We see then, that our Cherub is simply a Dragon.
To continue our inquiry regarding the prevalence of the Eden-myth among nations of antiquity.
The Chinese have their Age of Virtue, when nature furnished abundant food, and man lived peacefully, surrounded by all the beasts. In their sacred books there is a story concerning a mysterious garden, where grew a tree bearing "apples of immortality," guarded by a winged serpent, called a Dragon. They describe a primitive age of the world, when the earth yielded abundance of delicious fruits without cultivation, and the seasons were untroubled by wind and storms. There was no calamity, sickness, or death. Men were then good without effort; for the human heart was in harmony with the peacefulness and beauty of nature.
The "Golden Age" of the past is much dwelt upon by their ancient commentators. One of them says:
"All places were then equally the native county of every man. Flocks wandered in the fields without any guide; birds filled the air with their melodious voices; and the fruits grew of their own accord. Men lived pleasantly with the animals, and all creatures were members of the same family. Ignorant of evil, man lived in simplicity and perfect innocence."
Another commentator says:
"In the first age of perfect purity, all was in harmony, and the passions did not occasion the slightest murmur. Man, united to sovereign reason within, conformed his outward actions to sovereign justice. Far from all duplicity and falsehood, his soul received marvelous felicity from heaven, and the purest delights from earth."
Another says:
"A delicious garden refreshed with zephyrs, and planted with odoriferous trees, was situated in the middle of a mountain, which was the avenue of heaven. The waters that moistened it flowed from a source called the 'Fountain of Immortality'. He who drinks of it never dies. Thence flowed four rivers. A Golden River, betwixt the South and East, a Red River, between the North and East, the River of the Lamb between the North and West."
The animal Kaiming guards the entrance.