The Most Secret Secrets

Hieroglyphics, Book 1.

...barbarian writers call these things the necessities of life.

Book 1, chapter 2. The First Gods.

The same author Diodorus Siculus, the Greek historian mentioned on the previous page., in the very next chapter, relates that the Sun and Moon were worshipped as eternal Gods by the first men, and that the former was called Osiris while the latter was called Isis, for specific linguistic reasons. However, just as we have accepted from the Holy Bible—as an indubitable truth—who the one and true God of Gods is, and when and where the first men and kings of the world appeared; so too do we recognize the vanity of the Egyptians in this matter, as well as in their claims of antiquity and a numbered series of kings continuing for more than twenty thousand years. Since they say elsewhere that Isis and Osiris were born of Saturn Maier points out a logical contradiction: the Egyptians claim these gods are "eternal," yet also give them a father (Saturn/Kronos), implying a beginning., it is a wonder why they consider them the first eternal and unbegotten gods, or celestial lights. We can, however, excuse the Pagan writers if they handed down things differently than they truly are, both because their true nature could not be known due to their extreme antiquity (since the sacred history of Moses was unknown to them), and because the accepted religion of the Gods at that time did not allow them to think otherwise.

The proposition and summary of the entire treatise.

As for us, to establish the foundation of Egyptian doctrine, we have determined through innumerable signs that a certain science existed in Egypt that teaches the most secret works of nature. This was the GOLDEN MEDICINE—not made from gold, but a thousand times more precious than gold—which was in use especially among the most ancient Philosophers, Priests, and Kings. In order that this science might be passed down to wiser posterity while remaining unknown to the common crowd, they commonly employed hidden marks taken from animals (later called Hieroglyphics From the Greek hieros (sacred) and glypho (to carve). by the Greeks) for their writing. For the explanation of these things, they frequently used Allegories drawn from fictional persons and their deeds. Hence, in succeeding times, as the minds of ignorant men became preoccupied with superstition, those fictional persons were regarded as Gods or kings, and the animals were worshipped as sacred and inviolable; one finds that eternal monuments were established for each of them.

In order to investigate these matters in a certain order, we shall treat first of the Gods; next of the Egyptian Kings; thirdly of the Animals and their sacred characters; and finally of the monuments, signs, and traces that confirm this art in E-