168 THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XIV 



appear during the Moon's revolutions. " And 

 though," he adds, " such things may appear to 

 carry an air of fiction with them, yet it may be de- 

 pended upon, that the pupils of her eyes seem to 

 fill up, and to grow larger, upon the full of the 

 Moon, and to decrease again and diminish in their 

 brightness on its waning." 



The notion of the cat having been emblematic of 

 the Moon was probably owing to the Greeks sup- 

 posing Pasht or Bubastis, the Egyptian Diana, to 

 be related to the Moon, as in their own mythology. 

 That it was erroneous is evident, from the fact of 

 the Moon being represented in tlie Egyptian Pan- 

 theon by the God Thoth ; but it may be more 

 readily pardoned than many of the misconceptions 

 of the Greeks. 



According to the fable which pretended to de- 

 rive the worship of animals from the assumption 

 of their various shapes by the Gods, when striving 

 to elude the pursuit of Typho, or the wicked at- 

 tacks of mankind*, the Goddess Diana was said 

 to have taken the form of a cat. 



* Diodor. i. 86. Conf. Pint, de Is. s. 72. Ovid. Met. v. 323. 



" donee fcssos ^gyptia tellus 



Ceperit, et scpteni discretus in ostia Nilus. 



Hue (juoquc terrigenani venisse Typhoea narrat, 



Et sc inentitis Superos celasse fignris: 



Duxque gregiK, dixit, fit Jupiter ; luidc rccurvis 



Nunc qiuxjue forniatus Libys est cum cornibus Ammon. 



Delius in cHrvo, proles Senieleia capro, 



Fele soror Piia-bi, nivea Saturnia vacca, 



Pisco Venus latuit, Cyllenius Ibidis alis." 



