a different sense from that in which the mathematician uses it, but
oddly enough four-dimensional geometry provides the symbols by
which some of these occult and mystical ideas may be realized by the
rational mind. One of the most engaging and inspiring of these
ideas is that the personal self is a _projection_ on the plane of
materiality of a metaphysical self, or soul, to which the personal
self is related as is the shadow of an object to the object
itself. Now this coincides remarkably with the idea implicit in all
higher-space speculation, that the figures of solid geometry
are projections on a space of three dimensions, of corresponding
four-dimensional forms.

All ornament is in its last analysis geometrical--sometimes directly
so, as in the system developed by the Moors. Will the psychology
of the new dispensation find expression through some adaptation of
four-dimensional geometry? The idea is far from absurd, by reason of
the decorative quality inherent in many of the regular hypersolids of
four-dimensional space when projected upon solid and plane space.

If this suggestion seems too fanciful, there is still recourse to the
law of analogy in finding the thing we seek. Every fresh religious
impulse has always developed a symbology through which its truths are
expressed and handed down. These symbols, woven into the very texture
of the life of the people, are embodied by them in their ornamental
mode. The sculpture of a Greek temple is a picture-book of Greek
religion; the ornamentation of a Gothic cathedral is a veritable bible
of the Christian faith. Almost all of the most beautiful and enduring
ornaments have first been sacred symbols; the swastika, the "Eye of
Buddha," the "Shield of David," the wheel, the lotus, and the cross.