animals. The Apis was called "the second life of Ptah," the god of Memphis. The sacred Ram of Mendes was called "the life of Rā." Three other sacred Rams are mentioned, "the soul of Osiris," "the soul of Shu," and "the soul of Chepra."[1] They were also conceived as united in one, who is represented with four heads, and bears the name of Shefthāt, Primeval Force. This name I believe to be comparatively modern, and to bear the impress of pantheistic speculation rather than of mythology; but the word Ba, which means a ram, also means soul; so that here again there is every probability that the god originated, like so many others, in homonymous metaphor. The encouragement given to his worship by the Ptolemies is circumstantially exhibited in the great tablet of Mendes, published by M. Mariette,[2] and translated by Brugsch-Bey.[3]
If Pantheism strongly contributed to the development of this animal worship and to all the superstition therewith connected, it also led to simple Materialism. The hymns at Dendera in honour of the goddess Hathor irresistibly remind one of the opening of the poem of
