praise of Heavenly things."

"Bless me!" cried Madame Bavoil, who was getting somewhat scared by this
discussion, "I never saw it in that light. I know that red means fire,
as everybody knows; blue, the air; green, water; and black, the earth.
And this I understand, because each element is shown in its true colour;
but I should never have dreamed that it was so complicated, never have
supposed that there was so much meaning in painters' pictures."

"In some painters'!" cried Durtal. "For since the Middle Ages the
doctrine of emblematic colouring is extinct. At the present day those
painters who attempt religious subjects are ignorant of the first
elements of the symbolism of colours, just as modern architects are
ignorant of the first principles of mystical theology as embodied in
buildings."

"Precious gems are lavishly introduced in the works of the primitive
painters," observed the Abbe Plomb. "They are set in the borders of
dresses, in the necklets and rings of the female saints, and are piled
in triangles of flame on the diadems with which painters of yore were
wont to crown the Virgin. Logically, I believe we ought to seek a
meaning in every gem as well as in the hues of the dresses."

"No doubt," said Durtal, "but the symbolism of gems is much confused.
The reasons which led to the choice of certain stones to be the emblems,
by their colour, water, and brilliancy, of special virtues, are so
far-fetched and so little proven, that one gem might be substituted for
another without greatly modifying the interpretation of the allegory
they present. They form a series of synonyms, each replacing the other
with scarcely a shade of difference.

"In the treasury of the Apocalypse, however, they seem to have been
selected, if not with stricter meaning, with a more impressive breadth
of application, for expositors regard them as coincident with a virtue,
and likewise with the person endowed with it. Nay, these jewellers of
the Bible have gone further; they have given every gem a double
symbolism, making each embody a figure from the Old Testament and one
from the New. They carry out the parallel of the two Books by selecting
in each case a Patriarch and an Apostle, symbolizing them by the
character more especially marked in both.

"Thus, the amethyst, the mirror of humility and almost childlike
simplicity, is applied in the Bible to Zebulon, a man obedient and
devoid of pride, and in the Gospel to St. Matthias, who als