XI. 1. When, therefore, thou hearestthemyth-aayiogs

of the Egyptians concerning the Gods — wanderings and
> Eg. AsAr.
> Qenerally a ''throne'' in the hieroglypba. Bat for the nomeroufl variants, lee Bodge, Ood$ cf ike SffypHam^ IL IIS. Cf. li. 1 below.
' kSBidrirra — ^lit, form -(or idea-) leas-neBs ; tranaoeiidiqg all forma.
* fvfi^ one of the moet primitive terms of Qreek psychology— spirit or soul, or more generally life-principle.
^ iffx^^j sn altar for burnt offerings; here probably sym- bolising Earth as the eyzygy of Heaven.
* It is to be remembered that the " mark" of the warrion was their manliness (ix. IX
7 Matter (0Xiv) being the Nurse, ** according to Plata" The legend was that the scarab beetle deposited its seed into dnng which it first made into balls (Ixxiv. 6).
THE MYSTERIES OP ISIS AND OSIRIS 277
dismemberings, and many such passions^ — thou shouldst remember what has been said above, and think none of these things spoken as they [really] are in state and action.
2. For they do not call Hermes "Dog" as a proper name, but t^ey associate the watching and waking from sleep of the animal,^ who by knowing and not knowing determines friend from foe (as Plato says'), with the most Logos-like of the Grods.
3. Nor do they think that the sun rises as a new-bom babe from a lotus, but so they vrrUe " sun-rise," riddling the re-kindling of the sun from moist [elements].^
4. Moreover, they called the most crude and awe- some King of the Persians (Ochus)^ — who killed many and finally cut the throat of Apis and made a hearty meal off him with his friends — ''Knife," • and they call him so unto this day in the Catalogue^ of their kings, — not, of course, signifying his essence by its proper name,® but likening the hardness of his mood® to an instrument of slaughter.
1 vaBii/uera — the technical mystery-term for such experiences, or sensible knowing.
* Or " of the Animal "—the Living One or Animal Itself or World Soul, if Dog Ib taken to mean the genus or Qreat Dog.
» Bep.^ ii 376 f.
* That is, the ideogram of a new-bom child with its finger on its lips seated on the bosom of the lotos signified '^sun-rise," and * '' lighting up again " was presumably also a symbol of the ^ new birth from above."
^ Artaxerxes III. ; the priests, however, presumably used this incident to illustrate some more general truth. A similar story is also related of CSambyses (xliv. 8) ; they also called Ochu8"As8"(xxxi.4).
* The sacrificial knife again, as in x. 2. "^ Qf. xxxviii. 6.
* Perhaps even meaning by " his name of power."
* Or '*of the turn," where it might refer to the turn of Egypt's fate-wheel.
278 THRICE-GREATEST HERMES
5. So too shalt thoo, if thoa hearest and reoeivat the [mTsteries] about the Gkxls from those who interpret the myth pwrdy and according to the love of wiMdom, and if thou doeet ever and keepest carefully the customs observed by the priests, and if thou thinkest that thou wilt offer neither sacrifice nor act more pleasing to the Grods than the holding a true view concemiDg them, — thou shalt escape an ill no less than being- without-the-gods,^ [that is to say] the fearing- daimones.'