been some subtle, theological distinction between them.  But whatever the difference may have been, it was sufficient to make Amenophis forsake the old capital Thebes and withdraw to a place [Footnote:  The site is marked by the ruins of Tell el-Amarna.]some distance to the north of that city, where he carried on the worship of his beloved god Aten.  In the pictures of the Aten worship which have come down to us the god appears in the form of a disk from which proceed a number of arms and hands that bestow life upon his worshippers.  After the death of Amenophis the cult of Aten declined, and Amen resumed his sway over the minds of the Egyptians.

Want of space forbids the insertion here of a full list of the titles of Amen, and a brief extract from the Papyrus of the Princess Nesi-Khensu [Footnote:  For a hieroglyphic transcript of the hieratic text, see Maspero, Memoires, tom. i., p. 594 ff.] must suffice to describe the estimation in which the god was held about B.C. 1000.  In this Amen is addressed as “the holy god, the lord of all the gods, Amen-R[=a], the lord of the thrones of the world, the prince of Apt (i.e., Karnak), the holy soul who came into being in the beginning, the great god who liveth by right and truth, the first ennead who gave birth unto the other two enneads, [Footnote:  i.e., the great, the little, and the least companies of the gods; each company (paut) contained nine gods.] the being in whom every god existeth, the One of One, the creator of the things which came into being when the earth took form in the beginning, whose births are hidden, whose forms are manifold, and whose growth cannot be known.  The holy Form, beloved and terrible and mighty.... the lord of space, the mighty One of the form of Khepera, who came into existence through Khepera, the lord of the form of Khepera; when he came into being nothing existed except himself.  He shone upon the earth from primeval time, he the Disk, the prince of light and radiance....  When this holy god moulded himself, the heavens and the earth were made by his heart (or mind)....  He is the Disk of the Moon, the beauties whereof pervade the heavens and the earth, the untiring and beneficent king whose will germinateth from rising to setting, from whose divine eyes men and women come forth, and from whose mouth the gods do come, and [by whom] food and meat and drink are made and provided, and [by whom] the things which exist are created.  He is the lord of time, and he traverseth eternity; he is the aged one who reneweth his youth....  He is the Being who cannot be known, and he is more hidden than all the gods....  He giveth long life and multiplieth the years of those who are favoured by him, he is the gracious protector of him whom he setteth in his heart, and he is the fashioner of eternity and everlastingness.  He is the king of the North and of the South, Amen-R[=a], king of the gods, the lord of heaven, and of earth, and of the waters and of the mountains, with whose coming into being the earth began its existence, the mighty one, more princely than, all the gods of the first company.”