The Elephant which sleeps while standing was regarded as the emblem of the benevolent sentinel, or watchman, and as the symbol of giant strength, meekness, and ingenuity. According to the poet Donne:-- Nature's great masterpiece, an Elephant The onely harmelesse great thing; the giant Of beasts; who thought none bad, to make him wise But to be just and thankful, loth t' offend (Yet nature hath given him no knees to bend) Himself he up-props, on himself relies And foe to none. [Illustration: FIG. 43.--From _An Essay on Ancient Coins, Medals, and Gems_ (Walsh, R.).] The Elephant or Oliphant (Greek _elephas_, "origin unknown") is the hugest and the first of beasts, and in India it symbolises the vanquisher of obstacles, the leader or the opener of the way. Ganesa, the elephant-headed Hindu god is invariably invoked at the beginning of any enterprise, and the name Ganesa is practically the same as _genesis_ the origin or beginning. "Praise to Thee, O Ganesa," wrote a prehistoric hymnist, "Thou art manifestly the Truth, Thou art undoubtedly the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer, the Supreme Brahma, the Eternal Spirit." One of the reasons for the symbolic eminence of the Elephant seems to have been the animal's habit of spouting water. It is still said of the Man in the Moon that he is a giant who at the time of the flow stands in a stooping posture because he is then taking up water which he pours out on the earth and thereby causes high tide; but at the time of the ebb he stands erect and rests from his labour when the water can subside again.[168] The moon goddess of the Muysca Indians of Bogota is named Chin (akin to Cain, _cann_, and Ganesa?), and in her insensate spleen Chin was supposed at one period to have flooded the entire world. In Mexico one of the best represented gods is Chac the rain-god, who is the possessor of an elongated nose not unlike the proboscis of a tapir, which, of course, is the spout whence comes the rain which he blows over the earth.[169] The Hebrew Jah, _i.e._, Jon or Joy or Jack, is hailed as the long-nosed, and Taylor in his _Diegesis_[170] gives the following as a correct rendering of the original Psalm: "Sing ye to the Gods! Chant ye his name! Exalt him who rideth in the heavens by his name Jack, and leap for Joy before his face! For the Lord hath a long nose and his mercy endureth for ever!" It is quite beyond the possibilities of independent evolution or of coincidence that the divinity with a long nose or trunk, should have been known as _Chac_ alike in Mexico and Asia Minor. The spouting characteristic of the whale rendered it a marine equivalent to the elephant. _Whale_ is the same word as _whole_, and _leviathan_ is radically the _lev_ of _elephant_. According to British mythology, Keridwen or Ked was a leviathian or whale, whence, as from the Ark, emerged all life.