426 THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XIII. 



other was the desert, which destroyed all vegetable 

 life : and they no longer entertained the opinions of 

 those earlier philosophers, who contended that good 

 and bad formed part of one great principle ; that 

 evil proceeded from good, as good from evil ; and 

 that both were intended for the benefit of man- 

 kind. 



It was not until men considered the bad distinctly 

 separate from the good, in a positive and literal 

 sense, that Typho was treated as the enemy of man. 

 Such was tlie idea entertained by the Roman vota- 

 ries of Osiris. There is even reason to believe that 

 a similar change in the sentiments of the Egyp- 

 tians towards this Deity is hinted at by Plutarch*, 

 when he says, — "It is evident they hold Typho 

 in great abhorrence, though they still make offer- 

 ings to him, as if to console him for tlie loss of his 

 power, which had become less formidable than for- 

 merly." '* It was in consequence," he adds, " of 

 their hatred of Typho, that they treated with igno- 

 miny those persons who, from the redness of their 

 complexions, were imagined to bear a resemblance 

 to himt;" and, '* from a similar notion, they made 

 choice of red oxen in their sacrifices." The *' Ass 

 was also selected as an appropriate emblem of the 

 Evil Deity, from its being usually of that colour." 

 Diodorus t even asserts, that *' men of red com- 

 plexions were formerly sacrificed to Osiris, in con- 

 sequence of their supposed resemblance to T}^ho ; " 

 though this may be reasonably doubted, as so many 



* Plut. de Is. s. 30. 



f y^ide infra, on the Sacrifices, Chap. xv. J Diodor. i. 88. 



