SEYFFARTH EGYPTIAN THEOLOGY. 75 



pollion's theory, so far as translating entire hieroglyphic texts is 

 concerned, was a complete failure. 



However, the question is : what shall we do in order to eradi- 

 cate these noxious weeds? Shall we leave the Champollionists 

 unmolested, hoping that they will confess their sins voluntarily? 

 God forbid ! For it is extremely hard for ambitious men to con- 

 fess faults ; and whoever keeps silence in the face of false doc- 

 trines becomes an accomplice. Amicus Plato^ magis amico 

 Veritas ! It is true, I have from 1S26 down to this hour combatted 

 the Champollionists, but in vain ; and it is at present apparent 

 that other steps must be taken for protecting the public from the 

 present Egyptian humbug. I cannot excuse myself from the 

 duty of bringing the very nature of Champollion's system to 

 light — to show what ai'e the real values of the thousands of Egyp- 

 tian works published since Champollion's Precis, and based upon 

 his theory — to warn other Egyptologists against propagating pal- 

 pable errors — to guard the literary world from future impositions 

 of this kind — to enable every scholar to promote Egyptian phi- 

 lology by translating Egyptian texts grammatically and logically, 

 and thus to revive the oldest literature of the world. This is the 

 great problem of the present century ; but, down to this moment, 

 nobody, during fifty-four years, could by means of Champollion's 

 system really interpret any Egyptian inscription. Champollion's 

 Dictionary, Brugsch's interpretation of the Rosettana and his big 

 Dictionary, Rouges Memoire, Lepsius's Tanis-stone (particularly 

 the four volumes, " Records of the Past," published by the So- 

 ciety of Biblical Archaeology"), etc., are deplorable guess-works^ 

 nothing else. Moreover, it is everybody's office to preserve — - 

 according to the universal rule, su7i?n cuique — honesty in literary 

 society, and to punish the shameful sin of appropriating others' 

 property, repeatedly committed by the Champollionists. 



Therefore I am under obligation, first, to publicly challenge 

 Lepsius to translate and explain our astronomical inscription^ 

 grammatically and logically, according to Champollion's princi- 

 ples and alphabet. In so doing, however, he must not have 

 recourse to syllabic hieroglyphs. For Champollion in all his 

 publications maintained (see the passages in the author's Gram. 

 ^Eg. pp. xvii. xviii.) that no hieroglyph signified two or more 



