364 'O « Egypt and the Nile 



the Jons, whom the Hindus confider as incarnate rays or 'portions ,.. of their feve- 

 ral deities : now Jupiter was the Xswara of the Hindus and the Osiris 

 of the Egyptians >, and Hercules was an avatdr a of the fame divinity ;■ who- 

 is figured, among the ruins of Luxorein r in a boat, which eighteen men bear 

 on their moulders. The Indians commonly reprefent this myftery of their 

 physiological religion by the emblem of a 'Nymphaa,, or Lotos, floating like a 

 boat on the boundlefs ocean j where the whole plant fignifies both the Earth and; 

 the two principles of its fecundation : the germ is both Meru and the linga .; the 

 petals and filaments are the mountains, which encircle Meru, and are alfo a 

 type of the yoni-, the leaves of the calyx are the four vail regions to the car- 

 dinal points of Merit,, and the leaves of the plant are the dwipas or ifles, round 

 the land of Jambu. -Another of their emblemsis called Argha, which means 

 a cup or dijh, or any other vejfel, in which fruit and flowers are offered to the. 

 deitieSj and which ought always to Be fljaped like a beat though we now fee 

 arghas of many different forms oval, circular, or fquare -, and hence it is that 

 Is war a has the title of ArghandfUa, or the Lord of the boat-fljaped vejfel: 

 a rim round the argha reprefents the myfterious yoni, and the navel of 

 Vishnu is commonly denoted by a convexity in the centre, while the 

 contents of the veffel are fymbols of the linga. This argha, as a type 

 of the adhara-mcii, or power of conception y. excited and vivified by the 

 linga, or Phallus, I cannot but fuppofe to be one and the fame with 

 the fhip Argo,. which was built, according to Orpheus, by Juno and 

 Pallas, and according to Apollonius, by Pallas and Argus at the 

 inftance of Juno (a) : the word Yoni, as it is ufually pronounced, nearly 

 refembles the name of the principal Hetrufcan goddefs, and the Sanfcrit 

 phrafe Arghanafha I'swara feems accurately rendered by Plutarch, 



(a) Orph, Argon, v. 66. Apoll. Rhod. B. 2„ v. 11 J 90, 



