As that author points out, “We live in the midst of symbolic representations, from the ceremonies celebrating a birth to the funeral emblems adorning the tomb; from the shaking of hands all round of a morning to the applause with which we gratify the actor, or lecturer, of the evening. We write as we speak in symbols.
“It is sentiment, and above all, religious sentiment, that resorts largely to symbolism; and in order to place itself in more intimate communication with the being, or abstraction, it desires to approach. To that end men are everywhere seen either choosing natural or artificial objects to remind them of the Great Hidden One, or themselves imitating in a systematic manner the acts and deeds they attribute to Him—which is a way of participating in His life.” The symbols with which we will here occupy ourselves are not those of acts or rites, but those of objects or emblems.
In all but the last stages of its career a symbol is a living sign, now this vitality is very real, and by virtue of it, strange modifications take place.
For example, when a nation that employed a particular symbol came into contact with another nation that had a somewhat similar symbol, the two symbols, if quite alike, were indistinguishable, and one passed for the other; but if there were slight differences between the symbols a process of amalgamation took place, and they approximated more and more towards one another. In either case the meanings of both would doubtless commingle, and a more energetic vitality would ensue from the cross-fertilisation.
St. Anthony’s cross, T (croix potencée, “gibbet-cross”), is found, with almost the same symbolic signification, in Palestine, in Gaul, and in ancient Germany, in the Christian Catacombs, and amongst the ancient inhabitants of Central America.
Among the Phœnicians and kindred peoples this cross was an alphabetical sign, tau, and it was also used separately as a symbol. From a passage in Ezekiel[171] we learn that it was accounted a sign of preservation, and was marked upon the forehead, like its corresponding Indian symbol.[172] The symbolic signification of the tau is explained by its resemblance to the Key of Life, or crux ansata of Egypt, so widely diffused throughout all Western Asia.
“This tau was unquestionably the emblem of life, and, therefore, of the greatest virtue. M. Letronne, in his researches on the Christian monuments of Egypt, has shown in the most conclusive manner that the first Christians of that country adopted this sign, possibly to establish that Christ was pre-eminently the source of life, or as a prophetic sign. All the gods of the ancient Egyptian mythology bore in their hand the sign of Christianity, the monogram of Christ; they were, according to the first Christians of Egypt, supposed to announce the coming of Jesus.”[173]
The Double Hammer of the Celtic Tarann and of the Teutonic and Scandinavian Thor is a symbol of the lightning. “Thor was the sun-god proper; god of the sun in its active aspect; the thunder-god likewise, and thus the wielder of the hammer or axe (named Mjolnir, ‘the crusher’) representative of the thunderbolt, rendered in the form T. Thor was also lord of the Under-World, and guardian against the monsters that infested its precincts; he was likewise a protector against sickness, and was much worshipped by the franklin and peasant classes.”[174]
“To this day a representation of the hammer of the God of Thunder may be found on the barns and stable-doors of some German villages. It is stated that in the northern, midland, and eastern counties of this country—wherever, in fact, the Teutonic element has made its strongest imprint—some old church bells still bear the same sign as a charm against the tempest.
“As applied to Thor, this tree-shaped cross symbol sustains his double quality as the fiery Cleaver of the Clouds, who even as such represents the principle of fertility and the Sanctifier of the fruitful union of hearts.”[175]