In the year A.D. 1064 there was another seven years’ famine in Egypt, but the land was governed by a people ignorant of what the Pyramids were, and how their contents had once saved the world from a cruel death. The following account shows the consequences of their ignorance:—

“Egypt.[[86]] For seven successive years the overflow of the Nile failed, and with it almost the entire subsistence of the country; while the rebels interrupted supplies of grain from the north. Two provinces were entirely depopulated; in another half the inhabitants perished; while in Cairo city (El-Káhireh) the people were reduced to the direst straits. Bread was sold for 14 dirhems to the loaf; and all provisions being exhausted, the worst horrors of famine followed. The wretched resorted to cannibalism, and organised bands kidnapped the unwary passenger in the desolate streets, principally by means of ropes furnished with hooks and let down from the latticed windows.

“In the year 1072 the famine reached its height. It was followed by a pestilence, and this again was succeeded by an invading army.”

And again in “1877, short rainfall and low Nile; great scarcity.”

These calamities have occurred hitherto, and so long as the world exists they will occur again. It therefore behoves all monarchs and governors to adopt measures similar to those employed by Joseph, the first Viceroy of Egypt; that, wherever and whenever the enemy may appear, every nation may be found so well provided against it as to escape its dire consequences.

CHAPTER XII.
APOTHEOSIS OF MOSES.

During the period when the Shepherd Kings ruled the land of Egypt famine was not allowed to depopulate the world. After these Kings came their descendant Moses, the mortal to whom the Almighty spoke from the top of Mount Sinai, in the presence of a multitude of witnesses, and gave laws by which man must defend himself from an enemy more cruel than famine; for those who die from famine may still rise to enjoy life eternal, whereas death brought into the world by sin, through the instigation of Satan, is death eternal, from which there is no resurrection.

This inspired Moses taught the Israelites how to serve God, the only way by which they can secure themselves from eternal death. And when he considered them capable of continuing in the way he set them, he went to other nations, and everywhere instructed the people, that they might live for ever.

One of the moral precepts he taught in the Far East, in Hindustan, is still revered by the Hindoos to this day. In that country he assumed the name of Manu, so that the children of Israel who were in Palestine might not recognise him and claim him as their sovereign. The precept is this:—

Daily[[87]] perform thine own appointed work