CHAP. XX.] HIEROGLYPHICS OF THE EGYPTIANS.

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CHAPTER XX.

Of the Hieroglyphical Pictures of the Egyptians.

CERTAINLY of all men that suffered from the confusion of Babel, the Egyptians found the best evasion; for, though words were confounded, they invented a language of things, and spake unto each other by common notions in nature. Whereby they discoursed in silence, and were intuitively understood from the theory of their expresses. For they assumed the shapes of animals common unto all eyes, and by their conjunctions and compositions were able to communicate their conceptions unto any that coapprehended the syntaxes of their natures. This many conceive to have been the primitive way of writing, and of greater antiquity than letters; and this indeed might Adam well have spoken, who understanding the nature of things, had the advantage of natural expressions. Which the Egyptians but taking upon trust, upon their own or common opinion, from conceded mistakes they authentically promoted errors; describing in their hieroglyphicks creatures of their own invention, or from known and conceded animals, erecting significations not inferible from their natures.9

7 a language.] A common language might possibly bee framed which all should understand under one character, in their own tongue, as well as all understand in astronomy the 12 signes, the 7 planets, and the several aspects; or in geometry, a triangle, a rhombe, a square, a parallelogram, a helix, a decussation, a cross, a circle, a sector, and such like very many: or the Saracenicall and algebraick characters in arithmetick, or the notes of weight among physitians and apothecaryes: or lastly, those marks of punctuations and qualityes among grammarians in Hebrew under, in Arabick above, the words. To let pass Paracelsus his particular marks, and the common practice of all trades. -Wr.

8 by their conjunctions, &c.] More clearly, "by the conjunction and composition of those shapes of animals, &c."

Which the Egyptians, &c.] How little, alas, do we know of the picture-writing of the Egyptians, even after all the profound researches of Young, Champollion, Klaproth, Akerblad, De Sacy, and others: and how little (we may perhaps add) can we hope ever to see effected. We are told by Clemens Alexandrinus (and subsequent researches have done little more than enable us to comprehend his meaning) that the Egyp

And first, although there were more things in nature, than words which did express them, yet even in these mute and tians used three modes of writing ;-the epistolographic (called demotic by Herodotus and Diodorus, and enchorial in the Rosetta inscription), the hieratic (employed by the sacred scribes), and the hieroglyphick,— consisting of the kuriologic (subsequently termed phonetic) and the symbolic, of which there are several kinds;-one representing objects properly, another metaphorically, a third enigmatically. The great discovery made by Dr. T. Young, from the Rosetta inscription, was that some of the hieroglyphs were the signs of sounds, each hieroglyph signifying the first letter of the Egyptian name of the object represented. Supposing all their picture-writing to be symbolical, then it would be manifestly impossible to hope to read it. For example, we are told that the figure of a bee expressed the idea of royalty; but who could have guessed this? Supposing on the other hand that the hieroglyphs were entirely phonetic (which was not the case, nor can we possibly ascertain in what proportion they were so), supposing them also to be certain and determinate signs of sounds, one and the same sign always employed to represent one and the same sound;-supposing in short that "we could spell syllables and distinguish words with as much certainty and precision as if they had been written in any of the improved alphabets of the west, there would yet always remain one difficulty over which genius itself could not triumph; namely, to discover the signification of the words, when it is not known by tradition or otherwise :"-when the original language has long since utterly vanished;—and when the only instrument left wherewith we can labour (the Coptic) is but the mutilated and imperfect fragment of an extinct language, itself when living the remnant only of that elder form of speech which we are seeking to decypher; but of which, alas! through so imperfect a medium, but slight traces and lineaments can be here and there faintly reflected. The article, EGYPT, in the Sup. to Ency. Brit. and HIEROGLYPHICKS, in Ency. Metrop. together with articles in the 45th and 57th vols. of the Edinburgh Review, will give those disposed to go further into the subject a full and interesting view of all that has hitherto been effected in this most difficult, if not hopeless, field of labour.

But our author's special object in this chapter is to bring against the Egyptians the twofold charge; first, of "describing in their hieroglyphicks creatures of their own inventions;" and secondly, of "erecting, from known and conceded animals, significations not inferible from their natures." No charge, however, can be fairly entertained till it has been proved;—and it would be no easy matter to show that many of the monsters enumerated, were really Egyptian : Considering how absurdly and monstrously complicated the Egyptian superstitions really were, it becomes absolutely essential to separate that which is most fully established or most generally admitted, from the accidental or local varieties, which may have been exaggerated by different authors into established usages of the whole nation, and still more from those which have been the fanciful productions of their own inventive faculties."-Dr. Young, EGYPT, Sup. Ency. Brit, iv. 43.

CHAP. XX.]

HIEROGLYPHICS OF THE EGYPTIANS.

67

silent discourses, to express complexed significations, they took a liberty to compound and piece together creatures of allowable forms into mixtures inexistent. Thus began the descriptions of griffins, basilisks, phoenix, and many more; which emblematists and heralds have entertained with significations answering their institutions; hieroglyphically adding martegres, wivernes, lion-fishes, with divers others. Pieces

of good and allowable invention unto the prudent spectator, but are looked on by vulgar eyes as literal truths or absurd impossibilities; whereas indeed they are commendable inventions, and of laudable significations.

Again, beside these pieces fictitiously set down, and having no copy in nature, they had many unquestionably drawn, of inconsequent signification, nor naturally verifying their intention. We shall instance but in few, as they stand recorded by Orus. The male sex they expressed by a vulture,1 because of vultures all are females, and impregnated by the wind; which authentically transmitted hath passed many pens, and became the assertion of Elian, Ambrose, Basil, Isidore, Tzetzus, Philes, and others. Wherein notwithstanding what injury is offered unto the creation in this confinement of sex, and what disturbance unto philosophy in the concession of windy conceptions, we shall not here declare. By two drachms they thought it sufficient to signify an heart;2 because the heart at one year weigheth two drachms, that is, a quarter of an ounce, and unto fifty years annually increaseth the weight of one drachm, after which in the same proportion it yearly decreaseth; so that the life of a man doth not naturally extend above an hundred. And this

The authors on whom Browne relies, especially Pierius, are by no means to be received without the caution expressed in the foregoing quotation.

1 The male sex, &c.] See Pierius Hieroglyphica, fol. 1626, lxxiii. c. 1, 4. Horapollo (4to. curá Pauw), No. 12.

2 By two drachms, &c.] Pierius says that the Egyptians used the vulture to symbolize two drachms, or a heart; and he gives other reasons for the adoption of the symbol, though he deems that mentioned by Browne the most probable (Ibid. 1. xviii. c. 20). Horapollo says, they used the vulture to represent two drachms, because unity was expressed by two lines; and, unity being the beginning of numbers, most fitly doth its sign express a vulture, because, like unity, it is singly the author of its own increase (Ibid. No. 12).

was not only a popular conceit, but consentaneous unto the physical principles, as Hernius hath accounted it.*

A woman that hath but one child, they express by a lioness; for that conceiveth but once. Fecundity they set forth by a goat, because but seven days old it beginneth to use coition.4 The abortion of a woman they describe by an horse kicking a wolf; because a mare will cast her foal if she tread in the track of that animal.5 Deformity they signify by a bear; and an unstable man by a hyæna,7 because that animal yearly exchangeth its sex. A woman delivered of a female child they imply by a bull looking over his left shoulder; because if in coition a bull part from a cow on that side, the calf will prove a female.9

6

All which, with many more, how far they consent with truth we shall not disparage our reader to dispute; and though some way allowable unto wiser conceits who could distinctly receive their significations, yet carrying the majesty of hieroglyphicks, and so transmitted by authors, they crept * In his Philosophia Barbarica.

3 A woman, &c.] Pierius, lib. i. c. 14, Horapollo, No. 82. Fecundity, &c.] Pierius, lib. x. c. 10, Horapollo, No. 48.

5 The abortion, &c.] Pierius, lib. xi. c. 9, Horapollo, No. 45.

Whether the tracke of the wolfe will cause abortion in a mare is hard to bee knowne : but the mare does soe little feare the wolfe, that (as I have heard itt from the mouth of a gentleman, an eye-witness of what he related) as soone as shee perceaves the wolfe to lye in watch for her young foale, she will never cease hunting with open mouth till shee drive him quite away : the wolfe avoyding the gripe of her teeth, as much as the stroke of her heeles: and to make up the probability hereof, itt is certaine that a generous horse will fasten on a dog with his teeth, as fell out anno 1653, in October, at Bletchinden (Oxon), a colt being bated by a mastive (that was set on by his master to drive him out of a pasture) tooke up the dog in his teeth by the back, and rann away with him, and at last flinging him over his head lefte the dog soe bruised with the gripe and the fall, that hee lay half dead; but the generous colte leapt over the next hedge, and ran home to his own pasture unhurt.-Wr.

6 Deformity, &c.] Pierius, 1. xi. c. 42. Horapollo, No. 83, says, "Hominem, qui initio quidem informis natus sit, sed postea formam acceperit, innuunt depicta ursa prægnante."

7 an unstable, &c.] Pierius, 1. xi. c. 24, Horapollo, No. 69.

8 A woman, &c.] Pierius, 1. iii. c. 6. Horapollo, who adds also the converse of the proposition, No. 43.

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female.] I have heard this avowed by auncient grave farmers.—Wr.

into a belief with many, and favourable doubt with most. And thus, I fear, it hath fared with the hieroglyphical symbols of Scripture; which, excellently intended in the species of things sacrificed, in the prohibited meats, in the dreams of Pharaoh, Joseph, and many other passages, are ofttimes racked beyond their symbolizations, and enlarged into constructions disparaging their true intentions."

CHAPTER XXI.2

Of the Picture of Haman Hanged.

IN common draughts, Haman is hanged by the neck upon an high gibbet, after the usual and now practised way of suspension but whether this description truly answereth the original, learned pens consent not, and good grounds

1 intentions.] Ross despatches the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th chapters in the following summary remarks:

"In some subsequent chapters the doctor questions the pictures of St. Christopher carrying Christ over the river: of St. George on horseback killing the dragon; of St. Jerom with a clock hanging by; of mermaids, unicorns, and some others; with some hieroglyphick pictures of the Egyptians. In this he doth luctari cum larvis, and with Æneas in the poet, Irruit et frustra ferro diverberat umbras. He wrestles with shadows; for he may as well question all the poetical fictions, all the sacred parables, all tropical speeches; also escutcheons, or coats of arms, signs hanging out at doors-where he will find blue boars, white lions, black swans, double-headed eagles, and such like, devised only for distinction. The like devices are in military ensigns. Felix, Prince of Salernum, had for his device a tortoise with wings, flying, with this motto, amor addidit; intimating, that love gives wings to the slowest spirits. Lewis of Anjou, King of Naples, gave for his device, a hand out of the clouds, holding a pair of scales, with this motto, Equa durant semper. Henry the First, of Portugal, had a flying horse for his device. A thousand such conceits I could allege, which are symbolical, and therefore it were ridiculous to question them, if they were historical. As for the cherubims, I find four different opinions. 1. Some write they were angels in the form of birds. 2. Aben Ezra thinks the word cherub signifieth any shape or form. 3. Josephus will have them to be winged animals, but never seen by any. 4. The most received opinion is, that they had the shape of children; for rub in Hebrew, and rabe in Chaldee, signifieth a child; and che, as: so then, cherub signifieth as a child, and it is most likely they were painted in this form.'

2 Chap. xxi.] The whole chapter first added in 6th edition.