Adams, Walter M.: The house of the hidden places: a clue to the creed of early Egypt from Egyptian sources (London, 1895)

III.] The Two Natures of Osiris. 91

day, imaged to the Egyptian the splendour of
the light. And thus we have the cat cutting
off the head of the serpent of darkness in the
presence of the sacred Three. And that sym-
bolism, when its original meaning was lost,
that is, when the knowledge of God was no
longer retained in their science, would naturally
give rise to the foolishness of animal worship.
No less profound was the relation between
the Creator and His works, as intimated in
their well-known symbol for created life, called
the Ank * or Sacred Mirror, wherein every great
deity contemplates perpetually his own image ;
but which is rarely grasped in the hand of any
except Amen. But how should the universe
be represented by a mirror, and, if it be, why
should the heavenly powers behold themselves

* Another signification,that of a fisherman's knot, has
of late been adopted by some authorities ; but the shape
of the knot differs essentially from that of the Ank, the
head of the latter being upright upon the stem. And
again, how should a fisherman's knot stand upright on
fjhe knees of the gods ? and, if it could, why should it ?