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

iv.] The Years of the Most High. 111

around it, and span the gulfs of time with the
years of the Most High.

Such a system of harmonious periods and
of measured intervals, corresponding to uni-
versal, not arbitrary, standards, was a natural,
and indeed an essential, element in the
theosophy of a priesthood whose religious
teaching was intentionally veiled under the
analogies of astronomy. In examining there-
fore the astronomical science of the " Mystery-
Teachers of the Heavens," * to use the official
title employed in the Court of Pharaoh, we
may not unreasonably expect to trace the
origin and signification of various familiar
measures, of which the use is widely diffused,
but the fundamental conception unknown.
Nor shall we be altogether disappointed in

* For most of the facts here stated with regard to
Egyptian astronomy I am indebted to the invaluable
researches of the late lamented Dr. Brugsch upon the
kaleudar, as I am also to his history for quotations
from the papyri, ami allusions to the customs of the
country.