RELIGION, SUPERSTITION, ETC. 47 



the approaching waves, "an immense number of fish, 

 enough to frighten any one, from their multitude and 

 size." When the inquirer, on the bidding of the priest, 

 had carefully recounted to him the catalogue of the fish 

 he had seen, the other was illumined to take up his para- 

 ble, and to make known to his client his future destiny. 



The spirit for symbolizing all the objects of nature 

 became, in the early history of the Church, very powerful. 

 Material objects of all kinds, animate and inanimate, 

 were invested by religious visionaries with symbolical 

 meanings. Fish formed an important item in this idle 

 worship and veneration. 



In the lives of the Christian hermits of the East, we 

 have many of the illustrations between theology and the 

 finny tribes, besides that of Saint Anthony. The resi- 

 dences or cells of these personages were generally hewn 

 out of the solid rock, and almost invariably situated near 

 some clear and running brook or rivulet. This limpid 

 water was a necessary article of their existence. They 

 were in the habit of sitting for hours together musing 

 by the sparkling and murmuring streams ; and the small 

 fish in them became the daily companions of their solitude. 

 The hermits about mount Nitre, we are told, used to feed 

 the fish with crumbs of bread. It was in this way that 

 the various stories, recorded in the lives of the solitaries, 

 arose about the sympathetic affections manifested, by the 

 inhabitants of the waters towards the persons and move- 

 ments of their friendly benefactors. We are told that one 



