390 
traceable for three thousand years b.c.,* * * § there are preserved, 
along with others, though in a corrupted and exaggerated form, 
many of the great doctrines of revealed religion. 
II. That, prominent above other myths in that religious 
system, was the belief in a monstrous 'personal evil being, f 
typically represented as a serpent, and whose office was to 
accuse the righteous, oppose the Supreme Deity, and devour 
the wicked. 
III. That, co-existently in the order of time, there arose a 
dualistic principle of good, likewise represented, for scarcely 
intelligible reasons, by an entirely different serpent, and that 
between these two a constant spiritual warfare was main- 
tained. J 
IY. That, in the abstract, both good and evil were directly 
produced by one Supreme Being, who also co-operated with 
the righteous in their endeavours after holiness. 
Y. That the doctrine of the Metempsychosis, and the 
dogmas of Purgatory, vicarious propitiation, a tangible Hades, 
Heaven and Hell, were also a part of the Egyptian Cultus. 
YI. That negative and positive holiness, rewards and 
punishments, and conformity to the divine nature, were doc- 
trines of the same theology. 
YII. That the supreme delight of the justified consisted in 
conscious hypostatic union with the Eternal Being, § which was 
attainable only after much purgation, and long-continued 
effort. 
YIII. That the final punishment of the wicked consisted 
in utter annihilation, after a period of frightful torture in a 
fiery hell. 
IX. That the contest between good and evil would be at 
last terminated by the incarnation of Deity overcoming the 
great serpent, and utterly destroying him.|| 
X. That besides all this, the serpent myths originated other 
symbolisms indirectly connected with the preceding dogmas, 
and that these, not being revealed by the priests to the general 
body of the people, were by them misunderstood. 
* Lenormant, Bunsen, and "Wilkinson. 
t Satan Sheitan, the hinderer, or from shoot = JOlil the 
t t 
wanderer (Job i. 7, and ii. 2). 
I See also Plutarch, De Isicle ; and Bunsen, Egypt's Place in Universal 
History , vol. i. book i., for a fuller account of the Osiri-Typhonic myth. 
§ Differing herein essentially from the Nirwana or repose of Buddhism. 
j| See also for a brief popular resume of the principal of these doctrines, 
Keary, Early Egyptian History , pp. 364-409. 
