§ 109 CROSSES AND CRUCIFIXES. 501
entii'ely unwarranted. Besides simple wooden crosses, now that the church had risen to the kingdom, there were many crosses of silver and gold, or sumptuously set with pearls and gems.'
The conspicuous part which, according to the statements of Eusebius, the cross 2)layed in the life of Constantino, is well known : forming the instrument of his conversion ; borne by fifty men, leading him to his victories over Maxentius and Licinius ; inscribed upon his banners, upon the weapons of his soldiers in his palace, and upon public places, and lying in the right hand of his own statue. Shortly afterwards Julian accused the Christians of worshipping the wood of the cross. "The sign of universal detestation," says Chrysostom," "tho sign of extreme penalty, is now become the object of universal desire and love. We see it everywhere triumphant ; we find it on houses, on roofs, and on walls, in cities and hamlets, on the markets, along the roads, and in the deserts, on the mountains and in the valleys, on the sea, on ships, on books and weapons, on garments, in marriage ciiambers, at banquets, upon gold and silver vessels, in pearls, in painting upon walls, on beds, on the bodies of very sick animals, on the bodies of the possessed [ — to drive away the disease and the demon — ], at the dances of the merry, and in the brotherhoods of ascetics." Besides this, it was usual to mark the cross on windows and floors, and to wear it upon the forehead.^ According to Augustine this sign was to remind believers that their calling is to follow Christ in true humility, through suffering, into glory.
We might speak in the same way of the use of other Christian emblems from the sphere of nature; the representation of Christ by a good shepherd, a lamb, a fish, and the like,
' The cross occurs in three forms : the crux decussata x (called St. Andrew's cross, because this apostle is said to have died upon such an one) ; the a-ux comvi'^sa T ; ^tid the crux immissa, either with equal arms + (the Greek cross), or witb unequal f (the Roman).
" In the homily on the divinity of Christ, § 9, torn. i. 571.
' 'Ektv-kovv rhv aravphv Iv t(o fieranrcfi, eiSngere crucem in fronts, postare in fronte, which cannot always be understood as merely making the sign with the finger on the forehead. Comp. Neander, iii. 547, note.
5!S2 THIRD PERIOD. A.D 311-590.
which we have ah-eadj observed in the period preced
Tovirards the end of the present period we for tlie first time meet witli crudjhxes', that is, crosses not bare, but with tlie figure of the cruciiied Saviour upon them. The transition to the crucifix we find in the fifth ccntiuy in the figure of a lamb, or even a bust of Christ, attached to the cross, sometimes at the top, sometimes at the bottom." Afterw^ards the whole figure of Christ was fastened to the cross, and the earlier forms gave place to this. The TruUan council of Constantinople (the Quinisextum), a. d. 692, directed in the 82d canon : " Hereafter, instead of the lamb, the human figure of Christ shall be set up on the images.'" But subsequently the orthodox church of the East prohibited all plastic images, crucifixes among them, and it tolerates only pictures of Christ and the saints. The earlier Latin crucifixes ofi^'end the taste and disturb devotion ; but the Catliolic art in its flourishing period succeeded in combining, in the figure of the suffering and dying Redeemer, the expression of the deepest and holiest anguisli with that of supreme dignity. In the middle age there was frequently added to the crucifix a group of Mary, Jolin, a soldier, and the penitent Magdalene, who on her knees embraced the post of the cross.
» Vol. i. § 100 (p. 37V sqq.).
"^ Crosses of this sort, colored red, with a white lamb, are thus described by Pauliniis oI'Nola in the beginning of the fifth century, Epist. 32 :
"Sub cruce sanguinea nivco slat Christus in agno."
* KaTo Tov avSipMnLfov xapaKTf;pa. Ilefelc (1. c. 266 sq.) proves that crucifixes did not make their first appearance with this council, but that some existed before. The Venerable Bcdc, for example (0pp. ed. Giles, torn. iv. p. 370), relates that a crucifix, bearing on one side the Crucified, on the other the serpent Ufted up by Moscfa, was brought from Rome to the British cloister of Wcremouth in 686. Gregory of Tours, also (f 595), De gloria martyrum, lib. i. c. 23, describes a crucibx in the cliurch of St. Genesius in Narbonne, which presented the Crucified One almost entirely naked (pictura, qufe Dommum nostrum quasi pra;ciuctum liuteo indicat cmoifixum). But this crucifix gave offence, and waa veiled, by order of the bisbofi, with a curtain, and only at tuucs exposed to the people.