represent the night-sky. The rest of the decoration is very simple. In the
pyramid of Ûnas, which is the most ornamented, the decoration occupies only
the end wall of the sepulchral chamber; the part against the sarcophagus
was lined with alabaster, and engraved to represent great monumental doors,
through which the deceased was supposed to enter his storerooms of
provisions. The figures of men and of animals, the scenes of daily life,
the details of the sacrifice, are not here represented, and, moreover,
would not be in keeping; they belong to those places where the Double lived
his public life, and where visitors actually performed the rites of
offering; the passages and the vault in which the soul alone was free to
wander needed no ornamentation except that which related to the life of the
soul. The texts are of two kinds. One kind--of which there are the fewest--
refer to the nourishment of the Double, and are literal transcriptions of
the formulae by which the priests ensured the transmission of each object
to the other world; this was a last resource for him, in case the real
sacrifices should be discontinued, or the magic scenes upon the chapel
walls be destroyed. The greater part of the inscriptions were of a
different kind. They referred to the soul, and were intended to preserve it
from the dangers which awaited it, in heaven and on earth. They revealed to
it the sovereign incantations which protected it against the bites of
serpents and venomous animals, the passwords which enabled it to enter into
the company of the good gods, and the exorcisms which counteracted the
influence of the evil gods. The destiny of the Double was to continue to
lead the shadow of its terrestrial life, and fulfil it in the chapel; the
destiny of the Soul was to follow the sun across the sky, and it,
therefore, needed the instructions which it read on the walls of the vault.
It was by their virtue that the absorption of the dead into Osiris became
complete, and that they enjoyed hereafter all the immunity of the divine
state. Above, in the chapel, they were men, and acted as men; here they
were gods, and acted as gods.