SIDE VIEW OF THE GREAT SPHINX.

 

 

THE mutilated state of this enormous figure is, perhaps, more strikingly observed in profile than in front. Here, too, as only one of the Pyramids, that of Cheops, is seen in the back-ground, more undisturbed possession of its solitude is left to the Great Sphinx,  the most extraordinary of the productions of man in this land of his wonders. After drawing and studying it, Mr. Roberts said that he had more powerful emotions excited by it than by the Pyramids. Wathen says, that, on emerging from the gloomy interior of the Third Pyramid, instead of the blaze of Egyptian day which he had left when he entered it, he found a cool and delicious moonlight evening; and walking towards the tent where he was to take up his abode for the night, he discovered hard by a large black object, standing out in strong relief, apparently a circular temple of moderate dimensions. This temple proved to be the enormous head of the celebrated Sphinx.

    Many conjectures have been offered upon the origin of this monster: the zodiacal signs of Leo and Virgo blended have been vaguely supposed to relate to something astronomical, to which most Egyptian mysteries are referred, but this explains nothing; others represent it as an union of the intellectual and physical forces, but enough remains to us of the wisdom of the Egyptians to prove that they knew that knowledge alone was power. That the Sphinx was worshipped, there is no doubt; an altar was found before the Temple, erected between its paws.