BOOKS.

PROFESSOR RAWLINSON'S ANCIENT EGYPT.* A BOOR like the History of Ancient Egypt shows how well de- served is the high reputation gained by Professor Rawlinson for patient and devoted study in the obscurer portions of ancient history. His methods of explaining and exemplifying a very complicated subject are as worthy of praise as his learning. Professor Rawlinson has written a book which is both instruc- tive and entertaining, without being popular in the bad sense. He has adopted the best means of setting before us the history " History of Ancient Boypt. By Professor Rawlinson. In 2 vols. London: Longmans, Green, and 00.

of a people whose forms of social life are particularly difficult to realise. The admirable woodcuts so profusely scattered through the text, and the full-page engravings of the chief architectural monuments, render these two handsome volumes particularly attractive and useful. The special advantages offered to the wood-engraver by the simple linear designs on the monuments have not been missed.

The Egyptians have suffered perhaps more than any other race by the way in which their history is ordinarily approached. We think of the Egyptians, in the first place, as the cruel oppressors of the Jews, and then as having introduced into Rome in the days of the Empire a degraded and impure form of worship. From these two facts, and perhaps a general idea that Herodotus had a great many lies told him by the priests, we form an opinion of the Egyptians very diffi- cult to shake off. But the history that is revealed to us by the reading of the inscriptions and papyri is some- thing very different ; and it is for a clear account of the Egyptians as they really were, both in their days of glory and days of decadence, that we have to thank Professor Raw- linson. To attempt to follow the history of Egypt as traced in the author's second volume would be impossible within our limits, but something may be said of his account of the reli- gion, art, literature, and social life.

The religion of Egypt, like the religion of the Brahmins, was in its essence monotheistic. But like the Brahminical religion, it became debased by popular use,—the one God, worshipped under different attributes, or in different localities, became split up into a hundred forms. The educated classes, however—and here we find another analogy to the religion of India—always retained to some extent the monotheistic ideal. Of the exoteric and esoteric systems, Professor Rawlinson says :—

"To the former [the people at large], it was a polytheism of a multitudinous, and in many respects of a gross, character ; to the latter [the educated classes—the initiated], it was a system combin- ing strict monotheism with a metaphysical, speculative philosophy. on the two great subjects of the nature of God and the destiny of Man. The primary doctrine of the esoteric religion un- doubtedly was the real, essential unity of the Divine Nature. The sacred texts taught that there was a single Being, 'the sole pro- ducer of all things both in heaven and earth, himself not produced of any,'—` the only true and living God, self originated,'—' who exists from the beginning!—` who has made all things, but has not himself been made.' This Being seems never to have been represented by any material, even symbolical, form. It is thought that he had no name, or if he had, that it must have been unlawful either to pro- nounce or write it."

The belief in a future life included the idea of the transmigra- tion of the soul. The good soul, after being purged in a parga- toria.l fire, visited and revisited the earth for a certain mystic cycle of years, after which "the crowning joy of union with God was attained by being absorbed into the Divine Essence." The wicked soul was condemned to a certain number of trans- migrations in the bodies of unclean animals. If after many trials purity was not attained, the wicked soul underwent a further sentence at the hands of Osiris, and being pronounced incurable, suffered a complete and absolute annihilation, It is curious to notice this further resemblance to the religion of Brahma, in the idea of absorption into the essence of God, as the lot attained by the best and happiest souls. But beyond its attractive mysticism, the religion of Egypt has much to interest us. Its moral side is especially noteworthy. To show what were the moral obligations imposed, it will be well to quote from the soul's confession from the "Ritual of the Dead," —the holy book of the Egyptians. To Osiris, Judge of the Dead, and his forty-two assessors, the soul exclaims, in self- defence :—

"I have not blasphemed ; I have not deceived ; I have not been cruel to any one ; I have not caused disturbance ; I have not been idle ; I have not been drunken ; I have not issued unjust orders ; I have not been indiscreetly curious ; I have not multiplied words in speaking ; I have struck no one ; I have caused fear to no one ; I have slandered no one ; I have not eaten my heart through envy ; I have not made false accusations ; I have not kept milk from the month of sucklings; I have not ill-used my slaves."

Leaving the negative vindication, he goes on :—" I have given bread to the hungry, and drink to him that was athirst; I have clothed the naked with garments My mouth and my hands are pure." The humanity and regard to the welfare of society displayed are remarkable, and the moral teaching will compare favourably with that of any religious system but our

OWD.

The literature of ancient Egypt is of vast extent, and we are told "that those best qualified to give an opinion declare it to rival the existing remains of any other known ancient literature." The variety of subjects embraced is astonishing,—from works on theology to novels, from collections of proverbs and recipes to publications of the nature of Zadkiel's Almanack and the com- plete letter-writer. If space allowed, we would gladly quote the whole of the poem of lyrical character called "The Song of the Harper." The old, old theme, "Take thy pleasure to-day," has a quaint pathos in its Egyptian dress :—

"The Great One has gone to his rest, Ended his task and his race ; Thus men are aye passing away,

And youths are aye taking their place.

• ..... • Take thy pleasure to-day ; Father ! Holy One ! see, Spices and fragrant oils, Father, we bring to thee.

On thy sister's bosom and arms Wreaths of lotus we place ; On thy sister, dear to thy heart, Aye sitting before thy face.

Sound the song ; let music be played ; And let cares behind thee be laid.

Take thy pleasure to-day ; Mind thee of joy and delight !

Soon life's pilgrimage ends, And we pass to Silence and Night.

Patriarch perfect and pure, Neperhotep, blessed one ! Thou Didst finish thy course upon earth, And art with the blessed ones now.

Men pass to the silent shore, And their place doth know them no more."

Very amusing are the travels of an engineer officer in Pales- tine. The officer, after consoling himself with the rhetorical question, " Didst thou not go, then, to the land of the Hittites I,"

with a feeling of pride with which Professor Sayce must sym- pathise, reveals the disagreeable part of his journey in the following strain :—

" It is night when thou arrivest ; all thy limbs are wearied ; thy bones ache ; thou fallest asleep from excess of somnolence,—thou wakest up suddenly. It is the hour when sad night begins, and thou art all alone. Comes there not a thief to steal what lies about ? See ! he enters the stable—the horses are disquieted—he goes back in the dark, carrying off thy clothes. Thy groom wakes, and sees the thief retreating. What does he do ? he carries off the rest. Joining himself to the evil-doers, he seeks refuge among the Shashu ; he transforms himself into an Asiatic."

From some remarks on the characteristics of the prose litera- ture thrown out by Professor Rawlinson, we may conclude that the ancient Egyptian would have found the letters of the special correspondent very much to his taste. To change the tenses as

often and as abruptly as possible was the simple artifice adopted by those who aspired to be considered "fine writers," even in the year 2000 B.C. The question why the Egyptians, devoted to literature, and living under conditions favourable to its pro- duction, did not produce any literary work of the highest order, is a very difficult one, and cannot be discussed fully here. We

will only suggest that the reason may perhaps be found in the fact that what is greatest in their work is too much bound up

with their religious mysticism,—a mysticism which, indeed, it is hardly possible to understand, and with which we can certainly not put ourselves en Vapport. It has in it qualities too foreign to all our habits of thought and ideas. Again, too, the isolation of Egyptian civilisation must seem unfavourable, if we remember the conditions of foreign intercourse and external pressure under which the great works of the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and English literature were produced. •

In the art of Egypt, those who take a superficial survey find little but formalism and sameness. What is its real position, and what were the reasons that rendered Egyptian archaic art free and spontaneous, and later Egyptian art crude and formal,

are well sketched in the History of Ancient Egypt, to which the reader must be referred. Perhaps the most interesting of all the many woodcuts which illustrate the dynastic history with portraits of the Pharaohs—a series such as few other histories could produce —are those which give the busts of Thothmes I., III., IV. The face of Thothmes III, has a fascination quite its own. We seem to realise, in features more than ordinarily delicate and refined, that spirit of chivalry which made him impose on his soldiers the oath that they would not "precede him in his attacks on the enemy, or even step aside before the King, so as to afford him protection ;" and that love of magnificence and display which taught him to raise those four great obelisks with which the spoilers of ancient and modern days have adorned the cities of Rome, Constantinople, London, and New York. Professor Rawlinson seems unable to reconcile "the feminine appearance of the face" with the known qualities of the Conqueror. Coleridge has said that a strong female element can be traced in the features of many great men, and would point to the portraits of Frobisher and Drake for confirmation. Handsome, as far as mere physical beauty goes, is the face of the inglorious Thothmes IV., who leaves to history but the renown of the athlete, whose prowess as a hunter, whose strength with the javelin and lance, and whose skill as a charioteer, were unrivalled.

Of the social life and of the inexhaustible resources which we possess to furnish us its details, a full account is given. What chiefly impresses us is the high position accorded to women. The ladies are present at feasts, they partake in the religious ceremonials, they assume a semi-priestly office in connection with some of the temples, they are not absolutely excluded from the throne. Polygamy was never adopted by the people, and even the Pharaohs themselves were content with one wife till the time of the Rameside dynasty. A thousand curious analo- gies to our forms of civilisation are to be found scattered up and down the two volumes. A feeling of positive bewilderment is experienced by seeing an excellent picture of a dachshund, and reading that this is a dog, "fashionable about the time of Osirtasen I."

The history of the Jews in Egypt is a subject as in- teresting as it is obscure. The Shepherd Kings—the Hyksos —can hardly be unconnected with the history of Joseph, and yet it is almost impossible to reconcile the Biblical narra- tive with what we can discover from Egyptian sources. Pro- fessor Rawlinson's conclusion on the matter is thus stated :—

"We have expressed our opinion that Joseph was probably the minister of Apepi, the last Shepherd King, and that the sons of Jacob entered Egypt from Palestine under this monarch. Hospitably re- ceived by a people of the same pastoral habits with themselves, the

Israelites occupied the land of Goshen where they fed their own flocks, and at the same time superintended the herds be- longing to the Egyptian King. If Joseph lived, as is commonly sup- posed, about seventy years after this event, he must have long out- lived Apepi, whose entire reign is estimated at sixty-one years. Probably he died under Hahmes, about B.C. 1600, having, of course, lost his position as 'lord of the land,' when the Shepherd dominion fell, but having left an undying name, which long protected his kinsmen."

It is only possible to conclude our inadequate survey of so in- teresting a book by referring our readers to the volumes them- selves, where they will find, among many other things, an excellent account of Egyptian architecture.