X'Z !;; MBLEM OF THE SOUL. 



Let us look, lastly, at the "coming out' ; of insects with 

 reference to that symbolic history of the soul, of which, as now 

 " arrayed in all their glory ' they exhibit the concluding 

 page. And a cheerful history it is; not always, indeed, 

 so brilliant as at present, but at all times full of promise ; for 

 even in seasons when to the eye all but a blank we know 

 that its many-coloured characters (like those written in invisible 

 ink) are only as it were absorbed, to " come out " again, fresh 

 as ever under the influence of each summer sun. Now, after 

 the return of at least six thousand years, it is as free from 

 mildew, and should, surely (to our perceptions) be more free 

 from mist, than when first spread open ; yet was it, probably (in 

 common with other pages of the universal volume) more clearly 

 deciphered, and much more attentively marked, in ages of 

 antiquity than in our own. 



While the book of nature, as a mere natural history (whether 

 relating to insects or other things) was almost, perhaps, a 

 sealed volume, the "coming out ' of the butterfly had at- 

 tracted notice, and been hailed as a symbolic promise that 

 man also was to " come out," in due time, from the darkness 

 of the grave. The same Greek word PSYCHE was applied to 

 denote both a Butterfly and the human Soul; hence (say the 

 learned) the Egyptian fable of Cupid and Psyche, and the 

 reason that in Grecian sculptures Psyche is so often represented 

 as subject to Cupid, either under the form of a butterfly or 

 adorned with the wings of that most glorious of insect flutterers. 



