ΝΕΚΡΟΚΗΔΕΙΑ; Or, the Art of Embalming;: Wherein Is Shewn the Right of Burial, and Funeral Ceremonies, Especially That of Preserving Bodies After the Egyptian Method. Together With an Account of the Egyptian Mummies, Pyramids, Subterranean Vaults and Lamps, and Their Opinion of the Metempsychosis, the Cause of Their Embalming. As Also a Geographical Description of Egypt, the Rise and Course of the Nile, the Temper, Constitution and Physic of the Inhabitants, Their Inventions, Arts, Sciences, Stup — John Shaqi
ΝΕΚΡΟΚΗΔΕΙΑ; Or, the Art of Embalming;: Wherein Is Shewn the Right of Burial, and Funeral Ceremonies, Especially That of Preserving Bodies After the Egyptian Method. Together With an Account of the Egyptian Mummies, Pyramids, Subterranean Vaults and Lamps, and Their Opinion of the Metempsychosis, the Cause of Their Embalming. As Also a Geographical Description of Egypt, the Rise and Course of the Nile, the Temper, Constitution and Physic of the Inhabitants, Their Inventions, Arts, Sciences, StupGreenhill, Thomas
Philosophy
ΝΕΚΡΟΚΗΔΕΙΑ; Or, the Art of Embalming;: Wherein Is Shewn the Right of Burial, and Funeral Ceremonies, Especially That of Preserving Bodies After the Egyptian Method. Together With an Account of the Egyptian Mummies, Pyramids, Subterranean Vaults and Lamps, and Their Opinion of the Metempsychosis, the Cause of Their Embalming. As Also a Geographical Description of Egypt, the Rise and Course of the Nile, the Temper, Constitution and Physic of the Inhabitants, Their Inventions, Arts, Sciences, Stup
Greenhill, Thomas
Burial -- Early works to 1800; Embalming -- Early works to 1800; Funeral rites and ceremonies -- Early works to 1800; Mummies -- Early works to 1800
A Corps lying unbury’d and Putrifying, is not only a dismal Aspect to
our Eyes, offensive to our Nose, and ungrateful to all our External
Senses, but even horrid in our very private Apprehensions and secret
Conceptions; nay to hear it but only nam’d, is so very unnatural and
unpleasant to us, that we care not to entertain the least Thought of
Death, even to the deferr’d Time of our Expiration. What presence of
Mind can enable a Fellow-Creature to behold such a miserable Object as
this, express’d by its dismal Aspect, deform’d Proportion, fœtid Smell,
putrid Carcass, and the like, and this perhaps of one who was but just
now your Bosom-Friend or the World’s Favorite, a Prince worthy of
Immortality for his Wisdom, Piety, Valour, Conduct, _&c._ and justly
admir’d for the Beauty of his Person, Gracefulness of his Mien, and
Conformity of all the External Parts of his Body, as well as Internal
Qualifications of his Mind? Certainly common Humanity and
Self-Preservation would alone persuade us to Inter him out of our Sight,
or else preserve him from a State of Corruption and Deformity by
_Embalming_.
[Sidenote: By both to prevent infection, _&c._]
I have before observ’d how Beasts receiv’d the Infection of the Murrain
from a Putrefaction of their own Bodies; now I will shew you how they
likewise, by Natural Instinct, avoid each other in such like Calamities:
The Sound shun the Company of the Infected, and they reciprocally
separate from the rest to Mourn by themselves. A wounded Bird leaves the
Flight: A Stag (when Shot) forsakes the Herd and flies to the Desarts:
And every Diseas’d Creature retires into some solitary Place, where its
last Care seems to be, that of providing for its Burial. [Sidenote:
Every Creature takes care of its own _Burial_.] Reptiles creep into
Holes, and Birds into their Nests, or the Bottoms of thick Hedges:
Rabbets die in their Burrows: Foxes, Badgers and Wolves, _&c._ in their
Dens, after which nothing will Inhabit there. So that they seem to know
they shall lie undisturb’d in those Dormitories, which they took care in
their Lives Time to provide and dig in order to their Interment; like as
some Hermits, who, during their Lives, made their Cave their Habitation,
but when Dead their Tomb.
The larger sort of Domestic and Tame Creatures seem likewise to
endeavour this, as much as they can, as may be observ’d from Horses,
Oxen, Sheep, _&c._ who when they decline and draw near their Deaths,
seek either the thickest part of a Wood, a Dell or Gravel-Pit in a
Common, or deep Ditch in a Field, where they may lay themselves down, as
in a Grave, and die: They seem to desire nothing more of their Master,
whom they have all their Lives faithfully serv’d, than to cover their
Bodies with the Earth.
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