The unique symbolism of these writings constitutes their most striking and characteristic feature; and it is this uniform use of cryptic symbols instead of ordinary figures of speech that invests the Apocalypse of John with its peculiar charm, and at the same time creates the special problems of its interpretation. A symbol may be defined as a conventional objective form chosen to represent something else, often not otherwise capable of portraiture, because of some real or fancied resemblance that appeals to the mind; an ideal representation couched in sensuous form that embodies one or more of the prominent features of its subject, and that comes to represent a fixed conception in the world of fancy, a lower and material sign being used to represent a higher and abstract idea. The use of symbols of some sort is instinctive and universal, and grows out of a natural effort of the mind to clothe its ideas in forms that give free scope to the imagination. But the peculiar nature of the symbols and the profusion of their use in the Apocalyptic literature, serve to mark it as separate from all other literary forms. Oriental symbols, too, are so unfamiliar and oftentimes so incongruous to our minds, such as the Dragon, the Scarlet Beast, the Two‐horned Beast, and even the Cherubim, that we perhaps fail to realize how much they meant to people of a primitive civilization who were possessed of a vivid imagination without scientific precision of thought. This difference in the instinctive appreciation of the nature and value of symbols, together with the wide possibilities of meaning that are apparently inherent in the symbols used in the Apocalypse, has always given room for the fertile fancy of interpreters. But the later study of the Apocalyptic writings as a class has made it plain that this effort was largely misspent, and has led to more discriminating views of the meaning and use of symbols as there found, and to their limitation by established usage, where such is known to have existed. For while the growth of recognized symbols is necessarily slow, and their origin often impossible to trace yet when they have once been formed, and have come to possess an established meaning in the public mind, they exhibit a remarkable persistence; and though their meaning may be somewhat modified by subsequent use and by particular application, yet it can scarcely suffer sudden and radical change. And let us remember that the symbols, metaphors, and other figures found in the Revelation are not purely literary: they have had a history and have acquired a recognized and conventional meaning. We have, therefore, an available guide to the interpretation of the symbols in the book furnished by their use not only in the Old Testament, in which by former interpreters they were mainly sought, but especially in Jewish apocalypses, which give the current meaning of many of them at the time when this book was written, a sense which could not well have been departed from to any great extent without making their meaning wholly unintelligible. And the more clearly we apprehend this fact, the more constantly we apply it in our interpretation, the more likely are we to arrive at the meaning intended.(43) For while the Western mind revolts against the oftime obscurity of Apocalyptic symbols, yet we not infrequently recur to the same method of illustration. For instance, a good example of the present day use of symbols, aided by illustrative skill, is found in such a cartoon as “The Modern Juggernaut” that appeared a few years ago, in which the wheeled car of India was transformed into a huge wine bottle full of intoxicating drink that rolls along its way, crushing out the lives of thousands of miserable victims, while the fierce dogs of War, Famine, and Pestilence have under its malign influence slipped their leash and go forth to prey upon men.(44) This symbolism in some measure parallels that of the Scarlet Beast in the Revelation, and shows how a great destructive force operating in the world may be presented to many minds in an objective form much more effectively than by any abstract verbal statement. Like a parable an apocalypse flings a great truth across our path, instinct with the touch of spiritual life.