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The Pharaoh rose with majestic slowness and stood for a few moments perfectly motionless. Thus standing on a pedestal of shoulders, he soared above all heads and appeared to be twelve cubits high. Strangely lighted, half by the rising moon, half by the light of the lamps, in a costume in which gold and enamels sparkled intermittently, he resembled Osiris, or Typhon rather.
This was from the priests of Osiris-Apis who were performing the sacred mysteries of their god, at midnight, on the roof of the temple. She knew the hymn well a lament for the deceased Osiris which implored him with urgent supplication to break the power of death, to rise again, to bestow new light and new vitality on the world and on men, and to vouchsafe to all the departed a new existence.
The holy water used in the libations and for sprinkling the people was Nile water, specially imported from Egypt, and to the votaries of the goddess it symbolized the seed of the god Osiris, which germinated and brought forth fruit through the spells of the goddess Isis. The festivals and processions of Isis were everywhere most popular, and were enjoyed by learned and unlearned alike.
I kept well behind him, pretending to be afraid," and he chuckled quietly, adding, "I expect that he is now telling an angry tale about me to Osiris, or to the Grasshopper that takes him there, as it may happen." "These Easterns worship neither Osiris, nor your Grasshopper, Bes, but a flame of fire." "Then he is telling the tale to the fire, and I hope that it will get tired and burn him."
In the Osiris myth, the youthful Horus loses an eye in his battle with Set. This eye, the symbol of sacrifice, became, next to the sacred beetle, the most common talisman of the country, and all museums are rich in models of the Horus eye in glass or stone.
Frazer, speaking of the Egyptian Osiris as one out of many corn-gods of the above character, says : "The primitive conception of him as the corn-god comes clearly out in the festival of his death and resurrection, which was celebrated the month of Athyr.
Only when all the questions of the awful judges in the underworld had been answered satisfactorily was he allowed to pass into the presence of Osiris and to cultivate the fields of Alu with his own hands. This was the last trial demanded from the justified Egyptian, and it was a hard one for the rich and noble who had done no peasants' work in this present life.
O Egypt! dear land of Khem, whose black soil nourished up my mortal part land that I have betrayed O Osiris! Isis! Horus! ye Gods of Egypt whom I have betrayed! O ye temples whose pylons strike the sky, whose faith I have betrayed! O Royal blood of the Pharaohs of eld, that yet runs within these withered veins whose virtue I have betrayed!
In several papyri the god is seen standing up in the shrine, sometimes with and sometimes without the goddesses Isis and Nephthys. Who is he, I say?" When Horus had led in Ani he addressed Osiris, saying, "I have come unto thee, O Un-nefer, and I have brought the Osiris Ani unto thee.
We may be sure that no people believes more intensely in a future life. What compliment they pay this physical frame of men when they hold that embalmment restores to the soul its former body! After the judgment of Osiris, if their lives be true, the worthy shall enjoy the companionship of the great god forever. No other people wears such a visible emblem of their faith in another life.
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