cuted in the Eastern Empire; but Gregory II. became he champion of image worship in the West, and Italy, adhering to her ancient pagan instincts, substituted this new idolatry for that which she had abandoned.

The development of the graven representation of the passion was more gradual than its treatment in graphic art. This was the work of the sculptors. At first the figure of Our Lord was merely painted on a flat surface of wood or metal. This was afterward incised in outline, and exhibited in low relief, as on an ivory diptych of date A. D. 888 in the Vatican Museum. In this the sun and moon, as genii, hold torches above the cross; and by a singular association of ideas, Romulus and Remus, suckled by the wolf, appear at its foot, probably in allusion to Christ's spiritual subjugation of the Roman Empire.* The treatment of this sacred theme passed gradually through the stages of basso, mezzo, and alto relievo, becoming more and more detached, till, in the fourteenth century, the figure of Our Lord upon the cross stood out, the completed and portable crucifix.t From this, through rapid stages, we arrive at the gross and ghastly images which abound throughout Roman Catholic Christendom; in every church and at every shrine; in the homes alike of prince and peasant; at the street corners and by the way side; often in popular apprehension endowed with the power of weeping, motion, speech, and working miracles. By such grada*Hemans, Sacred Art in Italy, p. 534.

See the reliefs upon the marble pulpits of Pisa and Sienna.

See one at Lucca, ascribed by tradition to the workmanship of Nicodemus, which was so famous as to be sworn by in the oath, a favourite one with the Plantagenet kings, " by Saint Vult of Lucca." Hemans, Sac. Art, p. 534. Another at Naples is said to have spoken in approval to St. Thomas Aquinas. Perhaps the most revolting extant representation of Our Lord is one in the Cathedral of Burgos,

tions between the soul of man and the living Saviour came the image of the dead Christ, diverting the thoughts from the faith in a living Lord to an idolatrous veneration of a lifeless symbol.

Thus, as Dr. Maitland remarks, in painting sight superseded faith, and in sculpture touch superseded sight. But still another resource of sensuousness was to be discovered; and in the year 1223, "when the world was growing cold,"* as the Roman Church, with a deeper meaning than it knew, asserted, Saint Francis of Assis is feigned to have received the stigmata of the five wounds of Christ, and thenceforth to have borne about in his body-a living crucifix-the marks of the Lord Jesus. This miracle was afterwards frequently repeated; but the Church, seeking amid the growing darkness of the times to walk by sight and not by faith, wandered ever further and further from the central source of light and power, and lost all ability to communicate to a cold and dying world any spiritual life and warmth.

The sad lesson of the history we have been tracing is but too plain. In the early ages, and in the fervent glow of primitive faith, no outward symbol was necessary to reveal to the soul the presence of the Divine, or to interpret the profound meaning of the atonement. The Church required no sensuous image of Him, whom having not seen she loved, to prevent that love from growing cold. As the fervour of faith failed she relied more on the visible sign to quicken her languid devo

in Spain. It is a stuffed human skin, with a wig of false hair and a crown of real thorns. Elsewhere are Ecce Homos in wax with enamel eyes, and other puerile and unartistic modes of treatment of this solemn theme.

* Refrigerante mundo, says the Roman office for St. Francis' day.

tion; but not till six centuries of gathering gloom had passed over her head after her fatal alliance with imperial power did degenerate art dare to portray to the eye of sense the death pangs and throes of mortal agony of the suffering Son of God. In the church of the Catacombs these images of sadness and gloom have no place. All is bright, cheerful, and hope-inspiring. In the following chapter we shall see that these characteristics are strikingly manifested in all the representations of Our Lord that there occur.

NOTE. We have made no reference in the foregoing remarks to the pre-Christian crosses, of which so many examples occur. It is not remarkable that this perhaps simplest of all geometrical figures should have attracted the notice of many diverse, and ancient races, and even have been regarded as a sign of potent mystical meaning. This subject has been treated with a good deal of fantastic theory by S. Baring-Gould, M.A., (Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, pp. 341, et seq. ;) more philosophically by Creuzer, (Symbolek, pp. 168 et seq.,) and by various travellers and observers of ancient remains in many lands. Sir Robert Ker Porter mentions the hieroglyph of a cross, accompanied by cuneiform inscriptions, which he saw on a stone among the ruins of Susa. (Travels, vol. ii, p. 414.) Prescott mentions its occurrence among the objects of worship in the idol temples of Anahuac, (Conquest of Mexico, vol. iii, pp. 338-340.) It was found on the temple of Serapis at Alexandria, which fact was urged by the pagan priests to induce Theodosius not to destroy that building. (Socrates, Eccl. Hist., v, 17.) It was probably a Nilometer, or perhaps the socalled "Key of the Nile,” frequently held in the hand of Egyptian deities as the emblem of life, or the symbol of Venus, probably of phallic significance. (Tertul., Apol., c, 16.) It is found also on Babylonian cylinders, on Phoenician and Etruscan remains, and among the Brahminical and Buddhist antiquities of India and China. (Medhurst's China, p. 217.) It was also the sign of the Hammer of Thor, by which he smote the great serpent of the Scandinavian mythology. On rather slender evidence S. Baring-Gould attributes its use to the pre-historic lake-dwellers of Switzerland. It was also found, he asserts, combined with certain ichthyic representations in a mosaic floor of pre-Christian date, near Pau in France, in 1850. This example was probably post-Christian.

CHAPTER III.

THE BIBLICAL CYCLE OF THE CATACOMBS.

THE "Circlo Biblico," or Biblical Cycle, of the Catacombs, as De Rossi has called it, partakes of the same symbolical character as their other art-creations. It has, for the most part, a twofold object: first, the literal presentation of certain historical events; and, second, a typical or allegorical reference to the spiritual truths of Christianity, especially to the cardinal doctrines of the sacrifice, resurrection, and ascension of Our Lord. The range of this art cycle comprehends the grand drama of redemption, from the fall of man to his restoration through the greater Man, Christ Jesus; with the careful avoidance, however, of the scenes of the passion, which are nowhere exhibited except under the veil of allegory or symbol. These numerous and varied biblical representations imply a remarkable familiarity of the primitive Christians with the holy scriptures, in striking contrast with the prevalent ignorance of these sacred books in the papal Rome of to-day. Indeed, these storied crypts must have been a grand illustrated gospel, impressing upon the mind of the believer the lessons of holy writ, and probably furnishing to the catechumens of the faith and recent converts from paganism a means of instruction in these sacred themes. The execution may often be coarse, and the drawing uncouth; but to the devout mind this primitive Christian art is invested with a

profounder interest than all the triumphs of genius in the galleries of the Vatican.*

In consequence of its symbolical purpose this hieratic series is rather eclectic than cyclopædic in its character. Of the great variety of available topics, the number selected for art-presentation was comparatively limited; and the artist, in the treatment of these, frequently contented himself with the constant and unvaried reiteration of the same types, which were often of the rudest and most conventional form. The incidents that exemplified the leading doctrines of the faith," says Kugler,t "were chosen in preference to others." Hence the very fixedness of these doctrines imparted somewhat of their own character to the pictorial representations employed.

Subjects from the Old Testament are more numerous in proportion to the whole than would have been anticipated. This is also a result and illustration of the allegorical nature of the series. "Rome," says Lord Lindsay, "seems to have adopted from the first, and steadily adhered to, a system of typical parallelism— of veiling the great incidents of redemption, and the sufferings, faith, and hopes of the church under the parallel and typical events of the patriarchal and Jewish dispensations." We can refer in detail to only the more striking of these biblical scenes.

For

*In the bas reliefs of Chartres Cathedral and in other mediæval churches, a biblical cycle somewhat analogous in character to that of the Catacombs is represented. In the former case the whole drama of time from the creation of the world to the last judgment is set forth in a series of pictures in stone comprising 1,800 figures, often with a touching naiveté and simple grace.

Handbuch der Kunstgeschichte.

History of Christian Art, vol. i, p. 47.