440 THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XVI. 



guise as to be beyond their comprehension : all 

 could feel the disgrace of inhabiting the body of a 

 pig ; and the very one they beheld with loathing 

 and disgust probably contained the soul of a 

 wicked being they had known as their enemy or 

 their friend. 



TRANSMIGRATION AND IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL. 



" The Egyptians," according to Herodotus *, 

 " were the first to maintain that the soul of mant 

 is immortal; that after the death of the body it 

 always enters into that of some other animal which 

 is born ; and when it has passed through all those 

 of the earth, water, and air, it again enters that of 

 a man ; which circuit it accomplishes in 3000 

 years." This doctrine of transmigration is men- 

 tioned by Plutarch, Plato, and other ancient wri- 

 ters as the general belief among the Egyptians, 

 and it was adopted by Pythagoras t and his pre- 

 ceptor Pherecydes, as well as other philosophers of 

 Greece. 



Plutarch § says that " the Egyptians thought 



* Hcrodot. ii. 123. Vide .niprd, Vol. I. (2d Series) p. 21L 

 -j- St. Augustin says, " ^gyptii soli credunt resurrectioncni, quia 

 diligenter ciirant cadavera luortuonim ; niorem eniin liabent siccare 

 cor[)ora ct (|uasi iriica rodderc ; i^ahbaras ea vocaiit." It is singular that 

 tlie word now used in Egypt i'or a lo)iil) is t^nhr or gobbcr. Aug. Sermon, 

 c. 12. 

 i Conf. Lucian's Gallus ; and Ilor. 1. ()d. xxiii. 10. : — 



" Panthoiden iterum orco 

 Demissuni ; qnanivis clypco Trojana refixo 

 Tempora testatus, nilnl ultra 

 Nervos atque cutem niorti concesserat atrae." 



5 Plut. de Is. s. 72. and 31. 



