"Symbolism" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Robespierre threw the sacred symbol on the ground with a severe air, and then proceeded with a discourse of much austerity. Not that he was averse to a certain seemly decoration, or to the embodiment of revolutionary sentiment by means of a symbolism that strikes our cooler imagination as rather puerile. He was as ready as others to use the arts of the theatre for the liturgy of patriots. One of the most touching of all the minor dramatic incidents of the Revolution was the death of Barra. ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 1 of 3) - Essay 1: Robespierre • John Morley
... destroy the world. Again and again Syme strove to pull together his common sense in their presence. Sometimes he saw for an instant that these notions were subjective, that he was only looking at ordinary men, one of whom was old, another nervous, another short-sighted. The sense of an unnatural symbolism always settled back on him again. Each figure seemed to be, somehow, on the borderland of things, just as their theory was on the borderland of thought. He knew that each one of these men stood at the extreme end, so to speak, of some ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... they rested on a large and beautiful platinotype of G. F. Watts' picture of "Hope." The last time she had visited Miss Heath in that room Prissie had been taken by the kind vice-principal to look at the picture, and some of its symbolism was explained to her. "That globe on which the figure of Hope sits," Miss Heath had said, "is meant to represent the world. Hope is blindfolded in order more effectually to shut out the sights which might distract her. See the harp in her hand, observe her rapt attitude— she is listening to ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... none the less sensible of Mr. James's surpassing merits as a writer upon the philosophy of society. We dedicate this paragraph to him on account of the series of lectures he has just delivered in New-York, upon "The Symbolism of Property," "Democracy and its Issues," "The Harmony of Nature and Revelation," "The Past and Future Churches," &c. We understand that these splendid dissertations will be given to the public in the more acceptable form of a volume. The popular lecture is not a suitable ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... play, et seq.—First production of Hummerdinck's opera and cast, Earlier performance of the work as a melodrama, Author and composer, Opera and melodrama in Germany, Wagnerian symbolism and music, "Die Meistersinger" recalled, Hero and Leander, ...
— A Second Book of Operas • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... the glories of "Guillotina, the Tenth Muse," and fell down in worship before a Phrygian cap. It was due to his influence that in 1793 the death of Louis XVI. was celebrated throughout the American continent with grotesque symbolism and farcical solemnity. A single instance is enough to prove the malign effect of Jefferson's teaching. At Philadelphia the head of a pig was severed from its body, and saluted as an emblem of ...
— American Sketches - 1908 • Charles Whibley
... as a god of creative energy in general, since men at a certain stage of evolution fail to distinguish between the reproductive powers of animals and of plants. Hence a striking feature in his worship was the coarse but expressive symbolism by which this aspect of his nature was presented to the eye not merely of the initiated but of the multitude. At his festival women used to go about the villages singing songs in his praise and carrying obscene images of him which ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... feeling from the "peasants" of the Dutch painters. In the Salon of 1850 there appeared a picture called "The Sower" and representing a young peasant sowing grain. There was nothing in the subject to connect it particularly with any religious symbolism—not even with the Parable of the Sower who went forth to sow; nor with any series of personifications of the months. This was a simple peasant of the Norman coast, in his red blouse and blue trousers, his legs wrapped in straw, and his weather-beaten hat, full of holes. He marches with the rhythmic ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... evenings playing with it before he sees it. Fine to have children; lots of fun playing with their presents. We are sure that life after death is really so, because children always kick the blankets off at night. Fine bit of symbolism that; put it in a sermon, unless Doctor Conwell ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... less satisfactory interpretations of their symbolic meanings which are to be found in the works of some of the later fathers, and which afford, as in many other instances, illustrations of the extravagance of symbolism into which the studies of the cell, the darkness of their age, and the insufficiency of their education ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... encountered by the Catholic Church, and conquered by her in open and fair fight. Also these writings lay much stress upon Knowing and the Truth: 'this is life eternal, to know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent' (xvii. 3); symbolism and mysticism prevail very largely; and, in so far as they are not absorbed in an Eternal Present, the reception of truth and experience is not limited to Christ's earthly sojourn—'the Father will give you another Helper, the spirit of truth who will abide with you forever' (xiv. 16). ...
— Progress and History • Various
... the same time to the eye of fancy by accumulated images. The next eleven triplets introduce the presiding genius of the pageant. Students of Petrarch's "Trionfi" will not fail to note what Shelley owes to that poet, and how he has transmuted the definite imagery of mediaeval symbolism into something ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... wrinkle coming into his forehead, "so you think that in a rationalistic scheme of symbolism the ball should be on ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... at a restaurant of the discreet sort, divided into many compartments, and situated, with a charming symbolism, at the back of St. George's, Hanover Square. Geraldine had chosen it. They did not need food, but they needed ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... replica—That is what you call it, I think—" She skilfully interpolated, as Claude Vignon and Stidmann came up to them on hearing her talk of sculpture—"how far more beautiful than the Greek myth is that replica of Hercules at Omphale's feet.—Did Greece copy Judaea, or did Judaea borrow the symbolism from Greece?" ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... found here and there superficial accounts of strange customs and ceremonies, of which the symbolism or inner meaning was largely hidden from the observer; and there has been a great deal of material collected in recent years which is without value because it is modern and hybrid, inextricably mixed with Biblical legend and ...
— The Soul of the Indian - An Interpretation • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... for in such matters was, indeed, the best definition of him. When he read his play "The Street Walker" in drawing rooms and one lady told him it had the poetic symbolism of Tchekhov, and another said that it suggested the biting realism of Brieux, he never, in his most secret thoughts, questioned the acumen of either lady. Harold's speech, even if you heard it in the next ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather
... a lotus, not a rose flower. The latter is never used in Hindoo symbolism. The lotus is a solar emblem, and intimately associated with the worship ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... than the elder friend had produced; but Mary Stuart in Scotland (1864) had marked a step backward, and now Ibsen had once more shot far ahead of his rival. When we have admitted some want of clearness in the symbolism which runs through Brand, and some shifting of the point of view in the two last acts, an incoherency and a turbidity which are natural in the treatment of so colossal a theme, there is very little but praise to be given to a poem which is as manifold in its emotion ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse
... the closet, and left her there. Then she crept back into bed, and lay there crying over her precious baby shivering in her thin night-gown all alone in the dark closet. But she was firm in keeping her there, since, with that strange, involuntary grasp of symbolism which has always been maintained by the baby-fingers of humanity for the satisfying of needs beyond resources and the solving of problems outside knowledge, she had a conviction that she was, in such fashion, righting wrong and ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... The symbolism is clear enough. This is a new kind of King. He comes, not mounted on a warhorse, or thundering across the battlefield in a scythe-armed chariot, like the Pharaohs and the Assyrian monarchs, who have left us their vainglorious monuments, but mounted on ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... Through all their vicissitudes the people of France have upheld, unfaltering, their ideal—liberty, equality and fraternity. Our own republic exists to-day because France helped us when England sought to crush us. It is never amiss to freshen our memories as to these historic facts. The symbolism of the colossus would therefore be very fine; it would have a meaning which every one could understand. It would signify not only the amity of France and the United States, and the republican idea of brotherhood ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 2, Issue 3, December, 1884 • Various
... drawing, sketching, and tracing, analytic geometry, differential calculus, physics, descriptive geometry, botany, and physical geography. In the third year the course is extended to the theory of decoration, color, form, and proportion; conventionalism, symbolism, the decorative arts, stained glass, fresco painting, tiles, terra-cotta, original designs, specifications, integral calculus, strength of materials, dynamics, bridges and roofs, stereotomy. In the fourth year the student is turned out a finished architect, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... of the rebellion of men against their position is recorded in Guinea, where religious symbolism was used by the husband as a way of obtaining control and possession of his wife. The maternal system held with respect only to the ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... That which most particularly struck Pierre, however, in this, the noblest, most spacious, and most carefully tended garden of Rome, was the novel and unexpected view that he suddenly obtained of St. Peter's, whilst skirting a low wall: a view whose symbolism for ever clung to him. Rome had completely vanished, and between the slopes of Monte Mario and another wooded height which hid the city, there only appeared the colossal dome which seemed to be poised ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... only by the introduction of superstitious practices, such as the conjuring up of evil demons, was well adapted to stamp itself on the child's mind, and its naive symbolism was bound to make a profound impression upon his imagination. Pagan antiquity knew of nothing so delicate and at the same time so elevated in sentiment. Pindar, and Horace after him, conceived the fancy that the bees of Hymettus alighted on the child's ...
— Rashi • Maurice Liber
... the lover should first think of its durability and then of its sweet symbolism. It should be the best he can afford, and the small detail of fit is not to be ignored. The choice of stones and style will depend upon taste and the money available, but, personally, I like an engagement ring to be of special ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... Hindu arithmetic,[394] so that the subject must have been attracting considerable attention at that time. Indeed, the struggle to have the Hindu numerals replace the Arabic did not cease for a long time thereafter. 'Al[i] ibn A[h.]med al-Nasaw[i], in his arithmetic of c. 1025, tells us that the symbolism of number was still unsettled in his day, although most people preferred the ...
— The Hindu-Arabic Numerals • David Eugene Smith
... interposed. "What does life mean? As one may define it in a hundred different ways, so one may find a hundred different meanings in this picture. Its symbolism is as many-faceted as a well-cut diamond. Who, for instance, is that divine lady? Is it she who is the true Lux Mundi—the light reflected from jewels and young eyes, from polished marble and clear waters and statues of bronze? Or is that the ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... Aurora marveled at. Aurora marveled how Estelle could know, or seem to know, a lot of things which she had never before given sign of caring about. If the two of them were not conversing upon the symbolism of religious art! Having finished his tea, the abbe went to fetch a book from Gerald's shelves, which he knew as well as his own, and Estelle was shown reproductions of ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... the dead amid blooming nature and fair flowers has been and is natural to men. The symbolism is most natural, deep, and beautiful, expressing the possibility of life and even of advance in the life after apparent decay. There is something very pathetic in so eager a grasping after ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... north. Of these theological equalisations I have to speak afterwards. Here it is enough to notice that if some small mistake were made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness. A sentence phrased wrong about the nature of symbolism would have broken all the best statues in Europe. A slip in the definitions might stop all the dances; might wither all the Christmas trees or break all the Easter eggs. Doctrines had to be defined within strict limits, even in order that man might enjoy ...
— Orthodoxy • G. K. Chesterton
... constructions with the meaning as clear as the words. There is nothing rapt, nothing fantastic. Greek imagery in this region is to Hebrew imagery what the sculpture of Greece is to those weird creations of symbolism at Nineveh and Babylon, the colossal human-faced bulls and the genii with the eagle-head. And if you remind me that I am comparing prophet with poet, and not prophet with prophet, I answer that the poets are the ...
— Platform Monologues • T. G. Tucker
... noteworthy that the events foreseen are invariably unpleasant ones—death being the commonest of all; I do not recollect a single instance in which the second-sight has shown anything which was not of the most gloomy nature. It has a ghastly symbolism which is all its own—a symbolism of shrouds and corpse-candles, and other funereal horrors. In some cases it appears to be to a certain extent dependent on locality, for it is stated that inhabitants of ...
— Clairvoyance • Charles Webster Leadbeater
... symbolism in their intent.... The man they called a usurper must die on the very tree that gave their home its significance, and no other instrument of vengeance would satisfy them. The old bitterness had begun generations ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... by being happy, seeing in every flower and hearing in every harmony some exquisite symbol of human life. "Il Penseroso" takes us over the same ground at twilight and at moonrise. The air is still fresh and fragrant; the symbolism is, if possible, more tenderly beautiful than before; but the gay mood is gone, though its memory lingers in the afterglow of the sunset. A quiet thoughtfulness takes the place of the pure, joyous sensation of the morning, a thoughtfulness which ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... author of this little volume has been to indicate the symbolism and meaning attaching to the various portions of our churches and cathedrals, and to endeavour briefly to describe, in language as simple as the subject will allow, the various styles of ecclesiastical architecture ...
— Our Homeland Churches and How to Study Them • Sidney Heath
... raise our German churches to that degree of respectability in the religious world which they ought to enjoy." (Neve, 95.) The Lutheran Observer of March 21, 1862, while defending revivalism and misrepresenting the "symbolism" of the Missourians as the doctrine according to which one is saved by the Sacraments ex opere operato, without repentance and faith, condemns the Lutheran system of baptizing, catechizing, confirming, communing at the Lord's Supper, etc., as Romanism and Sacramentalism, ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 2: The United Lutheran Church (General Synod, General - Council, United Synod in the South) • Friedrich Bente
... Middle Ages the same character as the other arts, as indeed all the manifestations of life then harmonized so marvelously with one another. The tendency to parable shows itself here, as in poetry. When we now enter a Gothic cathedral, we hardly suspect the esoteric sense of its stone symbolism; only a general impression pierces our soul; we realize an elevation of feeling and mortification of the flesh. The interior is a hollow cross, and we wander among the instruments of martyrdom itself; the variegated windows cast on us red and green light, like blood ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... thing as correspondence or symbolism appears more and more urgent as we consider the duties that religion and philosophy enjoin ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... for the immediate behaviour of Florence herself, with her new standard, its colour was quite sufficiently significant in that old symbolism, when the first restrial bearing was drawn by dying fingers dipped in blood. The Guelphic revolution had put her into definite political opposition with her nearest, and therefore,—according to the custom and Christianity of the time,—her hatefullest, neighbours,— ...
— Val d'Arno • John Ruskin
... people who have not changed while their children were being literally reborn—what does this accomplish? Doesn't Aesop tell us something of a crow that would be a dove and found himself an outcast everywhere? We are replacing the beautiful symbolism of the Indian by our materialism and leaving him bewildered and discouraged. Why should he be taught to despise his hogan, shaped after the beautiful rounded curve of the rainbow and the arched course of the sun in his daily journey across the sky—a ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... probably in 41 B.C., is a very melodious Daphnis-song that has always been a favorite with poets. It has been and may be read with entire pleasure as an elegy to Daphnis, the patron god of singing shepherds. Those, however, who in Roman times knew Vergil's love of symbolism, suspected that a more personal interest led him to compose this elegy. The death and apotheosis of Julius Caesar is still thought by some to be the real subject of the poem, while a few have accepted another ancient conjecture that Vergil here wrote of his brother. The person mourned must, however, ...
— Vergil - A Biography • Tenney Frank
... divine ones navigate the upper deep. In the Navajo myths, when a god has a particularly long and speedy journey to make, he takes two sunbeams and, placing them side by side, is borne off in a twinkling whither he wills. Red is the color proper to sunlight in their symbolism, but the red and blue together represent sunbeams in the morning and evening skies when they show an alternation of blue and red. It will be seen later that the sunbeam shafts, the halo, and the rainbow are represented ...
— The Mountain Chant, A Navajo Ceremony • Washington Matthews
... Austin delighted in symbolism, and these apparent paradoxes fascinated him. But was it all true? He loved to think that life was the shadow, and death—what we call death—the substance; he had always felt that the reality of everything was to be sought for on the other ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... writing a good earnest man buttonholed me and held me tight for over an hour, while he outlined his own slight divergencies from the teachings of the Methodist Church, to which he belongs, and his interpretation of the symbolism of Scripture, none of which had the slightest interest to me. In our conversation, he expressed himself as quite willing—please note the condescension—to allow me the privilege of supposing the Catholic was honest and sincere in his faith and belief, ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... said Harkless, as he took the manuscript. "Have you finished your paper on the earlier Christian symbolism? I hope the 'Herald' may have the honor of printing it." This was the ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington
... know—good-natured, and all that, but not clever—while the chaplain is one of the cleverest men going; and the widow's awfully clever, too. They got beyond me in no time. They were talking all sorts of stuff about Gregorian chants, ecclesiastic symbolism, mediaeval hymns, the lion of St Mark, chasuble, alb, and all that sort of thing, you know, no end, and I sat like a log listening, just the same as though they spoke Chinese, while the widow took no more notice of me than if I'd been a Chinaman. And she kept up that till we ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... the moral purpose indicated by the symbol. Sometimes this purpose is dimly veiled in allegory, but even when his stories are sermons in allegory, like The Snow Image, he so invests them with poetic fancy or spiritual beauty as to make them works of art. His extensive use of symbolism and allegory has been severely criticized. It is unfortunate that he did not learn earlier in life what The Scarlet Letter should have taught him, that he did not need to rely on these supports. He becomes one of the great masters when he paints character from the inside with a touch ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... to S. John is of a somewhat later date, and bears a different character. It is reflective and meditative, and is penetrated throughout by a mystical symbolism. In many ways it suggests rather a spiritual interpretation of the significance of Jesus than a literal portrait of Him. Again, it is the product of a Greek rather than of a Jewish atmosphere, though its narrative presents so many touches of extraordinary ...
— Religious Reality • A.E.J. Rawlinson
... daily spectacle of her people. Why stay away among the dull streets and small houses of the hill-side, when there were these pleasures of eye and ear, this sensuous medley of light and color, this fellowship and society, this dramatic symbolism and movement, waiting for them below, in the church of ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... saints whom the Church has seen rejoicing in the heavenly life, rises the form of Mary, Mother of God. S. John's vision of the "great sign in heaven" in its primary meaning has, no doubt, reference to the Church itself; but the form of its symbolism would be impossible if there were not a secondary reference to the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is the thought of her and of her office as Mother of the Redeemer that has determined the form of the vision. The details are too clear to permit of doubt, and such has been the constant ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry
... were right! You have unlocked the impossible! Yet you seem to know nothing of the laws of similarity or of magic, Dave Hanson. Is that crystal similar to the sky, by association, by contagion, or by true symbolism? A part may be a symbol for the whole—or so may any designated symbol, which may influence the thing it is. If I have a hair from your head, I can model you with power over you. But not with the hair of a pig! ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... The new democracy was neither coldly Deist, nor austerely Republican. It has shown no inclination to inaugurate a reign of "pure reason" in religion or politics, but has boldly and cheerfully adopted symbolism and pageantry. Friendly societies and trade unions have their badges, banners, and buttons. The Roman Catholic Church grows in popularity with the working class, and in many towns and cities the Church ...
— The Rise of the Democracy • Joseph Clayton
... met by accident on the seventh terrace of the gardens. Patricia had mentioned casually at the breakfast-table that she intended to spend the forenoon on this terrace unsabbatically making notes for a paper on "The Symbolism of Dante," which she was to read before the Lichfield Woman's Club in October; but Mr. Charteris had not ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... that great waterway, have fitly been made to represent the art of the entire world, yet with such unity and originality as to give new interest to the ancient forms, and with such a wealth of appropriate symbolism in color, sculpture and mural painting as to make its great courts, towers and arches an inspiring story of Nature's ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... imbibes good sound stuff, worthy of the reputation of a noble brewery. Whereas your, Unicorn, true to the character of the numberless hosts he stands for, is manifestly a consumer of doctor's drugs. And there you have the symbolism of your country. Right or left of the shield, I forget which, and it is of no importance to the point—you have Grandgosier or Great Turk in all his majesty, mane and tail; and on the other hand, you behold, as the showman ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... phase. In the early Indian sculptures deities are mostly portrayed in human form, but in about the first century of our era there is seen a tendency to depict them with many heads and limbs and this tendency grows stronger until in mediaeval times it is predominant. It has its origin in symbolism. The deity is thought of as carrying many insignia, as performing more actions than two hands can indicate; the worshipper is taught to think of him as appearing in this shape and the artist does not hesitate to represent it in paint ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... The mythological symbolism of antique thought was full of this pictorial tendency and even now the shrewdest of modern thinkers are compelled to use images drawn from antique mythology. Poetic thought may go astray. But it can never negate itself ...
— The Complex Vision • John Cowper Powys
... still more common, and concludes that "both this love and fear are so strong and instinctive that they can hardly be fully accounted for without recourse to a time when association with animals was far closer than now, or perhaps when our remote ancestors were hairy." (Cf. "Erotic Symbolism," iv, in the fifth ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... Possibly the combination arose from priests wearing the heads of animals when personating the god, as the high priest wore the ram's skin when personating Amon. But when we notice the frequent combinations and love of symbolism, shown upon the early carvings, the union of the ancient sacred animal with the human form is quite in keeping with the views and feelings of the primitive Egyptians. Many of these composite gods never emerged from the ...
— The Religion of Ancient Egypt • W. M. Flinders Petrie
... against that democratic movement which desired, among other things, the Church's abolition. He had power of utterance. Roused to combat by the proletarian challenge, he could make his voice ring in the ears of men, even though he used a symbolism which he would not by ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... important in life, language, literature. Early use of symbolism; suggested reasons for this. Poem of the Phoenix. Allegorical interpretation of the story. Celtic influence on English poetry. Gifts of colour, fervour, glow. Various gifts of various nations enriching one ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey
... struck the table in ritualistic challenge, exchanged gestures, bent his neck and passed on. He circled the broad floor, sabre twirling, arms darting in an intricate symbolism. The orchestra blared shrilly, unmuffled now by the surf-roar of conversation. The Yill, Retief noticed suddenly, were sitting silent, watching. The dancer was closer now, and then he was before Retief, poised, towering, sabre above ...
— The Yillian Way • John Keith Laumer
... mystic circles, one at each corner of the oblong, one in the center, the heart of the Maze, and facing it two smaller circles, one at each side on a visionary line. Seven mystic, seven sacred circles in all did he draw, and vanished, unconscious of the sanctity and symbolism ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair
... which they inhabit. Here, as usual, the septenary character of our evolution shows itself, for there are seven such chief groups, related respectively to the seven states of physical matter—to "earth, water, air and fire," or to translate from mediaeval symbolism to modern accuracy of expression, to the solid, liquid, gaseous and etheric conditions. It has long been the custom to pity and despise the ignorance of the alchemists of the middle ages, because they gave the title of "elements" ...
— The Astral Plane - Its Scenery, Inhabitants and Phenomena • C. W. Leadbeater
... continue, have been of late years much discussed, and with diverse views. Some of these views are very literal interpretations of the divine Word, and others of them are very figurative. The fact is, it is not always easy to distinguish between symbolism and reality, whether in nature or in revelation. I remember that the first time that I saw Mount Tacoma in the distance, I could not distinguish as to what was mountain and what was cloud. When I got very near, then I knew. And so in several Scripture statements it is not ...
— Love's Final Victory • Horatio
... tale of capture. This would eliminate Proserpine. No more beautiful myth exists than this one of the springtime, but its beauty and its symbolism do not make it suitable for the kindergarten. It is more suited to the elementary child of the fourth grade. In fact, very few myths of any sort find a legitimate place in the kindergarten, perhaps only a few of the simpler ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... himself has ceased to speak and has returned to his customary avocations. And when members of his family visit the shrine and see the pole, they will be reminded of the particular benefit which they are entitled to expect from the souls of the departed. A certain rude symbolism may be traced in the materials and other particulars of these prayer-posts. A hard wood signifies strength; a tall pole overtopping all the rest imports a wish that he for whose sake it was erected may out-top all ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... of modern sects is also covered in other places in Revelation, for the ecclesiastical history of the Christian dispensation is described under different parallel series of symbolism. In the other series, however, the symbols representing Protestantism stand so closely connected with predictions of the last reformation that I shall not attempt to enumerate them in this chapter, but shall consider ...
— The Last Reformation • F. G. [Frederick George] Smith
... were, many adopted it because they were impervious to artistic influence or impatient of spiritual discipline. It will hardly do to divide the nation into intelligent Protestants and illiterate Catholics: the point is that the somewhat crude symbolism which had satisfied the cravings of the average man had ceased to be sufficient for his newer intelligent needs; he demanded either a higher symbolism or else as little as possible. Some felt the symbol a help, others felt it a hindrance to the realization of the ideal; ...
— The History of England - A Study in Political Evolution • A. F. Pollard
... beauty of it all?—the lights and flowers, the swinging censers, with the glory of the chant and the wealth of mystic symbolism which followed the passing of that solemn procession into the sanctuary? That could best be imagined, like the feeling in the heart of the young pastor who adored every line of the building. He had watched the laying of each stone, and could almost count the chips that had jumped from every ...
— The City and the World and Other Stories • Francis Clement Kelley
... straw. The shelves were hard and dirty; there was no relaxation of our involuntary asceticism, but we slept well. There was music in our ears. We had attained to Jerusalem, and our dreams were with the angels. Jerusalem the earthly had not forced itself upon our minds; we held the symbolism of the journey lightly, and the mind read a mystery in delicate emotions. The time was to come when some of us would be discontented with Jerusalem, as some of the disciples who fell away were discontented with the poor ...
— A Tramp's Sketches • Stephen Graham
... with Indian oratory will readily recollect its garb of bold and striking metaphors. These features, while imparting energy to the language, at the same time made it easy to convey its meaning by picture writing or symbolism, the only mode of writing which the aborigine possessed.[19] Thus, too, it was easy to put upon a belt a few significant characters which by the principle of mental association should clearly depict the salient features of an event or of a series of events. Such belts ...
— Wampum - A Paper Presented to the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society - of Philadelphia • Ashbel Woodward
... and pointed. "Behold the glory of Ippling that can be yours!" He held onto the halo, trying to get them to follow the symbolism. "Look upwards!" He screamed at them, but they watched the brush fire that swept the hill top. It was a goodie. It would wipe out a ...
— The Glory of Ippling • Helen M. Urban
... What this strange symbolism meant, or whence it derived its origin, Aunt Jane did not know. The cross was there, and the Trinity, though Jane was scarcely conscious of these, at this moment, as religious emblems. But she hoped, ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... calls it "Musical Symbolism," for Adelaide Ann Proctor's "The Story of the Faithful Soul." Of the greatest delicacy imaginable is the music (for piano, violin, and voice) to William Sharp's "Coming of the Prince." The "Watteau Pictures" are poems of Verlaine's variously treated: one as a head-piece to a ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... until their extinction in the fourth and fifth centuries of our era, schools of immorality, in which at intervals glimpses of the divine world were obtained by a sort of poetic intuition. Egypt, notwithstanding an apparent kind of Fetichism, had very early metaphysical dogmas and a lofty symbolism. But doubtless these interpretations of a refined theology were not primitive. Man has never, in the possession of a clear idea, amused himself by clothing it in symbols: it is oftener after long reflections, and from the impossibility felt by the human mind of resigning ...
— The Life of Jesus • Ernest Renan
... explained as such by perverted ingenuity, it is futile to seek for that form of psychologic exuberance in the stage of development attained by the tribes now under consideration. All predetermination to interpret either their signs or their pictographs on the principles of symbolism as understood or pretended to be understood by its admirers, and as are sometimes properly applied to Egyptian hieroglyphs, results in mooning mysticism. This was shown by a correspondent who enthusiastically ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... evidence to show that the engraving in Cogolludo is a relic of the purest ancient Maya symbolism,—one of the most interesting which have been preserved to us; but to enter upon its explanation in this connection would be too far ...
— The Books of Chilan Balam, the Prophetic and Historic Records of the Mayas of Yucatan • Daniel G. Brinton
... mightier monument, unseen and immeasurable, builded of the living stones of a nation's love and gratitude, the hearts of forty millions of people. But the world has not outlived its need of picture writing and symbolism, and the great object lesson of the Washington monument will doubtless prove a large factor in the moral and political education of present and future generations. Let us hope that it will be a warning as well as a benediction; ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... so gross as to be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings to be of a marked erotic character. The figure of Satan often enough reminds one of the pagan Priapus, and the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the ancient ones, with the mixture of Christian language and symbolism inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous intercourse between the sexes was said to occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard to account for both the persistency of the gatherings ...
— Religion & Sex - Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development • Chapman Cohen
... This piece of symbolism became a sort of fixed language with him; "the Snake" was a name by which it amused him to be known among his friends. The clash of the two opposites is crudely and narrowly conceived, with no suggestion yet of some more tremendous force behind both, such as later on was to give depth to his view ...
— Shelley • Sydney Waterlow
... shudder; there are mistakes of observation that make the serious naturalist wonder; and there is often an expression of contempt for his fellow countrymen, and the rest of mankind, and their aims in life, that makes the judicious grieve. But at his best there is a gay symbolism, a felicity of description, and a freshness of observation that delight ...
— The Last Harvest • John Burroughs
... without patience, and are pleasant even in being half seen. Trees, clouds, and rivers are enjoyable even by the careless; but the stone under his foot has for carelessness nothing in it but stumbling; no pleasure is languidly to be had out of it, nor food, nor good of any kind; nothing but symbolism of the hard heart and the unfatherly gift. And yet, do but give it some reverence and watchfulness, and there is bread of thought in it, more than in any other lowly feature ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... life—as eloquent to inform as it was potent to move. Adelaide Neilson was one of those strange, exceptional natures that, often building better than they know, not only interpret "the poet's dream" but give to it an added emphasis and a higher symbolism. Each element of her personality was rich and rare. The eyes—now glittering with a mischievous glee that seemed never to have seen a cloud or felt a sorrow, now steady, frank, and sweet, with innocence and trust,—could, in one moment, flash with the wild ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... who was still young enough to show to your Men Friends but old enough to cut out all the prevalent Mushgush about the Irish Drama and Norwegian Art and Buddhism and the true Symbolism of Russian Dancing. ...
— Knocking the Neighbors • George Ade
... admitted that the story of 'Tannhaeuser' is better suited for dramatic purposes than that of 'Der Fliegende Hollaender,' apart from the lofty symbolism which gives it so deeply human an interest. This would go far to account for the manifest superiority of the later work, but throughout the score it is easy to note the enhanced power and certainty of the composer in dealing even with the less interesting parts of the story. Much of 'Tannhaeuser' ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild
... a companion was perhaps to find it forthwith turned against himself. In those days of strife also, when men were more ready in action than in the turning of phrases, and so much was expressed by symbolism, the offering of a sword or dagger was frequently in itself a challenge, and a declaration of enmity. Thus, you see, that what was a natural inference in other times is meaningless in ours. The adage ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... dim many hurts, but with the last flicker of intelligence I shall remember that scene. Even then, in a flash, I saw the symbolism of it. ...
— The Log-Cabin Lady, An Anonymous Autobiography • Unknown
... inward demand for immense expansions of thought, a desire for all sorts of proportioned and balanced extremes. This is no superficial suggestion, though it may seem so. But in such cases it is not the positive horror and its direct effect which attract the poet: a deeper symbolism and an effect both aesthetic and moral recommend the element to him. With Milton, however, there follows a curious result. He produces his manufactured myth of Sin and Death and his ludicrous Limbo of Vanity with a gravity ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... and "Mysteres," which you will remember were presented to Francois I., the citizens determined that in case mythology and symbolism had lost their pristine charms, an absolutely novel entertainment should be given to the King on this occasion. So on the fields between the Couvent des Emmurees and the left bank of the Seine a great sham fight was arranged between a number of Norman sailors and ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... American Indians were the descendants of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Before we dismiss his theory with a smile, let us remember that he had not at his disposal the data now available which reveal points of likeness in custom, language formation, and symbolism among almost all primitive peoples. The formidable title-page of his book in itself suggests an author keenly observant, accurate as to detail, and possessed of a versatile and substantial mind. Most of the pages were written ...
— Pioneers of the Old Southwest - A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground • Constance Lindsay Skinner
... some sort of heiroglyphic significance to the specimen forms; in the writing of the American Indians, a wavy line meant water, an inverted V meant a wigwam. But, I discarded that idea in a moment. Benda's mind did not work along the paths of symbolism. It would have to be something mathematical, rigidly logical, leaving no ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... also to be remembered that the psalm is running in the track of a certain constant symbolism that pervades all Scripture. From the first book of Genesis down to the last chapter of Revelation, you can hear the dashing of the waters of the river. 'It went out from the garden and parted into four ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... occasion for invoking the unseen powers in behalf of the people at large for various purposes, particularly for good crops and abundant rains. It would appear that it is also designed to perpetuate their religious symbolism. Some of the shows of the last night are undoubtedly intended to be dramatic and entertaining as well as religious, while the merely social element of the whole affair is obvious. It is an occasion when the people ...
— The Mountain Chant, A Navajo Ceremony • Washington Matthews
... that I am only a Catholic in the sense that its symbolism is pleasant to me. You remember what Schopenhauer said—you cannot have the water by itself: you must also have the jug that it is in. Very well; the Catholic religion is my jug. I put into it the things I like. They were all there long ago, thousands of years ago. The Jews threw ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... contents noted. In reply we beg to state...." wandering about with their fingers in their hair and their features distorted with the agony of composition, as they try to find rhymes to "cosmic" and "symbolism." ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... different styles, each of them claimed that his was the only true style, and cried "Raca!" to that of their colleagues. They accused each other of sham writing and sham culture, and hurled at each other's heads the words "idealism" and "materialism," "symbolism" and "verism," "subjectivism" and "objectivism." Christophe thought it was hardly worth while leaving Germany to find the squabbles of the Germans in Paris. Instead of being grateful for having good music presented in so many different fashions, they would only tolerate their own particular ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... and when she illustrated the "Jungle Book" she could more easily imagine that the animals could speak a language that Mowgli could understand, than an academic artist could bring himself to fancy for a moment. Her work is full of poetic imagination, of symbolism, and of the ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... our Race The Discipline of Life Homogeneity of the Race Of God Of Jesus The Gods Knowledge of Occult Law Evanescence of Mere Beliefs The Fount of Inspiration for All Man versus Death Fear of Death Test of Character Character Forming Man the Final Earth Product Superstitions Self-Justice Symbolism Love Ideals of Love The Needs of Woman Man versus Woman Natural Cruelty of the Undeveloped The Worst Sin Reincarnation Processes of Reincarnation Education of Children Egotism Responsiveness Hell The Commonplace Petroleum ...
— Insights and Heresies Pertaining to the Evolution of the Soul • Anna Bishop Scofield
... scripture interpretation, especially, with some inconsistency, against the allegorical or mystical tendency which at that time marked the whole church, and especially the Alexandrian fathers. The allegorical method coincided with, if it did not arise from, the oriental instinct of symbolism, the natural poetry of the human mind. But in the minds of Jews and Christians it had been sanctified by its use in the Hebrew religion, and had become associated with the apocryphal literature of ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... circumstances—as, for example, Maliuag, which means "difficult," because the child's birth was such; Malacas, which signifies "a man of strength," because the mother thinks that the child will be strong, or desires that it be so. At other times they name it, without any symbolism or special reason, by the first word which occurs to them—as, for example, Daan, which signifies "road;" Babui, which means "pig;" or Manug, which signifies "fowl." All persons are called by these names from birth, without ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, - Volume XIII., 1604-1605 • Ed. by Blair and Robertson
... highly imaginative, the luminous glow deepened. He had studied much in the classics, after the fashion of the time, in the school at Albany, and his head was filled with the old Greek and Roman learning. Now he saw the ancient symbolism reproduced in the great forests of North America by the nations of the Hodenosaunee, who had never heard of Greece or Rome, nor, to him, were the religion and poetry of the Iroquois inferior in power and beauty, being much closer kin than ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... in our juices; he Should have shunned this detestable effeminacy, worthy only of the Dantes and Shakespeares. But unfortunately he was an Esotericist, with the business of helping, not plaguing, mankind: he must follow the grand symbolism of the story of the Soul, recording and emphasizing and showing the way to its victories, not its defeats. He had the eye to see deep into realities, and was not to be led from the path of truth eternal by the cheap effective expedients of realism. ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... or octagonal edifice, but also compelled her to accept their taste, and they saturated her with their genius. They imparted to her their love of luxuriant decoration, and of violent polychromy, and they gave religious sculpture and painting the complicated symbolism that pleased their ...
— The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont
... wonderful initial letters to the "Essence of Parliament" of Shirley Brooks—those intricate drawings which, covering nearly a whole page, were such miracles of invention, of fancy, and of allusion, swarming with figures, overflowing with suggestion, teeming with subtle symbolism. But these things did not come at once. It was not until the "comic cut" idea was put entirely on one side and his imagination allowed full play, that Mr. Sambourne fully developed his powers—his ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... recreation "for enlarging mind and heart." He happened to mention that, though his family was of the Zen sect of Buddhism, he was a Shintoist. It is difficult to believe that a genuine Buddhist could have evolved such a life scheme. There is certainly a Shinto symbolism in his plan of tree planting before his house. He has set there, in the order shown, eleven pines ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... talk is of bloodshed, true; but in punishment of those who have outraged the sanctity of the hearth, and to re-establish, after purification, domestic calm and security. It is one of the dreary aspects of modern life that natural symbolism has all but perished. We have no consecrated tree. The oak once held a place in English hearts, but who now reveres it?—our trust is in gods of iron. Money is made at Christmas out of holly and mistletoe, but who save the vendors would greatly care if ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... the thoughtful man revolts against it. What is this about a physical body and physical bones going up through the air into the sky? And where has it gone to? The modern man cannot believe it in that sense, and so he loses the spiritual verity enshrined in words of symbolism and of allegory. For the fact that Jesus the Master went away, but still dwells on earth in the flesh, that is the truth which the article tries to indicate; and not that He is gone far away into a far-off heaven to sit at the right hand of God, whence He shall come again to ...
— London Lectures of 1907 • Annie Besant
... something to do with the thing she was quite certain, since she knew well that Mr. Fregelius would never have invented any memorial so beautiful and full of symbolism; also she doubted his ability to pay for a piece of statuary which must have cost many hundreds of pounds. A third reason, which seemed to her conclusive, was that the face on the statue was the very face of Morris's ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... reality, all nature, even language, has significance only as sign, as allegory.—Here it is of paramount importance to be led into no error by the temptations lying in Christian, or rather ecclesiastical prejudices: such a symbolism par excellence stands outside all religion, all notions of worship, all history, all natural science, all worldly experience, all knowledge, all politics, all psychology, all books, all art—his "wisdom" is precisely a pure ignorance[11] of all such things. He has never heard of ...
— The Antichrist • F. W. Nietzsche
... is always employed in ceremonies, religious and secular, and is an accompaniment of gala dress for the purpose of honouring a guest or to celebrate an occasion. The face of the dead was frequently painted in accordance with tribal or religious symbolism. Paint is also used on the faces of children and adults as a protection from wind and sun. Plucking the hair from the face and body is a part of the daily program. The male Indian never shaves and the beard is a disgrace. A pair of tweezers becomes his razor. Sweet grasses and seeds serve as a ...
— The Vanishing Race • Dr. Joseph Kossuth Dixon
... artist who has justly earned the title of "Premier Painter of Polynesia." A whole school of painters have attempted to reproduce the exotic color and charm of these entrancing isles. It remained for Herman Swank, by his now famous method of diagrammatic symbolism, to bring the truth fully home. This he accomplished by living, to the limit, the native life of the Filbertese. Clad only in the light lamitu, or afternoon wrap of the islands, it was the artist's custom to spend entire days inhaling the perfume of the fragment alova flower, ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock |
