80 
by our responsibilities to be tbe first in the field to illustrate 
our faith and confirm our religion on the plan adopted by 
the Victoria Institute, while we have the opportunity to 
do so. Time would fail me, even did not your patience do so, 
to go further into this topic ; let it suffice that my paper be 
regared as suggestive, and not exhaustive. I look to the 
theologians to follow up the scheme which I lay before them, 
and I w T ait with some anxiety the discussion which I hope 
will follow the reading of this exposition of the Horus myth. 
I am very desirous that the subject should be well discussed, 
and that I should be permitted to hear the view's of all parties, 
however antagonistic those view's may be. Let some irritable 
critics and impatient authors say what they please, the value 
of the sheaf depends upon the grains in the ear, and they can 
only be well extracted by a steady and vigilant thrashing; 
therefore — oh ye bulls of Amen* * *** — to apply to the scholars pre- 
sent an Egyptian idiom, and to conclude with an Egyptian 
song, — here I throw down at your feet a sheaf of Horus wheat, 
gathered from the ancient plains of the Aahlu in the Kerneter.-f 
Therefore — 
Thrash, oh ye oxen, 
Thrash, oh ye oxen, 
Thrash, oh ye oxen, thrash away faster ; 
The straw for yourselves, 
The straw for yourselves, 
The straw for yourselves, and the grain for your master. J 
APPENDIX. 
EGYPTIAN SECTS. 
In tbe interpretation of these mythical texts there is a point to be 
taken into consideration, the materials for which are almost wholly wanting ; that 
is, the existence of sects among the Egyptian devotees. That there were such 
religious distinctions, the Stel'c of the Excommunication, of the [date of the 
XXVIth Dynasty, affords us evident proof, and there are indications of 
other sects having had influence also, but of the natui'C of these sects, save 
that of the Tumpesi (a sect who were forbiddeuto eat raw meat — Sec Records 
* A metaphorical expression applied to the Egyptian chief priests of 
Amen Ra. 
t The best Egyptian wheat was popularly called Horus wheat by the 
ancient Egyptians. 
t Champollion, Lettres ecrites sur VEgypte. 
*** The Emperor Domitian was the last person to whom the title 
“ Horus, son of Isis, the man God,” was applied. This appears on the 
obelisk in the Piazza Navona, at Rome. 
