A 19th-century exploration of ancient Egyptian magic and cosmology, linking temple rituals and sacred texts to the Western Hermetic tradition.
Collectanea Hermetica, Book VIII: Egyptian Magic
Florence Farr & W. Wynn Westcott
1896
Part of the late 19th-century Collectanea Hermetica series, this volume explores ancient Egyptian magical practices through translations and interpretations of papyri, hymns, invocations, and ritual formulae. Drawing connections between Pharaonic religion and Western esoteric traditions, the authors present Egyptian cosmology as a living system of symbolic forces, divine intelligences, and spiritual correspondences that influenced later Hermetic and occult thought.
“Magic was not with the Egyptians a superstition apart from religion, but the very method by which divine power was approached, invoked, and directed according to sacred law.”
Published during the Victorian occult revival, the book emerged from circles associated with the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, where Farr and Westcott were prominent figures. At the time, academic Egyptology was distancing itself from esoteric interpretations in favor of philological and archaeological rigor. Works that treated ancient religion as a living magical system were dismissed as occult speculation rather than scholarship. As a result, the text remained largely within esoteric communities and was seldom incorporated into mainstream historical or religious studies curricula.