Lecture V. Animal Worship. 95
could enter for a time whatever material form it chose; could
fly to heaven, for instance, in the body of a swallow, or return
to the mummified body in which it had once dwelt. But such
embodiments were merely temporary, and matters of free choice;
they were like a garment, which the soul could put on and take
off at will.
Modern writers have found it as difficult to explain the animal
worship of ancient Egypt as the philosophers and theologians
of Greece and Rome. Creuzer declared that it was the result of
a poverty of imagination, and that the beasts were worshipped
because they embodied certain natural phenomena. Lenormant
argued, on the other hand, that it was due to a high spiritual
conception of religion, which prevented the Egyptians from
adoring lifeless rocks and stones like the other nations of
antiquity. Of late the tendency has been to see in it a sort
of totemism which prevailed among the aboriginal population
of the country, and was tolerated by the higher religion of the
Pharaonic immigrants. In this case it would represent the religion
of the prehistoric race or races, and its admittance into the official
religion would be paralleled by the history of Bra%manism, which
has similarly tolerated the cults and superstitions of the aboriginal [103]
tribes of India. Indeed, it is possible to discover an analogous
procedure in the history of Christianity itself. The lower beliefs
and forms of worship can be explained away wherever needful
with the help of symbolism and allegory, while the mass of the
people are left in the undisturbed enjoyment of the religious ideas
and rites of their forefathers.
Recent discoveries, however, have cast a new light on the
matter. The early monuments of Egyptian history, found in the
neolithic graves and among the remains of the first dynasties,
have shown that the animal worship of Egypt was only part of
a larger system. Slate plaques, on which are represented the
actions of Pharaohs who preceded Menes or were his immediate
successors, prove that the prevailing system of religion must