Perhaps no representation exists which more acceptably renders the symbolic nature of the Four Beasts than does this. The exact imitation of nature, which appeared later in works of Art, is entirely opposed to the true meaning of these emblems, which was sacred and mystical. The cherub typifies St. Matthew, because his Gospel sets forth the human nature of Christ more forcibly than the divine. The lion was appropriate to St. Mark, because he first speaks of “the voice of one crying in the wilderness,” typical of the lion. The ox belongs to St. Luke, since he dwells on the priesthood of Christ, the ox symbolizing sacrifice; the eagle to St. John, as the emblem of his inspiration, by which he wrote so sublimely of the divinity of Jesus. There are several other explanations of these symbols which are so often seen in works of Art. But in this especial picture of the “Vision of Ezekiel,” it would seem as if the throne of the Son of Man is composed of these mystic beasts, while the angels are attending him, and gaze into his face, as if watching for some service to be rendered. When the Four Beasts are so pictured as to recall those who were full of eyes within, and rest not day and night, saying, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty” (Revelation iv., 7), they fulfil the intention of the symbol of the early Church, as it was understood by those to whom it was sacred. But when, in the hands of an irreligious and realistic artist, they become “as the beasts of the field,” his work is but a travesty upon the mysterious religious symbols, which he thus debases. The New Testament gives us a clearer idea of the nature and offices of angels than we obtain from the Hebrew Scriptures. We learn of their great numbers from the words of Jesus, “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew xxvi., 53), and from Paul, when he speaks of the “innumerable company of angels.” In the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke we learn that they are superior to human affections, and not subject to change. “For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God” (Matthew xxii., 30). “Neither can they die any more; for they are equal unto the angels” (Luke xx., 36). By the words of Jesus, however, we are assured of the sympathy of angels in all that concerns our spiritual good. In Luke xv., 10, Jesus says, “Likewise I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.” The belief that angels bear the souls of [Illustration: MELOZZO DA FORLI.--AN ANGEL.] the redeemed to heaven, rests largely on the declaration by St. Luke that “the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom;” and in Hebrews i., 14, St. Paul teaches that they are “sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation.”