silence, as has been wittily
remarked, Carlyle preaches in thirty-seven volumes of eloquent English
speech. "SILENCE and SECRECY! Altars might still be raised to them (were
this an altar-building time) for universal worship. Silence is the
element in which great things fashion themselves together; that at
length they may emerge, full-formed and majestic, into the daylight of
Life, which they are thenceforth to rule.... Nay, in thy own mean
perplexities, do thou thyself but _hold thy tongue for one day_: on the
morrow how much clearer are thy purposes and duties." Andreas, in his
old camp-sentinel days, once challenged the emperor himself with the
demand for the password. "Schweig, Hund!" replied Frederich; and
Andreas, telling the tale in after years would add, "There is what I
call a King."

Yet silence may be as devoid of reality as words, and most minds require
something external to quicken thought and fill up the emptiness of their
silences. So we have symbols, whose doctrine is here most eloquently
expounded. Man is not ruled by logic but by imagination, and a thousand
thoughts will rise at the call of some well-chosen symbol. In itself it
may be the poorest of things, with no intrinsic value at all--a clouted
shoe, an iron crown, a flag whose market value may be almost nothing.
Yet such a thing may so work upon men's silences as to fill them with
the glimmer of a divine idea.

Other symbols there are which _have_ intrinsic value--works of art,
lives of heroes, death itself, in all of which we may see Eternity
working through Time, and become aware of Reality amid the passing
shows. Religious symbols are the highest of all, and highest among these
stands Jesus of Nazareth. "Higher has the human Thought not yet reached:
this is Christianity and Christendom; a symbol of quite perennial,
infinite character; whose significance will ever demand to be anew
enquired into, and anew made manifest." In other words, Jesus stands for
all that is permanently noble and permanently real in human life.

Such symbols as have intrinsic value are indeed perennial. Time at
length effaces the others; they lose their associations, and become but
meaningless lumber. But these significant works and personalities can
never grow effete. They tell their own story to the succeeding
generations, blessing them with visions of reality and preserving them
from the Babel of meaningless words.

2. _Body and Spirit._--Souls are "rendered visible