The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia

46 The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia

further we recede in history. There is“another world,”but it is a
world strangely like our own.
Closely connected with this conception of“another world”
is the conception which man forms concerning his own nature.
There are few races of mankind among whom we do not find in
one shape or another the belief in a second self. Sometimes this
second self is in all respects a reflection and image of the living
self, like the images of those we see in our dreams; and it is
more than probable that dreams first suggested it. Sometimes it
is a mere speck of grey vapour, which may owe its origin to the
breath which issues from the mouth and seems to forsake it at
death, or to the misty forms seen after nightfall by the savage in
the gloom of the forest and by the edge of the morass. At times
it is conceived of as a sort of luminous gas or a phosphorescent
flash of light, such as is emitted by decaying vegetation in a
damp soil. Or, again, it may be likened to the bird that flies to
heaven, to the butterfly which hovers from flower to flower, or
even to insects like the grasshopper which hop along the ground.
But however it may be envisaged, it is at once impalpable and
material, something that can be perceived by the senses and yet
eludes the grasp.
The Egyptian theory of the nature of man in the historical age
of the nation was very complicated. Man was made up of many
[048] parts, each of which was capable of living eternally. The belief
in his composite character was due to the composite character
of the people as described in the last lecture, added to that
conservative tendency which prevented them from discarding
or even altering any part of the heritage of the past. Some at
least of the elements which went“to the making of man”were
derived from different elements in the population. They had
been absorbed, or rather co-ordinated, in the State religion, with
little regard to their mutual compatibility and with little effort
to reconcile them. Hence it is somewhat difficult to distinguish
them all one from another; indeed, it is a task which no Egyptian