Note 383 — Chapter II

In later art this figure is used as an emblem of the Lion of the tribe of Judah, and is sometimes represented as opening the apocalyptic book with seven seals. The four living creatures of John’s vision, (chap. iv, 6, 7,) the lion, calf or ox, eagle, and man or angel, and the tetramorph figure of that of Ezekiel, (chap. i, ver. 10,) became symbols of the four evangelists, and also of Christ.

In mediæval art uncouth and grotesque figures—“Gorgons and hydras and chimeras dire”—took the place of the bright and genial symbols of the Catacombs. To the terrified imagination of the age all nature swarmed with malignant and demoniac beings, which were bodied forth in the dragons and griffins, and monstrous forms and faces that haunt the gothic minsters and abbeys, especially in the northern countries of Europe, where the savageness of nature is reflected in the weirdness of art. Yet even in its distorted grotesqueness, this art proved its moral superiority to the gay and joyous spirit of heathenism. The intense consciousness of sin and evil, and of the mortal struggle of the human soul with the powers of darkness which it manifested, is essentially nobler than the frivolous sensualism of ancient art and life, without hope or fear of the future.