, and to live with him
ever after. Some souls preferred to remain at Abydos and to live with
Osiris, and those who were found righteous in the Judgment were allowed
to do so, and were granted estates in perpetuity in the kingdom of this
god. The Book "AM TUAT" describes the sections of the Tuat and their
inhabitants, and supplies all the information which the soul was
supposed to require in passing from this world to the next. Many copies
of certain sections of it are known, and some of these are in the
British Museum;[1] the most complete copy of it is in the tomb of Seti I
at Thebes.

[Footnote 1: See the massive stone sarcophagi of Nectonebus exhibited in
the Southern Egyptian Gallery of the British Museum.]

III. The BOOK OF GATES.--This book was also written to be a Guide to the
Tuat, and has much in common with the Book of the Two Ways and with the
Book Am Tuat. In it also the Tuat is divided into ten sections and has
two vestibules, the Eastern and the Western, but at the entrance to each
section is a strongly fortified Gate, guarded by a monster serpent-god
and by the gods of the section. The Sun-god of night, as in the Book Am
Tuat, makes his journey in a boat, and is attended by a number of gods,
who remove all opposition from his path by the use of words of power. As
he approaches each Gate, its doors are thrown open by the gods who guard
them, and he passes into the section of the Tuat behind it, carrying
with him light, air, and food for its inhabitants. The Book of Gates
embodies the teaching of the priests of the cult of Osiris, and the Book
Am Tuat represents the modified form of it that was promulgated by the
priests of Amen. From the Book of Gates we derive much information about
the realm of Osiris, and the Great Judgment of souls, which took place
in his Hall of Judgment once a day at midnight. Then all the souls that
had collected during the past twenty-four hours from all parts of Egypt
were weighed in the Balance; the righteous were allotted estates in
perpetuity in the "land of souls," and the wicked were destroyed by
Shesmu, the executioner of the god, and by his assistants. The texts
that describe the various "Gates" of the Book of Gates, explain who are
the beings represented in the pictures, and state why they were there.
And the Book proves conclusively that the Egyptians believed in the
efficacy of sacrifices and offerings, and in the doctrine of righteous
retribution; liars and deceivers