Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. I — G. R. S. Mead (1906)

5. And if he [Osiris] is really Reason (Logos), I think that the object of our enquiry is found in the case of these [animals] that are admitted to have common honours with him, — as, for instance, the ibis, and hawk, and dog-headed ape; [while] Apis himself [is his

1 (V fl\(i6vlas ir6\(t.

2 Over the fields ?

soul . . .j,1 for thus, you know, they call the goat at Mendes.

LXXIV. 1. There remain of course the utilitarian and symbolical [reasons], of which some have to do with one of the two [Gods], but most [of them] with both.

2. As for the ox and sheep and ichneumon,2 it is clear they paid them honours on account of their usefulness and utility, — just as Lemnians crested larks which seek out and break the eggs of locusts, and Thessalians storks, because when their land produced multitudes of snakes, they came and destroyed them all — (wherefore they made a law that whoever killed a stork should be banished3) — so with the asp and weasel and scarab, because they discerned in them certain faint likenesses of the power of the Gods, as it were [that] of the sun in water-drops.

3. For as to the weasel, many still think and say that as it is impregnated through the ear and brings forth by the mouth, it is a likeness of the birth of reason (logos).*

4. Again [they say] the species of scarab has no female, but all, as males, discharge their seed into the stuff they have made into balls,6 which they roll along by pushing, moving [themselves] in the opposite direction, just as the sun seems to turn the heaven round in the opposite direction, while it is [the heaven] itself that moves from west to east.6

1 A lacuna occurs here which I have partially filled up, conjecturally, as above.

2 An Egyptian animal of the weasel kind which was said to hunt out crocodiles' eggs ; also called " Pharaoh's rat."

3 Cf. Arist., Mirab., xxiii.

* Cf. xxii. 1 — " Physiologus " again. For a criticism of this legend, see R. 43. " 6 Cf. x. 9.

6 Budge (op. at., ii. 379 f .) writes : " The beetle or scarabaeus . . . belongs to the family called Scarabacidae (Coprophagi), of which

5. And the asp, because it does not age, and moves without limbs with ease and pliancy, they likened to a star.

LXXV. 1. Nay, not even has the crocodile had honour paid it without some show of credible cause, for it alone is tongue-less.1

For the Divine Keason (Logos) stands not in need of voice, and :

" Moving on a soundless path with justice guides [all] mortal things." 2

2. And they say that it alone, when it is in the water, has its eyes covered by a smooth and transparent membrane that comes down from the upper lid,3 so that they see without being seen, — an attribute of the First God.4

3. And whenever the female lays her eggs on the land, it is known that this will be the limit of the Nile's the Scarabseus sacer is the type. ... A remarkable peculiarity exists in the structure and situation of the hind legs, which are placed so near the extremity of the body, and so far from each other as to give the insect a most extraordinary appearance when walking. This peculiar formation is, nevertheless, particularly serviceable to its possessors in rolling the balls of excrementitious matter in which they enclose their eggs. . . . These balls are at first irregular and soft, but, by degrees, and during the process of rolling along, become rounder and harder ; they are propelled by means of the hind legs. Sometimes these balls are an inch and a half, or two inches in diameter, and in rolling this along the beetles stand almost upon their heads, with the heads turned from the balls." The scarabseus was called kheprera in Egyptian, and was the symbol of Kheperd the Great God of creation and resurrection ; he was the " father of the gods," and the creator of all things in heaven and earth, self -begotten and self-born ; he was usually identified with the rising sun and new-birth generally.

1 " Physiologus " again, doubtless ; it might, however, be said that its tongue is rudimentary.

2 Euripides, Tro., 887.

3 Lit., "brow."

4 That is, the First-born Reason.