Lewis Spence after 40 years of painstaking study produced this book on the Egyptian Mysteries, which is also notable as the first work written in English which attempts to present the esoteric traditions of the land of the Nile in a form accessible to the modern reader. The ancient Egyptions located the World of the Dead far beyond the rolling desert hills, in that "Western Land" into whose depths the sun-god sinks each evening. And they called the deceased "Westerners," a term which has profound meaning in our time, for the striking parallels - even in small details - between ancient Egypt and our modern cultural-spiritual life, as well as our present-day fascination witht eh world of ancient Egypt cannot have escaped the astute observer. Is it possible that those ancient Egyptions who became "Westerners" in death, have reappeared on earth as "Westerners" in our twentieth century, bringing with them, hidden in a deep layer of their being, an almost forgotten memory of their life of long ago beside the sacred Nile? The ancient initiation-rituals described in these pages can convey to the sensitively perceptive reader an intimate experience of a people of a glorious past, in whose spiritual aspirations he will recognize a startling affinity with his own.
