[From a papyrus in the British Museum, No. 10,016.]] The =morality= of the Egyptians was of a high character, and certainly higher than that of Oriental nations in general. Many of the Precepts of Ptaḥ-ḥetep, Kaqemna, and Khensu-ḥetep bear comparison with the moral maxims of the Books of Proverbs and Ecclesiasticus. The view of the Egyptian as to his =duty towards his neighbour= is well summed up by Pepi-Nekht, an old feudal lord of Elephantine, who flourished under the VIth dynasty, and said: “I am one who spoke good and repeated what was liked. Never did I say an evil word of any kind to a chief against anyone, for I wished it to be well with me before the great god. I gave bread to the hungry man, and clothes to the naked man. I never gave judgment in a case between two brothers whereby a son was deprived of his father’s goods. I was loved by my father, favoured by my mother, and beloved by my brothers and sisters.” =Love of parents and home= was a strong trait in the character of the Egyptian; and it was one cause of his hatred of military service and of any occupation which would take him away from his town or village. He prayed, too, that in the Other World he might have his parents, wife, children, and relatives, with him on his farm in the Fields of Peace, and that when his spirit was on the way thither, the spirits of his kinsfolk would come to meet him, armed with their staves and weapons, so that they might protect him from the attack of hostile spirits. Like all African people he loved =music=, =singing=, and =dancing=, and was attracted by ceremonials, processions, and display of every kind; the =satirical papyri= (see the illustrations on pages 27-30), and even the wall-paintings in the tombs, show that he possessed a keen sense of =humour=. The peasant was then, as now, a laborious toiler, and as he was literally the slave of Pharaoh for thousands of years, the ideas of =freedom= and =national independence=, as we understand them, were wholly unknown to him.