinary manner of the Egyptians, and presented by one of his companions, a female wearing an ostrich feather in her hair, to the other, also a female, similarly ornamented, and having the sceptre of tranquillity and the symbol of life in her hands. This group represents the soul of the deceased introduced by the two Themeis (representing the two attributes they impersonate, truth and justice) to the bar of the judge of all things. It was their office 'to receive the souls of the deceased on their appearance before his tribunal. They were also the presidents of the forty-two avengers, who are represented on the upper part of the picture, seated in two rows, to both of which the deceased offers supplications. The heads of these judges vary considerably; some have the human form, others the heads of living creatures, such as the crocodile, snake, ram, hawk, ibis, jackal, hippopotamus, lion, and ape. We have seen that they are the ministers of vengeance, whose wrath is to be deprecated by the deceased. The names of all the forty-two, and the particular regions over which they preside, occur in the entire copies of this scene. In other copies, they are represented sitting before their presidents. In the presence of the judge Osiris, these and other divinities, or genii, rigorously examined the conduct of the soul while incarnate upon earth. The motives thereof, most significantly symbolized by his heart, are placed in the huge balance of Amenti, which occupies the centre of the picture; and in the opposite scale appears the image of Thmei, or the ostrich feather that adorns her head-dress, (the symbol of justice or truth,) indicative of the inexorable nature of the scrutiny which is taking place. One of the ministers of Thoth, in