i8 FLORAL SYMBOLISM 



beneath the patronage of the Devil, typify- 

 ing and inducing envy, hatred, or perhaps 

 malice. 



Lastly there were the mystic symbolists, and 

 it is they who have had most influence on 

 pictorial art. There were those who, like Saint 

 Bernard of Clairvaux, could discern through 

 the darkened glass of Old Testament meta- 

 phor the divine facts of New Testament revela- 

 tion, and those who, hke Saint Mectilda of 

 Germany, were favoured by Heaven with clear 

 and detailed visions, in which Christ Himself 

 deigned to explain the complicated symbolism 

 of His surroundings. His embroidered robes 

 and jewelled ornaments. And there were those 

 mystics who were not in holy orders, who did 

 not claim direct communication with Heaven, 

 yet who have, nevertheless, by giving shape 

 and colour to the vague indications of Holy 

 Writ as to the future state, and by material- 

 izing, as it were, the illusive inner vision of 

 things invisible, profoundly influenced the re- 

 ligious sentiment, if not the theology, of the 

 world. Chief among them is the poet Dante, 

 the friend of Giotto and the spiritual father 



