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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

contemptible a Thing it is to be cast out unbury’d, and to be trodden
under Foot, to lye expos’d to the Air and Weather, to rot and stink or
become Food to Birds, Beasts and Reptiles. _Jeremiah_ foretelling the
Desolation of the _Jews_, acquaints them, _Chap._ 19. 7. _Thus says the
Lord of Hosts, I will cause them to fall by the Sword before their
Enemies, and their Carcasses will I give to be Meat to the Fowls of the
Heavens, and to the Beasts of the Field, and none shall fright them
away_, Chap. 7. 33. _Deut._ 28. 26. Also speaking of their Kings,
Princes, Priests and Prophets, he tells them that _Their Bones shall be
spread before the Sun and Moon_, &c. _they shall not be bury’d, but be
for Dung upon the face of the Earth_, Jer. 8. 2. In other places of his
Prophesie he tells them, They shall die of grievous Deaths and Diseases,
they shall be neither bury’d nor lamented, but lye rotting like Dung,
and be Meat for the Fowls of the Heavens and Beasts of the Earth,
_Chap._ 16. 4. _Chap._ 25. 33. _Chap._ 34. 20. 1 _Kings_ 14. 11. _Chap._
21. 23, 24. 2 _Kings_ 9. 10. and _Ezek._ 29. 4. Also in the 39. Chapter
of the Prophet _Ezekiel_ and the 17, 18, 19 and 20 Verses, GOD to shew
his severe Judgment, calls the Fowls of the Air and Beasts of the Field
to a Sacrifice of the Flesh and Blood of the Princes of the Earth, to
eat their Fat and drink their Blood; abundance more Examples of the like
nature the Scripture affords us.

Next we will consider what a miserable thing it was esteem’d, even by
the _Pagans_, to lye cast out unbury’d. That disconsolate Mother of
_Euryalus_, is not so much griev’d for the loss of her Son, who was
slain in Battel, as for that he should be made a Prey to the Birds and
Beasts, whom therefore she thus bewails:

             _Heu Terra ignota, Canibus data Præda Latinis
             Alitibusq; jaces._  Virg. _Æn._ 9. _v._ 486.

         Cold on the Ground, and pressing foreign Clay,
         To _Latian_ Dogs and Fowls he lyes a Prey.  _Dryden._

Also the same Poet represents _Tarquitus_ thus insulting over his
conquer’d Enemy, _Æn._ 10. _v._ 557.

            _Istic nunc, metuende, jace: non te optima Mater
            Condet Humi, Patriove onerabit Membra Sepulchro;
            Alitibus linquere Feris, aut Gurgite Mersum
            Unda feret, Piscesq; impasti Vulnera lambent._

          The vengeful Victor thus upbraids the Slain:
          Lye there, Inglorious, and without a Tomb,
          Far from thy Mother and thy Native Home;
          Expos’d to salvage Beasts and Birds of Prey,
          Or thrown for Food to Monsters in the Sea.
                                                    _Dryden._

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