[The advice given by Amenemhat I., the founder of the XIIth Dynasty, to his son and successor Usertesen I. (about B.C. 2500), is a short composition that was much in vogue during the New Kingdom as an exercise for schoolboys. Six copies of portions or of the whole have survived to our day; but with one exception all are very corrupt, and the text is extremely difficult to translate. Our oldest copies appear to date from the middle of the XIXth Dynasty (about B.C. 1300). But the composition itself must be older than this; indeed, it may be a true record of the great King's charge to his son. The following seems to be the purpose and argument of the work. Amenemhat, who has already virtually associated Usertesen with himself in the kingdom, determines in consequence of a plot against his life to insure his son's succession by announcing it in a formal manner. He has labored strenuously and successfully for his own glory and for the good of his people, but in return he is scarcely saved from ignominious dethronement or assassination through a conspiracy formed in his own household. The moral to be drawn from this is pointed out to his son with considerable bitterness and scorn in the 'Teaching,' in which, however, Usertesen is promised a brilliant reign if he will attend to his father's instructions. It is perhaps worth while noticing that there is no expression of piety or reference to the worship of divinities either in the precepts themselves or in the narrative. The personified Nile is spoken of in a manner that would be likely to offend its worshipers; but in the last section, the interpretation of which is extremely doubtful, Amenemhat seems to acquiesce in the orthodox views concerning the god Ra. Usertesen's reign dates from Amenemhat's XXth year, and that his association was then no secret but already formally acknowledged, is amply proved. The King seems to feel already the approach of old age and death, and though he lived on to assist his son with his counsel for no less than ten years, it was apparently in retirement from public life.[244] The work has been considered as a posthumous charge to Usertesen, but although certain expressions seem to support this view, on the whole I think its correctness improbable. In several copies the text is divided by rubrics into fifteen paragraphs, and the phrases are punctuated by dots placed above the lines. In the following rendering the paragraphs are preserved, and summarized where they are too difficult to translate. The incompleteness of the best text leaves the last two paragraphs in almost hopeless confusion.] 1. [Title and introduction.]