terpretation, while by the light of the Egyptian theosophy and its symbolical language, he explains numerous difficult and hitherto meaningless passages of Scripture. His first proposition is, that the Hebrew "has a monosyllabic type, whose conformation reveals to us the whole secret of the intimate relation existing between it and the ancient Japhetic and Hametic idioms." In studying the hieroglyphs, he felt the inadequacy of the Coptic, and it struck him that, where it was insufficient to give the value of Egyptian words, he might seek it in the Semitic languages. This course he asserts he has followed with entire success, and it has led him to his present position. His labors are looked upon by the learned with various feelings. Some regard him with jealousy, some combat him with earnestness, most wait in anxious expectation for a further development of his doctrine, and a few are his ardent admirers and disciples. Certain it is, that no element has been added to oriental science since the days of Champollion so valuable as his, whether all his conclusions prove correct or not.

A notion of his peculiar views and method of procedure may be gained by following him for a few pages in the outset of this work. We give this analysis as a matter of scientific curiosity and novelty, leaving each of our readers to judge of its truth for himself. He commences with an examination of the instruments seen in the hands of Osiris and other deities, and which have been regarded as the pastoral crook or crozier, and flail or scourge, signifying the power to restrain and to impel. This interpretation Lanci will by no means accept. He regards the supposed scourge as an aspersoir or sprinkler, with which the "holy water" was sprinkled by the priest upon those who received his benediction. He insists upon this, because it is the starting point of his chain of deductions. His mind was first led to it by observing that, in the bas-relief of Carpentras, the priestess Tebba implores Osiris to bless her, and graciously water her with the liquor of divine expiation. He next discovered, upon an ancient sculpture, the figure of a priapic Amun, or Amun-generator, who carried the instrument in question, with the Phenician word chofekh, or, he who waters. He next turned his attention to certain passages of Scripture, which he believed to have the same bearing. The first was in the prophet Zachariah, who speaks of these Osirian emblems under the names of Noâm and Hobelim, or Power and Love, which our translators have curiously rendered Beauty and Bands. The first is evidently the pastoral crook, and the second is the plural of hob-el, or the divine love. The one symbolized royalty, and the other the priesthood. In like manner he translates Isaiah iii. 1, "the sceptre of bread and the sceptre of water." He finds another mention in the 33d Psalm, where he translates mishenet by "mercy of the most resplendent." The word ezob, translated hyssop, in the 51st Psalm, he derives from the same root as the Coptic soph, to flow, and considers it "an utensil for watering." He recognises the same emblem in the tau of the book of Job, because that letter of the primitive Phenician alphabet has precisely the form of the Osirian sprinkler, and he has shown in his "Sagra Scrittura" that this was the early alphabet of the Israelites also. He regards the tau as the sign of safety placed by Moses on the door-posts of the children of Israel. In conclusion, he ha

found upon a mummy-case a figure of this instrument, and written over it its name in hieratic characters, nedjoh, a word very similar to nodjekh, known to signify sprinkler, and synonymous with the Phenician name already given. He also proves that the priapic Amun-generator, bearing this emblem, and who is commonly called Amun-Khem, is properly Amun-Hat-En-Nouf, or Amun who scutters the seed, the meaning of which is obvious. The other emblem all admit to be the shepherd's crook. Lanci concludes that it was called hon, commandment. It was the symbol of the divine power as the other was of the divine love.

He next considers the symbolical hatchet, which always signifies the divine nature. He has found in two instances this emblem accompanied by its name in hieratic characters. It is apht, a word not found in the Coptic. Lanci finds frequently in the Bible the word aph, always signifying divine wrath; and in Arabic he discovers the root apht, giving the value of reprobation. He who bore the hatchet was, therefore, a reprover; and we accordingly find it in the hands of those who punish the damned. Its use was analogous to that of the crook. There are therefore essentially two divine emblems, signifying power and love, a consideration of the first letters of whose names leads to important results. By taking their material form they give aleph-tau; or by taking their proper names, they give an aspirated aleph and a nun. In this way are obtained the two most ancient of divine names, At and On.

This leads our author at once to a consideration of the sacred tetragrammaton, or four-lettered word of the Egyptians, which he believes to be included in AT, because it expresses the principles of creation and destruction, of life and death. The declaration in the Revelations, he reads, not "Alpha and Omega,”—but, following the Hebrew alphabet: I am aleph-tau; or rather, I am AT. The Egyptian tetragrammaton was Rêfo, corresponding closely with that of the Hebrews, which Lanci prefers to write Jeoa. To prove his position, he goes back to the Kioun (Chiun) of Amos v. 26, which in the Greek text of the Septuagint and the Acts of the Apostles is given as Renfan, which is the Egyptian Rêfo or Rêpô. On the tablet in the British Museum he finds the word Kioun to designate the female standing on the lioness, and Renpo as the name of the phallic god opposite her. Obscene as the representation may appear to our view, it was to the ancients a harmless and instructive allegory of the divine principles of creation and destruction. But this name does not give us exactly the tetragrammaton, which is undoubtedly REPO. The n is introduced here to show that in this particular representation Ré is the male principle of the female Po, and that therefore he belongs to the severe side of the dualism. Lanci believes that there will yet be discovered the Po of Re, or the female of the beneficent side, together with variations of the phonetic group Repo and Poré, showing that the tetragrammaton may be written either from right to left, or from left to right. The wife of Renpo (the Renfan of the Septuagint) is represented on the lower pannel of the same tablet, armed, and inflicting chastisement on the guilty; and the hieroglyphic record gives her name when regarded in her judicial capacity. It is Anta, or rather Anata,which, with the feminine article T, yields us the goddess Tanata, the thanatos, or death of the Greeks.

In the fifteenth section he comes to the consideration of the Hebrew tetragrammaton, as illustrated by the Egyptian. This is preceded by remarks on some points of priapic worship, for which, together with a most curious explanation of the Bible appellations of Adam and Eve, we must refer the reader to the original. The Egyptian tetragrammaton is Re-po, the male and female principles; and, in like manner, the Hebrew contains simply the personal pronouns, he-she. The word is Jeoa, or Ihoh, and consists of two vowels, each followed by the same consonant or aspirate, which may be represented by our H. When the reading of this word is reversed, it may be given in our letters as HO-HI. The "secret of the name" probably lay in its being read from left to right, contrary to the usual method of Hebrew writing, as well as in the androgynous nature indicated by it. One knows not what to make of the business recorded in Exodus xxxiii. 19-23, and xxxiv. 1-7, as it stands in our translation. It is merely hinted at in the letter to Prisse, so that in order to comprehend fully Lanci's view of it, it becomes necessary to go back to the Paralipomeni. He there labors to prove, from a study of Arabic, and other Semitic roots, that the word IHOH contains the expression of HE-SHE, or the male and female natures included in one being. The first part, HO, is masculine, and the second, HI, is feminine. The feminine idea is associated with sweetness, gentleness, love, peace and life, while the masculine implies strength, severity, desolation and death. The word Jah, which is HI, is used in connection with mercy, peace, forgiveness, &c. See Ps. cxxx. 3, where the first name is Jah, and the second Adonai: "If Jah shall pay attention to sins, O Adonai, who shall stand?"—i. e. if the merciful HI should take offence. If the HI or Jah is abstracted from the tetragrammaton, there remains only HO, the avenging or terrible half. For this HO, see Zach. v. 3. Lanci considers the "flying roll" to be properly a whirling disk," a form of the winged globe, and analogous to, if not identical with, the cherubim. He then reads: "Verily, every thief by this (the disk), as by OH, shall be destroyed." The avenging right hand, or simply "right," of Jehovah perhaps refers to the OH, or right half of the word. In Ps. cl. 1, he reads, "HalleluIH, Hallelu-EL." Praise Jah, praise El, the merciful and the strong, El being frequently the equivalent and substitute of Oh or Ho. There is reason to suppose, that the meaning of the tetragammaton was occult, while the world itself was common. Ps. cxxxix. 4-6, probably refers to this. Ps. cxi. 1, says: "I will celebrate IHOH with all heart, in the secret of the righteous and in the congregation:"-that is, among the initiated, and also in public, or esoterically and exoterically. The original worship of the East was solar and generally phallic, the generative and vivifying power of the sun being symbolized under the masculine and feminine forms of the phallus and yoni. To a purer faith the sun became the symbol of the abstract and immaterial divinity, whose self-generating and plastic power would be expressed by the same emblems and modes of speech. But the ignorant and rude would either abuse this knowledge, or run into mere idolatrous dualism. Hence the dual HO-HI is proclaimed to the people as the ineffable unit IHOH or Jeoa. "Hear, O Israel! IHOH, our El-hi, IHOH is one."

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The learned Cahen says, that the Rabbis considered this verse the

most sacred of the whole Bible,-because, perhaps, it contains the "secret of the name." The prohibition of "taking the Lord's name in vain," Lanci thinks may refer to the same. The commandment itself would have an exoteric and esoteric sense. To the people it would appear a prohibition of the unnecessary or profane use of IĤOH, while by the adepts it would be recognised as forbidding the enunciation of the name as HOHI. Exodus, chap. xxxiii., now comes in to receive and give light on this most abstruse topic. According to Lanci, the eighteenth and nineteenth verses should read thus:-" And he said, Cause me then to see the direction of thy way. Said Jao: I marking, in thy presence, the name IHOH, will declare to thee all my inversion: moreover, I will abhor whomsoever I abhor, and succor whomsoever I succor." Here is a declaration of the facts of inversion, and the duplicate or masculo-feminine nature. Again, (21st,) "And continued Jao; Behold, I have already wherewith to write, and thou shalt stand opposite to the stone. (22d,) And when I shall be about to show thee the straightness of my way, and will cause thee to be present at the engraving of the stone, I will hide from thee my contrary-going until I shall have pronounced the declaration. (23d,) After which, manifesting to thee my contrary movement, thou shalt affix thine eyes to my end: thus, my faces shall not have appeared." And again, chap. xxxiv. 5-7, "And Jao descended in the cloud and stood there with him and signed the name IHOH. And Jao made the declaration upon its two faces, and said, IHOH is HOHI, that is, the principle which succors and abhors, constant in the two breathings, and great in mercy and in firmness: that maintains mercy for thousands of generations, &c." The two breathings are the two principles, good and evil, or rather life-giving and destroying. Moses was merely taught to read the sacred tetragrammaton from left to right, as HO-HI, the androgynous dual, and also the great ultimate unity. Following up these inquiries in the present work, Lanci next investigates the form of the square Hebrew letter, in which we have the word written. Placing the two halves in opposition, so that one reads from left to right, and the other from right to left, it brings the vowels in the middle, and the aspirates outside. The aspirate is readily decomposed into the sacred apht or hatchet, with the unit mark, signifying unity or principle. This sign, therefore, reads "divine principle." The form of the vowel letters he shows to be admirably adapted to express the relations already mentioned, and therefore, the whole word, by its very shape, gives us the expression of the two divine principles in one. Lanci believes the same to be the meaning of the ansate cross, so common in the hieroglyphics, and about which so much has been said. This view will satisfactorily explain its frequent occurrence and its mythological importance. He refers the celebrated Jachin and Boaz to the same origin, translating it Ikin with Oz, symbolizing the union of the two principles. The connection of these emblems with astronomical science, and their place in the various ancient zodiacal systems, also present a field of inquiry scarcely touched in this volume, but which he has elsewhere treated largely.

We have thus given a concise and necessarily imperfect sketch of his method of treating one topic, as a specimen of his general style of

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reasoning. Many other subjects of great importance are discussed. The bearing of some of them upon archæological and scriptural studies is not apparent. He frequently introduces his peculiar interpretation of Bible names in a startling form. Indeed he finds the tetragrammaton covered up everywhere. Thus, in investigating the value of the eye as a sacred symbol, he falls upon the Hebrew word chemes, the primary signification of which he holds to be eyes. He finds the root in Coptic, soms, signifying to see. This leads him to the conclusion that Samson is Soms-on, the sun or eye of day, while Dalila is evidently the mistress of the night, the moon or nocturnal eye. The two, by their sexual and astronomical relation, give us another expression of the grand idea of the four-lettered name.

All these deductions Lanci gives as a matter of pure science. They seem true to him, and that is enough. He does not trouble himself about any ulterior considerations. He remains faithful to the church of which he is a member. He cannot see that Christianity, even in its more orthodox forms, has any thing to fear from his investigations. He sometimes speaks of the mystic science he is endeavoring to explain, as the remnants of an antediluvian system. In the present work he asserts distinctly that the Egyptian priesthood borrowed the idea of the tetragrammaton from Moses. He speaks of the Bible in terms of the highest respect, as the only source of true light amidst general darkness. He evidently has no doubt of its authenticity and antiquity, nor does he hesitate to believe that the Pentateuch was written by Moses. If his opinions are correct, the Bible is the original and most ancient record of a system of dualism, illustrated by a comparison to the sexual relation, and hidden under a Kabbalistic veil. He finds this fully expressed in the prophecy of Ezekiel and the Apocalypse, the two books of greatest Kabbalistic value.

As to the truth or falsity of this view, we have no opinion to express. We merely give it for what it is worth, and as indicating the course which Biblical exegesis will soon have to take. It is too important and apparently too well fortified by facts to be overlooked. It must be either accepted or disproved. It is not to be forgotten, however, that he takes for granted certain positions which are strongly contested by modern scholars. He assumes the antiquity of the Zodiac, which Letronne has quite conclusively shown to be of comparatively modern date. The oldest, which is the famous Zodiac of Dendera, cannot be referred to a period long antecedent to the commencement of our era. He also holds to the antiquity of the square letter of the Hebrews, which, it has been shown, did not exist in the time of the Maccabees, and which some believe to have been introduced at the period of the publication of the Jerusalem Talmud, at least two centuries after Christ. He leaves out of the discussion the important element introduced by the German critical school, whose conclusions militate with his opinion as to the antiquity of the books of the Old Testament. The truth of these conflicting sentiments do not affect the philological facts he brings forward, although they do certainly invalidate the general conclusions implied in his remarks. He undoubtedly proves that much of the Old Testament has an astronomical and zodiacal significa