Goddess of Liberty, the cap is not a symbol; it is a conventional attribute. Says the learned and distinguished historian of ancient art, C. O. Müller, "The essence of the symbol consists in the supposed real connections of the sign with the thing signified." In some authoritative works, as, for instance, that of Fairholt, the serpent in medical art is said not to be a symbol; but this is not true if it be taken to represent the god of medicine, which, as I have already stated, was done by both Greeks and Romans. Evidently, if taken as of this narrow meaning, there are not many comprehensive medical symbols. But I will take it in

2

SYMBOL.

a wider sense; I will take it to mean any mystic figure or any kind of attribute. In doing so I do no more than Fairholt holds should be done. Referring to the words symbol, image, and allegorical figure as well as attribute, he says, "Their shades of difference are so slight that it would FIG. 1.—A MEDICAL be most convenient to regard them all under the general term symbol."3 I may add these remarks of Tiele: "A symbol is a simple or complex thought clothed in a sensuous form. A myth is a phenomenon of nature represented as the act of a person. Usually symbols originate in myths, and in every case mythology is antecedent to symbolism."4 There are many symbols, however, which never had anything to do with myths, as will become evident later.

1844.

Introduction to a Scientific System of Mythology, p. 197. London,

A Dictionary of Terms in Art. London, 1854.

3 Ibid. Article, "Attribute."

4 History of the Egyptian Religion, p. 219. London, 1882.

66

In the wide sense in which I propose to use it, symbol is almost or quite synonymous with emblem, as popularly used. Mackenzie and other authorities, however, state that the word emblem is properly applicable only to a mystic object or figure of two or more parts. Thus, it is more correct to speak of a skull and cross-bones" as emblematic than symbolic of a poison or of death. Again, while a serpent might properly be called a symbol, one in connection with a staff is an emblem. In this restricted sense, emblem is closely allied in meaning to allegory. But in an allegorical representation most of the elements of it are apt to be symbolic, and beauty of the whole is a consideration. The great Epidaurian representation of Æsculapius is an example. A simple image or statue is essentially a symbol.

I need hardly say that any figure may or may not be a symbol; but a mere figure is simply a representation of any object regarded as void of any other than its ordinary meaning. A conventional representation of any idea may be nothing more than a figure. In this sense, it is sometimes called an ideograph.

'Royal Masonic Cyclopædia. London, 1877.

CHAPTER II.

THE SERPENTINE GOD OF MEDICINE AT ROME.

As I have already intimated, the god of medicinethat is, Esculapius1-was not only on familiar terms, so to speak, with the serpent, but at times given a serpentine form. Pausanias expressly informs us that he often appeared in such singular shape. The visitor to imperial Rome about two thousand years ago saw this divinity in reptilian guise an object of high regard and worship. It is worth while to enter into a short study of the matter.

Now, at the outset, I may observe that it is a noteworthy fact that in their regard for medical men the early Greeks and others contrasted remarkably with the Romans. The Greeks would seem to have duly prized the class. One has but to turn to Homer to find evidence of the fact. A passage suggested by Machaon's splendid exercise of his beneficent art, spoken by Idomeneus when the "offspring of the healing god" was wounded by a dart fired by "the spouse of Helen" (Paris), and "trembling Greece for her physician fear'd,"

runs:

"A wise physician skill'd our wounds to heal,

Is more than armies to the public weal."3

Cowper translates this interesting couplet more literally than Pope:—

"One so skill'd in medicine and to free

The inherent barb is worth a multitude."

'The Greek form of the name is Asclepios or Asklepios, 'Aoкλntiòs. The Latin form being the one in general use, I will adhere to it in this essay.

'Itinerary of Greece (translation), vol. iii, p. 23.

* Iliad, xi.

This is a very noble tribute to the physician; in fact, I know of but few as good, among them being the one in "Ecclesiasticus " which reads: "The skill of the physician shall lift up his head and in the sight of great men he shall be praised." The latter is Hebræo-Egyptian in origin, and its date is about two hundred years before our era. The early Romans did not look on doctors with any such favor.2

It is a well-known fact that the art of medicine was never very enthusiastically or successfully cultivated by the Romans. It was not until a comparatively late date that medical practitioners existed among them at all. Pliny has left us some interesting notes on the matter. After the statement that many nations have gotten along without physicians, he says: "Such, for instance, was the Roman people for a period of more than six hundred years; a people, too, which has never shown itself slow to adopt all useful arts, and which even welcomed the medical art with avidity until, after a fair experience of it, there was found good reason to condemn it."3 himself was not a great friend of it.

He

Cato, who died in the year of the city of Rome 605, said, authoritatively: "They (the Greeks) have conspired among themselves to murder all barbarians with their medicine, a profession which they exercise for lucre, in order that they may win our confidence and despatch us all the more easily. I forbid you to have anything to do with physicians."4 Notwithstanding this, the imperious old Roman had not a personal dislike to taking medicine; "far from it, by Hercules," says Pliny,

Ch. xxxviii, v. 3.

2 Cicero would appear to have duly prized the physician. I recall a passage of his to the effect that in no way can man approach so near to the gods as by conferring health on his fellows.

"Natural History, xxix, 7.

Ibid., xxix, 8.