With all this, however, there was no severe literalism in the interpretation of the symbol. Whatever may have been the case at the outset, the symbol was as much a metaphor in the historical ages of Egyptian history as are the metaphors of our own language. When the Egyptian spoke of “eating” his god, he meant no more than we do when we speak of “absorbing” a subject.(198) The Pyramid texts are full of such faded and forgotten metaphors; the Egyptian was conservative above all other men, and the language of religion is conservative above all others. Doubtless, in some cases, he was the victim of the symbols and metaphors he used; but in this respect he does not stand alone. Where he has no rival is in the magnitude of the part played in his religion by the symbol and its logical development. It was just this symbolism which enabled him to retain, on the one hand, all the old formulæ with their gross materialism and childlike views of the universe, and, on the other hand, to attain to a conception of the divine being which was at once spiritual and sublime. For Egyptian religion, as we find it in the monuments of the educated classes before the decay of the monarchy, was, in spite of its outward show of symbols and amulets, full of high thoughts and deep emotions. I cannot do better than quote the words in which it is described by one of its least prejudiced students, Professor Maspero:(199) “When we put aside the popular superstitions and endeavour solely to ascertain its fundamental doctrines, we soon recognise that few religions have been so exalted in their principles. The Egyptians adored a being who was unique, perfect, endowed with absolute knowledge and intelligence, and incomprehensible to such an extent that it passes man’s powers to state in what he is incomprehensible. He is ‘the one of one, he who exists essentially, the only one who lives substantially, the sole generator in heaven and earth, who is not himself generated.’ Always the same, always immutable in his immutable perfection, always present in the past as in the future, he fills the universe without any form in the world being able to give even a feeble idea of his immensity; he is felt everywhere, he is perceived nowhere.