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Article ON SYMBOLS AND SYMBOLISM. ← Page 9 of 19 →
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On Symbols And Symbolism.
by whom he Avas received as a miracle ; being carefully nurtured , Avhen of a proper age , he governed in that toAvn , Avhich is now called SchlesAvig , but then was Haddebye : it formerly had the name of Old England , Avhence the Angli came into Britain , and is placed betAA'ixt the Goths and Saxons . We -will , hoAvever , resume our classic allusions . Theocritus
says ( Idyll , xxvi . ) that Pentheus Avas pulled to pieces by the female Bacchantes for prying into the sacred things which they took out of the cista to place on the altars ; and Catullus says the rites of the cista Avere celebrated Avith the utmost secresy : — " Pars obscura cavis celebrant orgia cestus . " The heathens always carried the cista on the shoulderand
, the person who carried it Avas called Kistopherus , according to Suidas . This cista mystica , or somewhat equivalent , was carried also in the ceremonies of Diana ; and therefore we find , in another picture in the " Antiquities of Herculaneum" ( vol . i . p . 67 ) , representing the sacrifice about to be made of Orestes and Pylades , at the altar of the Diana Taurica , that behind
Iphigenia are two females , one of Avhich is busy reaching the sacred symbols from the cista . That it was also borne in the rites of Ceres and Isis needs no further comment , AAdien we reflect that towards the decline of the Roman empire all these deities had been refined by the subtleties of their philosophers and the ingenuity of the priesthood to a conformity of attributes and poAver , and differed in little but in name .
The early Church seems to have used a reflex of heathen veneration towards the ark for its OATO purposes . Tertullian , de Baptismo ( cap . viii . ) , declares the ark a symbol of the Church —eeclesiam arcam figuratam . It is , however , from the time of St . Cyprian that the constant use of this symbol for the Church obtains , Avhich almost all the Latin ecclesiastical writers comply
Avith , and thence may arise the many instances we meet Avith it pictorially represented . Justin M . in Dial . c . Tryphon . c . 138 , expressly declares Noah in the ark Avaiting the return of the dove Avith the olive-branch as a figure of Christ . It would , hoAveA r er , be more difficult to account for a medal of the Emperor Severus , Avhich on its reA'erse contains an unmistakeable
pictorial exhibition of the falling of the Avaters and of the ark , did we not knoAV that the tradition of a great flood pervaded the early histories of most of the ancient nations . They were throughout adapted to the feelings and fashions of each country , but the great lineaments of the relation are throughout identical . The tales of Cadmus , of Deucalion and Pyrrha , are familiar to all the readers of Ovid ; but it may surprise some of
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On Symbols And Symbolism.
by whom he Avas received as a miracle ; being carefully nurtured , Avhen of a proper age , he governed in that toAvn , Avhich is now called SchlesAvig , but then was Haddebye : it formerly had the name of Old England , Avhence the Angli came into Britain , and is placed betAA'ixt the Goths and Saxons . We -will , hoAvever , resume our classic allusions . Theocritus
says ( Idyll , xxvi . ) that Pentheus Avas pulled to pieces by the female Bacchantes for prying into the sacred things which they took out of the cista to place on the altars ; and Catullus says the rites of the cista Avere celebrated Avith the utmost secresy : — " Pars obscura cavis celebrant orgia cestus . " The heathens always carried the cista on the shoulderand
, the person who carried it Avas called Kistopherus , according to Suidas . This cista mystica , or somewhat equivalent , was carried also in the ceremonies of Diana ; and therefore we find , in another picture in the " Antiquities of Herculaneum" ( vol . i . p . 67 ) , representing the sacrifice about to be made of Orestes and Pylades , at the altar of the Diana Taurica , that behind
Iphigenia are two females , one of Avhich is busy reaching the sacred symbols from the cista . That it was also borne in the rites of Ceres and Isis needs no further comment , AAdien we reflect that towards the decline of the Roman empire all these deities had been refined by the subtleties of their philosophers and the ingenuity of the priesthood to a conformity of attributes and poAver , and differed in little but in name .
The early Church seems to have used a reflex of heathen veneration towards the ark for its OATO purposes . Tertullian , de Baptismo ( cap . viii . ) , declares the ark a symbol of the Church —eeclesiam arcam figuratam . It is , however , from the time of St . Cyprian that the constant use of this symbol for the Church obtains , Avhich almost all the Latin ecclesiastical writers comply
Avith , and thence may arise the many instances we meet Avith it pictorially represented . Justin M . in Dial . c . Tryphon . c . 138 , expressly declares Noah in the ark Avaiting the return of the dove Avith the olive-branch as a figure of Christ . It would , hoAveA r er , be more difficult to account for a medal of the Emperor Severus , Avhich on its reA'erse contains an unmistakeable
pictorial exhibition of the falling of the Avaters and of the ark , did we not knoAV that the tradition of a great flood pervaded the early histories of most of the ancient nations . They were throughout adapted to the feelings and fashions of each country , but the great lineaments of the relation are throughout identical . The tales of Cadmus , of Deucalion and Pyrrha , are familiar to all the readers of Ovid ; but it may surprise some of