• The four Evangelists, of whom the four mysterious animals in Ezekiel are regarded as symbols. Mrs. Jameson, Sacred and Legendary Art , I 99:⁠— “The general application of the Four Creatures to the Four Evangelists is of much earlier date than the separate and individual application of each symbol, which has varied at different times; that propounded by St. Jerome, in his commentary on Ezekiel, has since his time prevailed universally. Thus, then⁠— “To St. Matthew was given the Cherub , or human semblance, because he begins his Gospel with the human generation of Christ; or, according to others, because in his Gospel the human nature of the Saviour is more insisted on than the divine. In the most ancient mosaics, the type is human, not angelic, for the head is that of a man with a beard. “ St. Mark has the Lion , because he has set forth the royal dignity of Christ; or, according to others, because he begins with the mission of the Baptist⁠—‘ the voice of one crying in the wilderness, ’⁠—which is figured by the lion: or, according to a third interpretation, the lion was allotted to St.