(17) Differently, the stones might be the various phases of salvation; some occupying the upper, some the lower parts of the entire body saved. The three hundred and sixty bells, suspended from the robe, is the space of a year, "the acceptable year of the Lord," proclaiming and resounding the stupendous manifestation of the Saviour. Further, the broad gold mitre indicates the regal power of the Lord, "since the Head of the Church" is the Savour. The mitre that is on it [i.e., the head] is, then, a sign of most princely rule; and otherwise we have heard it said, "The Head of Christ is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." Moreover, there was the breastplate, comprising the ephod, which is the symbol of work, and the oracle logion; and this indicated the Word logos by which it was framed, and is the symbol of heaven, made by the Word, and subjected to Christ, the Head of all things, inasmuch as it moves in the same way, and in a like manner. The luminous emerald stones, therefore, in the ephod, signify the sun and moon, the helpers of nature. The shoulder, I take it, is the commencement of the hand.

(10) The golden lamp conveys another enigma as a symbol of Christ, not in respect of form alone, but in his casting light, "at sundry times and divers manners," on those who believe on Him and hope, and who see by means of the ministry of the First-born. And they say that the seven eyes of the Lord "are the seven spirits resting on the rod that springs from the root of Jesse."

(7) Again, there is the veil of the entrance into the holy of holies. Four pillars there are, the sign of the sacred tetrad of the ancient covenants.

(7) The vignette represents a vulture with outspread wings, which is often found made of cartonnage on the mummies. The same bird is often painted on the ceilings of tombs or temples

(2) And there are those who fashion ears and eyes of costly material, and consecrate them, dedicating them in the temples to the gods - by this plainly indicating that God sees and hears all things. Besides, the lion is with them the symbol of strength and prowess, as the ox clearly is of the earth itself, and husbandry and food, and the horse of fortitude and confidence; while, on the other hand, the sphinx, of strength combined with intelligence - as it had a body entirely that of a lion, and the face of a man. Similarly to these, to indicate intelligence, and memory, and power, and art, a man is sculptured in the temples. And in what is called among them the Komasiae of the gods, they carry about golden images - two dogs, one hawk, and one ibis; and the four figures of the images they call four letters. For the dogs are symbols of the two hemispheres, which, as it were, go round and keep watch; the hawk, of the sun, for it is fiery and destructive (so they attribute pestilential diseases to the sun); the ibis, of the moon, likening the shady parts to that which is dark in plumage, and the luminous to the light. And some will have it that by the dogs are meant the tropics, which guard and watch the sun's passage to the south and north. The hawk signifies the equinoctial line, which is high and parched with heat, as the ibis the ecliptic. For the ibis seems, above other animals, to have furnished to the Egyptians the first rudiments of the invention of number and measure, as the oblique line did of circles.

(49) Now the Salitter and Mercurius signify the Father, the gold signifieth the Son, and the power or virtue signifies the Holy Ghost: In such a manner also is the Ternary in the holy Trinity, only that all moveth and goeth forth therein universally.

(11) It is said also in a certain oracle,- "A pillar to the Thebans is joy-inspiring Bacchus," from the history of the Hebrews. Also Euripides says, in Antiope,- "In the chambers within, the herdsman, With chaplet of ivy, pillar of the Evoean god." The pillar indicates that God cannot be portrayed. The pillar of light, too, in addition to its pointing out that God cannot be represented, shows also the stability and the permanent duration of the Deity, and His unchangeable and inexpressible light. Before, then, the invention of the forms of images, the ancients erected pillars, and reverenced them as statues of the Deity.

(15) For He who prohibited the making of a graven image, would never Himself have made an image in the likeness of holy things. Nor is there at all any composite thing, and creature endowed with sensation, of the sort in heaven. But the face is a symbol of the rational soul, and the wings are the lofty ministers and energies of powers fight and left; and the voice is delightsome glory in ceaseless contemplation. Let it suffice that the mystic interpretation has advanced so far.

(18) The twelve stones, set in four rows on the breast, describe for us the circle of the zodiac, in the four changes of the year. It was otherwise requisite that the law and the prophets should be placed beneath the Lord's head, because in both Testaments mention is made of the righteous. For were we to say that the apostles were at once prophets and righteous, we should say well, "since one and the self-same Holy Spirit works in all." And as the Lord is above the whole world, yea, above the world of thought, so the name engraven on the plate has been regarded to signify, above all rule and authority; and it was inscribed with reference both to the written commandments and the manifestation to sense.

(16) Now the high priest's robe is the symbol of the world of sense. The seven planets are represented by the five stones and the two carbuncles, for Saturn and the Moon. The former is southern, and moist, and earthy, and heavy; the latter aerial, whence she is called by some Artemis, as if Aerotomos (cutting the air); and the air is cloudy. And cooperating as they did in the production of things here below, those that by Divine Providence are set over the planets are rightly represented as placed on the breast and shoulders; and by them was the work of creation, the first week. And the breast is the seat of the heart and soul.

(12) 6. The Mast. “Bearer “Bearer of the Great one whilst she passeth” is thy name

(47) It enlighteneth also the heaven, the stars, and the deep above the earth, working in all things that are in this world, and is the king and the heart of all things of this world, and so rightly signifieth the Son of God.

(5) "The secret teaching explains the reason for this reference by the symbolism of the prehistoric races. The 'First Cause' had no name in the beginnings. Later, it was pictured in the fancy of the thinkers as an ever invisible Bird that dropped an Egg into Chaos, which Egg became the Universe. Hence, Brahm was called 'Kalahansa,' the Swan of Eternity which laid at the beginning of each Mahamanvantara a 'Golden Egg.' It typifies the great Circle, or O, itself a symbol for the universe and its spherical bodies. * * * The first manifestation of the Kosmos in the form of an egg was the most widely diffused belief of antiquity. It was a symbol adopted among the Greeks, the Syrians, Persians, and Egyptians. In the Egyptian Ritual, Seb, the god of Time and of the Earth, is spoken of as having laid an egg, or the Universe. Ra is shown like Brahma gestating in the Egg of the Universe. With the Greeks the Orphic Egg was a part of the Dionysiac and other mysteries, during which the Mundane Egg was consecrated and its significance explained. The Christians—especially the Greek and Latin Churches—have fully adopted this symbol, and see in it a commemoration of life eternal, or salvation and resurrection. This is found in and corroborated by the custom of 'Easter Eggs.' From the 'Egg' of the pagan Druids, to the red Easter Egg of the Slav, a cycle has passed. And, yet, whether in civilized Europe, or among the abject savages of Central America, we find the same archaic, primitive thought; if we only search for it and do not disfigure—in the haughtiness of our fancied mental and physical superiority—the original idea of the symbol." The concept of the World Soul, in some form of interpretation and under some one of many names, may be said to be practically universal. Among many of the ancient schools of philosophy it was taught that there was an Anima Mundi, or World Soul, of which all the individual souls were but apparently separated (though not actually separated) units. The conviction that Life was One is expressed through nearly all of the best of ancient philosophies; and, in fact, in subtly disguised forms, may be said to rest at the base of the best of modern philosophies.

(14) And Atlas, the unsuffering pole, may mean the fixed sphere, or better perhaps, motionless eternity. But I think it better to regard the ark, so called from the Hebrew word Thebotha, as signifying something else. It is interpreted, one instead of one in all places. Whether, then, it is the eighth region and the world of thought, or God, all-embracing, and without shape, and invisible, that is indicated, we may for the present defer saying. But it signifies the repose which dwells with the adoring spirits, which are meant by the cherubim.

(1) Whence also the Egyptians did not entrust the mysteries they possessed to all and sundry, and did not divulge the knowledge of divine things to the profane; but only to those destined to ascend the throne, and those of the priests that were judged the worthiest, from their nurture, culture, and birth. Similar, then, to the Hebrew enigmas in respect to concealment, are those of the Egyptians also. Of the Egyptians, some show the sun on a ship, others on a crocodile. And they signify hereby, that the sun, making a passage through the delicious and moist air, generates time; which is symbolized by the crocodile in some other sacerdotal account. Further, at Diospolis in Egypt, on the temple called Pylon, there was figured a boy as the symbol of production, and an old man as that of decay. A hawk, on the other hand, was the symbol of God, as a fish of hate; and, according to a different symbolism, the crocodile; of impudence. The whole symbol, then, when put together, appears to teach this: "Oh ye who are born and die, God hates impudence."

(169) IV. The birds or fowls, fishes and beasts, signify and denote the several forms or shapes of figures in heaven.

(5) The rods signify the kingly and directing faculty, making all things straight. The spears and the battle-axes denote the dividing of things unlike, and the sharp and energetic and drastic operation of the discriminating powers. The geometrical and technical articles denote the founding, and building, and completing, and whatever else belongs to the elevating and guiding forethought for the subordinate Orders. But sometimes the implements assigned to the holy Angels are the symbols of God's judgments to ourselves; some, representing His correcting instruction or avenging righteousness, others, freedom from peril, or end of education, or resumption of former well-being, or addition of other gifts, small or great, sensible or intelligible. Nor would a discriminating mind, in any case whatever, have any difficulty in properly adapting things visible to things invisible.

(10) Said also on a figure the middle part of which is that of a man; his arms are hanging down. The head of a ram is on his right shoulder, and another on his left shoulder. Thou wilt paint on one bandage the two figures of the god with raised arm, and put it across the chest of the deceased, so that the two painted figures may be on his breast

(41) I will shew thee a similitude in nature, signifying how the holy being in the holy Trinity is.

(49) The head signifieth heaven; the same is grown on the body, by the veins, passages and going forth of powers; and so all the powers come again from the head and brain into the body, into the fountainveins or arteries of the flesh.