I.] The Sacred Writings. 2>7

lapse of time could impair, no variation could
affect in the secret places, the masonry of the
Pyramid of Light. This embodiment, at once
secret and unalterable, forming literally a
Masonic Ritual of the whole doctrine of Light,
accounts for the singularly piecemeal fashion
in which the sacred words were committed to
writing. During the first three dynasties one
chapter alone has a dim traditional claim to
have been written, while one other is said to have
been revealed to Men Kau Ra, the grandson of
the builder of the Grand Pyramid. And though
on the later Pyramids sacred inscriptions begin
to appear, it is not until the XI,b dynasty
that they become at all common. Of the
various chapters so published (that is, used as
inscriptions or written on papyri) at different
times, there have been, as Mr. Budge mentions
in his " Treatise on the Mummy," four principal
recensions. The first is that of the Ancient
Empire, written in hieroglyphics, to which the
important inscription on the coffin of Amamu