To present a visible symbol to the eye of another is not necessarily to inform him of the meaning which that symbol has to you. Hence the philosopher soon superadded to the symbols explanations addressed to the ear, susceptible of more precision, but less effective and impressive than the painted or sculptured forms which he endeavored to explain. Out of these explanations grew by degrees a variety of narrations, whose true object and meaning were gradually forgotten, or lost in contradictions and incongruities. And when these were abandoned, and Philosophy resorted to definitions and formulas, its language was but a more complicated symbolism, attempting in the dark to grapple with and picture ideas impossible to be expressed. For as with the visible symbol, so with the word: to utter it to you does not inform you of the _exact_ meaning which it has to _me_; and thus religion and philosophy became to a great extent disputes as to the meaning of words. The most abstract expression for DEITY, which language can supply, is but a _sign_ or _symbol_ for an object beyond our comprehension, and not more truthful and adequate than the images of OSIRIS and VISHNU, or their names, except as being less sensuous and explicit. We avoid sensuousness only by resorting to simple negation. We come at last to define spirit by saying that it is not matter. Spirit is--spirit. A single example of the symbolism of _words_ will indicate to you one branch of Masonic study. We find in the English Rite this phrase: "I will always _hail_, ever conceal, and never reveal;" and in the Catechism, these: Q.'. "_I hail_." A.'. "_I conceal_;" and ignorance, misunderstanding the word "_hail_," has interpolated the phrase, "From whence do you _hail_?" But the word is really "_hele_," from the Anglo-Saxon verb Ðelan, _helan_, to _cover, hide_, or _conceal_. And this word is rendered by the Latin verb _tegere_, to _cover_ or _roof over_. "That ye fro me no thynge woll hele," says Gower. "They _hele_ fro me no priuyte," says the Romaunt of the Rose. "To _heal_ a house," is a common phrase in Sussex; and in the west of England, he that covers a house with slates is called a _Healer_. Wherefore, to "_heal_" means the same thing as to "_tile_,"--itself symbolic, as meaning, primarily, to _cover_ a house with _tiles_,--and means to _cover, hide_, or _conceal_. Thus language too is symbolism, and words are as much misunderstood and misused as more material symbols are.