This worship, moreover, has nothing symbolical in it viewed simply as such; for it is the actual living animal, Apis or the like, which is here itself revered as the existence of God. The Egyptians, however, have used the shapes of animals in a symbolical way. In that case they are no longer valid, simply for what they are, but it is further assumed that they express a more universal import. We find the most ingenuous illustration of this in the use of animal masks, which we find more particularly under representations of embalming, at which process certain individuals, who take an active part, either in opening the corpse or removing the intestines, are depicted wearing such masks. It is obvious that the animal's head is not taken to present the animal itself, but a significance at the same time distinct from it and more universal. The forms of animals are also utilized in other ways than this in admixture with the human form. Human figures are to be found with heads of lions, which have been interpreted as images of Minerva; then there are heads of the hawk, and in the heads of Ammon we find the horns still retained. Examples such as the above obviously imply symbolical relations. In a like sense the hieroglyphical writing of the Egyptians is in great measure symbolical, for it either endeavours to make its meaning comprehensible through the images of real objects which do not stand for themselves, but a universality which is cognate with them, or, as is still more frequently the case, in the so-called phonetic aspect of this style of writing, it signifies particular letters by means of the specific mark of some external object, whose initial letter possesses in speech the same tone as that which it is the intention to express. 3. And generally it is the fact that in Egypt pretty nearly every conformation is symbolical and hieroglyphical, expressing not itself but indicative of something more, with which it possesses affinity, or in other words a cognate relation. The truest forms of the symbol, however, are only completely illustrated in such cases where we find that this relation is of a more profound and fundamental character than those we have just adverted to. We will now briefly enumerate a few constantly recurring examples of this more important type of affiliation.