DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4668#0257
vii.] The Investiture of the Illuminate. 239
" vigilant; " Lust, " the consumer, the over-
thrower in a moment," that " lives off
reptiles ; " Pride, with its " face of stone ; "
Sloth, that hardens irretrievably the heart,
the "final stopper of the rejected;" all these
betray their nature to him over whom death
has power no longer. And he discerns (as in
the vignette) the seven avenging spirits, each
armed with the two swords of physical and
spiritual destruction.
Mounting then the steep ascent, he beholds
the mystery of judgment disclose itself in
successive stages as the twenty-one Gates of
Aahlu—their spaces measured by the years of
Light, as it speeds from Sothis, the gates which
open only to "the meek-hearted" (cxlvi.)
unfold before him. At each of the first ten
portals flows a celestial stream of sparkling
waters, which shed their undying lustre over
the person of the Illuminate. Ascending still
towards the throne of Ra, at the nineteenth
portal he is clothed with robes of power ; and
" vigilant; " Lust, " the consumer, the over-
thrower in a moment," that " lives off
reptiles ; " Pride, with its " face of stone ; "
Sloth, that hardens irretrievably the heart,
the "final stopper of the rejected;" all these
betray their nature to him over whom death
has power no longer. And he discerns (as in
the vignette) the seven avenging spirits, each
armed with the two swords of physical and
spiritual destruction.
Mounting then the steep ascent, he beholds
the mystery of judgment disclose itself in
successive stages as the twenty-one Gates of
Aahlu—their spaces measured by the years of
Light, as it speeds from Sothis, the gates which
open only to "the meek-hearted" (cxlvi.)
unfold before him. At each of the first ten
portals flows a celestial stream of sparkling
waters, which shed their undying lustre over
the person of the Illuminate. Ascending still
towards the throne of Ra, at the nineteenth
portal he is clothed with robes of power ; and