And if in the Old Testament we find authority for the principle of symbolism, much more do we in the New. We shall presently have occasion to allude to the rise and progress of the sacramentality of Baptism: we may now refer more particularly to the frequency with which S. Paul symbolises the enactments of the law; as in the case of the ox forbidden, while treading out the corn, to be muzzled. So again, the Revelation is nothing but one continued symbolical poem. The parabolic teaching of our Lord we shall presently notice. To this we may add, the exoteric and esoteric signification of certain books, _e.g._, the Song of Solomon: the double interpretation of many of the prophecies, primarily of the earthly, principally of the heavenly Jerusalem: we may refer to the symbolical meaning attached, under the Christian dispensation, to certain previously {xliv} established rites, as, for instance. Holy Matrimony. With symbolical writings, enactments, events, personages, observances, buildings, vestments, for her guides and models, how could the Church Catholic fail of following symbolism, as a principle and a passion? But not only is Christianity symbolical: every development of religion is, and must necessarily be so. On the Grecian mythology, we shall have occasion to say something more presently. The symbolism of Plato, and still further development by Proclus and the later philosophers of his school, will occur to every one. If it be asserted that the more it was touched and acted on by Christianity, the more symbolical did it become,--we only reply, So much the more to the purpose of our argument. But not only in Roman and Grecian Paganism is this the case. The Hindoo religion has much of symbolism; and some of its most striking fables, derived from whatever source--whether from unwritten tradition, or from contact with the Jews--possess this character wonderfully. Take, for instance, the example of Krishna suffering, and Krishna triumphant; represented, in the one case, by the figure of a man enveloped in the coils of a serpent, which fastens its teeth in his heel; in the other, by the same man setting his foot on, and crushing the head of the monster. Now here, it is true, the doctrine symbolised has long been forgotten among those with whom the legend is sacred: we, on the contrary, have a very plain reference to the promise concerning the Seed of the Woman and the serpent's head. This is an instance of the fact, that Truth will live in a symbolical, long after it has perished in every other form: and doubtless, when the time for the conversion of India shall have arrived, thousands will receive the truth the more willingly, in that they have had a representation of it, distorted it is true, but not destroyed, set, for so many centuries, before their eyes. {xlv} Some truths, accidentally impressed on a symbolical observance, may still live, that otherwise must have perished: just as the only memory of some of