our very own,-there is the still more precious, the matchless shield by Vehm, whereon, in most expressive imagery, are hammered out the discoveries of Newton, Milton's noble epics, and Shakespeare's dramatic wonders. We may, too, in passing, allude to the richly-embossed and ornamented cups for which our swift racers and grey-hounds, and those "dogs of war," our volunteers, contend; and the almost imperial pieces of plate, such as the Cæsars never beheld, in which genius and the highest art combine, by their "cunning work," to carve the deeds and enhance the renown of some of our great Indian administrators and illustrious generals; these all, truly "choice emblemes," intimate the extent to which our subject might lead. But I forbear to pursue it, though scarcely any path offers greater temptations for wandering abroad amid the marvels of human skill, and for considering reverently and gladly how men have been "filled with the spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship." Exodus xxxi. 3.

Of glyptic art the most ancient, as well as the most ample, remains are found in the temples and the other monuments of Egypt. Various modern explorers and writers have given very elaborate accounts of those remains, and still are carrying on their researches; but of old writers only Clemens, of Alexandria, who flourished "towards the end of the second century after Christ," "has left us a full and correct account of the principle of the Egyptian writing,' "* and has declared what the subjects were which were included in the word hieroglyphics;

* See Kenrick's Ancient Egypt under the Pharaohs, vol. i. p. 291.

and as

+ See the Stromata of Clemens, vi. 633,-where we learn that it was the duty of the Hierogrammateis, or Sacred Scribe, to gain a knowledge of "what are named Hieroglyphics, which relate to cosmography, geography, the action of the sun and moon, to the five planets, to the topography of Egypt, and to the neighbourhood of the Nile, to a record of the attire of the priests and of the estates belonging to them, and to other things serviceable to the priests."

far as is known, no other early author, except Horapollo of the Nile, has written expressly on the Hieroglyphics of Egypt, and declared that his work-which was probably translated into Greek in the reign of the emperor Zeno, or even later-was derived from Egyptian sources; indeed, was a book in the language of Egypt.

Probably the best account we have of the author and of the translator, is given by Alexander Turner Cory, in the Preface to his edition of Horapollo. He says, pp. viii. and ix.,

"At the beginning of the fifth century, Horapollo, a scribe of the Egyptian race, and a native of Phonebythis, attempted to collect and perpetuate in the volume before us, the then remaining, but fast fading knowledge of the symbols inscribed upon the monuments, which attested the ancient grandeur of his country. This compilation was originally made in the Egyptian language; but a translation of it into Greek by Philip has alone come down to us, and in a condition very far from satisfactory. From the internal evidence of the work, we should judge Philip to have lived a century or two later than Horapollo; and at a time when every remnant of actual knowledge of the subject must have vanished."

However this may be, it is certainly a book of Emblems, and just previous to Shakespeare's age, and during its continuance was regarded as a high authority. Within that time there were at least five editions of the work,—and it was certainly the mine in which the writers of Emblem books generally sought for what were to them valuable suggestions. The edition we have used is the small octavo of 1551,* with many woodcuts, imaginative indeed, but designed in accordance with the original text. J. Mercier, a distinguished scholar, who died in 1562, was the editor. In 1547 he was professor of Hebrew at the Royal

*

:

"ORI APOLLINIS NILIACI, De Sacris notis et sculpturis libri duo," &c. "Parisiis apud Jacobum Keruer, via Jacobæa, sub duobus Gallis, M.D. Li." Also, Martin's "Orus Apollo de Ægypte de la sygnification des notes hieroglyphiques des Ægyptiens: Paris, Keruer, sm. 8vo, 1543.”

College of Paris, and in 1548 edited the quarto edition of Horapollo's Hieroglyphics.

From the edition of 1551, p. 52, we take a very popular illustration; it is the Phoenix, and may serve to show the nature of Horapollo's work.

long absence will return to his friends from abroad?" By the Phoenix; "for this bird, after five hundred years, when the death hour is about to seize it, returns to Egypt, and in Egypt, paying the debt of nature, is burned with great solemnity. And whatever sacred rites the Egyptians observe towards their other sacred animals, these they observe towards the Phoenix."

And bk. ii. 57,-"The lasting restoration which shall take place after long ages, when they wish to signify it, they paint the bird Phoenix. For when it is born this bird obtains the restoration of its properties. And its birth is in this manner: the Phoenix being about to die, dashes itself upon the ground, and receiving a wound, ichor flows from it, and through the opening another Phoenix is born. And when its wings are fledged, this other sets out with its father to the city of the Sun in Egypt, and on arriving there, at the rising of the Sun, the parent dies; and after the death of the father, the

young one sets out again for its own country. And the dead Phoenix do the priests of Egypt bury."

But the drawings, which in the old editions of Horapollo were fancy-made, have, through the researches of a succession of Egyptian antiquaries, assumed reality, and may be appealed to for proof that Horapollo described the very things which he had seen, though occasionally he, or his translator Philip, attributes to them an imaginative or highly mythical meaning. The results of those researches we witness in the editions of Horapollo, first by the celebrated Dr. Conrad Leemans, of Leyden, in 1835,* and second, by Alexander Turner Cory, Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge, in 1840;† both of which editions, by their illustrative plates, taken from correct drawings of the originals, present Horapollo with an accuracy that could not have been approached in the sixteenth century. We have indeed of that age the great work of Pierius Valerian (ed. folio, Bâle, 1556, leaves 449), the Hieroglyphica, dedicated to Cosmo de' Medici, with almost innumerable emblems, in fifty-eight books, and with about 365 devices. But it cannot be regarded as an exposition of the Egyptian art, and labours under the same defect as the early editions of Horapollo,-the illustrations are not taken from existing monuments.

An example or two from Leemans and Cory will supply sufficient information to enable the reader to understand something of the nature of Horapollo's work, and of the actual Hieroglyphics from which that work has in great part been verified.

The following is the 31st figure in the plates which Leemans gives; it is the pictorial representation to explain "What

*

Horapollinis Niloi Hieroglyphica, 8vo, pp. xxxvi. and 446: "Amstelodami, apud J. Muller et Socios, MDCCCXXXV.”

+ The Hieroglyphics of Horapollo Nilous, sm. 8vo, pp. xii. and 174: "London, William Pickering, MDCCCXL."”

the Egyptians mean when they engrave or paint a star."* "Would they signify the God who sets in order the world, or destiny, or the number

five, they paint a star; God, indeed, because the providence of God, to which the motion of the stars and of all the world is subject, determines the victory; for it seems to them that, apart from

Leemans' Horapollo, 1835.

God, nothing whatever could endure; and destiny they signify, since this also is regulated by stellar management, and the number five, because out of the multitude which is in heaven, five only, by motion originating from themselves, make perfect the management of the world."

Of the three figures which are delineated above, the one to the left hand symbolizes God, that in the middle destiny, and the third, the number 5, from five rays being used to indicate a star.

The same subjects are thus represented in Cory's Horapollo.

Cory's Horapollo, bk. i. c. 8, p. 15, also illustrates

the question, "How do they

indicate the soul?" by the accompanying symbols; of which

Horapollo's Hieroglyphica, by Conrad Leemans, bk. i. c. 13, p. 20:-Tí àσrépa γράφοντες δηλοῦσι. Θεὸν δέ ἐγκόσμιον σημαίνοντες, ἢ εἰμαρμένην, ἢ τὸν πέντε ἀριθμὸν, ἀστέρα ζωγραφοῦσι· θεὸν μὲν, ἐπειδὴ πρόνοια θεοῦ τὴν νίκην προστάσσει, ᾗ τῶν ἀστέρων καὶ τοῦ παντὸς κόσμου κίνησις ἐκτελεῖται· δοκεῖ γὰρ αὐτοῖς δίχα θεοῦ, μηδὲν ὅλως συνεστάναι εἱμαρμένην δέ, ἐπεὶ καὶ αὕτη ἐξ ἀστρικῆς οἰκονομίας συνίσταται· τὸν δὲ πέντε ἀριθμὸν, ἐπειδὴ πλήθους ὄντος ἐν οὐρανῷ, πέντε μόνοι ἐξ αὐτῶν κινούμενοι, τὴν τοῦ κόσμου οἰκονομίαν ἐκτελοῦσι.

E