the beauty of holiness."--_Psalm_ xxix. 2.

[116] It is at least a singular coincidence that in the Brahminical
religion great respect was paid to the north-east point of the heavens.
Thus it is said in the Institutes of Menu, "If he has any incurable
disease, let him advance in a straight path towards _the invincible
north-east point_, feeding on water and air till his mortal frame totally
decay, and his soul become united with the Supreme."

[117] This symbolism of the double position of the corner-stone has not
escaped the attention of the religious symbologists. Etsius, an early
commentator, in 1682, referring to the passage in Ephesians ii. 20, says,
"That is called the corner-stone, or chief corner-stone, which is placed
in the extreme angle of a foundation, conjoining and holding together two
walls of the pile, meeting from different quarters. And the apostle not
only would be understood by this metaphor that Christ is the principal
foundation of the whole church, but also that in him, as in a
corner-stone, the two peoples, Jews and Gentiles, are conjoined, and so
conjoined as to rise together into one edifice, and become one church."
And Julius Firmicius, who wrote in the sixteenth century, says that Christ
is called the corner-stone, because, being placed in the angle of the two
walls, which are the Old and the New Testament, he collects the nations
into one fold. "Lapis sanctus, i.e. Christus, aut fidei fundamenta
sustentat aut in angulo positus duorum parietum membra aequata moderatione
conjungit, i.e., Veteris et Novi Testamenti in unum colligit gentes."--_De
Errore profan. Religionum_, chap. xxi.

[118] This permanence of position was also attributed to those cubical
stones among the Romans which represented the statues of the god Terminus.
They could never lawfully be removed from the spot which they occupied.
Hence, when Tarquin was about to build the temple of Jupiter, on the
Capitoline Hill, all the shrines and statues of the other gods were
removed from the eminence to make way for the new edifice, except that of
Terminus, represented by a stone. This remained untouched, and was
enclosed within the temple, to show, says Dudley, "that the stone, having
been a personification of the God Supreme, could not be reasonably
required to yield to Jupiter himself in dignity and power."--DUDLEY'S
_Naology_, p 145.

[119] Dudley's Naology, p. 476.

[120] Masonic Discourses, Dis. iv. p. 81.

[121] "The act o