The symbolism of the alphabet

...in certain circles to ignore how common snake worship was and is in India. Even the study of poetic meter Prosody is ruthlessly distorted for this purpose. Such an attitude, even if excusable in politicians, is unworthy of archaeologists, who above all men should be guided by the clear light of truth.

Unfortunately for the once-glorified serpent, it is now the traditional devil of Western civilization. Such is the unavoidable fate of a dethroned deity. No insult is too harsh for those who have been cast from power. What was once sacred is now considered accursed. Similarly, we view Friday as unlucky because it was once—and still is in the East—a holy day. The same is true for the mystic number 13, which is now excluded from dinner tables and sometimes even removed from street addresses.

The elements of the pillar and the curve stand alone and separate in the letters I and S. The letter I is a symbol of the Deity. Its adoption by English-speaking people as the first-person pronoun exceeds even the boldness of the Romans, that other imperial race, for whom it was good grammar (if poor courtesy) to say "I and the King" original: "Ego et Rex". The letter S, still resembling a serpent in both shape and sound, stands upright and self-sufficient.

T is the Tau, an early form of the Cross. It is formed by joining a vertical line and a horizontal line; the former represents the Heavens and the latter represents the Earth. Neither the Roman cross nor the Greek cross appears in the alphabet. The reason for this notable omission may have been to avoid confusion with the letter T, or perhaps because these forms of the holy emblem were reserved for the signatures of Kings or high-ranking church officials Prelates.

X is St. Andrew's Cross. It is the sign of the sun crossing the equator at the equinoxes. These were regarded as critical times in the solar year. The death of Osiris is supposed to have occurred when the sun was in Scorpio during the autumn equinox and in Taurus during the spring equinox. This is illustrated in Mithraic sculpture, where a scorpion fixes its claws into the reproductive organs of a Bull. According to Proclus, the intersection of the X represents the union of "the circle of the Same and the circle of the Different," or the fixed and the variable—or rather, the equinoctial circle and the Zodiac. "Such," he adds, "is the mathematical discussion of the soul."

The secret arcanum of 1 and 0, so obvious in the decimal system, also plays a part in the formation of italic letters. The first of these, a, is the simplest combination. Among the variations are b, d, p, and q. The close proximity of these letters in a printer's type case, and the fact that a q in the metal type appears as a p when printed, was a source of confusion for beginners. This is likely the origin of the proverbial warning to "mind your p's and q's."