Note 56 — Chapter II · PHALLISM IN ANCIENT RELIGIONS.
Reading edition
Mr. J. H. Rivett-Carnac suggests that the snake is a “symbol of the phallus.” He adds, “The sun, the invigorating power of nature, has ever, I believe, been considered to represent the same idea, not necessarily obscene, but the great mystery of nature, the life transmitted from generation to generation, or, as Professor Stephens puts it, ‘life out of death, life everlasting.’”—Snake Symbol in India (reprinted from. “Journal of As. Soc. of Bengal”), 1879, p. 13.