relegated to the appendix. Mr. Barker's sources of illustration are sufficiently various; poetry, history, philosophy, divinity, travels, antiquities, are all made to bear on the passage under consideration. He reminds us of Bentley's character of John Tzetzes, "a man of rambling learning." Some of his notes, on the other hand, might be extended with advantage, by the addition of further illustrations. We think too, that many points are passed over in silence, which to the learner require a comment. On the whole, however, he is fully entitled to the praise to which he lays claim in the Preface.

"He trusts, that in the selection" (of notes from preceding commentators)" he has always kept utility in view, and that, if he has not on every occasion successfully, with the aid of his learned predecessors, removed the corruptions and the obscurities of the text, he has at least furnished his readers with some means of forming clear ideas on the points in dispute. The 3rd Edition of Dr. John Aikin's Translation of these Tracts, published in 1815, has been advantageously consulted in some instances."

We have not the two preceding editions before us, so that we are unable to form any judgment as to the comparative merits of the present. Mr. B.'s observations on the well-known words in the description of Germany, ch. 2. "informem terris, asperam cœlo, tristem cultu aspectuque," may serve as a specimen of his style of annotation.

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"Informem terris. What Tacitus means by this expression, will be felt by those, who compare with it what he says in ch. 5. Terra, etsi aliquanto specie differt, in universum tamen aut silvis horrida, aut paludibus fada, and who recollect that in Ann. 2, 23, he says, Tumidis Germania terris, the mountainous countries of Germany.' Longolius is mistaken in supposing that Tac. intended to speak of the sterile appearance of Germany:Sic quoque Seneca de Prov. 4. Germanos maligne solum sterile sustentat. Enimvero nondum extra omnem dubitationem positum est, Germaniam omnem adeo informem fuisse, Nam si vel maxime concedamus, eas regiones, in quibus Romani incursiones fecerunt, sive steriles fuisse, s. potius, ob rationes politicas, incultas jacuisse, an exinde tuto colligere licet, Germaniam omnem si non desertam, certe incultam fuisse? Deinde probe notandum est, vett. Germanos non amavisse luxum eorum igitur terras incultas esse, Romanos luxui deditos exinde falso collegisse mirum non est.' The culture and aspect of the soil is mentioned by Tac, in what immediately follows, tristem cultu aspectuque, and besides in ch. 5. he represents Germany as 'satis ferax. Dr. Aikin's version is therefore faulty: A land rude in its surface, rigorous in its climate, cheerless to every beholder and cultivator except a native.' Horat. Sat. 1, 8, 14. Nunc licet Esquiliis habitare salubribus, atque Aggere in aprico spatiari, quo modo tristes Albis informem spectabant ossibus agrum." "Asperam cœlo. Seneca 1. c., Germanos triste cœlum premit."

"Tristem cultu aspectuque. Seneca 1. c., Germanos maligne solum sterile sustentat. Tac. Germ. c. 5. Terra etsi aliquanto specie differt, in universum tamen aut silvis horrida, aut paludibus fada, satis ferax, frugiferarum arbo

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rum impatiens. Est metonym. effectus pro causa. Tristis cultu est ergo terra, quam etsi optime colas, et studiosissime ares, tamen nihil proferet, e quo lætitiam capere possis, Cic. de N. D. 2, 40. Idem fere de Thracia Mela 2, 2, 4. dicit, Regio nec calo lata, nec solo.' Longol."

The signification of tristis in the above passage, is remarkably well preserved in the French triste. The aspect of modern Germany made the same impression on Madame de Stael as its ancient appearance seems to have done on the countrymen of Tacitus.

We shall only now mention a curious, and, we believe, original conjecture of F. Schlegel in his Lectures on the History of Literature, which recurred to our recollection, on perusing the passage in ch. 3, "Ceterum et Ulixem quidam opinanturadisse Germaniæ terras," &c. that this fancy originated in a confusion of the name of Odin with that of the Greek 'Oduσσεùs, through the well-known propensity of the ancients to identify the fabulous heroes of all other countries with their own;' for which see, among others, Mr. R. P. Knight in his very learned "Inquiry into the Symbolical Language of ancient Art and Mythology," Part IX. §. 209-211, Classical Journal LIII. p. 68.; a passage which Mr. Barker would undoubtedly have quoted, had it occurred to him at the time. Ulysses and Odin were both wanderers.

We observe an error in p. 90, note, col. 1. (at least if the word is meant for Latin) pyrata for pirata. This corruption is not unfrequent, and seems, like some others of the same kind, to have originated in those early times of classical printing, when i and y were to a great extent confounded with each

other.

ON THE PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT.

PART III. [Continued from No. LVI.]

MR. BRYANT thinks that these mysteries originated in the deluge; which is not improbable as far as concerns some of the details, particularly where the ark or scyphus was introduced. I am however persuaded that the leading object of the mysteries, both Egyptian and Greek, was the "loss of Man's first perfect state," his fall, and anticipated restoration. The rites of the funereal Osiris seem rather to have typified the sentence of

This propensity, or something like it, prevails among most nations. A copious and amusing article might be written on the subject.

death on the first man, and his restoration by the promised seed. A greater than Noah was implied, though the second Adam was evidently a type of the third. To this great secret, it is probable that the earliest initiation offered access and par ticipation. The name of Proserpine, and the story of Eurydice, combined with that of Hercules, seem to confirm this view. But I hasten from this digression to concentrate the scattered rays of the Egyptian fable, in order that they may fall in one powerful focus on the pyramid of which we treat.

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The funeral rites of Osiris were sometimes called those of Pluto or Serapis, which means the tomb of Apis. We have before seen what reason there is for believing that the pyramids were dedicated to the triple deities of the infernal regions. In the three heads of the Egyptian Cerberus, the triple image of Hecate, the triple image at Eleusis, the triple image at Elephanta, the numen triplex of Japanese and Chinese pyramidal fanes, there appears a strong and satisfactory connexion with the pyramid seated over the Egyptian hell or Necropolis, and in the neighborhood of Elysium. I come to a part of the subject which is in reality the strongest part of the argument, though hitherto considered as the most hostile to any such induction; I mean the coffer in the central room.

This is Bryant's interpretation: but I should rather derive Sar front a Hebrew word signifying column, than from the Greek ofós. It harmonises also with the word Apis or measurement, signifying mystic years (Sari), counted by TENS.

The most direct derivation is from Serap, to burn, whence Seraph; since Serapis was so represented; and since it is evident that Moses cab balized in translating names, he may have done so here; and if this, meaning a column of measured time, evince connexion with the pyramid, the name Boore-Muth, cavern or well of Pluto, is a no less weighty than curious derivation.

Even now the word Cabura in Arabic (in Hebrew, a pit with the sign of classification affixed) signifies fire-worship, and thus the most ancient mysteries of the three Cabiri, the gods of fire and sons of Vulcan, to whom triangles were devoted, may be referred with great safety to funereal rites enacted in the pyramids.

So the name Osiris may be derived ad libitum from three words; first, meaning Measurer (Apis); second, Riches (Dis, or Pluto); and third, Ten, the pyramidal number (Oshiri).

The Cabiri are called the sons of king Sadek (Shem) by Sanchoniatho but Shem was more probably one of them. Human victims were offered to them. They had a temple near Memphis, which none but priests could enter. One of the Pyramids is attributed by the Copts to Shem, and another to Ham.

The whole island is dedicated to the Indian Pluto, the trident-bearing, three-eyed (trilochos) Mahadeva, who, as Iswara, is identified by name with Adonisiri, or Lord Isiris, (Misra) and who according to Sanchoniatho was brother of Cna (Canaan).

Similar stories of the murder and mangling of a body, its deposition in a coffin, and resurrection, were related of many gods besides Osiris, and entered into the rites of many institutions. Thús one of the Cabiri was murdered and commemorated with similar dreadful rites. Adonis was torn by a boar, the Egyptian image of Typhon, sought, mourned, and restored to immortality by Venus. One of the Cabiri was to live half a year in heaven and half in hell; so was Persephone, and so was Adonis. A similar condition seems to have been imposed upon Osiris.

Bacchus was cut in pieces by the Titans, committed by Cadmus with his mother Semele to an ark, and restored to life by Minerva: it was also said that he was sewn into Jove's thigh; and the same account is given of Erechthonius and Minerva. Bryant argues that the thigh was a symbol of the ark, which is possible; but I rather incline to think, for reasons to be stated hereafter, that it was the type of a lost golden age. Certainly, the thigh of Apis seems to have been consecrated to Osiris. It is offered to him amidst the Hieroglyphics, and forms the central figure of the Tentyrian Planisphere. It was evidently an im portant feature of the mysteries. Perseus and his mother Danae were also committed to an ark. To this god, as Sagittarius or Apollo, the thigh was consecrated, and this perhaps explains the mystery of the GOLDEN thigh of Pythagoras, and the reason why Abaris on that account pronounced him to be Apollo. Of the 14 worlds, the TENTH, of agriculturists, is seated by the Brahmins in the thigh of Brahma. It appears from Homer and Pausanias that the thigh was devoted to the gods at sacrifices. Among the Jews it was sworn by, and one of its sinews held sacred. The solar tripods were sometimes supported by three animal, and the great deity is often represented on Basilidian talismans by three human, thighs. Among the dismembered deities, Jupiter is reported to have been cut in pieces by the giants, and subsequently revived, as Jason's father was cut in pieces and restored to existence by Medea.

The Manicheans and Rosicrucians perpetuated these mysteries. Manes is clearly the funereal Maneros of the Egyptians. He also was deposited in a coffin, his bloody murder wept, and his resurrection affirmed; nor is it unlikely that the Persian heretics derived the Manichean story from the Magian mysteries of fire. The funereal rites of Hossein in Persia are apparently a relic of Magianism, The mysteries of Freemasonry are derived from the same source-the murder of Hiram-the conspirators-the coffin, and the initiatory secret. Nor can it escape reflection where to look for the fountain-head,-in the earliest and most audacious MASONIC structures of the world, where theology was certainly

typified by the MASONIC emblems of the triangle and the square. The Great Pyramid was perhaps the first great Lodge, Even now the sun rising behind a pyramid is a symbol of Freemasonry and the motto "Let there be light, and there was light," derived from Moses, was that of the Rosicrucians and Hermetic philosophers, and evidently applied to the secrets of the old fire-worship. A similar society to these, the tribunal of the Purrah, is still in existence in Africa, and evidently a remnant of Egyptian freemasonry.

My opinion, therefore, is that the stone coffer in the central room was not the coffin of a really buried personage, as Strabo and Diodorus, Pauw, and others imagine, but an ark or tabernacle, used (like the coffin of Hiram and "Sarcophagus of Hossein") in the mysteries of the Egyptian Pluto, thence called Serapis and Busiris (house of Osiris). Nor is it unlikely that tradition has reported truly of the last, and that the mysterious chest has streamed with the blood of human sacrifices, and the gloomy chamber where it stands resounded with the thrilling shriek of dying agony.

But let us proceed to the proofs. I have before inferred from many corroborating circumstances that the stone chest was not the sarcophagus of any deceased monarch. The alternative is, that it was an ark or cista employed in the initiatory rites. Such chests, in short, appertained to almost all the ancient mysteries,

The form of this chest is itself mysterious; it is composed of two cubes, which symbolised the Gemini or Dioscuri,' those conflicting principles of light and darkness which sprung from the egg of Chaos. Cubic stones were dedicated to Baal and Astarte, and Pluto and Proserpine, and, according to Proclus, to the mundane gods. The shrine of Butis was a cube of 60 feet; the temple of Mecca is a hollow cube, and, as Bryant affirms, the Arabians of Petræa worshipped a black cubic stone, At all events the cube is adored by the Javanese and Chinese, and generally devoted to tricipital deities. Nor is it unlikely that the phrase used in the Sibylline oracles (lib. 5. ad fin.) “ Kai ov, Σέραπι, λίθοις ἐπικείμενε,” referred to some similar representation; moreover, the chest is placed in a mystic manner, that is, if the containing chamber were divided by three lines, it occupies the farthest line east and west, which is precisely that of the ancient tabernacles and Holy of Holies; so, another line drawn from the lateral holes in the chamber completes the tripartite division. We

Agreeing with the Urim and Thummim (perhaps from Horus and Thummuz) in the Mosaic ark.