The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1888-09-05
!. ANCIENT EGYPTIANS.
NOTIONS OF THE PEOPLE WHO
BUILT THE PYRAMIDS.

Their Theory cSncernIng "DoubIes''-Ori-
gin of the Practice OF Embaiming.
Bodies of Stone or wood-why Egyp-
tians Are So Frequently Mutilnted.
The oldest form the ancient Egyptians at
tributed to the soul was that of a shadow-a-
double born with each person, and following
him through the various stages Of life, grow
ing as he grew and declining us he declined.
They applied this theory not only to human
beings, but also to gods and animals, trees
and stones. Everybody and everything was
held to have its double. even beds, chairs and
knives. The component particles Of these
doubles were so minute and subtle that or
binary people could not perceive them. Only
a special order of priests or seers, gifted or
trained for the purpose, could identify tho
doubles of the gods, and obtain from them a
knowledge of past and future events Tho
doubles Of men and inanimate objects re-
MANNED securely hidden from sight in the or
binary course of LIE. Still, they sometimes
left the body, endowed with color and voice,
and went away to manifest themselves at
distance, after the manner OF modern ghosts
THE DOUBLES AFTER DEATH.
After death the doubles maintained not
only the characteristics Of tho particular
man they had been associated with while in
the flesh, but were subjected to the common
wants and pains of humanity-to hunger
and thirst, to heat and cold, to fatigue and
illness-with the aggravation that, whereas
the living have ways and means of self pro-
lection against the evils which befall them,
the dead arc utterly destitute II left to
themselves they were doomed to roam about
tho places they had inhabited, and feed upon
the refuse of houses, with certainty of per-
ishing after prolonging their miserable ex-
istence for a short time. II properly at
tended to-if provided with food and other
necessaries-they had O fair chance to live
on and on for an indefinite period. They
did not become immortal; "tho splendid in
vention of Immortality as prominent
American statesman has called it, was un-
known in primitive Egypt; but at least they
often had facilities for survival that were al
most equivalent to Immortality, as is pointed
out by Mr.. G. Maspero, in an interesting
contribution to The Princeton Review, enti-
tied Egyptian Souls and Their Worlds
from which the facts in this article are
mainly derived. 1t is easy to believe that
the germ of the latter conviction Of another
and everlasting life was present in this crude
notion of a double-a soul apart from the
body--which might continue its existence,
under favorable conditions, for an unlimited
time.
Since the double WIS q perfect image of
the being to which it had been linked at
birth, It was natural that it should remain
near where the corpse was buried, and par
ticipate in its destinies. Havinggrown with
tho body, it ought logically to decay with the
body, and thus there was reason to believe
that the natural term OF its existence after
tho body's death might be measured by tho
time required for the human frame to disin-
tegrate completely. Therefore, the Egyptian
savants decided the best means OF arresting
the decomposition of the soul was to stop
the decomposition of tho flesh, and to this,
Mr. Maspero suggests, we probably owe the
practice of embalming. The drying up and
hardening of tho mummy enabled it TO last
for centuries, and to serve as kind Of stay
for its double
STONE OR WOODEN BODIES.
But this expedient was not wholly salts
factory, since even the best OF mummics
could not endure forever-and then what
would become Of tho doublof The only way
they found out OF this difficulty was to pro
vide stone or wooden bodies against the pos
sibility of the mummy moldering away
Most OF the statues discovered in Egyptian
sonnos' M. e. naspo,o ass .i us we.9 vniy
pouies LOT OF INC uouoiss VI .ne men put'eu IN
.neln' 10 presch. mem rom peins p, .ns'.
~ pieces u culiiou sway, .ney "aiicu mem
UP IN oarN some s.nluns, sonio si'elns
some squae.lns, accoruins 70 .aseo os son-
Vcniehce' 'lhu aii wele ~ my she nlooe. =.
a's couiu inino saeni s.ii. .no 'ou' "is"'
more 81, e''slly auap ~. '.sen y. 40, vne.n
ansre was NO a,,ne 70 .us nu. w sa "a sn.n
eiisies pu' .ne pie'y or "cai.n u 'no sul Wv
,ns reia.iycs, eno more hunie,o's sneJ WIZ
.hc pe..er was iol ehS uo'au. ono s.u.ue
was, n,.cI al, oniy oiio oi''i'oo =, pe,possi'y,