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116 MYTHOLOGY second half of the day he sees the sun gradu- ally sink and disappear, and feels the pleasant warmth depart. His own body loses strength, and sleep overpowers him. At his waking he sees the light gradually return, the sun rise, the plants revive, and the animals come forth from their retreats. He perceives his powerlessness in these ever-recurring scenes, and he conceives a fear for the invisible forces which every day rob him of light, warmth, and life. Summer is followed by winter, and darkness and cold seem to gain daily in strength. Then comes spring ; the powers of light and warmth regain the ascendant, and everything is rejuvenated and renewed. In tropical climes this change of season is ushered in by dreadful thunder storms and great floods of rain. Primitive races, the children of humanity, do not know what causes the warring of the elements. To explain it, they have to draw upon their ima- gination, and to believe what their fancy can supply. They consider themselves to be the centre of a great contest between beings who hate or love them, persecute or shield them. They give to these beings forms with which they are acquainted, and conceive them either as men or as animals. The earth is peopled from above, and hence there are in the heavens beings like those here below. As the chief interest of the transmundane powers rests in man, the good and evil spirits are often in the midst of human habitations. They are difficult to distinguish from ordinary men and animals, but as they must be adored or propitiated, it is to be presumed that they bear some distinc- tive sign by which man may recognize them. Though it is possible thus plausibly to elaborate theories of the origin of myths, the earliest records of ancient peoples exhibit mythological conceptions far beyond these primitive ideas. Even Egyptian inscriptions, of which some are perhaps from 5,000 to V,000 years old, bear witness to the existence of an already highly developed mythological system, unfolded by some sacerdotal class. The inhabitants of Low- er Egypt differed in religious ideas and prac^ tices from those of the upper Nile. At Mem- phis Ptah was the object of the highest adora- tion. He is the father of the god of the sun, and presumably the ruler of the region of light and the god of fire. He is symbolized by the scarabcBus sacer, an insect believed to propagate without bearing. Ra was the supreme divinity at On or Heliopolis, near Memphis. Manetho names him second to Ptah. The solar disk supported by two rings is his symbol, and the male cat, the light-colored bull, and the hawk are sacred to him. He is the god of the sun, rejuvenating every morning and creating all that exists below the heavens. Eight children of Ptah were worshipped at Ashmunein or Hermopolis. They are the gods of the ele- ments, on whom the various forms of created beings depend. Female deities were wor- shipped at Sais, Buto, and Bubastis. Neith, adored at Sais, is the cow which bore the sun, the mother of the gods, who represents the creative power of nature. The goddess of Buto the Greeks compared to their own Leto, the parent of Apollo, the solar deity. Bast or Pasht, the Greek Artemis, had her temple at Bubastis. She is represented either with a solar disk on her head, or as having the head of a cat, the animal sacred to her, and the fes- tivities connected with her worship resembled those of Venus in Greece and Rome. In Up- per Egypt Amun, the Greek Ammon, or "the hidden," is the creating, sovereign god, rep- resented by Ptah at Memphis. He is a phallic god, sitting upon a throne, and having upon his head the two plumes, symbolizing dominion over the upper and the lower country. The goddess Maut or Mut, who bears the crown of Upper Egypt, is the mother and mistress of darkness. Shu, Sos, or Sosis, the son of Amun and Maut, was worshipped principally at This or Thinis and Abydos, as the spirit of the air and the bearer of the heavens. Turn or Atmu represents the sun in his nocturnal course, and Mentu or Mandu the setting sun. Turn, in some respects the equal of Amun and Ptah, generated himself, and is the father of the gods. Khem, whom the Greeks likened to Pan, is a phallic god. Khnum, Num, Kim- phis, or Kneph regulates the overflowing of the Nile. The goddess Hathor received ado- ration both in Upper and Lower Egypt, espe- cially at Aphroditopolis, near Memphis, and at Edfoo and Denderah. To her are consecrated mirth, orgies, and the dance. She is generally represented as holdiug a tambourine in her hand, but sometimes merely as a cow. The mythological conceptions in regard to Isis, Osiris, and Horus have been given at length in separate articles. Seb and Nut, the Greek Cronos and Rhea, are the spirits of the earth and the firmament. Typhon, says Plutarch, was called Set by the Egyptians ; the ass was sacred to him, and his symbol is an unknown, strange-looking animal. It is remarkable that even in their higher civilization the Egyptians continued to look upon animals as incarnations or representatives of their gods. The bull rep- resented the gods who created life ; the cow, the goddesses of conception and birth; the hawk and the cat, gods of light or of the sun ; the scarabaeus, Ptah; the vulture, Nut and Isis ; a sort of ibis, Thoth ; and the crocodile, Seb. The priest recognized the incarnated gods among these animals by various signs, and introduced them into the temples. The holiest of the chosen animals was the bull in the temple of Ptah at Memphis. He was the famous Apis, born of a cow which conceived him by a spark from heaven, or by a moon- beam. (See APIS.) The ardea purpurea, a species of heron with two long plumes on its head, generally appears at the time of the overflow of the Nile, which is the fertile sea- son in Egypt; and hence also these birds, called bennu by the Egyptians, were regarded as manifestations of the god of life. With this