olumn. Hence the picture of her weeping over
a broken column torn from the palace, while Horus, god of Time, stands
behind her pouring ambrosia on her hair. She took the body back to
Egypt, to the city of Bouto; but Typhon, hunting by moonlight, found
the chest, and having recognized the body of Osiris, mangled it and
scattered it beyond recognition. Isis, embodiment of the old
world-sorrow for the dead, continued her pathetic quest, gathering
piece by piece the body of her dismembered husband, and giving him
decent interment. Such was the life and death of Osiris, but as his
career pictured the cycle of nature, it could not of course end here.

Horus fought with Typhon, losing an eye in the battle, but finally
overthrew him and took him prisoner. There are several versions of his
fate, but he seems to have been tried, sentenced, and executed--"cut
in three pieces," as the Pyramid Texts relate. Thereupon the faithful
son went in solemn procession to the grave of his father, opened it,
and called upon Osiris to rise: "Stand up! Thou shalt not end, thou
shalt not perish!" But death was deaf. Here the Pyramid Texts recite
the mortuary ritual, with its hymns and chants; but in vain. At length
Osiris awakes, weary and feeble, and by the aid of the strong grip of
the lion-god he gains control of his body, and is lifted from death to
life.[41] Thereafter, by virtue of his victory over death, Osiris
becomes Lord of the Land of Death, his scepter an Ank Cross, his
throne a Square.

II

Such, in brief, was the ancient allegory of eternal life, upon which
there were many elaborations as the drama unfolded; but always, under
whatever variation of local color, of national accent or emphasis, its
central theme remained the same. Often perverted and abused, it was
everywhere a dramatic expression of the great human aspiration for
triumph over death and union with God, and the belief in the ultimate
victory of Good over Evil. Not otherwise would this drama have held
the hearts of men through long ages, and won the eulogiums of the most
enlightened men of antiquity--of Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato,
Euripides, Plutarch, Pindar, Isocrates, Epictetus, and Marcus
Aurelius. Writing to his wife after the loss of their little girl,
Plutarch commends to her the hope set forth in the mystic rites and
symbols of this drama, as, elsewhere, he testifies that it kept him
"as far from superstition as from atheism," and helped him to approach
the