There came, then, a period when the Serpent crept behind the veil, or lid of the ark, or into a chalice,--a very small worm, but yet able to gnaw the staff of Solomon. No wisdom could be permitted to rise above fear itself, though its special sources might be here and there reduced or vanquished. The snake had taught man at last its arts of war. Man had summoned to his aid the pig, and the ibis made havoc among the reptiles; and some of that terror which is the parent of that kind of devotion passed away. When it next emerged, it was in twofold guise,--as Agathodemon and Kakodemon,--but in both forms as the familiar of some higher being. It was as the genius of Minerva, of Esculapius, of St. Euphemia. We have already seen him (Fig. 13) as the genius of the Eleans, the Sosopolis, where also we see the Serpent hurrying into his cavern, leaving the mother and child to be worshipped in the temple of Lucina. In Christian symbolism the Seraphim--'burning (sáraf) serpents'--veiled their faces and forms beneath their huge wings, crossed in front, and so have been able to become 'the eminent,' and to join in the praises of modern communities at being delivered from just such imaginary fiery worms as themselves! CHAPTER V. APOPHIS. The Naturalistic Theory of Apophis--The Serpent of Time-- Epic of the Worm--The Asp of Melite--Vanquishers of Time-- Nachash-Beriach--The Serpent-Spy--Treading on Serpents. The considerations advanced in the previous chapter enable us to dismiss with facility many of the rationalistic interpretations which have been advanced to explain the monstrous serpents of sacred books by reference to imaginary species supposed to be now extinct. Flying serpents, snakes many-headed, rain-bringing, woman-hating, &c., may be suffered to survive as the fauna of bibliolatrous imaginations. Such forms, however, are of such mythologic importance that it is necessary to watch carefully against this method of realistic interpretation, especially as there are many actual characteristics of serpents sufficiently mysterious to conspire with it. A recent instance of this literalism may here be noticed. Mr. W. R. Cooper [224] supposes the evil serpent of Egyptian Mythology to have a real basis in 'a large and unidentified species of coluber, of great strength and hideous longitude,' which 'was, even from the earliest ages, associated as the representative of spiritual, and occasionally physical evil, and was named Hof, Rehof, or Apophis,' the 'destroyer, the enemy of the gods, and the devourer of the souls of men.' That such a creature, he adds, 'once inhabited the Libyan desert, we have the testimony of both Hanno the Carthaginian and Lucan the Roman, and if it is now no longer an inhabitant of that region, it is probably owing to the advance of civilisation having driven it farther south.'