of the mind of the Christian, we must then look at human
C2 ON CIiniSTIAN DOCTPJXE. [BOOK II.
them ; in the same way also, those signs by which the ruinous intercourse with devils is maintained have meaning just in proportion to each man's observations. And this appears quite plainly in the rites of the augurs ; for they, both before they observe the omens and after they have completed their observations, take pains not to see the flight or hear the cries of birds, because these omens are of no significance apart from tlie previous arrangement in the mind of the observer.
CiiAP. XXV. Tn human institutions which are not superstitious, there are some things superfluous and some convenient and necessamj.
38. But when all these have been cut away and rooted out of the mind of the Christian, we must then look at human institutions which are not su])erstitious, that is, such as are not set up in association with devils, but by men in association with one another. For all arrangements that are in force among men, because they have agreed among themselves that they should be in force,, are human institutions j and of these, some are matters of superfluity and luxury, some of convenience and necessity. For if those signs which the actors make in dancing were of force by nature, and not by the arrangement and agreement of men, the public crier would not in former times have announced to the people of Carthage, while the pantomime was dancing, what it was he meant to express,— thing still remembered by many old men from whom we have frequently heard it.^ And we may well believe this, because even now, if any one who is unaccustomed to such follies goes into the theatre, unless some one tells liim what these movements mean, lie will give liis whole attention to them in vain. Yet all men aim at a certain degree of likeness in their choice of signs, that the signs may as far as possible be like the things tliey signify. But because one thing may resemble another in many ways, such signs are not always of the same significance among men, except wlieii tliey have mutually agreed upon them.
39. But in regard to pictures and statues, and other works of this kind, wliich are intended as representations of things, nobody makes a mistake, especially if they are executed by skilled artists, but every one, as soon as he sees the likenesses,
> See Tylor's Earhj History of Maulind, pp. 42, 4?.