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and Pyrrha, the daughter of Philinus, being canefora (or basket-bearer) of Berenice, the daughter of Euergetes ;" and in the latter, are "the priestess of Arsinoe, the father-loving:" and "the prize-bearer of Berenice Euergetes: the basketbearer of Arsinoe Philadelphus: and the priestess of Arsinoe Eupator :" and those of the three Cleopatras.*

The same office usually descended from father to sont, but the grade was sometimes changed; and it is probable that even, when a husband was devoted to the service of one deity, a wife might perform the duties of priestess to another. They enjoyed important privileges, which extended to their whole family. They were exempt from taxes; they consumed no part of their own income in any of their necessary expensest; and they had one of the three portions into which the land of Egypt was divided, free from all duties. They were provided for from the public stores, out of which they received a stated allowance of corn and all the other necessaries of life; and we find that when Pharaoh, by the advice of Joseph, took all the land of the Egyptians in lieu of corn §, the priests were not obliged to make the same sacrifice of their landed property, nor was the tax of the fifth part of the produce entailed upon it, as on

* In p. 72. of Dr. Young.

+ Diod. i. 73. Proofs of this are frequently met with in the sculptures; but I believe that though a priest was son of a priest, the peculiar office held by a son may sometimes have been different in point of rank from that of his father.

Herodot. ii. 37.

§ Gen. xlvii. 20. 22.

that of the other people.* Diodorus states, that the land was divided into three portions, one of which belonged to the king, the other to the priests, and the third to the military order; and I am inclined to think this exclusive right of freehold property is alluded to in the sculptures of the Egyptian tombs. And if the only persons there represented as landed proprietors are the kings, priests, and military ment, this accordance of the sculptures with the scriptural account is peculiarly interesting, as it recalls the fact of Pharaoh's having bought all the land of the Egyptians, who farmed it afterwards for the proprietor of the soil, on condition of paying him a fifth of the annual produce; though Herodotus would lead us to infer that Sesostris divided the lands among the people ‡, and having allotted to each a certain portion, received an annual rent from the peasant by whom it was cultivated.

In the sacerdotal, as among the other classes, a great distinction existed between the different grades, and the various orders of priests ranked according to their peculiar office. The chief and high priests held the first and most honourable station; but he who offered sacrifice in the temple appears to have had, at least for the time, the

* Gen. lxvii. 26.

+ The priests and soldiers had an allowance from the government; though the latter are not mentioned as having profited by this during the famine of Joseph.

Herodot. ii. 189. Vide infra, on the lawgivers; and supra, p. 74. Unless he means that the crown lands were portioned out, and given to the peasants to farm, on payment of a certain rent, or a fifth of the produce, as mentioned in Genesis, xlvii. 26.

highest post, and one that was usually filled by the kings themselves. It is, however, probable that the chief priests took it by turns to officiate on those occasions, and that the honour of doing sacrifice was not confined to one alone; but the priests of one deity were not called upon to perform the ceremonies in the temple of another, though no injunction prevented any of them making offerings to the contemplar gods, and still less to Osiris in his capacity of judge of Amenti. Some also, who were attached to the service of certain divinities, held a rank far above the rest; and the priests of the great gods were looked upon with far greater consideration than those of the minor deities. In many provinces and towns, those who belonged to particular temples were in greater repute than others; and it was natural that the priests who were devoted to the service of the presiding deity of the place should be preferred by the inhabitants, and be treated with greater honour. Thus the priests of Amun held the first rank at Thebes, those of Pthah at Memphis, of Re at Heliopolis, and the same throughout the nomes of which these were the chief cities.

One of the principal grades of the priesthood was the prophets. They were particularly versed in all matters relating to religion, the laws, the worship of the gods, and the discipline of the whole order; and they not only presided over the temple and the sacred rites, but directed the management of the priestly revenues.* In the solemn

* Clem. Alex. strom. i. p. 758.

processions, their part was conspicuous; they bore the holy hydria, or vase, which was frequently carried by the king himself on similar occasions; and when any new regulations were introduced in affairs of religion, they, in conjunction with the chief priests, were the first whose opinion was consulted, as we find in the Rosetta stone, where, in passing a decree regarding the honours to be conferred on Ptolemy Epiphanes, "the chief priests and prophets" headed the conclave assembled in the temple of Memphis.*

The sacred office of the priests, by giving them the exclusive right to regulate all spiritual matters, as well as to announce the will, threaten the wrath, and superintend the worship, of the gods, was calculated to ensure them universal respect; and they were esteemed for a superior understanding, and for that knowledge which could only be acquired by the peculiar nature of their education. In consideration of the services they were bound to perform in the temples, for the welfare of the country and of its inhabitants, they were provided with ample revenues, besides numerous free gifts; for the Egyptians deemed it right that the administration of the honours paid to the gods should not be fluctuating, but be conducted always by the same persons, in the same becoming manner, and that those, who were above all their fellow-citizens

* "The chief priests and prophets, and those who have access to the adytum, to clothe the gods, and the pterophora, and the sacred scribes, and all the other priests . . . . . assembled in the temple at Memphis, established the following decree." Ros. St. line 6.

in wisdom and knowledge, ought not to be below any of them in the comforts and conveniences of life. With a similar view, a stated portion was assigned also to the kings, in order that they might be enabled to reward the services of those who merited well of their country, and that by having ample means for supporting their own splendour and dignity, they might not burthen their subjects with oppressive and extraordinary taxes.*

The chief cause of the ascendency they acquired over the minds of the people was the importance attached to the mysteries, to a thorough understanding of which the priests could alone arrive; and so sacred did they hold those secrets that many members of the sacerdotal order were not admitted to a participation of them, and those alone were selected for initiation who had proved themselves virtuous and deserving of the honour: a fact, satisfactorily proved by the evidence of Clement of Alexandria, who says, "the Egyptians neither entrusted their mysteries to every one, nor degraded the secrets of divine matters by disclosing them to the profane, reserving them for the heir apparent of the throne †, and for such of the priests as excelled in virtue and wisdom."+

From all we can learn on the subject, it appears that the mysteries consisted of two degrees, denominated the greater and the less §; and in order to

Diod. i. 73.

+ If of the priestly order.

Clem. Alex. strom. i. p. 670. He adds, "Therefore, in their hidden character, the enigmas of the Egyptians are very similar to those of the Jews."

§ Like the Eleusinian, which were borrowed from Egypt.

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