E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Soul.
The Moslems fancy that it is necessary, when a man is bow-strung, to relax the rope a little before death occurs to let the soul escape. The Greeks and Romans seemed to think that the soul made its escape with life out of the death-wound.
1
Soul. The Moslems say that the souls of the faithful assume the forms of snowwhite birds, and nestle under the throne of Allah until the resurrection.
2
Soul. Heracli’tus held the soul to be a spark of the soul to be a spark of the stellar essence: “scintilla stellaris essentiæ.” (Macrobius: Somnium Scipioris, lib. i. cap. 14.)
3
“Vital spark of heavenly flame,
Quit, oh! quit this mortal frame.”
Pope: The Dying Christian to his Soul.
Soul, in Egyptian hieroglyphics, is represented by several emblems, as a basket of fire, a heron, a hawk with a human face, and a ram.
