nchorial_ or common hand,
in which the earlier system of writing is improved by the characters
representing only letters, though sadly too numerous for each to have a
fixed and well-known force. But, as the hieroglyphics were also always
used for carved writing on all subjects, and the common hand only used
on papyrus with a reed pen, the latter became wholly an indistinct
running hand; it lost that beauty and regularity which the
hieroglyphics, like the Greek and Roman characters, kept by being carved
on stone, and hence it would seem arose the want of a new alphabet for
the New Testament. This was made by merely adding to the Greek alphabet
six new letters borrowed from the hieroglyphics for those sounds which
the Greeks did not use; and the writing was then written from left to
right like a European language instead of in either direction according
to the skill or fancy of the scribe.

It was only upon the ancient hieroglyphics thus falling into disuse that
the Greeks of Alexandria, almost for the first time, had the
curiosity to study the principles on which they were written. Clemens
Alexandrinus, who thought no branch of knowledge unworthy of his
attention, gives a slight account of them, nearly agreeing with the
results of our modern discoveries. He mentions the three kinds of
writing; first, the _hieroglyphic_; secondly, the _hieratic_, which is
nearly the same, but written with a pen, and less ornamental than
the carved figures; and thirdly, the _demotic_, or common alphabetic
writing. He then divides the hieroglyphic into the alphabetic and
the symbolic; and lastly, he divides the symbolic characters into the
imitative, the figurative, and those formed like riddles. As instances
of these last we may quote, for the first, the three zigzag lines which
by simple imitation mean "water;" for the second, the oval which mean
"a name," because kings' names were written within ovals; and for the
third, a cup with three anvils, which mean "Lord of Battles," because
"cup" and "lord" have nearly the same sound _neb_, and "anvils" and
"battles" have nearly the same sound _meshe_.

In this reign Pantonus of Athens, a Stoic philosopher, held the first
place among the Christians of Alexandria. He is celebrated for uniting
the study of heathen learning with a religious zeal which led him to
preach Christianity in Abyssinia.

[Illustration: 135.jpg HIEROGLYPHIC, HIERATIC, AND DEMOTIC WRITING]

He introduced a taste for phil