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LIBRARY 1

Theological Seminary, j

PRINCETON, N. J.

C((se
Skid
Boo

DG 807.4 .S324 1873 ^
Scott, Benjamin, 1814-1892.
The contents and teachings
of the catacombs at Rome

Digitized by

the Internet Archive

in 2015

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THE CONTENTS AND TEACHINGS

CATACOMBS AT ROME.

GALLERIES OF THE CATACOMBS.

THE CONTENTS AND TEACHINGS

THE CATACOMBS

ROME:

A VIXDICATIOy OF PURE AJfD PRIMITIVE CHRISTIAN 1 TV, AXD AN EXPOSURE
OF THE CORRrPTIONS OF POPBET, DERIVED FROM! THK

^ejjukhml l^mains of tin (Karlg C^hristian.^
at llomc.

'Now I saw iQ my dream, that at the end of the valley lay bloc J, bones, ashes, and
mangled bodies of men ; . . . . and while I was musing wliat should be the
reason, I espi d a little before me a cave, where two giants. Pope and Pagan.

dwelt.' — JOHK BUNTAN

BENJAMIN SCOTT, i'.R.A.S.,

CHAMBERLAIN OF THE ^CITY OF LONDON, AND HONOEABY SECRETARY O;
THE WORKING iltN's EDUCATIONAL UNION.

LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO
1873.

PlilCE FOUR SEILLIhQS.

DIAGEAMS.

79 Gladiatorial Combats — Bas-reliefs from Pompeii. (The first sub-
ject represents a Bamnite defeated by a Mirmillo. The former
lowers his sword-arm, and implores his life of the people ; his ad-
versary is impatient to despatch him. The second shows a Mirmillo
falling, being mortally wounded by a Saynnite.

Mit^trattbe nf CataromB^ at 2K0me.

Nos.

80. A Galleey, with Tombs — The large grave on the left is a Bisomum,

or Grave for two.

81. Tombs and Slabs.

82. FossORS — Inscriptions relating to. Also, Painting of one with his

Implements, etc.

83. Phonetic Symbols, referring to Names.

84. Symbols referring to Trades and Occupations.

85. The same.

86. RELiaiOTTS Symbols — The Monogram of Christ.

87. Sfndeies — " The Fish Symbol ;" Inscription with the word ixOvs ;

Crown and Palms ; Lamp found in the Jews' Gallery ; Inscrip-
tions with the Jewish Candlestick.

88. Eeligiotts Symbols — Doves; " Heavenward- sailing Ship ;" Anchor.

89. Insceiptions — Christian and Pagan contrasted.

90. Martyrs' Epitaphs— (four).

91. Praying Figures — Bellicia and the Apostle Paul.

92. Painting of Love Feast, also Cups.

93. Pas Eeliees — 1, Noah and Jonah ; 2, Jonah.

94. Fresco Painting— Daniel and the Lions.

95. Bas Eeliees — 1, The Eaising of Lazarus ; 2, Elijah taken up into

Heaven.

96. Eepresentations of " the Good Shepherd."

97. Bas Eeliees — Pilate washing his Hands ; the Three Youths in the

Furnace at Babylon.

98. Petee Denying his Loed, and the Cock Crovs^ing.

99. Paintings — The Miracles of the Loaves and Fishes, and the Water

changed to Wine.

100. Bas Eeliees — Abraham about to sacrifice Isaac ; Moses receiving
the Tables of the Law.

The usual allowance to Subscribers and the Trade.

W. THOENj Depositoey, 28, Pateenostee Eow.

PHEFACE TO FIRST EDITION.

The following pages contain the substance of four
Lectures^ delivered before an audience composed of
working men ; this statement will sufficiently account
for tlieir style. Gratified by the interest excited on their
delivery, encouraged by several partial friends to give
them a more enduring form, influenced by a knowledge
that they were useful to some who heard them, and a
hope that they may yet be serviceable to the class for
whose benefit they were prepared, the writer has (amidst
many distractions, arising from engagements of another
character) committed them to the press.

He will be gratified if they shall in any degree serve
to direct attention to a subject too much overlooked in
this inquiring age — the 'primitive condition of the Divine
institution of Christianity — particularly as exemplified by
the inscriptions and works of early art in the Museums
of Europe. Buried in ponderous and expensive folios,
expressed in either foreign or dead languages, or locked
up in the treasuries of distant antiquarian collections,
the subject was inaccessible to the general reader, until
the publication of the learned and deeply interesting

Vlll

INTRODUCTION.

work of Dr. Charles Maitland, " The Church in the
Catacombs.^^ Of the merits of that work it would be
impertinent in the writer to speak. He may, however,
be permitted to express the deep obligation under which
he lies, as one of the public, for the pleasure and profit
which it has afforded him ; he desires also gratefully to
' acknowledge the facilities which Dr. Maitland has kindty
rendered in the preparation for the press of this little
work, in which the writer has attempted to effect for the
working-classes that which the Doctor has so admirably
accomplished for the reading public in general. In every
case in which '^The Church in the Catacombs^' has been
quoted or referred to, the second edition has been used.

London^ A'prilj 1860.

CONTENTS.

LECTUEE I.

PAGANISil.

" The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty."
Psalm Ixxiv. 20.

The Augustan age — PAaAXiSii, polytheistic — Character of Pagan gods-
Effects of Pagan worship — Paganism sacerdotal — Ceremonial — Impure
— Cruel — Human sacrifices — Burning Children to Moloch — Human
sacrifices in Grreece, Rome, etc. — In the East — Assyrian cruelty —
Human sacrifices among the Hindoos and Chinese — The northern
nations of Europe — Mexico — Africa — South Sea Islands — Origin of
sacrifices — Infanticide in Greece and Eome — Condition of female sex
— In Hindostan — Among the Jews — Polygamy — Widow-burning in
India — Destruction of female children — General depravity — Character
of rulers at Rome — Moral state of the people — Cruel sports — Gladia-
torial combats — Slavery — Bondage among the Jews — Objection an-
swered— Slavery of Greece and Rome— Social and moral condition
recapitulated — Improvement Pages 1 — JG

LECTURE II.

CHEISTIAXITT.

" To give light to them that sit in darkness and the shadow of death." — Luke i. 79.

Pagan gloom and despondency— A deliverer anticipated — " The desire of
all nations" — Arrival of the Messiah — His story — His doctrine —
Cheistianitt — An innovation on Judaism and Paganism — A con-
trast between Paganism and Christianity — Dignity of labour — Chris-
tianity at Rome — Paul's arrival there — Persecution of Christianity
commences — The Catacombs — Construction and origin — Occupied by
Christians — Galleries of described — Lost sight of — Closed — Re-opened
in 16th century— Works on the contents of the Catacombs — Lapidarian
Gallery — Tombs or graves — Pagan and Christian inscriptions con-
trasted— Improvement — Power of pure Christianity— Objections re-
plied to — Slavery as practised by professing Christians — Serfdom in
Russia and Slavery in the L^nited States now abolished— Conclusion

Pages 47—90

CONTENTS.

LECTURE nr.

THE CATACOMBS. ,
" They wandered in dens and caves of the earth." — Hkb. xi, 39.'^

The Early Christians unlearned— Style of inscriptions — Fossors —Symbols
used by Eai'ly Christians — Phonetic symbols — Trade symbols —
Religious symbols — The Monogram — the fish, dove, crown, palm-
branch, etc. — Jews at Rome in time of the Apostle Paul — Jews'
Gallery in Catacombs — Martyrs' graves — Inscriptions upon — Praying
figures —Posture in prayer — Simplicity of Early Christians— Love-
feasts — Conclusion Pages 91 — 113

LECTURE IV.

POPEEY — DEBASED, OE SPUEIOTJS CHEISTIANITY.

"I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured beast having seven heads and ten horns

The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth And the

woman which thou sawest is that gbeat city which reigneth over the kings of the
earth."— Kev. xvii. 3, 9, 18.

Christianity corrupted — Popeet tested by history — By Scripture — By the
contents of Catacombs — Sources of corruptions of Christianity — Sacer-
dotal priesthood — Ministers of religion — Sacrifices and altars — Demon
or spirit worship— Many mediators — Manufactured Martyrs— Manu-
factured saints — Relics — Purgatory — Indulgences — Sale of pardon

Purgatory, a Pagan device — Reading the Scriptures — Fine arts in the
Catacombs— OZ^? Testament history illustrated — Ifew Testament illus-
trated— Christ's miracles recorded — His sufi'erings not depicted— Abuse

of symbolism — Representations of God — Spirit of Christ's religion

Cursing and persecuting — The Inquisition — Spirit of the Christians of

the Catacombs — Recapitulation of argument — Come out of Rome

Objections answered — Improvement . . , Pages 114 — 168

LECTURE 1.

PAGANISM.

" The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of
cruelty." — Psalm Ixxiv. 20.

Thej subject of oiir present course of lectures introduces
us to the period called the Augustan Age.'' This era,
commencing with the reign of Augustus Cassar, born about
63 B.C.J and comprising that of his immediate successors,
was greatly distiuguished for the flourishing state of litera-
ture and learniug, and the successful cultivation of the
fine arts.

•Julius Cassar, the great uucle and predecessor of
Augustus_, had_, by his victorious arms, rendered tributary
to Rome all the surrounding nations ; and the Roman
Empire, on the accession of Augustus, was almost co-
extensive with the known world.

The religion of all these nations, with the single ex-
ception of the Jew^s, consisted of Paganism , in some form
or other, which was also the religion of Imperial Rome.
With her arms she had carried her gods, and promoted
their worship ; or with politic tolerance, had adopted the
gods of other Pagan nations into her Pantheon. Farthest
India, Scythia, Southern Africa, and China, although un-
conquered, and consequently untributary to Rome, were
Pagan also. Notwithstanding the deities worshipped in
these countries differed in name, their attributes and

PAGAN I sir.

characters can be easily identified witli tliose revered in the
Roman Empire.

The Pagan system was polytheistic, that is^ many gods
were worshipped. These deities were generally repre-
sented under some human form^ such as Jupiter, king of
Olympus, and some score of other reprobates, whose
names are doubtless familiar to you — Jupiter, Mar?,
Mercury, Neptune, Bacchus, Yulcan, Juno, Yenus, and
others, presiding over fighting, thieving, lust, debauchery,
and drunkenness, with some few who personified domestic
and civil virtues. These, together with deified kings,
heroes, and freebooters, fi)reign gods, such as Isis of the
Egyptians, and minor divinities or demigods, who pre-
sided specially over certain countries, cities, rivers,
seasons, and groves, made up the list to hundreds, the
lords many and gods many,^' to whom homage was
rendered by the civilized world at the period to which I
allude.

Authors innumerable could be quoted to prove the
number and the wortlilessness of these divinities. One
writer of the period satirically remarks, " it is easier to
find a god than a man.^'* Livy, speaking of Athens, the
chief city of Greece, says it was " full of the images of
gods and men, adorned with every variety of material and
with all the skill of art/^f while another writes, on
every side there are altars, victims, temples, and festi-
vals.''^ J But not only did they worship every god whom
they had invented, but in their feeling after a true God,
^^if haply they might find Him,^^ conscious that there
must be some one more worthy of their regard than the
wortliless creations of their own corrupt imaginings, they

* Petronius, Sat. xvii. f Livy, 45, 27.

X Lucian Prometh., Book i. p. 180.

CHARACTER OF PAGAN GODS.

added to thousands of altars by erecting some to the
Unknown God."

This fact is familiar to you from the statement in
Luke^s Acts of the Apostles/^ which is fully confirmed
by Pagan writers.* The Apostle PauFs spirit " was stirred
within him when he saw the city'^ of Athens ^^full of
idols^' (Acts xvii. 16, margin); and in his address to the
Athenian court of Areopagus, lie tells them, I perceive
that ye are altogether devoted to the worship of the gods,
for as I passed hither and belield your gods that ye
worship, I found an altar with this inscription. To the
Unknown God^^ (Acts xvii. 22, 23). As at Athens so
was it at Eome, the world^s capital, for we are told, on
the authority of Minutius Felix, they build altars to
iinknowm divinities/^

Such, then, was the polytheistic or pantheistic nature
of the Pagan system, and now a few words upon the
character of these gods, and the nature of the worshij)
rendered to them ; and here I must premise that the
subject forbids that I should be explicit. Sufiice it to
remark that there is no crime, however abominable, that
was not imputed to them. In the words of Pope, their
characters may be justly summed up —

*' Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust,
Whose attributes were rage, revenge, and lust."

* Lucian, in his " Philopatris," uses the form of oath, " I swear
hy the Unknoicn God at Athens ;" and again he says (chap. xxix.
180), "we have found out the Unknown God at Athens, and
worshipped him, with our hands stretched up to heaven." Philo-
stratus says (in Yita Apollo, vi. 3), " and this at Athens, where
there are even altars to the unknown gods." Pausanius (in Attic,
cap. 1) says that " at Athens there are altars of gods, which are
called the unknown ones." Diogenes Laertius mentions also these

PAGANISM.

As with the gods, so with the system with which they
were identified, and its effects upon its votaries. I will
judge that system out of the mouths of Pagans themselves.
Aristotle* advises that statues and paintings of the gods
should exhibit no indecent scenes, except in the temples
of such deities as preside over sensuality/^ What must
have been the state of things to render such advice need-
ful, and what the state of mind of an enlightened Pagan
who could justify such an exception ?

Petronius t informs us that temples were frequented,
altars crowned, and prayers offered to the gods, in order
that they might render agreeable unnatural lusts. The
moral Seneca,t revolting at what he witnessed around
him, exclaims, in the sight of such things, How great
is now the madness of men ! they lisp the most abominable
prayers ; and if a man is found listening, they are silent ;
what a man ought not to hear, they do not hlitsh to relate to
ihe gods.'^ Again, ^' if any one considers what things
they do, and to what they subject themselves, instead of
decency, he will Qnd indecency ; instead of the honourable,
the unworthy ; instead of the rational, the insane.'' And
to crown the testimony of Pagans as to the character and
effects of their own system, Plato declares, man has
Slink helow the basest of the brutes.''

Well might the Apostle Paul, in writing to Rome at
the very period to which I refer, paint the fearful picture
contained in his first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans,
which is fully borne out, as we have seen, by the testimony
of Pagan writers. AVell might he attiiljute it all to the

altars, and ascribes their origin to a period of pestilence (riled in
Barnes* Notes, Acts xvii.)

* Politica, vii. 18, ed. Schn'^ider,

t Cited in Thokick's " luilaence of Heatlienlsin."

MOEALITY OF PAGANISM.

system of their religion, and the character of their gods,
that they " changed the glory of the incorruptible God into
an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and
four-footed beasts, and creeping things ; wherefore God
also gave them np to uncleanness through the lusts of their
own hearts/^ And even as they did not like to retain God
in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate
mind, to do those things which are not convenient ; being
filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness,
covetousn^ss, maliciousness ; full of envy, murder, debate,
deceit, malignity ; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God,
deceitful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, dis-
obedient to parents, without understanding, covenant-
breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerci-
ful/^ * What a catalogue ! It would have been sufficient
for me to have quoted it, to have proved my point ; but
as there may be some among you who have not investi-
gated the satisfactory evidence upon which the authen-
ticity of the inspired writings rests, I have thought it
best to place the combined testimony, Pagan and Christ ian,
before you. Let me ask of you the favour that you will, at
your leisure, read attentively the chapter from which I have
quoted ; it will assist you to appreciate a contrast which
I shall have occasion to introduce in a subsequent lecture.

Respecting the character of ancient Pagan idols and
idolatry beyond tlie bounds of the Eoman Empire, we
have not the same amount of information, but sufficient
evidence exists to prove that oriental Paganism was
equally degraded and degrading with that of Greece and
Rome. Unchanged to the present hour, we can study it
by actual observation ; I will only quote one passage
upon this point, from a public document laid before
* Pvum. i. 23, 24,28-31.

PAGANISM.

Parliament by a resident magistrate of Lo^er Bengal.*
Speaking of the Tvorship of tlie goddess Kale^ he says.
The murderer, the robber, and the prostitute, all aim to
propitiate a being whose worship is obscenity, and who
delights in the blood of man and beast, and. without
imploring whose aid no act of wickedness is committed/^
There were, doubtless, exceptions to this rule. Some
few of the gods personified virtues, and some men were
found better than the system w^hicli prevailed ; but these
exceptions w^ere rare indeed, and stand out upon the
records of the times with a lustre the more brilliant in
consecjuence of their infrequency. These men were
virtuous, by reason of spaiks of heavenly light not quite
trampled out of their fallen nature ; they were virtuous
in sjjite of their religious system, and not because of it.
Dionysius of Halicamassus says, There are only a few
who have become masters of philosophy ; on the other
hand, the great and unphilosophic mass are accustomed
to receive these narratives (the lives of the gods) rather
in their worst sense, and to learn one of two things :
either to. despise the gods as beings who wallow in the
grossest licentiousness, or not to restrain then.selves even
from what is most abominable and abandoned, when they
see the gods do the same.'''' f

Such, then, were the gods of Paganism; such the
natural effects of their character upon their votaries.

* H, Oakley, Esq., cited in "Philosophy of Plan of Salvation."

t " It is absolutely impossible to write in detail of the shocking
depravities of the old heathen world. The very rottenness of its
sepulchre vfWl ever most surely guard its own dreadful mystery.
For it is a shame even to speak of those things which were done
of them in secret. The reader need not be told how heavily
charged with all kinds of moral death a religion must have been
whose divinities were lechers, sots, fratricideSj harlots, and pander? ;

HUMAN SACRIFICES.

I would next observe tliat the system of Paganism,
like that of the Jews, was sacerdotal, that is, it was

its temples sacred brothels, the less scandalous alone of which
could be tolerated within the walls of cities (Yitruvius, i. 7) ; its
s^pectacles, the merciless gladiatorial shows, or scenes too impure
for a soldierly Cato to witness ; its processions, those of the
Phallics ; its altars not guiltless of human blood; its festivitie?,
the Bacchanalia, the Saturnalia, the Floralia, the Cotyttia; its
ritual vice, and its ministers of both sexes — but a veil must be
thrown over their too warm devotion to their strictly sacerdotal
functions. In the age of Augustas, marriage was rapidly growing
into disuse, and had to be propped up by liberal bounties from
the state. "Where the tie existed at all, it was for the wife an
indenture of servitude, she was the drudge ; concubines and
courtezans were the friends of her lord. E^'en this is the brighter
side of the picture. There is not one of the odious vices for which
the unclean Canaanites were doomed to extirpation, and the Cities
of the Plain weltered in the fiery storm, which does not soil the
portrait, handed down by history, of full many a ruler, statesman,
poet, and philosopher of classic Greece and Eome. The fretting
leprosy was everywhere. Few, inc'eed, of any rank in society
escaped the plague, and the invention of monstrous pleasures was
studied as a science, and followed as a thriving trade. Cruelty was
as rampant as sensuality. Slavery was universal, and the dread
power of life and death which the law gave to masters was sure to
be no idle prerogative in the hands of men who gloated for days
together over the dying throes of the gladiators."

"The aspirations of a Socrates were not those of the millions.
The masses rather sought to gain the aid of their gods in the
attainment of their, at best, animal and often devilish desires.
They anointed, crowned, and kissed the images in which they saw
and handled the divinities themselves ; they regaled their nostrils
with incense, and their appetites with the quivering limbs and
smoking blood of the victims ; they pledged them in cups of wine,
whirled round them in frantic dances, or gashed themselves with
knives, to coax or tease them to patronize some worldly scheme or
other, even some filthy intrigue or murderous plot. In times of
public calamity, the gods weie dragged forth from the gloom of

PAGANISM.

administered bj a priesthood — among the Pagans male
and female — who stood between the people and their
deities, offered their prayers, performed sacritices, inter-
preted signs and omens, and communicated the will of
the gods, besides exercising certain judicial functions.

The worship consisted in tlio performance of certain
ovtvjard ads or rites ; was, in other words, exclusively
external or ceremonial : of preaching or the inculcation or
teaching of morals, there does not exist a trace.^ The
rites comprised sacrifices, offerings, prayers, burning
incense, pilgrimages to sacred places or shrines, pro-
cessions in honour of the gods, abstinences, mortifications,
penances, observance of festivals, and frequently vicious
practices as above hinted.

These rites were costly, requiring a sacrifice on the
part of those w^ho performed them, according to position
in life, and were suited to bestow more upon the rich
than upon the needy. They were not only sometimes
abominably impure, but oftentimes harharoiij'1 1/ cruel.
Upon the impurity of the ceremonies it is impossible and
unlawful to speak ; nor would the statements be credited
when made, unless the authorities were cited at length.
Suffice it then to say, that whatever Christianity may or
may not have done, one of its effects is apparent ; it has
banished the general knowledge and even the names of
crimes then publicly committed, which not only reflected
no general discredit on those who practised them, but, as

the temples and laid on couches in the streets, that they might the
better see, and be moved bj the tears of the whole population.
IVorship was mavipidation, arid prayer an exercise of the lungs, not
o f the heart." — " The Free Church of Ancient Christendom," by
Basil H. Cooper, B.A., pp. 31, 32, 20.

* Vide Dr. Smith'd " Dictionary of Antiquities," article Su-
rerdos.

HUMAN SACRIFICES.

forming part of tlieir religious rites^ were in some cases
obligatory^ and in others accounted honourable and meri-
torious. It is a mercy the languages are dead in which
such thiugs are written ; but assuredly we do not well to
forget the lessons which they teach.

I said the Pao-an rites were often barbarously criicJ.
I referred chiefly to the practice of offering human sacri-
fices, which practice, so far as history has brought intelli-
gence down to us, appears to have been universal. It is
not known when this abomination was first introduced,
but it was certainly very early in the world's history ; the
Canaanites, more than 3300 years since, certainly prac-
tised it, offering their offspring to the idols of Canaan, to
Moloch especially.* It was evidently one of the crimes
assigned by the Almighty as the reason for the destruction
of that people : " Thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass

through the fire to Moloch For all these

abominations have the men of the land done, which
were before you, and the land is defiled; that the
land spue not you out also, Avhen ye defile it, as it
spued out the nations that were before you^^ (Lev. xviii.
21, 27, 28).

It may be needful to explain to some of you, that the
expression in our Bibles, to pass seed tlirougli the fire
to Moloch,^^ means to burn children to that divinity ; f
upon this point no doubt exists. Moloch, Molec, Malcom,
or Milcom, as he is variously called, was the planet
Saturn deified^ and his worship existed chiefly among the
Canaanites, Ammonites, Carthaginians, and Phoenicians.
He was represented by a statue of brass, under the form

* Deut. xviii. 9, 10.

t Compare Di ub. xii. 31, xviii. 10 ; 2 Kings xvi. 3, etc, with Ps.
cvi. 38; Jer. vii. 31, xix. 5; Ezek. xvi. 20, 21.

PAGANISM.

of a human being witli tlie head of a bull ; the arms of
the figure being extended forward_, but declining towards
the earth ; children were placed by their fathers in the
hands of the idol, and falling thence into a furnace
were burned to death; drums and trumpets drown-
ing their cries. Sometimes the idol was hollow, and
heated to redness by fire placed within, in which
case the child was burned by the heated hand of the
figure. [ 74. ]

In spite of the strongest prohibitions of this crime by
the Almighty, it was occasionally resorted to by the
Jewish kings and people, especially in the reigns of
Ahaz and Manasseh. The idol was erected in the valley
south of Jerusalem called IJinnom, but termed, in con-
sequence of the practice of this abomination, Tophef, or
Drums, in reference to the drums beat to drown the cries
of the innocent victims.* The place became, conse-
quently, so abhorrent to the more recent Jews that they
applied its name, Ge-hinnom, or Gehenna, to the place of
punishment in a future life. So that, in the estimation of
these Jews, it only required the practice of Pagan abomi-
nations to constitute a hell upon earth. t

And novv let us pause for a minute while I extract a
lesson, in passing, from this Pagan superstition. I see
fathers and mothers present. I am a parent myself.
What think you, fathers, what say you, mothers,
could you bring yourselves to offer'^your children to
Moloch if you were living in Pagan times, and were
unvisited with the light of Christianity, received or
reflected ?

* 2 Kings xxiii. 10 ; Isa. xxx. 33 ; Jer. vii. 31, 32, xix. 4—14.
t Diodorus Sic, xx. 24; Easebius Pr^p. Evaog., iv. c. 16;
Juhn's Bib. Antiq , ar t. 410.

HUMAN SACRIFICES.

" A thousand voices answer ' ISTo ! *
Ye clasp your babes and kiss ;
Your bosoms yearn, your tears o'erflow,

Yet ah ! — remember this :
The infant trained alone for earth
May live, may die, to curse its birth ;
Is this a mother's love ?

" A parent's love may prove a snare ;
The child she loved so well,
Her hand may lead with gentlest care

Down the smooth road to hell ;
Nourish its frame, destroy its mind
Thus do the blind mislead the blind,
E'en with a mother's love."

The application will be apparent to you — the idolater of
old brought his child to the flames, and after a few
minutes of suffering_, its spirit winged its flight to the
presence of its God. Fear not/^ says the Saviour,
"those that kill the body, and after that have no more
that they can do.''^ If we, by our neglect, by our counsel,
or (what is more influential than either) by our example,
destroy the souls of the children committed to us^ how
will the comparison stand between ourselves and the
ignorant and inhuman votaries of Moloch, in that day,
when all alike, whatever their advantages or their disad-
vantages, must render an account of their stewardship ?

But I pass from this digression to consider further the
practice of offering human sacrifices. And first among
the civilized and philosophic Greeks. Agamemnon, king
of Mycene, offered up his daughter Iphigenia to obtain
a favourable wind to cross a sea not wider than the British
Channel, and a human sacrifice was offered again on his
return. The Athenians and Massalians annually offered
a man to Neptune. Menelaus, king of Sparta, being

PAGANISM.

detained by contrary winds^, offered up two Egyptian
cliildren. Histor}^ allows it to transpire, tliat many of
the Grecian states offered linman victims previously to
undertaking an expedition or a war. At Eliodes, a man
was offered to Chronos (agreeing witli Molocli) on tke
6tli of July, annually ; at Salamis, a man was offered in
March, annually ; at Chios and Tenedos, a human victim
was annually torn in pieces. Erecthens sacrificed, in
Attica, his daughter ; Aristides sacrificed three nephews
of the king ^f Persia; Tliemistocles sacrificed several
noble persons. These men were not savages, bear in
mind, but accounted wise, just, and benevolent in their
day. In Thessaly, human sacrifices were offered ; the
Pelasgians, in a time of scarcity, offered a tenth of their
rJiildren ; in the Crimea, and among the Taurians, everij
stranger shipwrecked, instead of receiving the rights of
hospitality, was sacrificed to Diana ; her temple in Aricia
was always served by a priest who had murdered his
predecessor, and the Lacedemonians yearly offered her
human victims, until the time of Lycurgus, who changed
the custom into the sacrifice of flagellation, but boys
were often whipped to death.

And to pass from the Greeks and their neighbours to
Imperial Home; histor}^ incidentally acquaints us witli
the fact that although probably less frequent, yet human
sacrifices existed, and may be traced for many centuries.
It was a custom to sacrifice annually thirty men, b}'
throwing them into the Tiber, to obtain prosperity for
the city. Livy mentions that two men and two women
were buried alive to avert public calamities. Plutarch
relates a similar sacrifice ; and Caius Marius offered his
daughter Calpurnia to ensure success in an expedition
against the Cimbri. It is true a law was passed (b.c. 96)

HUMAN SACEIFICi:?.

to put a stop to the practice, but this only proves that
the custom existed. Besides which, the Pagan priest was
oftentimes stronger than the civil magistrate, and the
custom was not abolished although the law was promul-
gated, for numerous instances are mentioned, even as late
as A.D. 300, nearly 400 years after the passing of the
law.*

From Greece and Eome let us proceed to other nations
of a"ntiquity, and inquire what in this respect were the
practices of Paganism.

Among the Tyrians the king frequentl}" offered his
son to procure prosperity ; that this was the custom also
among the Moabites, we gather from Scripture. In
2 Kings iii. 27, we read, on the occasion of the defeat of
the king of Moab by the combined armies of Judah and
Israel, " then he (king Mesha) took his eldest son, that
should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a
burnt-offering on the wall."" In New Testament times,
Pilate mingled the blood of certain Galileans with his
sacrifices. The Carthaginians followed the practice most
extensively. On extraordinary occasions, multitudes of
human victims were offered ; thus, during a battle between
the Sicilians and Carthaginians under Amilcai-, the latter
remained in the camp offering sacrifices to the deities of
his country, and consuming upon one large pile the bodies
of numerous victims. f Again, when Agatliocles was
about to besiege Carthage, its inhabitants, fearing that
their misfortunes were attributable to the anger of Saturn,
because- they had offered him children of slaves and

* Yide Miihleisen's " Genuine and Spurious Rehgion," vol. ii.
chap. iv. ; and Home's " Introduction to the Scriptures," voL i.
chap, i., notes.

t Herod., lib. vii. c. 167.

PAGANISM.

foreigners only, instead of noble children, sacrificed two
hundred children of the best famiHes to propitiate the
offended deity, and three hundred citizens voluntary
immolated themselves on the same occasion.* On another
occasion, to celebrate a victory, the same people immo-
lated all the handsomest of their captives, and the flame
of the pile was so great that their camp was burned. t
TertuUian, a Christian writer, says, that human sacrifices
were common in Arcadia and at Carthage in his own day,
even so recently as the third century of the Christian era.

And now to glance at the East. In Egypt, human
victims were offered, and their ashes scattered over the
land to procure fertility ; red-haired men were selected.
During the dynasty of the Hyksos, Manetho states, three
were sacrificed daily, that is, over 1000 in a year; among
the Persians we learn, incidentally, that the same practice
prevailed. On the occasion of Annestris, the wife of
Xerxes, reaching the age of fifty, fourteen children were
buried alive as a thank-offering to the gods. J With respect
to the Assyrians, we do not possess as yet sufficient infor-
mation as to their mythology to say with certainty that
human sacrifices formed a part of their religious system ;
but the recent discoveries on the site of Nineveh, and the
recovery of the written Assyrian language, by the exertions
of Colonel Eawlinson, disclose the fact that gods were wor-
shipped, to whom, in other countries, human victims

* Diodorus Sic, xx. c. 14.
t lb. XX. c 65.

J Besides the authorities already cited, numerous testimonies,
drawn from classic authors, may be found in Harwood's " Intro-
duction to the New Testament," Bryant's "Analysis of Antient
Mythology," and Dr. Leland's " Advantage and ]S"ecessity of the
Christian Eevelation."

172

ASSYRIAN CRUELTY. TONGUES TORN OUT. &C.

175

ASSYRIAN CRUELTY. EYES PUT OU-T 8< c .

HUMAN SACRIFICES.

were offered.* That the Assyrians formed no exception
to the rule as regards the cruelty of Paganism, is evident,
as representations of flaying alive and other atrocious acts
pf cruelt}^, form part of the decorations of their royal
palaces. [172 and 175.]

With regard to the Hindoos and Chinese, it will be
more satisfactory to quote their existing or recent practices,
as few of their ancient writings have come down to us.
Of the Hindoos, even under European sway, we find it
recorded in official documents — the public registers of
Bengal — that in the matter of widow-burning alone, be-
tween the years 1815 and 182 1, that is in about ten years,
5997 widows were burned alive; and the cruelty is still
practised in parts beyond the influence of British rule.
Drowning and burying alive are also common. Among
the Chinese^ children are, in Tunquin, sacrificed by cutting
in two or by poison ; and in Laos^ on founding a temple,
the work is cemented by the blood of the first stranger
who passes. Children are also thrown into the rivers_, as
sacrifices to the water.

To come nearer home, let us inquire concerning the
practice among the Pagans of northern Europe. Materials
are scarce from which to ascertain facts, but from these
abundant evidence of the practice, in all its malignity,
may be eh cited. Harold, the Saxon king, slew two of
his sons in order to obtain a storm to wreck the fleet of
the Danes. In Russia, as late as the tenth century, a
man was chosen by lot and sacrificed to appease the anger

* Kawlinson's " Outlines of History of As^^yria." The same
researches disclose ihat the worship of the goddess Milytta pre-
vailed, whose rites consisted of revolting obscenity. The same
remark applies to Babylon.

PAGAN IS il.

of tlie gods. In Zealand, ninety-nine persons were annu-
ally sacrificed to the god Swan-to-wite ; in Denmark, the
same number of men, horses, cocks, and hawks. The
Scandinavians sacrificed every captive to Odin. The
Slavonian priests not only slew human victims, but drank
their blood. The mode of destroying life differed, but the
principle was the same, and appears to have been universal.
The Galli killed with the stroke of an axe, so administered
as not to deprive immediately of life, but to obtain con-
vulsions in the victim by means of which omens could
be obtained ; the Celts laid their victims on an altar, and
opened the breast with a sword ; the Cimbri ripped up
the bowels ; the Norwegians knocked out the brains with
the yoke of an ox ; the Icelanders pierced the victim with
arrows. In Britain, a wicker figure in the human form
was filled with victims and burned.* [75.]

The details are not only revolting but, I fear, weari-
some. I cannot, however, consider this part of the
subject complete without glancing at countries which may
be classed with, those of antiquity, notwithstanding almost
nothing is known of their ancient history, for their
religion is now, or was until very recently, in every sense
Pagan, and it is safe to conclude ][t was the same at the
period to which I more particularly^refer. I allude
chiefly to the continents of America, Africa, and tho
islands of the Pacific. In Mexico, the crime of sacri-
ficing human victims appears to have reached its utmost
development; no author estimates the number of tho
victims annually at less than 20,000, and some carry
the number as high as 50,000. On great occasions the
number slaughtered became really appalling. At the
dedication of th.e great temple Huitzilo-polchh, in the
* Miihleisen, vol. ii. chap. 4.

HUMAN SACKIFICES.

year 1 186, the prisoners, who had been long reserved for
the purpose, ranged iu files, formed a procession nearly
two miles in length ; the ceremony lasted several days,
and 70,000 are said to have perished. The companions
of Cortez, the conqueror of Mexico, counted 136,000
skulls at one of their temples. When Montezuma, the
last emperor of Mexico, was asked why he had suffered
the republic of Tlascala to maintain her independence, he
replied, '-That she might furnish me with victims for the
gods."*^* On the occasions of seasons of drought, to pro-
pitiate Theloc, the god of rain, children were sacrificed,
dressed in fine robes, decked with the early blossoms of
the spring. As they were carried along in litters to the
place of slaughter, writers state that the cries of these
innocents would have moved the hardest hearts. Not so !
they could not affect the hard hearts of the Pagan priests,
w^ho, like the votaries of Moloch, drowned their cries with
noisy music and chanting. To crown the picture, these
innocent victims were generally bought by the priests from
their po 07' parents ; and parents were found to sell their
offspring. This was also the case with ancient Paganism. t
Witlioid natural affections'* is indeed the true verdict of
the inspired Apostle before referred to. But I must be brief
in my remaining review of Pagan cruelty. The Fantih,
and many other tribes of Africa, offer human sacrifices
every new moon. In Ashantee, the worship of sharks
and snakes is accompanied by human sacrifices in their
most appalling forms. J The late king of Ashantee gave
directions for the slaughter of 6000 slaves at his funeral,
which hideous testament was put in execution. In every
* Prescott's " Conquest of Mexico."

t Miihleisen's " Genuine and Spurious Eeligion," vol. ii. p. 299.
X Hutchinson's " Western Africa."

PAGANISM.

discovered island of the Pacific the practice was found to
prevail. At Otaheite^ appalling numbers were slaughtered:
the eye of the victim being first taken out to present to
the king. At the Marquesas Islands^ among the inhabi-
tants of Palliser's and Harvey Islands, and of New
Zealand_, they not only sacrificed their enemies, hut
devoui^ed them.

It forms no part of my plan in this course of lectures
to enter upon the inquiry, how the offering of sacrifices,
and particularly human sacrifices, became universal.
Suffice it to remark, in passing, that there is scarcely any
practice of Paganism but may be traced to some founda-
tion of truth. Thus sacrifices, whether oflfered by the
Jews or the Pagans, recognized three great truths : firstly,
that man had offended his God ; secondly, that some
atonement must be offered, or recompense made to satisfy
offended law; and, thirdly, that a vicarious atonement
would suffice, that is, an innocent victim would be
accepted in the place of the sinner himself. These ideas
appear to have existed universally ; there is hardly a
corner of the world in which they cannot be traced. They
doubtless originated in the Divine communication made
to man, in the earliest state of his existence, as to the
method which had been devised for effecting reconciliation
between fallen man and his offended Maker. The truth
became corrupted, but conscience, by arousing incessantly
man's guilty fears, prevented its being entirely lost.
Feeling his need of a costly offering, and losing sight of
the most costly of all offerings vvbi jh God had engaged
to provide, man sought in the sacrifice of human life,
which all value so highly, to provide an offering adequate
to his guilt ; and thus arose a practice of sacrificing " the

INFANTICIDE.

fruit of tlie body fur the sin of the soul/^ It is not, how-
ever, the origin of Pagan ideas, but the state of the
Pagan world which is the subject of our lecture.

I must now iuquire, very briefly, if such were the re-
ligious rites, what was the social and moral condition of
Pagans at the period under review ?

The voice of history, fairly listened to, making all
allowances for poetical hyperbole and philosophical mis-
representations, asserts most unequivocally that the social
condition of the people was wretched and degraded in
the extreme.

Infanticide, the practice of destroying young children,
prevailed almost as universally as those practices to which
I have just alluded. Not in barbarous countries only,
where it is still prevalent, such as India and China, and
among some of the American tribes — where the digging
of the grave by the mother precedes the birth of her
child — but I refer again to polished Greece and civilized
Rome.

Among the Athenians and Gauls, the laws authorized
parents to destroy their children. At Sparta, the laws'
of Lycurgus required the father to bring the child before
an examining committee, and if found deformed or weakly,
it was cast into a deep cavern near Mount Taygetus.
Aristotle says, " it is necessary to expose (that is, to leave
to perish) weak and sickly children, to prevent too rapid
an increase of citizens.''^ Plato, in his ^' Model Republic/'
provides that children likely to prove weakly should not
see the light. So at Rome, the laws of Romulus gave
parents authority to put their children to death. Erixo
and Arius, Roman citizens, each flogged his son until he

PAGANIS^r.

expired.* Tertullian affirms ^'^ tliey exposed their sons,
drowned them^ or allowed them to perish by famine or by
dogs/' Cicero and Seneca both speak of the practice
incidentally but treat it as a matter of course, without
censure or even without comment. Terence describes one
Chromes as " a man of universal benevolence/' but never-
theless represents him as commanding his wife to expose
her new-born infant, and flying into a passion with her
for committing the painful and unnatural duty to another.f

* Seneca, de Clem., i., 4, 15.

t Yide Miihleisen, ii. chap. 4 ; also a paper in the " Leisure
Hour," No. 8, 1852.

Child murder, particularly female infanticide, is thus referred
to by a modern writer, Thomas Bacon, Esq., F.S. A., author of "Fir.^t
Impressions and Studies from Nature in Hindustan," in a paper
on Benares, in the "Oriental Annual," 1839, pp. 92—94:—
" The revoltinor crime of infanticide was at one time carried to a
great height in Benares and the adjacent districts; and there cnti
be little doubt, by the account of the Mussulmans, that it is still
occasionally practised, in defiance of the active measures for its

prevention adopted by the Government The great

supporters of this iniquitous practice were formerly the B,r,jh-
•poots, the Rajhkomars, and the Ra.jhvansis, among whom a sintjle
female infant was never permitted to exist ; nor did they consider
their destruction as an act of sin or cruelty, though I am unable
to believe, as many have affirmed, that they regard the sacrifice as
an acceptable offering to the gods. It appears rather to have
originated in convenience, on account of the ruinous expense
attending their marriage, and to have been practised without fear
of offence to the deities, for their belief is, that the souls of those
daughters who were thus destroyed were eventually returned to
them in the persons of sons; and when this did not appear to be
borne out by the birth of a male child, it only followed that Siva
was displeased, and conciliation was resorted to, until a son should
really be born to them. In these cases it was usual to seek pro-
pitiation by placing the next female infant in the hands of the

INFANTICIDE.

I cannot leave this subject without quoting the testimony
of a vn-iter^ which will be the more valuable,, as he strove
to paint heathenism in bright colours at the expense of
Christianity. Gibbon writes thus : The exposure of
children was the stuhhorn and ijrevailing vice of antiq^idfy ;
it was sometimes prescribed, often permitted, almost
always practised with impunity, even by nations who

Brahmin?, to be solemnly sacrificed in the temple of the Genesa,
whereby that god might be moved to compassion for the babe and
be induced to intercede with Siva for the future birth of male
children to the parents. It is easy to perceive -whence this delu-
sion had its commencement, since a handsome douceur to the
immolating priests was an indispensable part of the ceremony,
which in all respects differed from the method of destruction pri-
vately used. In the latter place the operation was performed with
very little former expense, by what the Hindoos call drinldng ndlk.
So sooner had the sex of the infant been ascertained, than a caldron
of warm milk was brought into the apartment where the mothei
lay, and after prayers for the child's return in the form of a son,
the little innocent was immersed in the milk, and held down until
life became extinct, and then it was carried to the Ganges and
thrown into the stream. When, however, the deed was committed
to the Brahmins to be executed by way of sacrifice to Genesa, the
poor babe was carried to the temple, and, being laid upon its back,
was, after certain diabolical ceremonies, destroyed by the club of
the inhuman /a/j/r." [76.]

The Eev. T. H. Home, in his admirable and learned work,
" Introduction to the Study of the Holy Scriptures," states that
'* not fewer than ten thousand children are computed tj be thus
murdered (i.e., by abortion or after birth), in the single province of
Bmgal, every month" (vol. i. p. 18). Speaking of China, he says :
" Polygamy universally prevails, as also the cruel practice of ex-
posing infants to perish ; not fewer than nine thousand of whom
are computed to be annually destroyed at Pekin, and the same
number in the rest of the empire" (vol, i. p. 19). See authorities
referred to in that work for these statements.

PAGANIS^kl.

never entertained tlie Roman ideas of paternal power;
and the dramatic poets^ who appeal to the human heart,
represent with indifference a popular custom which was
palliated by the motives of economy and compassion."

Let us next inquire what was the social condition of
the femcde sex.

* Gibbon, in his "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," thus
writes of the condition of children under the Roman laws: — "In
his father's house he (the son) was a mere thing ; confounded by
the laws with the moveables, the cattle, and the slaves, whom the
capricious master might alienate or destroy, without being re-
sponsible to any earthly tribunal (chap. xUv. p. 367). According to
his discretion, a father might chastise the real or imaginary faults
of his children by stripes, by imprisonment, by exile, by sending
them to work in chains among the meanest of his servants. The
majesty of the parent was armed with the power of life and death,
and the examples of such bloody executions, which are sometimes
praised and never j^umshed, may be traced in the annals of Rome
beyond the times of Pompey and Augustus" (chap. xliv. p. 368).
Such is the testimony of an enemy to Christianity to the cruelty
of Paganism ; now mark his undesigned testimony to the amelio-
rating and humanizing nature of Christianity in these respects : —
"The Roman Empire was stained ivith the blood of infants, till
such murders were included by Valentinian and his colleagues in
the letter and spirit of the Cornelian Law" (chap, xliv, p. 371).
This was about the year a.d. 438, after the triumph of Christianity,
temp. Valentinian III.

An illustration of the treatment of children, at the height of
Rome's civilization, may be found in the case of the execution of
Sejanus, ^ew2J. Tiberius. His children, a boy and girl, too joung
to partake of his guilt, were condemned to death with him. The
girl, with infantine simplicity, asked what she had done, and pro-
mised never to do it again, but neither youth, sex, nor innocence
could shield her; in compliance with a vile custom, she was first
ravished, then put to death. The bodies of both children, being
dragged through the streets, were cast itito the Tiber. — See
Ferguson's " Roman Republic," vol. v. p. 35L

CONDITION OF WOMEN.

"Woman was everywhere considered as inferior to man.
In Hindostan, in China [ 76 ], and in the South Seas,
female infants are still destroyed for this reason. In
northern Bengal, /emaZe infants are suspended in baskets
to the branches of trees, and perish by ants, flifes, and
birds of prey. So much for the female sex in infancy ;
but in after years, if she survived, woman was degraded
to the lowest level. Aristotle writes, Women are a
kind of monsters — the beginning of degeneracy of our
nature.^^

Polygamy, that is, the practice of having many wives
at the same time, although forbidden by the laws of some
countries, was nevertheless universally prevalent. I need
not point out to you that this practice is evidently con-
trary to nature, which provides an almost absolute equality
of the sexes. Neither need I say that it is a practice
peculiarly degrading to woman, treating her as if she
were incapable of the affectionate attachment which so
distinguishes her sex ; affording her no opportunity of
centering her affections upon one object, furnishing her,
at best, with a divided heart.

Woman was defined by the laws of Rome, not as a
person hut as a thing, and if the title to her were wanting,
she could be claimed like other moveables * She was
treated as the slave of man, not his helpmate, companion,
and best friend ; was bought, sold, exchanged, betrothed,
married, divorced, and separated from her children, with-
out consent, often without mercy, as suited the caprice of
her master — I cannot term him her husband ; who could
lawfully put her to death, even for sipping his wine or
using his keys.f

* Gibbon's " Dedine and Fall," chap. 44, p. 373.
f Plin. Kat. Hist., xiv. 14; Plutarch, p. 57-

PAGANISM.

It may not be unprofitable to listen to the living testi-
mony of one who has witnessed the condition of woman
under the influence of modern Paganism.* ^' Truly/^ he
says, '^''the life of an Indian female, from the cradle
to the' grave, is one of misery. Have we not heard
the melancholy tale of the little one betrothed in early
childhood to one who feels no interest in her, and
on whom she looks only with awe ; from her wedding-day
compelled to live a poor, down-hearted, abject slave ; wait-
ing on her lord in silent and submissive servitude, perform-
ing every menial office without one syllable of thanks
or comfort; and on that awful day when death removes
her tyrant, compelled to hum with him, a living holocaust,
or to sit down beside him in the toinh whilst the earth
covers them ahoue.-f [77.]

^^Or, again : have we not heard of India's daughters
in the south, casting aside the feelings and tenderness of
womanhood, and acting the Pey-adi in their demon-
worship, with all its horrible accompaniments, drinldng
the life-blood of the slavghtered victim even to intoxication,
and whirling round in her unnatural frenzy till she sinks
exhausted on the ground — herself the victim of her own

* Dr. Yidal's Sermon for the Society for Promoting Female
Education in the East.

t " Between the years 1815 — 1820 there came under the notice
of the Bengal Government the cases of no less than 62 girls under
the age of eighteen, who were thus cruelly destroyed. The ages
of these poor girls were as follows :— 14 were seventeen years old;
1 was sixteen and a half years ; 22 were sixteen years ; 6 were
fifteen years ; 2 were fourteen years ; 2 were thirteen years ; 10
were twelve years ; 1 was ten years ; 3 were only eight years of
age." ("The Pioneers, or Early Christian Missionaries of
Bengal." G. Gogerly.) This barbarous custom of Suttee was
abolished by Lord William Beutinck in 1830.

HINDOO

suttee:.

CONDITION OF WOMEN.

wild and terrible imaginiDgs and of that evil spirit to
wbicli she has .devoted herself? When questioned as to
the prospect of her soul^ her vacant answer is^ ^ My soul^
my mother? What soul have I? I am a woman; no, my
mother^ no ; I am hut a tooman.'

Once more : let us direct our eyes more eastward, to
the teemino- multitudes of China, that land of dwarfed
and stunted promise ; how is it with the female there ?
Oh ! what a tale of woe does that single fact reveal, which
meets us on the very threshold_, which stares us in the
face the moment we set foot upon her shores ; I mean the
prevalence of horrible infanticide, by which the female
infant is consigned to death as soon as born, murdered
without compunction, as the almost unavoidable necessity
attaching to its sex. Where it is accounted a disgrace and
a misfortune to he the father of a Jemcde child — where two
such children out of every four fail victims to this terrible
delusion, what can we expect with reference to the lot of
the survivors ? Thus debased, despised, counted unfit to
live, a disgrace and reproach to the family of which she
ought to be the ornament and honour, the Chinese female
may be well described as joining her lament to those of
her Mahometan and Indian sisters. ' Is it nothing: to
you, all ye that pass by ? Behold, and see if there be
any sorrow like unto my sorrow^ which is done unto
me.'^^

I could weary you with tales of cruelty and of blood-
shed, arising from the Pagan view of the social position
of woman. But enough has been said, I trust, to satisfy
you that woman, at least, has been a gainer wherever she
has escaped from the influence of Paganism. But yjou
may imagine that, as I have dwelt upon the misery of
childhood and womanhood under Paganism, I have little

PAGANISM.

to say concerning tlie social and moral condition of society
ganerally.

In every picture tliere are points which first arrest our
attention, from the strength with which they stand out
from the canvas. It is so with regard to the picture
which history and literature have left of the times when
Paganism was everywhere triumphant. As we begin to
read, we are struck by isolated acts of cruelty or injustice
towards certain classes, and particularly towards the help-
less ; continuing to peruse and to reflect, we are im-
pressed with the general depravity, misery, and degrada-
tion of the whole of society, from the emperor to the
slave j and reasoning upon the matter, we arrive at the
certain conclusion that, had not all ranks and classes- and
both sexes been alike degraded, a loud, indignant protest
from some class must have been heard rising above the wails
of misery and the frenzied shouts of their bacchanalian
orgies.

But you will require something in the shape of facts,
to enable you to come to a verdict upon this statement.
I will furnish you with a few illustrations, gathered from a
field which would yield a plentiful crop of like baneful testi-
monies ; first, referring to the rulers and governors, then
to the common people or freemen, and, lastly to the slaves.

The histories of the lives of the Roman emperors, their
families, and connections, with few and therefore re-
markable exceptions, exhibit all the vices of which fallen
nature is capable ; could their biography be written in
the Newgate Calendar of our day, it would blacken its
pages. As these emperors were frequently raised to the
imperial purple by the voice of popular election, or that
voice ratified and confirmed their appointment, it will be

CHARACTEE OF RULERS.

obvious that they reflect tlie social condition of tlie masses
who assisted them to rank and dignity. Not to appear
invidious in making a selection, I will briefly enumerate
the crimes attributed to a few of the first and greatest of
the Caesars.

Julius CgesaTj the successful soldier and talented
general_, slew in war^ mostly waged for the advancement
of himself and the gratification of his inordinate ambition,
upwards of eleven hundred thousand me?i,* and corrupted,
according to the statement of a talented Frenchman who
has reviewed his life, one half of the ladies of rank and
influence at Eome. " Ctesar,''^ says he, " who destroyed
the agents of his crimes if they failed in address ; Csesar,

the husband of every wife, has

been accounted a great man by the mob of writers ; the
talents of this singular man, and the good fortune which
constantly attended him till the moment of his assassina-
tion, have concealed the enormity of his actions. t

Augustus, one of the best of the emperors, was guilty
of heartless adultery and gross licentiousness ; his only
daughter, Julia, became infamous for her abandoned con-
duct, for which she was banished by her father, to the
influence of whose example her corrupt actions must be
attributed.

Tiberius, who succeeded Augustus, was a monster of
cruelty, intemperance, and debauchery. " Not only his
relations and friends, but the great and opulent were
sacrificed to his ambition, cruelty, and avarice ; and there
was scarcely in Rome one single family that did not re-
proach him for the loss of a brother, a father, or a
husband. He at last retired to the island of Caprese, on

* Piatt's "Universal Biography," vol. i. p. 651.
t M. Ophellot, " Melanges Philosophiques."

PAGANISM.

the coast of Campania, where he buried himself in un-
lawful pleasures. In his solitary retreat he proposed
rewards to such as invented new pleasures, or could pro-
duce luxuries. He disgraced himself by the most un-
natural vices and enormous indulgences, which can draw
a blush even upon the countenance of the most de-
bauched and abandoned."^ His intemperance was such,
that it was wittily observed by Seneca, "that he was
never intoxicated but once in his life, for he continued in
a perpetual state of drunkenness from the time he gave
himself up to drinking until the last moment of his exis-
tence/^

Yet Tiberius, with his predecessors Juhus and
Augustus, and many of their successors, were, after
death, rui.sed to tlte vanh of god^, and icorsldp^ed as
dicinities at Rome. If such were thy gods, Eoman citi-
zens, what must have been the condition of yourselves ?

Caligula, next in succession, committed the most atro-
cious acts of impiety, cruelty, and folly. He began his
career of wickedness by murdering several of his rela-
tions, senators, and people of rank. He openly married
his own sister Drusilla, and on her death caused divine
honours to be paid in temples built to her. For his
favourite horse he erected a palace, with a marble stable
and ivory rack, and fed him with gilt^ barley out of a
golden cup. He introduced his said horse to the temple
in the vestments of the priest of Jupiter, and caused
sacrifices to be offered to himself, his wife, and his steed.
He married several wives, whom he pat away one after
another. Cruelty became in him an inordinate habit ; he
gave directions for a murder on one occasion, in these

* Piatt's "Universal Biography," vol. i. pp. 709—711.

CnARACTER OF EULERS.

words^ Strike in such a manner that he mm/ feel hlmseif
die.^^ On another occasion he exclaimed^ Would to
heaven that the Eoman people had but one head, that it
might be struck off at a blow He seems, as Seneca
observe?^ to have been brought forth by nature for the
express purpose of showing how much mischief could be
effected by the greatest depravity^ supported by the
highest power.

Claudius^ apparently by nature of a weak and inoffen-
sive turn of mind, commenced his reign so as, in some
degree^ to i*edeem the character of his chiss, and to win
the respect of the Eoman people ; but his wife Messalina
supplies us with an illustration of the social and moral
condition of the high-born at that period^ which
might be considered as wanting in the person of the
emperor. Her name has become infamous in relation to
all that is abandoned in her sex ; she was no less noto-
rious for cruelty, which her influence over the emperor
enabled her to perpetrate in his name. It would be
tedious to enumerate all her acts, suffice it to state the
members of his own family whose deaths she procured :
Appius Silanus, who married the emperor's mother-in-
law, Silanus and Pompey, his sons-in-law, and his two
nieces, the Livias. Suetonius, also informs us, tliat thirty-
five senators and above three hundred kuights were
executed by Claudius. The most extraordinary event in
his reign was the puhlic i.iarriaqe of Messalina, the
empress, to a young noble named Silius, during the
temporary absence of the emperor at the sea- coast. That
abandoned woman, not content with the most undis-
guised display of her fondness for her paramour, had

* Piatt's " Universal Biography,'' vol. ii. p. 10.

PAGANISM.

resolved to show lier contempt for all ordinary decency
by this step ; they were married in sight of the whole
city, with all the accustomed nuptial ceremonies. What
must have been the moral condition of the people who
couldj complacently and without excitement to riot, wit-
ness such conduct in high places ? Messalina having
been put to death, the emperor married his niece, who
endeavoured to emulate Messalina's conduct, and even-
tually poisoned her imperial husband.*

Nero succeeded Claudius, and most appropriately closes
my catalogue. He appears to have attained an eminence
in all that is disgraceful to human nature, which has
never been surpassed. He frequented, nightly, in dis-
guise, all the scenes of debauchery which Rome contained,
acted publicly at the theatre, contended in a state of
nudity at the public games, and before the assembled
people displayed the most abominable conduct which it is
possible to conceive, and is impossible to describe. He
caused Rome to be set on fire in different places, and
during several days enjoyed the dreadful scene to which
his atrocious barbarity had given rise, playing upon a
lyre on the top of his palace, and singing the destruction
of Troy. To crown all, this monster having failed in a
deliberately -planned scheme for drowning his own mother,
caused her to be assassinated.f

Such were the first emperors of Rome ; were I to
continue the scrutiny further it would but weary and
disgust, and the result would be generally the same.
Although a Titus, a Nerva, or a Trajan happily arise at
intervals to vary the history, yet a Domitian, insisting

* Piatt's "Universal Biography," vol. ii. p. 4.
t Piatt's "Universal Biography," vol. i. p. 717, etc.; vol. ii.
pp. 10—12.

CHARACTER OF RULERS.

npon being styled God/^ but addicted to incest and
killing flies ; a Commodus, wbo dishonoured all liis sisters^
and cut off the noses of Lis courtiers under pretence of
sLaving them ; a Caracalla^ who murdered his wife and
his own brother in his mother^s arms ; and a Helioga-
balus_, w^ho chose a senate of abandoned women_, and
exalted his horse to the dignity of the consulate^ but
too completely confirm my statements regarding the
moral and social condition of ' those who bore rule in
Kome.

The general condition of society may be gathered
from what has preceded. The Romans, as a people, must
have been strangely corrupted, to have been incapable
of protecting themselves from such detestable vice and
tyranny, practised by so many of their emperors ; ex-
treme degeneracy of the people must have deprived them
of all right principles, morals, and sentiments, before
such excesses of absolute power could have taken place.
If there be anything of generous and masculine public
opinion exhibited, it has been generally found sufficient
to make the laws of society and the requirements of
decency respected, even in states not so free as was
ancient Rome.

The moral state of a populace may be conveniently
estimated by the mode in which the hours of relaxation
are spent, and by the character of the amusement suited
to the popular taste. In this respect history aff'ords
abundant evidence of the degraded morals of the Roman
people. Their amusements consisted chiefly of public
games, carried forward in their spacious amphitheatres,
which were almost invariably accompanied either by gross
indecency or by frightfal cruelty and waste of life. With

PAGANISM.

respect to tlie first class of representations, it will be
sufficient to state tliat riots on more than one occasion
took place, when, out of respect to common decency,
reformation of this abuse was attempted.

A few words on their cruel sports, and particular!}" the
(jlaJiatorial comhats, will not be uninstructive.

In the earliest records the practice of slaying do-
mestic animals, captives, or slaves at the tombs of
departed kings and chieftains may be traced, and it
appears to have existed in many nations widely separated
from one another. Indeed, to the present day the
practice prevails among many of the American-Indian
and African tribes, and numerous examples might be
cited from the funereal rites with which Achilles honoured
the pyre of his friend Patroclus, and the funereal pile of
the king of Assyria, mentioned by Diodorus, on which all
the king^s wives were burned, to that of the Hindoo
suttee, and the burial of the mother of the king of
Ashantee in 1817, w^hen three thousand human beings
Avere immolated.

The practice, however, was so congenial to the
tastt s of a cruel populace, that it became a matter of
oiavsemf.nt, and these games were common at Rome, even
in tLe period of the republic; while under the emperors
they assumed a magnitude which astonishes and almost
passes belief.

They consisted of contests waged betw^een brute
beasts, or between men and wild beasts, and gladiatorial
combats between man and man. Various buildings were
set apart for these cruel exhibitions; and the Flavian
Amphitheatre, now known as the Colosseum, the largest
building the world has seen, capable of seating a hundred

CRUEL SPORTS.

thousand persons^ was specially dedicated to this fiendish
sport.

And first with respect to tlie animal comhafs, it is
astonishing to read of the nnmber of animals wantonly
excited against one another and slain. As early as the
year 251 B.C., the slaughter of one hundred and forty-two
elephants in the circus is mentioned.* In the year 168
B.C., sixty- three panthers, and forty bears and elephants
made sport for the Romans ; f from this time combats
between elephants and lions, lions and bulls, bears and
elephants, etc., recur so frequently, that it would be
tedious to recite the instances. The evil, however,
increased in magnitude as the empire advanced, as may
be gathered from the almost incredible number of animals
said to have been slaughtered. A hundred lions were
exhibited by Sulla and destroyed by javelin- men. J At
games given by Pompey, B.C. 55, immense numbers were
put to death, among which are mentioned six hundred
lions and twenty elephants. Julius C^sar, in his third
consulship, B.C. 45, gave an entertainment of the kind,
which lasted five days, in which giraffes were first intro-
duced, and men from Thessaly combated with infuriated
bulls. The hippopotamus, rhinoceros, crocodile, and
rattle-snake were introduced by subsequent emperors to
vary the sport. At the consecration of the grand amphi-
theatre of Titus, Jive tliousand wild beasts and four thou-
sand tame animals were killed ;§ while Trajan, celebrated
among Roman emperors for his clemency, on the occasion
of a victory over the Dacians, slaughtered as many as
eleven thousand animals in the rejoicings which followed. ||

* Pliny, Nat. Hist., viii. 6. f Livy, xxxix. 18.

X Seneca de Brev. Vit. 13. § Suet. Tit. 7 ; Dion. Cass., Iv. 25.
II Dion. Cass., Ixvii. 15.

PAGANISM.

But tlie half has not been told ; numerous as were the
animals put to death in these games_, they were as nothing
compared with the multitudes of human heings who were
slaughtered in cold blood to satisfy the unnatural and
depraved craving for scenes of bloodshed and cruelty.
Passing over all reference to those who fell in the
combats with wild animals^ I proceed to consider the
gladiatorial combats^ conducted solely by men. [78, '<9.]
The combatauts were generally captives taken in war^
slaves^ or condemned criminals, though frequently free-
born citizens entered the lists for hire.

As they fight/^ says a modern writer, ^' the spec-
tators narrowly and eagerly watch each blow ; when one
is wounded, the exulting cry, ' Hahet, Jiahet' (he has it,
he has it), rings through the amphitheatre. If the wound
be so severe as to disable him, he lowers his arms in
token of defeat ; then, raising his hand, looks up to the
people with mute, imploring gaze, asking them to spare
his life. If he has acquitted himself very well, or has in
any way won the favour of the spectators^ his request
may perhaps be granted ; but when their passions and
thirst for blood have been excited, or if he have shown
any signs of fear, his death is inevitable. The people
give the well-known fatal signal by turning up their
thumbs. As he rolls his dim, despairing eyes along the
crowded benches, and meets only the merciless gaze of
men and women, from whose hearts every vestige of pity
has been effaced, he yields himself to his fate. The
conqueror plunges his sword into the breast of his old
companion ; the blood gushes forth and dyes the sand ;
the attendants come in, strike a hook into the mangled
corpse, drag it out, strew fresh sand or sawdust over the
spot ; a showier of perfumed w^aters refreshes the specta-

MORAL DEPRAVITY,

tators j tlie bets which have been won or lost are settled^
and then the sports begin again ; and the same scene is
repeated through the whole day, and often for many
days in succession. Sometimes^ to render the sports
more attractive, the lihelli (handbills) announced that
they would he ^ sine missione/ that is, that no defeated
gladiator would be spared.''^ Lipsius, the great authority
on this question, reckons that the combats of the amphi-
theatre cost from twenty to thirty thousand lives per months
and adds, that no war ever waged has caused so much
slaughter as these games. When we reflect that the
throng of eager spectators included all classes, from the
emperor to the meanest slave — the knight, the senator,
the priest, the matroD, the vestal virgin — all the pomp
and refinement with all the rudeness and brutality of the
empire — swelled the crowd which flocked to glut its eyes
with blood, and to exult in the cries and groans of the
wounded and the dying — we shall feel no difficulty in
estimating the moral condition of the people under the
influence of Paganism in the refined and civilized Au-
gustan age.*

The limits of a single lecture render it impossible to
allude to all the evils resulting from the Pagan system ;
the following illustrations of moral depravity may be,
however, adduced. f Profane swearing was commended,
if not by the precepts, yet by the example of the best
heathen moralists — particularly Socrates, Place, and
Seneca, in whose works numerous oaths occur. Many of
them not only pleaded for self-murder, as Cicero, Seneca,

* Vide Smith's " Dictionary of Eoman and Greek Antiqui-
ties," articles Venatio, Bestiarii, and Gladiatores, and a paper in
the Leisure Hour, 1852, No. 6.

f Home's Introduction, vol. i., pp. 13, 14.

PAGANISM.

and otliers,* but carried about witli tliem the means of
destruction , of wliicli tliey made use ratlier than fall into
the hands of their adversaries^ as did Demosthenes,
C'ato, Brutus, Cassius, and others. Truth was of small
account among many, even the best of heathens; for
they taught that, on many occasions, " a lie teas to he
preferred to the teuth itself/'' In support of this start-
ling statement, Mr. Horne quotes many passages from
Pagan writers.

One more statement with respect to the moral and
social condition of mankind under the Pagan system, and
my case is closed.

Slavery, the practice of buying, selling, and holding
in bondage human beings, was universal throughout the
Pagan world.

You will meet me with an objection, possibly, upon
this head, by reminding me that slavery was permitted
by the Almighty under the Jewish dispensation. It is
perfectly true that a modified bond-service was permitted
under the Mosaic economy, but the institution differed
most essentially from that which prevailed in Pagan
nations.

Slavery among the Jews could arise, legally, either
from captivity in war, insolvency, or from inability to
make restitution in case of theft. In the first case, it is
very doubtful whether modified bondage was not a mer-
ciful practice in the age in which Moses lived. The
horrible mutilations and other cruelties practised on
captives were so universal among the Gentile nations,
that bondage among the Jews would be a preferable
state of existence. In the other cases referred to, slavery
* Seneca, De Ira, lib. iii. c. 15.

SLAVERY.

was permitted by way of punishment,, just as fraudulent
insolvency and theft are punished among ourselves by
deprivation of liberty.

Man-stealing, that is^ taking an individual by force
(except in the cases above alluded to)^ and selling him
into slavery^ or retaining him as a slave^ is severely re-
primanded by the law of Moses^ and made punishahle
ivith death.

And with respect to the condition of those who could
legally be detained in bondage under the Jewish law^
the following most important modifications of the insti-
tution mark the position of the bond-servant as infinitely
superior to that of the slave who groaned under the iron
bondage of Pagan taskmasters.

They were to be treated with humanity (Lev. xxv.
39 — 65)^ and the injunction is enforced by the powerful
argument, For unto Me,'' says God, ^'the children of
Israel are servants, they are My servants, whom I brought
forth out of the land of Egypt.^^ They were not to be
punished severely ; and, in case of the death of a ser-
vant, the master was amenable to punishment (Exodus
xxi. 20, 21). If a master injured a bond-servant in eye,
tooth, or member, he was to receive his freedom (Exodus
xxi. 26, 27). They were to enjoy rest and religious pri-
vileges on every Sabbath-day and festival, so that, at
least, one-seventh of their time was redeemed from
labour (Exodus xx. 10; Deut. v. 14). They were to be
invited to certain feasts (Deut. xii. 17, 18, etc.) They
were to receive adequate subsistence (Deut. xxv. 4, etc.)
The master was bound to provide for the marriage of a
female servant, to take her to himself, or betroth her to
his son (Exodus xxi. 8, et seq.) No servant of Hebrew

* Exod. xxi. 16 ; Deut. xxiv. 7.

PAGANISH!.

origin could be obliged to serve more than six years,
after wliicli time lie must be dismissed witli bis wife, and
presents of considerable value (Exodus xxi. 2 — 4 ; Lev.
XXV. 1 — 17). Even before the expiration of the six
years, they might redeem themselves, or be redeemed by
another, by purchase adequate in amount to the remain-
ing years of service (Lev. xxv. 47 — 55). On the year of
Jubilee, at the sounding of the silver trumpets, all He-
brew servants or slaves were to be emancipated (Lev.
xxv. 40, 41). Slaves of Hebrew birth were permitted to
hold property, as may be learned from Lev. xxv. 49,
and 2 Sam. ix. 10; and, lastly, a fugitive slave from
another nation, who sought refuge among the Hebrews,
was to be received and treated kindly, and not to be
forcibly sent bac'k again (Deut. xxiii. 15, 16).

We see, then, that slavery, as it existed among the
Jews, was, to those of Hebrew descent, little more than
servitude or apprenticeship among ourselves ; while the
foreigner, taken captive in war, received better treat-
ment than he could have expected in such times, had he
fallen into the hands of Pagan idolaters ; with the privi-
lege of admission to the benefits of union with God^s
people, by right of circumcision, which was to be admi-
nistered to him, and the enjoyment of a Sabbath of
rest, and kind treatment, enjoined and enforced by the
laws which regulated his master^s conduct.

Nor must it be overlooked that the Mosaic economy
was both temporary and imperfect (Heb. vii., viii., and
xi., passim) ; and as our Lord explained that divorce
"vyas permitted by Closes on account of hardness of heart,
S(^ a modified bond- service was doubtless permitted on
account of covetousness, which, in such times, would
have resulted in gross cruelty and great destruction of

SLAVERY.

life, unless it liad been permitted a more convenient and
merciful exercise in tlie retention of the services of cap-
tives.

Concerning slavery, as practised by professing Cliris-
tians, a few words will be necessary in the next lecture.

And now I proceed^ very briefly, to depict the con-
dition of slaves under Pagan masters, particularly in
Greece and Eome.

The practice appears to have been universally per-
mitted and approved ; not one philosopher has been found
to object to it in its grossest forms : many of tlie more cele-
brated philosophers are known to have kept slaves them-
selves. Even Plato, in his " Perfect State,^^ desires onh'
that Greeks should not be enslaved. In Attica, a district
not larger than an English county, there were at one
time 150,000 slaves j while history informs us that at
Rome, one Scaurus had 8000 slaves ; and a Roman
senator in the reign of Augustus, dying, left, with other
property, 4116 slaves. In the reign of Julius Ci^sar, the
slaves were more numerous than the freemen, and the
proportion afterwards assumed so alarming au aspect,
both in Greece and RoQie, that slaves were forbidden
to wear a distinguishing dress, lest it should acquaint
them with the fact of their numerical superiority. By
the laws of Rome they were considered chattels -/^ were
bought, sold, exchanged, without restraint ; could be
punished at the pleasure of their master, and put to
death by him at his own will. They possessed no legal
tights, any more than a horse or a cow may be said to
have leofal rio-hts, and whatever treatuient thev received,
could not appeal to any court of law, unless some humane

PAGANISM.

citizen allowed the appeal to be made in liis name. The
property of the slave was the property of his master. I
cannot say that the wife of the slave was his master's
property also^ for the Roman law considered the slave
incapable of legal marriage, and therefore he had no
wife ; his children belonged to his master, and were sold
or exchanged, as it pleased him. If examined at law, his
testimony must be extorted by torture.

It is true that laws were made to restrain cruelty to
slaves, and to ensure to them adequate sustenance ; but
as the slave had no right of appeal to the law, of what
use could the law be to him ? Some of these laws show
the abject condition to which he was reduced : one law
obliges masters to give each slave one pound of corn
daily ; another restrains mutilation of their persons, their
limbs, and tongues ; another prohibits the compulsion of
slaves to combat with wild beasts at the shows, and
requires for that purpose the license of the judicial
authorities ; another law forbids the forcible subjection of
female slaves to prostitution ; while it transpires that
one Pollio, a knight in the time of Augustus, and a friend
of that emperor, was reprobated^' for his irregular
conduct, in throwing slaves alive into a pond to feed
lampreys for his table.* It was a practice with men of
rank to keep slaves in a state of nudity, chained up at
the doors of their dwelliugs — your equals and mine, in
the sight of God, possessed of mental powers and im-
mortal souls — converted into watch-dogs. The story of
Lazarus, which you read in the New Testament, is no
exaggerated picture, when applied to Rome at the height
of her civilization. Moreover, the dogs came and licked

* Art. Pollio Vedins, Lempriere's " Classical Dictionary."

SOCIAL AND MORAL CONDITION.

his sores. •'^ Dogs, more merciful tlian man, when his
mind is altogether alienated from God. This is no libel.
The office of the chained, wounded, and hopeless crea-
tures was to warn the household in case of attempted
assassination (a daily occurrence at that period). As
gratitude could not, of course, be expected to influence
the slave, fear was resorted to as a motive ; it was death
to the watch-dog if the master fell. The slave had the
option of death by the assassin, if faithful, or death by
his master, if silent ; and history mentions, incidentally,
two such cases, in one of which two slaves suffered, and
in the other, the four hundred slaves of Pedanius Secundus
were put to death.*

*' Slaves to be lash'd and tortur'd and resold,
Or maim'd or murder'd for a fine of gold.
Helots degraded, scarce esteem'd as man.
Having no rights, for ever under ban,
Were half the world when ancient Homer sung,
And wit and wisdom flowed from Plato's tongue.
Slaves were the swarming multitudes of Rome,
Having no hope, no thought of better doam ; —
Fetter'd in body and enslaved in mind,
Their mental eyeballs sear, and dark, and blind,
They crawl'd mere brutes, and if they dar'd complain,
Were lash'd and torturd until tame again " f

But I must gather up my subject to bring it to a
conclusion.

I have set before you the leading features of Paganism,

* Tacitus, Annal. xiv. pp. 42 — 44. The principal facts regard-
i ng slavery have been gathered from Jahn's "Archseologia Biblica,"
the Cyclopaedia of the Society for Diffusing Useful Knowledge,
and Maunder's " Scientific and Literary Treasury," article Slavery.
Also Home's Introduction, vol. i. pp. 12, 13.

t Dr. Mackay's "Hope of the World."

PAGANISM.

the system wliicli swayed tlie world in tlie Augustan age.
I have told you somewhat of the cliaracter of that system;
its pantheistic, sacerdotal, and ceremonial nature. I have
hinted at the gross obscenity and spoken of the flagrant
cruelty of its rites. I have endeavoured to convey a
just idea of the moral and social condition of the world
under its influence ; its effects upon the morality and
the happiness of children, females, rulers, people, and
slaves.

The picture is indeed a dark, a revolting one ; any
one who attentively and thoughtfully reads the history of
those times, must become convinced that mankind, with
few exceptions, had become as degraded, as sinful, as
ignorant of truth, as cruel, as vindictive, and withal as
vjretclied, as it is possible to conceive. Eevenge, public
and private, had come to be accounted virtue. ^Yar,
bloodshed, and violence conferred the highest glory ;
shame and decency, both public and private, were well-
nigh lost ; the cruelty and ferocity of the people were
such, that the blood shed for their gratification would
have more than satiated a community of tigers.

Things which in our days would create a riot if
attempted, then created riots when 'prevented; while man
had universally enslaved his fellow-man. With all this
the greatest insecurity of life existed ; all went armed
everywhere, a needful precaution, for assassinations and
poisonings were of daily occurrence, and men were not
ashamed to ask of the gods to speed the dagger or the
poison bowl. Thinking men were longing, hoping, and
looking, they knew not to whom, for deliverance, being
filled with terror or with loathing at what they witnessed.
Every Pagan god they could invent, or borrow from
conquered nations, had his altars and his temples, and

IMPEOVEMEXT.

wa.s supplicated for relief ; from tlie likeness of cor-
ruptible man and birds and four-footed beasts/^ they
descended to deify tlie very sinls and seu'ers, diseases,
jxissions, vermin, and vices, until all hope of remedy
appears to have been given up.

Plato's opinion has been already quoted — ''men had
sunk lower than the basest of the brutes/' Pliny writes :
Nothing certain upon earth is to be found,, and nothing-
is found so miserahle yet so proud as man.'' Tacitus
anticipates the end of the worlds ''on account of the
corruptions of mankind.'' Seneca writes : "J// is replete
with crime, and vice everywhere ahounds. More evil is
committed than can possibly he healed; ihe struggle and
confusion are becoming more desperate, while lust daily
grows into sin ; shame is rapidly declining ; veneration for
what is pure and good is unknown ; every one yields to hi^
own lusts. Vice no longer hides in secret, it is made piihlic
to cdl eyes ; depravity has so far advanced, that innocence
has become not only more rare, hut is now a thing alto-
gether [JXKNOWN.-"*

And what is the lesson ^vhich we learn from the sub-
ject of to-nig]it's lecture ?

That neither learning, nor civilization, nor philo-
sophy, NOR ALL OF THEil COMBINED, CAN OF THEMSELVES
MAKE PEOPLE EITHER VIRTUOUS OR HAPPY.

Contrasted with our own times and country a marked
difference is observable, both as it regards morality and
the social condition of all classes : there is now more of
security, of virtue, of solid comfort and happiness in
society, in families and with individuals. I am not pre-
pared to-night, even if time permitted, to enter into the

* Seneca, De Ira, ii. cap. 8.

PAGANISM.

question^ '"''to wliat is tliis difference to be attributed?^''
but I will siraply observe that^ whatever it may be, it is
not civilization, not the cultivation of arts and of letters,
not the study of philosophy ; for, observe, all these had
arrived at the greatest perfection in the ancient world,
when the greatest depravity and wretchedness prevailed.
The Augustan age has become proverbial, as I stated in
the outset, for the encouragement given to the fine arts,
to literature, and to learning. We have no sculptors whose
works can compare with those of Phidias and Praxi-
teles ; no architecture which can exceed in excellence the
Parthenon at Athens, or the Forum at Rome ; no epic
poet like Virgil ; no lyrical poet to excel Horace ; of
original and profound thinkers we have none like Plato
and Seneca ; no historians more gifted than the Plinys,
than Tacitus, than Sallust, than Plutarch; no actor like
Roscius, nor orator to excel Cicero.

Our amehorated condition, then, must be attributable
to some other influence than that of mere learning, or
civilization, or cultivation of the arts ; and the lesson, so
far as we can learn it to-night, appears to be that the
world by wisdom (philosophy) knew not God.'' ^

The remarks of a recent writer,t applying to the
great Assyrian empire, which had well-nigh passed away
before Rome was founded, are so applicable to the case of
Rome and of Grece, and to all the Pagan empires of
antiquity, and are withal so suited for the consideration
of ourselves, in these days, that I quote them as an
appropriate conclusion and improvement to this lec-
ture : —

* 1 Cor. i. 21.

t " Nineveh : its Rise and Ruin." By Rev. J. Blackburn, p. 142,
second edition.

lilPEOVEMEXT.

" It is plain that human nature amongst the Assyrians
was not^ physically or intellectually^ in an infantile or
dwarfish state. If we contemplate their figures upon the
sculptured panels in our Maseum^ we must acknowledge
their frames were finely developed^ and that they have the
aspect of a brave and noble race, fitly compared by the
prophet to lions, in their terrible presence and majestic
bearing. And if we mark their intellectual progress, as
seen in their discoveries in astronomy, their taste in art,
their knowledge and skill in manufactures, their power
and prowess in arms, we must confess that they betray
no signs of intellectual feebleness. And yet, with all
these advantages, what were they ? Avaricious, lewd,
drunken, lawless, oppressive, cruel. The scenes of re-
finement, splendour, and magnificence which surrounded
them gave, perhaps, grace and dignity to their man-
ners, but no purity to their characters, nor kindness
to their hearts. Like all the great nations of antiquity
that surrounded or succeeded them, they were the victims
of ignorance and vice, of war and despotism. The first
object of all governments — the happiness of the people —
was never considered by their rulers ; and consequently
they were used as the tools of sanguinary princes and
idolatrous priests, who placed national happiness and
glory in martial spoils and constrained proselytes. The
slavery they imposed upon their miserable captives must
often have been more bitter than death. It is, in fad,
plain from all history, whether of nations or individuals,
that the hnoidedge of arts and letters is not sufficient to
renew the heart or life of those who cultivate them. Emi-
nent attainments in both have been made by men destitute
of moral sense, and the slaves of every low, selfish, de-
grading vice. They have lived amidst the loveliest scenes

PAGANISM.

of nature and of art ; all tlie soft and elevating influences
of tlie beautiful and the sublime have fallen upon them in
vain ; and the fairest countries have witnessed the foulest
crimes. Whilst_, then^ we rejoice in the progress of art,
science_, and literature amongst ourselves, and are thank-
ful to witness museums and menageries, picture-galleries,
and schools of art, parks, and pleasure-gardens, provided
for the people — and admit that these occupations may
divert their attention from grosser and more grovelling
pursuits — yet we hold that all these are compatible with
proud, selfish^ sensual, and godless hearts, manifesting
both misanthropy towards their fellow -men and a haughty
rebellion against the Most High. It is by the influ-
ence OE Divine truth alone that men are to be rk-

STOEED TO a HAPPY CONFOEMITY TO THE MOEAL CHARACTER

OP God.

LECTUEE 11.

CHRISTIANITY.

" To give light to them that sit in darkness and the shadow of
death." — Luke i. 79.

Our last lecture closed amidst the gloom and shadows of
Pagan darkness. We left man^ who had shut his eyes to the
light of natural religion — or that which may be learned of
God from Nature — and with whom the last glimmering of
primeval revelation had gone out, groping his way in
almost utter hopelessness of finding any light to guide
his forlorn footsteps. We listened to the complainings
and forebodings of virtuous men ; we noted the reckless
depravity of the bad. It is now my office to inform you
that, amidst all that called for despondency and despair,
there existed, nevertheless, a very prevalent anticipation
of deliverance — an almost universal looking or waiting for
a deliverer. It is true this idea was undefined, and con-
sequently imperfectly appreciated, but it was generally
entertained among all the nations whose literature has,
to any extent, come down to us ; and, what is more
worthy of remark, the expectation had reached its height
at the Augustan age — the period to which I particularly
refer in these lectures.

The H'mdoos were expecting another Avata, or incar-
nation of their chief god, and that Avata a most important
one as it regarded the destinies of the human race.
Among the Persians, who followed the teaching of

CHRISTIANITY.

Zoroaster, their Sosiosh, Man of the World/' was ex-
pected. The Chinese, according to Confacius, were " to
look for the holy one from the west." The Pythian oracle
among the Greeks and the Etruscan priests in Italy had
alike predicted their own overthrow. The Sybil prophetess
had spoken of the coming of the Lord of the earth.*
Chaldean astrologers travelled, as you know, to Judea,
prepared with kingly gifts to offer to the expected de-
liverer.f Herod, the governor of Judea, entertained the
same expectation, and consulted the council of the Sanhe-
drim as to the birth-place of this great One ; being in-
formed that the Jewish prophet had foretold it should be
at Bethlehem, he sent and killed all the young children
there, hoping to compass his destruction. Devout Jews,
such as Simeon and Anna, were waiting in the Jewish
temple for his appearance, convinced that the time was
at hand. J

So we see that ancient writers gave currency to the
tradition ; crafty Pagan priests and * pretended prophets
worked up the popular belief into feigned communications
from heaven ; cruel rulers dreaded that which all antici-
pated ; and holy men and women waited for the " con-
solation of Israel" and of the world. All of them, good
and bad, are witnesses of a prevalent anticipation of
coming interference in the aflPairs of men.

But Rome is more especially the field of our inquiry ;
and as she has left to our times a large mass of literature,
we may expect to find there especial reference to this
looking for deliverance from evil. Suetonius, the Roman
historian, says : An ancient and settled persuasion
prevailed, throughout the East, that the Fates had de-

* Miihleisen's " Genuine and Spurious Keligion," vol. i. p. 185.
t Matt. ii. 1, 2. X Luke ii. 25—35, 36—38.

A DELIVERED ANTICIPATED. 49

creed some one to proceed from Jiidea, who should
attain universal empire.* Tacitus writes : " Many were
persuaded that it was contained in the ancient books of
their priests, that at that very time the East should pre-
vail, and that some one should proceed from Judea, and
possess the dominion. ■'■'f Josephus and Philo both state
that there existed the same expectation.

About the time when Augustus was born — some sixty
years B.C. — the anticipated coming of a king, a con-
queror, or a deliverer had even passed into a proverb —
was referred to in the senate, and was the theme of the
poets.

Yirgil wrote a Pastoral complimenting the Roman
consul Pollio on the birth of a son, whom, in the spirit of
flattery, he describes as the predicted deliverer. The
substance of the Pastoral is said to have been borrowed ^<
from a prophecy deUvered by the Sybjl. The following
lines form part of a translation of the ode : —

" The last great age, foretold by sacred rhymes,
Eenews its finished course : Saturnian tirues
Roll round again ; and mighty years, begun
From their first orb, in radiant circles run.
The base, degen'rate, iron off*spring ends ;
A golden progeny from heaven descends.
The father banish'd virtue shall restore ;
And crimes shall threat the guilty world no more.
The son shall lead the life of gods, and be
By gods and heroes seen, and gods and heroes see.
The jarring nations he in peace shall bind.
And with paternal virtues rule mankind." J;

As another indication of this prevalent expectation,

* Suet., Vespasian, cap. 4. f Tacitus, Annals, v. 13.

i Yngil, fourth Pastoral.

CHRISTIAXITY.

Uie Emperor Augustus^ born about this time^ "having his
nativity cast by Nigidius Figuhis, an astrologer and
mathematician^, it was predicted of him that he should be
T-ord of the earth; he was deitied during his lifetime by
liis flatterers, temples were erected to hhn, and his
worship established ; his name, originally Octavianus,
was altered to Augustus, sacred, and in the Greek, to
Sehastos, adorable. Our eighth month still bears his
name.

Such were the prevailing longings of good men, the
fears of bad men, and pride of ambitious men, respecting
the advent of a king and deliverer. These anticipations
explain, at the same time that they confirm, the prophecies
of Scripture delivered long before the event, particularly
the prophecy of Haggai, 520 years before Christ: "For
thus saith the Lord of Hosts : Yet once, it is a little
while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and
the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake (agitate) all
nations, and the desire of all nations shall come.''"^

In the physical world, it has often been noticed that
the most intense darkness precedes the first dawning of
the day : in the course of the world^s history, it has fre-
quently happened that the period of the greatest discord
and confusion has been but the harbinger of prosperity
and peace. It was so with the era to which our lectures
refer : the uncertainty and perplexity of mind, the dark-
ness of the moral atmosphere, and the violence of the
storms of human passions, were about to usher in the
dawnings of light, purity, and peace.

It is now about 1877 — 8 years ago (a few months more

* Haggai ii. 6, 7.

THE MESSIAH.

or less) J* but certainly in the reign of Augustus Caesar,
that a most remarkable person appeared in this our world,
^ and wrought an extraordinary innovation upon existing
systems. By birth and station he ranked as an artizan —
one of your own class, so the Evangelists inform us ;
tradition has added, perhaps correctly, that he pursued,
with his reputed father, the trade of a carpenter; and our
English version of the Bible has endorsed the tradition.

The world, as I have told you, was then intently
awaiting the coming of some great one ; but it was cer-
tainly not looking for his advent in the lower ranks of
life. The appearance I allude to attracted, therefore,
little attention. His birth was, however, remarkably
attested by prodigies, such as the appearance of an un-
usual star, and visions of angels. It happened at the
period pointed out by Daniel ;t at the place indicated by
MicahjJ at the time of a census of the inhabitants of
Judea, taken by Augustus, the Roman emperor. This
registration disclosed officially the fact that, both by the
niother^s and the reputed father's side, he was of the
lineage of the royal house of David, of the tribe of
Judah, of the family of Abraham : all of which had been
distinctly predicted in the Jewish Scriptures.

It is not my intention to detail the remarkable facts
connected with His birth, life and death ; many of you
are fully acquainted with them, and all of you have the

* Jesus Christ was born from about four to six years before
the commencement of the common Christian era — at what period
of the year is not known. The error in the computation of
the period occurred about a.d. 527. Vide Archbishop Usher's
" Chronology," also Dr. Kitto's " Daily Bible Illustrations," Life
and Death of our Lord, 29th week, 6th day, under Matt. ii. 1.

t Daniel ix. 25-27. + Micah v. 2.

CHRISTIANITY.

fullest facilities for informing yourselves concerning tlieni.
He claimed to be no less than the Son of God; to be one
with Godj in short, ^'the desire of all nations/^ the
Messiah, the expected deliverer of Jews and Gentiles.
It forms no part of my purpose to enter upon tbe argu-
ment as to the truthfulness of these claims. Some of
you admit them, with all their consequences, and pos-
sibly some of you do not, or may not have fully investi-
gated the foundations upon which they rest. You will
all of you feel that it is a question too important to hurry
over or to treat slightly; nor could the evidences be
brought fully before you in the course of a single lecture.
At other times, in other places, I affectionately advise
you, if you have not done so already, to study the sub-
ject with humble and teachable minds. The investiga-
tion of such a subject is surely not unworthy of any one
of you, nor, indeed, of the highest human intelligence ;
for some of the loftiest intellects which have conferred
lustre on our species have undertaken the study, and
submitted unreservedly to His claims.

It is rather with the historical facts, and the doctrine
which Christ introduced, that we have to do; and with
these, of necessity, treated very briefly.

He asserted, then, that His mission was undertaken
to heal and to save a sin-stricken world ; that He might
be a light to those who sat in darkness, and lead all
those who would follow His guidance to peace, to holi-
ness, and to heaven. He lived, so far as the facts of His
life have been communicated, only to do good to the
bodies and souls of men, and to propagate, inculcate,
and explain His doctrines. He associated with the hum-
ble, the illiterate, the needy, and the sinful. He refused
kingly honours when ofl'ered to Him, and discountenanced

THE MESSIAH.

all ideas of worldly rule or aggrandizemeutj as unsuited
to His kiiigdom_, which He explained to be spiritual in
its nature. He died (contrary to the expectation of all
His followers) as a malefactor^ by the hands of the
Roman government^ at the instigation of His disap-
pointed countrymen^ the Jews — as He^ and the prophets
before Him^ had oftentimes predicted. At His deaths as
at His birth, prodigies occurred, such as an earthquake,
and a supernatural darkness at a period when no eclipss
of the sun, according to the laws of Nature, could pos-
sibly happen;* which prodigies were reported to the
authorities at Rome.f

And, to render his story the most remarkable in
' the world^s history (irrespective of its importance in a
religious aspect), He forsook the grave, as predicted, in

* All eclipses of the sun must happen at the time of new
moon. Jesus Christ was crucified at the Feast of the Passover,
always celebrated at the full moon.

t That the prodigies which attended the Crucifixion did not
pass without notice at Bome is certain, notwithstanding the
statement to the contrary made by Gibbon, in his " DecUne and
Fall of the Eoman Empire" (vol. ii. p. 379). That false state-
ment has been dealt with at length, and annihilated by Mr. Hart-
well Horne, in his " Introduction to the Critical Study and
Knowledge of the Scriptures" (Unabridged Edition, vol. i., chap,
iii. p. 187). It may be useful, however, to cite here the two
authorities which are most conclusive upon this point. Th-e dark-
ness and earthquake are both expressly referred to by Celsus, the
bitter and acute adversary of Christianity, as facts which he was
unable to deny (" Origen contra Celsum," lib. ii. 55, p. 94) ; and
TertuUian, in addressing his Pagan adversaries, asserts, without
fear of contradiction, "at the moment of Christ's death, the light
departed from the sun, and the land was darkened at noonday;
ivhich wonder is related in your own akna.ls, and is 2)reserfed in
vouii ARCHIVES TO THIS DAY " (Tertullian, "Apol.," c. 21).

CHRISTIANITY.

spite of a Roman guard, and appeared to His friends and
followers repeatedly during forty days, and then disap-
peared from their sight.

The reality of these facts has been testified as no
other events of history were ever confirmed. In no less
- than five separate histories were they recorded by those
who were eye-witnesses ; while many other books, written
by parties to the transactions, refer to tnd confirm their
truth. And what is even more remarkable, the witnesses
of these facts travelled over land and sea to spread the
intelligence, without any of the usual motives which in-
fluence men, and with no personal interests to serve ;
who gained nothing hy their assertions hut "persecution,
scorn, and contempt; and vho, the greater iiart of them,
laid down their lives gladly as witnesses to the truth of their
statements.

I repeat that no single fact of history has been so
abundantly verified as the facts connected with the life
and death and resurrection of Christ ; and he that re-
jects these truths must be prepared to credit — firstly,
that at least some one hundred and twenty individuals
entered into a conspiracy to propagate a falsehood, with
nothing to gain by it, but, on the contrary, prepared to
undergo loss of all the world values, even life itself ;
secondly, that such parties, although guilty of falsehood,
inculcated and practised virtue, unusual and extraordi-
nary for such, or indeed for any times ; thirdly, that
all of them persisted in the assertion of a falsehood until
death, without disclosing the nature of the conspiracy
which existed, or the deceptions they had practised;
and, fourthly, that many of them sealed their witness
with their blood, when confession of their error, had it
been such, would have saved their lives.

A CONTEAST.

Who is tlie credulous man, think you ? He who
Jiccepts a statement supported by all the eye-witnesses^
iaid uncontradicted by those who would have contra-
dicted if they could ; or the man who disbelieves every
one, but behoves in all the extraordinary consequences
which I have shown must result from falsehood, had it
existed ?

I must now leave the facts relating to the inti'oduc-
tion of Christianity, and consider, also very briefly, the
nature of the doctrine, or teaching, introduced by Christ;
in other words, the character of the system termed Chris-
tianity. This, it will be observed, admits of no argu-
ment as to its reality. Although much misunderstood,
and, it may be, misrepresented, Christianity is a fact of
which no one has been bold enough to deny the exist-
ence.

And first I would remark, that Christianity consti-
tuted a wondrous innovation upon the views of the world,
both Jewish and Pagan. It was no adaptation, no mere
reformation; no compromise was entered into. The
language of Christ, on more than one occasion, was to
the effect, " Behold, I make all things new.^^ He ex-
plained to his astonished followers, by figures, that as
new wine could not conveniently be put into perishing-
skins, and as it would be inappropriate to patch up,
with new cloth, worn-out garments, so His system was
to supersede and set aside those systems which were
decayed, had waxed old,^^ and were ready to vanisli
away.''-' The religion of Christianity, in short, effected a
revolution, and cannot be viewed in the light either of a.
restoration, a reformation, or a reconstruction.

It formed an entire contrast to existino- Pao-anism ; aii

CHRISTIANITY.

outline of tlie leading features of tlie two systems will
convey to your minds a clear perception of their strong
antagonism.

Paganism was^ as already explained, ]joJytlieisiic;
Christ taught that God was one.

Paganism represented God in the likeness of visible
ohjects, such as ^''corruptible men and birds, and four-
footed beasts, and creeping things.''^ Christianity repre-
sented Him as a Spirit, "whom no man hath seen or
can see;^^ '^eternal, immortal, invisible.

Paganism was in its services formal, external, ceremo-
nial, and local. Christ taught that henceforth religion
would be acceptable only as it was spiritual and of the
heart. " They that worship must worship Him in spirit
and in truth "for the Father seeketh such to worship
Him.^^

Paganism was esseutially sacerdotal. Christianity
teaches that a mediatorial and sacrificial priesthood, is
no longer needed ; that Christ had opened "a new and
living way " of access to God, and invited all His fol-
lowers to come unto God directly " throngh Him.''

Paganism, like Judaism, appointed continually recur-
ring sacrifices for transgression. Christianity teaches
that " Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many,^^
and " by one offering He had perfected for ever them that
are sanctified."

For cruel, costly, and cumbersome rites and offerings,
Christ substituted faith, with love to God and love to
man.

In lieu of purch.ased pardon, attainable among Pagans
by means of costly offerings, Christ offered salvation
and pardon /ret^/// to the poorest, "without money and

DIGNITY OF LABOUR.

witlioiit price/^ Wliile Paganism initiated only the
v'eaWiy, the ivise, or the toorthy to its mysteries, Christ
ordered His message to be carried especially to tlie
poor, to the sinful, and the simple, and Himself set tlie
example.

So far from sanctioning immorality or sensnaJify,
wliich Paganism encouraged and promoted, Christ
taught that even the thoughts of the heart should be
watched and controlled, and that the guilty emotion in-
dulged was equivalent to sin in action; and He pro-
nounced His blessing, and the promise of a sight of
God^s presence, to the ''pure in heart.''

So far from sanctioning cruelty, Christ taught,
''Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.^'

So far from honouring revencjc or haired, so universal
with Pagans, Christ taught the, till then unheard of,
doctrine, " I say unto you, love your enemies ; do good
to them which hate you and pray for them that despite-
fully use you and persecute you."^ He led the way in
this difficult path by praying for His murderers, ''Father,
forgive them, for they know not what they do/^

So far from justifying murder by way of retaliation,
accounted meritorious among Pagans, Christ taught that
to be angry, without just cause, with a brother, the irri-
tating word, and the unkind judgment, all ivere classed
hy Him wiili the deprivation of life.

To sum up : war, aggressive or revengeful, blood-
shedding, rapine, oppression, slavery — almost the entire
practices of Paganism — Christ unequivocally condemned.
He cut up by the root all excuse for such practices, by
the commands, " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy-
self "whatsoever ye would that men should do unto
you, do ye even s;o to them;^^ and when one asked Him

CFIPJSTIAXITY.

for the definition of the term, neighbour/' He answered
by a parable, Your bitterest foe.''

I have given you necessarily a very brief and imperfect
sketch of the facts connected witli the founding of Chris-
tianity, and the character of the system so called. And
here I would say to you, as wor'king men, do not consider
It any indignity, but rather an honour, to be termed by
that name ; labour is honourable, more honourable than
idleness, even though it be dignified by titles and gilded
by wealth. God has shown respect for honest labour, by
creating man fitted for it, and by making him miserable
without it; by appointing our common progenitor to
" dress and to keep^"* the garden in which he was placed;
and, above all, hj permitting His Son to pass the greater part
oj- His life on earth, in the workshop of a Jewish artificer.

" Sixty centuries have failed to teach
The dignity, the beauty, and the joy,
The piety and usefulness of work !
'Tis but excess of labour that is pain —
Just as excess of food, or wine, or rest.
Or any blessing that mankind abuse."

Never believe any who shall tell you that God inflicted
the curse of labour on man ; his organization, »muscular
and nervous, contradicts it, your own experience denies
it, and, above all, the Word of God repudiates the state-
ment. The ground has been cursed for man^s rebellioji,
and his labour, as you well know, is often excessive and
ill-requited, but there is more of mercy than of judgment
in that labour still.

But to proceed: Christianity, born in Judea, very
soon reached Rome, the world^s metropolis. The exact
time of its arrival there is unknown, but it is not im-

* Yiie Sermon on the Mount, and Xew Testament, _23a6'6'i//i.

CHRISTIANITY AT ROME.

probable tliat it was carried there by some of tbose three
thousand Christians,* the fruits of Peter's address on the
day of Pentecost^ when he exercised the high privilege
conferred upon him of unlocking the kingdom of
heaven" by the preaching of Christ crucified to that
crowd of converts from every nation under heaven/^ t
\Ye are distinctly informed that there were amongst his
hearers strangers of Rome — Jeivs and proselytes/^ that
is_, Jews from Eome_, native born, and proselytes from
among the Eomans to Judaism ; and if any of these were
converted, they would immediately carry Christianity to
Rome on their return thither. Be this as it may, it is
quite clear that there were Christians at Rome in the
reign of Claudius, or about a.d. 52, say within tsventy-
five years of the death of Christ. For Suetonius, a
Pagan writer at Rome, says the Jews raised tumults at
Rome at the instigation of Chrestus (Christ, of whose
death he, as a Pagan, was ignorant), and were banished
accordingly by the Emperor Claudius. J This Pagan
testimony agrees exactly with the statement made by
Luke, § that Paul, the apostle_, found at Corinth, in
Greece, "a certain Jew named Aquila, lately come from
Italy with his wife Priscilla ; because that Claudius had
commanded all Jews to depart from Home J' That Aquila
and Priscilla were Christianized Jews, previously to their
departure from Rome, there can be little doubt, for their
conversion at Corinth is not mentioned ; they associated
with Paul in their daily labour as tent-makers ; were the
means of instructing Apollos in the " way of God more

* Acts ii. 41. t Acts ii. 5.

X Suetonius, Claud., c. 2 5 : '* Judceos, impulsore Chresto assidue
tiimultuantes, Roma expulit."
§ Acts xviii. 1, 2.

CHRISTIANITY.

perfectly assisted Paul in liis apostolic labours, arid
Lad a clmrcli in their house.*

Christianity, then, and persecution on account of it,
had both found place at Rome in the reign of Claudius
within twenty-five j^ears from the death of its founder.
Some five or six years later, about 57 to 59 a.d., the
Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the Christians at Rome,
called by us the Epistle to the Romans.'" In this letter
lie speaks of his strong desire to visit them, and tbanks
G-od that tlieir faith is spoken of throughout the whole
world ;^^t the concluding portions of the letter,

sends his Christian salutations to so many persons and
households, that it is quite clear that Christianity had not
been then very recently established, and, moreover, that
it had made some progress at that time in Rome.

It may not be very important to ascertain the exact
period when the religion of Christ began to be known at*
Rome, but it will, I think, be interesting to show its early
introduction there, and the opposition it created in the reign
of Claudius, when we come to consider the local position of
the Catacombs, to which I must presently refer, and couple
all the facts with the circumstances related concerning the
first arrival of the Apostle Paul at the Imperial city.

About two years later than the date of his letter, Paul
visited Rome, as related in the Acts of the Apostles, as a
prisoner under course of trial, he having appealed to
Nero the then Roman emperor. If you will refer to the
map of the Mediterranean Sea, you will notice the course
which the Apostle took in his voyage to Rome, as recorded
in the last chapter of the Acts of the Apostles ; from
jMelita or Malta, where he suffered shipwreck, to Syracuse

* Compare Acts xviii. 2, 3, 26 ; Rom. xvi. 3 — 5 ; and 1 Cor.
xvi. 19. t Rom- i- 8» 10, 11.

CHUISTIANITY AT ROME.

on the coast of Sicily^ where he tarried three days ;
thence to Rhegium_, the southern point of Italy ; thence
to Puteoli, and so onwards to Appii Forum^ " the market-
place of Appius/^ about fifty-six miles^ and to the " Three
I'averns/^ about thirty miles from Eome. These two
]jlaces were situated on the Appian Way, a road lead-
in o" south, from Rome. You will notice that Christian

brethren came to meet him even as far as Appii
Forum/^ that is_, fifty-six miles on the road,* a cir-
cumstance remarkably indicating the affection of these
early Christians for the Apostle. Now it was under and
along the line of this Appian Way, which Paul traversed ■
in his journey to Eome, that the Catacombs — the hiding-
places of the early Christians — had been excavated.

Looking to the fact of the opposition to Christianity
manifested in the reign of Claudius, the circutii stance
stated by Paul, that no man stood by him, hut that all
forsook him at his first examination before Nero,t and
the admission of the Jews at that very place and period,
for as concerning this sect, we know that everywJiere it
is spolcen against/' ^ I think I may assume that even at
that early period the Christians, influenced by a regard
for their safety, had commenced taking refuge from
popular dislike, Jewish opposition, and the persecution of
the Roman Government, in these subterranean fastnesses,
which have been found to extend at least fifteen miles
from Rome in the direction of the Appian Way. This is,
at all events, an interesting speculation, and may account
for these poor people being able to meet Paul at so great
a distance from Rome.

We are not, however, left long to conjecture as to the
state of things as it regarded Christianity at Rome. The
* Acts xxviii. 15. f 2 Tim. iv. 16. I Acts xxviii. 22.

CHRTSTJANITY.

storm of persecution, so repeatedly predicted by their
Lord and Master_, was about to break upon His followers^
and before the close of the sanguinary reign of the
monster Nero, they were doubtless glad to take refuge in
these " dens and caves of the earth/^

It is not my intention, in these lectures, to follow the
history of the Christian Church at Rome in its early
struggles, and to narrate the persecutions which it ex-
perienced ; it will be suflScient for me to state, that the
first well-authenticated instance of persecution occurred
under Nero, about the year a.d. 64, soon after PauFs first
visit. Tacitus narrates the circumstances very fully, and,
being a Pagan, regards the Christian sect from that point
of view. In the tenth year of Nero the city was nearly
destroyed by fire, which continued burning eight days,
and out of fourteen divisions only eight remained entire.
So great was the indignation of the populace, who charged
Nero with having intentionally caused the fire, that he
found bribes to men and offerings to the gods alike use-
less, and with the view of appeasing the people, he
attributed the crime to the despised Christians. These are
the words of Tacitus : —

*^ The infamy of that horrible transaction still adhered
to him. To suppress, if possible, this common rumour,
Nero procured others to be accused and punished with
exquisite tortures : a race of men detested for their evil (?)
practices, who were commonly known by the name of
Christians. The author of this sect was Christus, who in
the reign of Tiberius was punished with death as a crimi-
nal by the procurator Pontius Pilate. At first those only
were apprehended who confessed themselves of this sect,
alterwards a vast multitude discovered by them ; all of
whom were condemned, not so much for the crime of

PAULAS ARRIVAL AT ROME.

burning tlie city as for tHeir enmity to mankind. Their
executions were so contrived as to expose them to derision
and contempt. Some were covered over with the skins
of wild beasts^ that they might be torn to pieces by dogs ;
some were crucified ; while others, having been daubed
over with combustible materials, luere set up as lights in the
night-time and thus burned to death. For these spectacles
Nero gave his own gardens, and at the same time exhibited
there the diversions of the circus, until at length these
men, though really criminal and deserving exemplary
punishment, began to be commiserated as people who
were destroyed, not out of regard to the public welfare,
but only to gratify the cruelty of one man.'^*

At his second visit to Rome, Paul was put to death bv
Nero. From this date onwards, history identifies the
Christians at Rome with the Catacombs there. The per-
secutions were repeated again and again, under different
emperors, during several centuries, and many of the
edicts authorizing the persecutions commence with a
prohibition to enter and take refuge in these hiding-places
— the rescript of Valerian and Gallienus, for instance ; at
the close of a persecution, Gallienus gave the Christians a
formal licence to return to the Catacombs. t

But it is time for me to introduce you to this cradle of
Christianity at Rome; to take you by the hand and lead
you through its tortuous windings, explaining what
appears mysterious, directing your attention to that which
is interesting, gathering instruction as we proceed, and
closing with such moral improvement as the circumstances
are calculated to afford.
* Tacitus, Annal. xv. c. 44.

t Maitland's " Church in the Catacombs," p. 38 ; Eusebiiis, Hist.
Eccles. ib. vii. c. 13.

CHEISTIANITY.

The word catacomb means literally a subterranean
excavation, but has been applied in recent times to
excavated places of burial ; the extensive quarries in the
vicinity of many large cities having been used for such
purposes. Thus, at Syracuse, Alexandria, Naples, and
Paris, as well as at Rome, there exist extensive excava-
tions used as receptacles for the dead. Those at Rome,
however, exceed all others in extent^ and surpass them in
interest.

In the latter days of the Republic, and daring the
reigns of the first Csesars, the city of Rome increased
exceedingly in extent and magnificence. It was the
boast of Augustus that " he had found Rome brick, and
had left it marble.^' To procure the material necessary for
these public works the soil around the city was quarried
in many directions. The material obtained was a soft,
sandy stone, of volcanic origin, termed tufa and fuzzolana.

There were other excavations in Rome — those of the
Esquiline Hill, outside the gate of that name ; from these
pits sand was obtained, used for making cement, as recom-
mended by Vitruvius, the architect, as preferable to all
others for that purpose.* These sandpits of the Esquiline
Hill must not be confounded with the excavations, chiefly
south of Rome, called the Christian Catacombs, as it is
clear that the former were never used as Christian ceme-
teries, but were receptacles for the bodies of Pagans. At
the period to which I refer, it was the custom for the
Pao-an Romans to burn their dead, and to preserve only
the ashes. Those, however, who perished by the hand
of the law, by lightning, and also suicides, were forbidden
the usual rites of burial : while the lower orders of the
people, and slaves, could not afford the honours of a
* Maifcland, pp. 24, 25.

TOMBS & INSCRIBED SLABS.

THE CATACOMBS.

funeral pile. Their bodies were therefore cast without
cereraony down these pits^ where they putrefied, much to
the annoyance of the inhabitants of Home ; and the pits
were termed, accordingly, puticulce, from the Latin word,
which signifies to putrefy. These Esquiline pits were
evidently closed in the reign of Augustus,* before the
introduction of Christianity to the world, and therefore
they contain only the bodies of Pagans, and will not be
referred to again in these lectures.

I return now to the consideration of the Catacombs —
the excavated galleries which were used, as hiding or
burial-places, exclusively by the Christians, as appears by
the inscriptions, and b^; the fact of the dead having been
buried there entire in separate graves, and neither reduced
to ashes nor heaped together in pits, like the bodies of
Pagans.

We will set out on our journey along one of the high
roads which lead out of Rome, the Via Flaminia, the Via
Ostiensis, or perhaps, better than all, the Via Appia, and
visit the extensive Catacombs named after St. Sebastian,
which lie in that quarter. We enter through a low, dark
doorway, upon an aisle, which divides into branches run-
ning in various directions, all losing themselves in the
darkness which envelops objects at the distance of a few
feet; but we will light our candles and torches, and
proceed cautiously, attended by a guide who knows some-
thing of the intricate windings of the labyrinth. [80-]
The galleries are about eight or ten feet hi^h, and from
four to six feet in width. Tombs, rifled of their contents or
from which the slabs which closed them have been removed,
yawn around you, tier above tier in never-ending succes-

* Horace, Satires, i. 8.

CHRISTIANITY.

sion : here is one larger than others — it is a hisomum, or
grave for two ; here a passage branches off to the left — it
is unsafe to traverse, for the puzzolana has fallen in blocks ;
on the rightj another has been walled up with masonrj,
as a measure of precaution, as strangers have strayed,
lost their way, and never been heard of. We arrive at a
part of the gallery so obstructed with rubbish, that we
must crawl on hands and knees, if we would further
explore in this direction. But here are rough and dan-
gerous stairs descending ; they lead to a lower labyrinth
of galleries and crypts, and if we explore these, we shall
find a third and sometimes a fourth range of excavations,
one below the other. Here is a wider space, at the junction
of four branching galleries, it is slightly domed at the
summit ; and there is a chain which once suspended a
lamp ; and there are tombs arranged with more regard to
order, and inscriptions which speak of holy men and
women, and rude sculptures and primitive paintings of
Scripture subjects. It is a place of gathering, where the
early Christians met to worship their God and Saviour. But
what is it makes the air fresher, the breathing more easy
here ? the atmosphere does not taste so hot and dusty and
earthy. Look, there is an air-hole and a glimmer of day-
light from above ; it is one of the luminaria cryptce or shafts,
which lighted and ventilated these subterranean abodes,
and which are still found at intervals perforating the
soil about the Campagna, near Rome, indicating the extent
and direction of the ramifying galleries beneath.

You will be glad now to ascend to the upper air
while I tell you somethins: of the extent of these Cata-
combs. Some of the cemeteries contain galleries which
extend probably two or three miles, with branches in all

GALLERIES DESCRIBED.

directions^ and no one now living is personally acquainted
witli more than a small portion of them. A German
traveller of the last century says_, that to visit all parts
of the Catacombs of St. Sebastian_, would be to under-
take a icalJc of twenty miles, and that he thought^ that if
the length of all the passages, crypts, and galleries could
be summed up and put together, there might be one
hundred miles of this subterranean Rome ; but, in his
time, many of the galleries were walled up, several
bewildered persons having perished in them.* It is clear
that all the Catacombs have not as yet been discovered
and explored; for during the French occupation of Rome,
further discoveries have been made and are still makino-,
and very large collections of drawings and of works of
art have been recently brought to Paris by M. Ferret, an
enterprising French architect. f

And now as to the occupation and contents of the
Catacombs. They were used, as I have before stated, as
places of refuge from the storm of persecution, which,
commencing at or about the time of Xero, beat upon tlie
first followers of Christ, and, with some few intervals,
raged during the first three centuries, until it finally
ceased, a.d. 311, by an edict of Galerius. That emperor
was dying of a frightful and incurable disease, which
neither physicians nor Pagan idols could alleviate. Having
sent to the Christians to request them to pray for him, he
issued the edict referred to, which closed the Pagan per-
secution of Christianity in the Roman empire. During this

* Keyster's "Travels in Germany," quoted in Macfarlane's
" Catacombs of Rome."

t M. Perret has been engaged six years in these researches.
Yide Athenceujn, No. 1250, Oct., 1851.

CHRISTIANITY.

period of persecution, they were likewise used as places
of sepulture for those Christians who resided in them, as
well as_, doubtless_, for many who_, aboveground, died in
the faith of Christ.

Upon the issue of the edict of Galerius, and the pro-
fession of Christianity by Constantino,, which almost imme-
diately followed, a great change necessarily took place as
it regarded the use of the Catacombs. No longer a pro-
scribed and persecuted race, the Christians came forth
from their hiding-places, enjoyed the light and breathed
the pure air of heaven ; while those who henceforth
visited the Catacombs, did so from a feeling of venera-
tion for the martyrs and holy men whose bodies were
there interred ; and with a degree of superstition, easily
accounted for, worshipped at their tombs in the Catacomb
chapels, surrounded by the remains of the Christian dead ;
or they sought a grave for those whom they loved among
the resting-places of those persecuted Christians, whom
they regarded with so much veneration. We shall be pre-
pared, then, to meet with two classes of monuments in
our search : those which were deposited by the defenceless
Christians during the first three centuries ; and those
which were placed in the Catacombs, after the toleration
of Christianity, by those who visited them, to decorate the
tombs and chapels in honour of the martyrs. Auiong the
first we shall expect to find much which speaks of a pure,
primitive, uncorrapted faith ; and we must not be sur-
prised to find occasionally among the latter some indica-
tions of that declension from primitive faith and practice
which distinguished the era of the Churches worldly pros-
perity, and which became so apparent and marked in the
succeeding centuries.

The establishment of Christianity at Rome was soon

THE CATACOMBS_, THETR OCCUPATION.

followed by the irruption of those barbarous hordes who
overthrew the ancient city^ Home. In their search after
treasure, thej ransacked the graves of the Catacombs, so
far as they were accessible, and from this period they be-
came deserted ; all knowledge of their windings being lost,
except to banditti, thieves, and debtors, who resorted to
and made them a terror to the peaceful and well-disposed.

"War, civil commotion, and social discord continued at
Rome for many centuries. The entrances to the Cata-
combs became lost by the falling in of the earth, the
growth of trees and rank vegetation; from time to time,
some of them were also closed up with masonry, to pre-
vent the galleries being used by robbers or conspirators
against the government.

About the middle of the sixteenth century, say about
a thousand years from the period of their being used as
Christian cemeteries, interest being excited concerning
them and theii- contents, many of them were again opened
and explored. About the year 1585, under Pope Paul
III., some of the Catacombs were cleared of rubbish,
cleansed, and lighted up. At this time, a controversy,
respecting relics, was waging in the Romish Church, and
much attention was consequently directed to the contents
of the rediscovered Catacombs. Antiquarians pursued
their inquiries with intense interest. Bosio, an Italian,
spent more than thirty years — from the year 1567 to 1600 —
in exploring the galleries, collecting antiquities, and copy-
ing inscriptions, paintings, etc. He died while completing
his great work called Roma Sotterranea (Subterranean
Rome), published after his death, and translated into
Latin by Aringhi.

In 1720, another valuable work was published by
Boldetti, on the subject of the contents of the Cata-

CHRISTIANITY.

combs ; this indefatigable explorer also spent more than
thirty years of his life in these underground investiga-
tions. Bosio and Boldetti were followed hj others in this
branch of study^ such as Bottari_, Marangoni, and Fabretti,
Italians; and MM. d^Agincourt and Faoul Eochette,
Frenchmen : the former of whom repaired to Eome to
spend six months in the study^ but found it at once so
attractive and so vast^ that he remained there ffty yearsy
and died while arranging his materials for a work published
after his death.

All these works_, written either in a foreign or dead
language^ and accessible only to those who could resort to
public libraries,, are little known to Englishmen ; grati-
tude is due therefore to Dr. Charles Maitland for making
the subject accessible to us by the publication^ in our own
language, of his learned and deeply interesting work,
The Church in the Catacombs.''*

"It is difficult/' says that writer, "now to realize the
impressions which must have been made upon the first
explorers of this subterranean city ; a vast necropolis, rich
in the bones of saints and martyrs; a stupendous testi-
mony to the truth of Christian history, and, consequently,
to that of Christianity itself ; a faithful record of the trials
of a persecuted Church. * * * * must now

have recourse to the museums of Eome and the works of
antiquarians to understand the appearance of the Cata-
combs at that time, from the removal of everything
portable to a place of greater security and more easy
access, as well as from the difficulty of personally ex-
amining these dangerous galleries."

* "The Church in the Catacombs ; a Description of the Primi-
tive Church of Eome, illustrated from Sepulchral Remains."
Longman & Co., I cndon.

LAPIDARIAN GALLERY.

The monuments^ inscriptions^ and antiquities removed
from the Catacombs are chiefly deposited in the Vatican
Museum at Rome. The Christian Museum there contains
many sarcophagi, bas-reliefsj inscriptions, and medals ;
but the most valuable collection of inscriptions is that of
the Lapidarian Gallery, or Gallery of Stones, a long corri-
dor in that museum, the sides of which are completely
lined with slabs plastered to the walls. There is a marked
contrast, however, between the two walls of this corridor
and the emotions which they are calculated to excite in
the minds of the thoughtful. On the right hand are
arranged Pagan inscriptions; while opposite to them,
appear more than three thousand epitapbs of the ancient
and primitive Christians.

" I have spent,^^ says Raoul Rochette, " many entire
days in this sanctuary of antiquity, where the sacred and
profane stand facing each other in the written monuments
preserved to us, as in the days when Paganism and
Christianity, striving with all their powers, were engaged
in mortal conflict. And were it only for the treasure of
impressions which we receive from this immense collection
of Christian epitaphs, taken from the graves of the Cata-
combs and now affixed to the walls of the Vatican, this
alone would be an inexhaustible fund of recollections and
enjoyment for a whole life.^^*

The inscriptions in this and the adjoining museums
are the witnesses which I shall call to testify to the
Paganism of the past and the Christianity of the present,
during the remainder of this course.

It must not be concluded, however, that the three
thousand inscriptions of the Lapidarian Gallery are all the
inscriptions which have been preserved to us. Seventy
^ Eaoul EocheLte, " Tableau des Catacombs," p. ]0.

CHRI-STIANITY.

thousand are estimated to have been contained in the
Catacombs^ and removed or copied at different times^*
and many hundreds have been very recently discovered.

The inscriptions are chiefly upon slabs of stone or
marble, used to close the graves in the walls of the
galleries before referred to. Here are representations
which will convey good ideas of the graves and slabs.
[ 81. ] In one grave the skeleton is almost entire ; in
the other, a little dust alone remains, reminding us of the
sentence pronounced upon our perishing bodies : Dust
thou art, and unt-o dust shalt thou return.^^

The inscription reads upon the upper grave : —
VALERIA SLEEPS IN PEACE.
On the lower slab the palm-branch of triumph is rudely
scratched.

The slabs average generally from one to three feet in
length; the letters upon them are from half an inch to
four inches in height, and are scratched or cut in the
stone, and the indentation usually filled in with Vene-
tian red.

You will easily distinguish, among the illustrations
which I shall exhibit to you, the facsimiles, or exact re-
presentations, from those which are mere copies of inscrip-
tions, by noticing the rude and irregular forms of the
letters in the former.

I have thus drawn a picture of Paganism ; have endea-
voured to describe to you Christianity as it was introduced
by its Founder — the Christianity of the New Testament.
I have taken you down into the hiding-place of some of
its earliest professors ; I must defer to a future lecture
some explanations of inscriptions and signs, which would,

* Maitland, p. 16.

lA^SCRIPTIONS CONTRASTED.

without such explanation, be to you mysterious and unin-
teresting; but I desire to point out to you a contrast
which those silent witnesses, the tombstones of the early
Christians, enable us to draw between the two systems
called Pagan and Christian.

In nothing is the contrast between the two systems
so striking as in the spirit in which death is regarded by
the professors of the two faiths : with the Pagan it is ex-
tinction of existence, the terraination of all that is de-
sirable, and a feeling of disappointment or revenge is
manifested against the Great Disposer of life and death ;
with the Christian all is peace, hope, anticipation of
happiness, and indication of triumph. It has been well
said, turn where you will in the Catacombs, all is peace,
PEACE, PEACE, everywhere.

Let me take a few Pagan and Christian epitaphs to
illustrate this observation. [ 89. ]

Pagan.

I, PROCOPE, LIFT UP MY HANDS
AGAINST GOD, WHO SNATCHED ME
AWAY INNOCENT. SHE LIVED
TWENTY YEARS. PROCLUS SET UP
THIS.

Christian .
(Fragment.)
WHO GAVE AND HATH TAKEN

BLESSED OF THE LORD

WHO LIVED-YEARS...;.

IN PEACE, IN THE CONSULATE OF

Here the Pagan inscription regards death as an injury,
calling for resentment against God ; and man^s puny arm
is raised against the Great Arbiter of the universe. The
Christian epitaph, although a fragment, speaks a different
language — that of implicit submission, resignation, and
peace. The remainder,^^ says Dr. Maitland, of this
inscription has been destroyed, as far as perishable mar-
ble is concerned ; but the immortal sentiment which
pervades the sentence supplies the loss. Like a voice
from among the graves, broken by sobs^ yet distinctly

CHRISTIANITY.

intelligible^ fall the words upon the ear:* 'The Lord
gave, and the Lord hath taken away^ blessed be the
name of the Lord/ ^'

We are reminded by this early Christian tombstone
of a practice^ which has become common in our Christian
graveyards,, of inscribing texts upon tombs : —

"His name, his years, spelt by tli' unletter'd muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she strews,
To teach the rustic moralist to die."

Again ; contrast the following inscriptions : — [ 89. ]

Pagan.

CA1U8 JULIUS MAXIMUS, (AGED)
II YEARS AND V MONTHS.

0 RELENTLESS FORTUNE,
DELIGHTEST IN CRUEL DEATH, WHY
IS MAXIMUS SO SUDDENLY SNATCHED
FROM ME? HE WHO LATELY USED
TO LIE JOYFUL ON MY BOSOM.
THIS STONE NOW MARKS HIS TOMB.
BEHOLD HIS MOTHER.

Christian.

PETRONIA, A DEACON'S WIFE,
THE TYPE OF MODESTY.

IN THIS PLACE I LAY MY BONES;
SPARE YOUR TEARS, DEAR HUSBAND
AND DAUGHTERS, AND BELIEVE THAT
IT IS FORBIDDEN TO WEEP FOR ONE
WHO LIVES IN GOD. BURIED IN
PEACE ON THE THIRD BEFORE THE
NONES OF OCTOBER, IN THE CON-
SULATE OF FESTUS.

In the Pagan inscription is heard the voice of repining
and despondency ; the mother weeping for her child^
" and will not be comforted^ because he is not.''' In the
Christian epitaph^ all this is reversed ; the mourning
husband and daughters are consoled by the conviction
that the deceased " lives in God/' and are called upon to
dry their tears^ under the assurance — as it is beautifully
expressed, both on the tomb and by the Apostle — that

Maitland's Church in the Catacombs," p. 14.

INSCRIPTIONS CONTRASTED.

the Christian should not weep as those Pagans who have
no hope of immortahty. ^' But I would not have you to
be ignorant, brethren, concerDing them which are asleep,
that ye sorroiu not, even as others which have no hope. For
if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them
also irJiich sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him.'^*

Where can a stronger contrast in sentiment be found ^
than exists between the Pagan and Christian monuments
upon this point? Paganism, notwithstandiog the allu-
sions of her poets to Elysian fields beyond the dark
waters of the Styx, had no certain hope of immortality ;
out of many thousands of epitaphs still extant in cabinets
and museums, not one well-authenticated allusion to a
settled conviction of immortality can be found. t Cicero,
mating to a friend suffering from bereavement, hesitates
to suggest consolation arising out of the belief in the
immortality of the soul ; all he can say is, " though we
may conjecture something respecting this immortality, it
is a subject so completely in doubt, that I dare not present
it to you as a real and genuine subject of consolation/^

An epitaph given by Dr. Maitland shows how the
Pagan prospect was bounded by this earth, and life was
looked upon as a drama which, when acted out, ended all.
It reads : —

* 1 Thess. iv. 13, 14.

t In a work, published as these sheets were issuing from the
press, The Free Church of Ancient Christendom," by Basil H.
Cooper, BA., this statement is abundantly confirmed. " The
author has not lighted upon a single clear example of the kind,
amongst the selection of upwards of 750 sepulchral marbles
given in the work of Zell ; nor has he met with one such
of undoubted and purely heathen origin in the only portion of
Bockh's great work, the ' Corpus Inscriptionum Graecorum,' torn,
i.— iii." (p. 17, note.)

CHRISTIANITY.

WHILE I LIVED, I LIVED WELL MY DRAMA IS NOW ENDED: SOON YOURS
WILL BE. FAREWELL, AND APPLAUD ME.

How different the sentiment of the following, from the
Catacombs, in which the separate existence and happiness
of the soul are regarded as certainties : —

NICEPHORUS, A SWEET SOUL IN REFRESHMENT.

Again : —

LAURENCE TO HIS SWEETEST SON SEVERUS, THE WELL-DESERVING, BORNE
AWAY BY ANGELS ON THE VIITH BEFORE THE IDES OF JANUARY.

The same idea is beautifully illustrated by the follow-
ing inscription on the tomb of a martyr, who suffered
under the Antonine persecution, which commenced about
the year a.d. 160. The original is decorated with the
monogram of Christ, and olive-branch, and also exhibits
a pot containing fire — perhaps referring to the manner of
his death : —

ALEXANDER IS NOT DEAD, BUT LIVES ABOVE THE STARS, AND HIS BODY
RESTS IN THIS TOMB. HE ENDED LIFE UNDER THE EMPEROR ANTONINE,
WHO, FORESEEING THAT GREAT BENEFIT WOULD RESULT FROM HIS SER-
VICES, RETURNED EVIL FOR GOOD. FOR WHILE ON HIS KNEES AND ABOUT
TO SACRIFICE TO THE TRUE GOD, HE WAS LED AWAY TO EXECUTION..
OH, SAD TIMES! IN WHICH, AMONG SACRED RITES AND PRAYERS, EVEN
IN CAVERNS, WE ARE NOT SAFE. WHAT CAN BE MORE WRETCHED THAN
SUCH A LIFE? AND WHAT THAN SUCH A DEATH? WHEN THEY CANNOT BE
BURIED BY THEIR FRIENDS AND RELATIONS. AT LENGTH THEY SPARKLE
IN HEAVEN. HE HAS SCARCELY LIVED, WHO HAS LIVED IN CHRISTIAN

TIMES.

Respecting this interesting monument, Dr. Maitland
remarks : ' He lives above the stars, and his body rests
in this tomb there is faith in this joining together, as

INSCRIPTIONS CONTRASTED.

things equally tangible and matter of fact, tlie place of
liis spiritual abode, and the resting-place of his body.
There are also other points in the inscription worthy of
notice. The first words, ^ Alexander is dead/ after lead-
ing us to expect a lamentation, break out into an assur-
ance of glory and immortality; the description of the
temporal insecurity in which the believers of that time
lived ; the diflBculty of procuring Christian burial for the
martyrs, with the certainty of their heavenly reward ; and
the concluding sentence forcibly recalling the words of
St. Paul — ^as dying, and behold we live.^'^* Truly
these inscriptions throw more light than all the Commen-
taries upon one passage of Scripture : — " Christ hath
brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." ^
In another respect, the Pagan and Christian inscrip-
tions, standing face to face, in the Lapidarian Gallery, are
most illustrative of the two religions of which they are
the silent exponents. On the Pagan side is found a proud
array of names. The nomen, prcenomen, and cognomen ;
and of titles, hereditary, imperial, civil, military, and mu-
nicipal. " Further on, the whole heaven of Paganism is
glorified by innumerable altars, where the epithets, ' un-
conquered, greatest, and best,^ are lavished upon the
worthless shadows that peopled Olympus. The first
glance at the opposite wall is enough to show, that ' not
many mighty, not many noble,^ were numbered among
those whose epitaphs are there displayed ; that these
records, in almost every instance, are ^ the short and
simple annals of the poor.^ The Christian convert deemed
it sufficient to be recognized by that name which belonged
to him as a subject of the heavenly kingdom.^' " Till the
number of Christians increased so as to render a further

* Maitland's " Church in the Catacombs," p 40. f 2 Tim. i. 10.

CHRISTIANITY.

distinction necessary, the Christian name alone was re-
coided in tlie cemetery/^*

Witness the following simple inscriptions : —

THE PLACE OF PHILEMON.
VIRGINIUS REMAINED BUT A SHORT TIME WITH US.
THE PLACE OF SEVUS.
MARTYRIA, IN PEACE.
THE DORMITORY OF ELPIS.
PRIMA, PEACE BE TO THEE.
ZOTICUS LAID HERE TO SLEEP.
CEMELLA SLEEPS IN PEACE.

And now you will agree with me that it is high time
that I bring my lecture to some practical conclusion.
Allow me, for a minute, to recall the subjects we have
been considering, before I attempt to deduce the improve-
ment of which they are susceptible.

We spoke of the doubts and gloomy forebodings of
human nature, groping, in the midst of " darkness which
might be felt," for light and hope of deliverance. I told
you of intense desire and high anticipation of coming-
help from above. I pointed out to you the fulfilment of
all hopes and anticipations in the rising of ^' the Sun of
Eighteousness, with healing in His wings the advent
of ^' a light to them which sat in darkness and the shadow
of death, to guide their footsteps into the way of peace."
I contrasted the teaching of' this Deliverer with the
* Maitland's "Chuich in the Catacombs," pp. 12, 15.

IMPROVEMENT.

Pagan teaching of old. I spoke of His new and startling
doctrine spreading even to Rome, the world^s capital, I
hinted briefly at its rough reception there, and the cruel
treatment of its unoffending professors ; of the victory
which their steadfast faith and patient endurance wrought
over the powers of the earth. You accompanied me to
view their ancient underground dwellings, used as hiding-
places_, chmxhes^ and sleeping -places.''"^ We together
explored their dark and winding galleries, noticed their
tombs and inscriptions, by which they told the simple
tale of confiding faith and unshaken hope in a crucified
Lord and Master ; their conviction of union with Him, and
^•'sure and certain hope of a resurrection from the dead.

And what do we learn from all this ?

I would have you notice, if you have not done so
already, the irresistible, the stupendous power of pure Chris-
tianity ; and, noticing that, ask yourselves if it be not of
Divine origin ?

Reflect, for a few moments, on the state of the con-
tending parties and systems at Rome, in mortal conflict,
during the occupation of the Catacombs. On the one
side were arrayed all the powers of the world — the Roman
emperors, whose will dictated law to the earth ; a power-
ful army; all the wealth of Rome; all the learning of
the Augustan period; all the intellect of philosophy and
science "falsely so called a priesthood, whose influence
extended to the bounds of the Roman empire, and whose
power perhaps exceeded even that of the emperor him-
self; all the rulers; the great majority of the people;
and the prestige of high antiquity in favour of a religion
which was admirably adapted to the human heart.

* The name *' ceoietery," i.e., sleeping -placet was first used by
the Christians of the Catacombs.

80 CHRISTIANITY.

On the other side we find a few poor, illiterate,
despised outcasts, hiding in 'Mens and caves of the
earth/' without arms, or refusing to use them ; decimated
by persecutions repeated again and again ; opposing their
enemies, not with carnal weapons, but blessing and pray-
ing for them; and yet we find one emperor after another
declaring that they were "incorrigible " or, in other
words, invincible.

Agoiu and again edicts went forth to exterminate
them from the earth; and inscriptions were set up to
celebrate and perpetuate the supposed success of the
persecutions. Here are two which have been preserved
by antiquarian writers : —

-DIOCLETIAN, C/ESAR, AUGUSTUS, HAVING ADOPTED CALERIUS IN THE
EAST; THE SUPERSTITION OF THE CHRISTIANS BEING EVERYWHERE
DESTROYED, AND THE WORSHIP OF THE GODS PROPAGATED.

Again : —

DIOCLETIAN, JOVIUS, AND MAXIMIAN, HERCULEUS, C/ESAR, AUGUSTUS.
THE ROMAN EMPIRE HAVING BEEN ENLARGED THROUGHOUT THE EAST AND
THE WEST, AND THE NAME OF THE CHRISTIANS, WHO WERE OVERTHROW-
ING THE ROMAN REPUBLIC, BLOHED OUT. *

Never in the world's history was there found a more
striking instance of the short-sightedness of man, and
the irresistible working of the providence of God.
Within ten years from the reign of Diocletian, the " su-
perstition every where dest7'oyed/' and the tiame blotted
out/' became the prevailing, the established religion of
the Roman Empire. The seed cast into the ground, im-
bued from the first with Divine life, and watered con-

* According to Gruter, these inscriptions were found upon
two columns in Spain. They are quoted in Neauder's " General

OBJECTION ANSWERED.

tinually by the Divine blessing, sprang all at once into
observation, asserting its power, and overturning tlie
decaying system v^^liich impeded for a time its upward
progress.

But you may object, perhaps, — If Christianity is
Divine, why did it not arrive earlier in the world ? To
this I must reply very briefly, that God is Sovereign :
He doeth as He will in • the armies of heaven, and
among the inhabitants of the earth." No one may rea-
sonably say unto Him, What doest Thou ? "

But, beyond this general reply, I think there are
reasons apparent why the coming of Christ was delayed.

I would ask you, was there no wisdom displayed in.
delaying Divine help until man had proved to his hearths
content his own helplessness ?

Man is so proud, so self-sufficient, that surely it was
befitting that he should try a religion of his own — should

Church History," i. 210. In the original language they are as
follow : —

DIOCLETIAN . C^S.
AVG. . GALERIO . IN . ORI
ENTE . ADOPT. . SVPERS •
TITIONE . CHRIST.
VBIQ. . DELETA . ET . CVL
TV . DEOR. . PROPAGATO.

DIOCLETIANVS . lOVIVS . ET
MAXIMIAN . HERCVLEVS .
C^S. . AVG.

AMPLIFICATO . PER . ORIENTEM . OCCIDENTEM .
IMP. . ROM. .
ET

NOMINE . CHRISTIANORVM .
DELETO . QUI .
REMP. . EVER
TEBANT.

CHRISTIANITY.

be filled witli his own devices, before interference in his
behalf was attempted. Bo we not so deal with the self-
willed among ourselves ? " Let them go their own way/'
say we, " try their own remedies ; and, when they dis-
cover that they require help, they will gladly accept it.-*'
I do think, my friends, that when a few more thousand
years have rolled away — and with God they are but as
one day — that all will admit that the troubled infancy of
this world, its moral disorder, and its yearnings for order
and peace, will not have been without their uses ; as the
chaotic upbreakings of the earth's physical surface in
past ages are now ministering to our wants, our comfort,
and to human advancement. I could, if time permitted,
show you that the period selected for the mission of
Christ was admirably adapted for the purpose contem-
plated : in that the world had come to be under the rule
of one emperor, whose policy tolerated all religions, so
that Christianity was carried, in its early days, even to
the burning sands of India and to the snows of Siberia ;
in that the Jewish Scriptures and prophecies had been
ti'anslated into Greek, and the literature of that polished
nation had been extensively diflfused over the world ; in
that the troubles which had fallen upon Palestine had
distributed the Jews into " every nation under heaven.-"
All these circumstances concurred to further the spread
of Christianity, while they indicated that the fulness of
time had come.'"

Or you may, some of you, perhaps object — If Chris-
tianity was from God, why did it not cast down Paganism
at once and destroy it on the spot ?

God does not work so, either in the moral or the
physical world. The earthquake and the tornado are not
His usual but His extraordinary agencies. Why He

OBJECTION ANSWERED.

does not so work is not for us to determine; we can
watch_, however, and trace His working in Nature, and
we shall find it agree with His dealings in Providence.
God is in no haste (if I may use the expression). His
time is not limited like man^s, who, if he have aught to
do, must ^' do it with all his might," for " the night
Cometh when no man can work.'^ But it is not so with
God; eternity is before Him, and He works, to our
senses, deliberately , hut surely and irresistibly.

Let us consider an illustration of His method of
working.

Insignificant insects are diligently piling atom upon
atom ; ages pass away, and their work is gradually rising
to the top of the waters, lifting up itself a coral reef
above the foaming waves; sea-birds alight on it, and
sea-weed is flung upon it, and contribute to the forma-
tion of a soil ; volcanic action, deep seated beneath, is
heaving gradually the surface into hill and dale. A bird
drops a seed here, a wave casts up another there. The
graceful palm, the useful bread-fruit, and the grateful
orange spring up, and a forest diversifies the scene.

But thousands of years have passed away since the
animalcules began their task.

Look again : a drifted canoe is borne out of its accus-
tomed course ; the island is peopled ; the inhabitants
are naked, savage, idolatrous, bloodthirsty. Another
thousand years wing their flight.

Again the scene changes : a strange sail is in sight,
a boat puts ofi" — civilized men are landing ; they make
overtures of peace and of reciprocal barter. The inha-
bitants clothe themselves, and erect convenient dwellings;
a written language is being constructed. A printing-
press is set up ; the Book of Truth is printed, read.

CHRISTIANITY.

acted upon. They have " cast their idols to the moles
and to the bats they have thrown down their blood-
stained altars ; they have converted their " swords into
ploughshares^ and their spears into pruning-hooks.'^
GoD^s PURPOSE IS COMPLETE ; lut it Tias occujjied j^erhaps
six thousand years to bring it about.

Count not, then, Grod^s years as you would number
the few days allotted to yourselves. The Lord is not
slack as men count slackness.''^ Let us beware of at-
tempting to measure with our puny lines the depths of
infinity and the length and breadth of eternity, remem-
bering that

" His judgments are a mighty deep,

Where plummet of archangel's intellect
Could never yet find soundings, but from age
To age, let down, drawn up, then thrown again,
With lengthened line and added weight, yet fails :
For still the cry in heaven is, ' Oh, the depth ! ' "

Learn, then, that when God works none may hinder
Him, but He will work like an Eternal God nevertheless.
Thus worked He, and thus works He still, with regard
to Christianity, the Divinely-appointed agency for this
world^s regeneration. It has cast down the Paganism of
the Roman Empire ; it is now at work upon other evils
to which I must refer in my concluding lecture. In the
words of our Lord^s parable, the leaven cast into the
meal is at work, until the whole is leavened. It is
actively engaged upon Eastern and Western Paganism,
and is undermining and supplanting false religion and
superstition all over the world.

" Its wakening smiles

Have broke the gloom of Pagan sleep ;

The Word has reached the utmost isles ;
God's spirit moves upon the deep.

EFFECTS OP CHRISTIANITY.

Already, from the dust of death,

Mau, in his Maker's image, stands ;
Once more he draws immortal breath,

And stretches forth to heaven his hands."

In conclusion, let me bespeak your gratitude for what
Christianity has done for us. It would have done more,
but for the reasons I shall assign in my last lecture ; but
its beneficial effects are too apparent not to demand
grateful acknowledgment.

Paganism amongst us has been cast out, with its
cruelty, human sacrifices, and revolting rites. The
horrors of war have been mitigated. In lieu of child-
murder, carried on systematically, we have asylums for
mothers in the hour of trial, for foundlings, orphans, the
ragged, the starving and the forsaken. Mercy is now
extended to the poor, the outcast, and the abandoned.
We have refuges for the erring, the idiot, and the de-
mented ; hospitals for the wounded, the sick, and the
dying. Suicide and revenge, once accounted honourable,
are now disgraceful and illegal. Woman has been lifted
to the level she was designed to occupy ; instead of the
drudge and slave of man, she is now, with us, his equal,
the ornament and the happiness of his home. And with
respect to yourselves, as forming part of the great mass
of the people, how has Christianity improved your posi-
tion, your moral character !

Had you lived in those days of Pagan darkness, how
would you, my friends, have amused yourselves this
evening ? Instead of listening to a lecture, which, by
your attention, I conclude, has been interesting, you
would, in all probability, with your families, have been
gloating over scenes of bloodshed, or indulging unfeel-
ing ears with the cries and groans of the helpless, the

CHRISTIANITY.

wounded^ and the dying ; have been shouting, perchance,
for The Christians to the lions or would have rioted,
perhaps, because some fresh victim, to be torn with the
ungulce,"^ had been denied to you. You and I, but for
God^s grace, might have been equally callous to human
suffering with human nature of old ; and this very even-
ing we might have given, again and again, the signal to
despatch a fellow-mortal, already so miserable, that death
would hardly be regarded as a foe. Or, if illuminated
by the light of the Gospel shining in our hearts, you and
I might have occupied the more enviable position as vic-
tims, to make sport for a short hour for all ranks and
classes of Pagan Rome.

You will remind me that slavery is still practised in
some countries by professing Christians, attended by
many of its most revolting features. I have not for-
gotten it j who could ignore the painful fact ? The incon-
sistency is so glaring, that it is difficult to determine
whether feelings of astonishment or of shame predominate
in the breast of the Christian who regards it. The oppo-
nent of Christianity may well point his finger at such an
exhibition ; but I must beg his candid attention to one
or two statements, which he in fairness must listen to
before he comes to a decision hostile to Christianity,
founded on such inconsistency.

No sooner had Christianity attained to worldly power,
than it directed itself to mitigate evils which it could
not immediately subdue. 'J'he manumission — that is,
liberation — of slaves, was esteemed so honourable in the
Christian, that the first Christian emperor dignified the

* Instruments of iron, resembling a claw or hand, used for
tearing and lacerating the flesh.

SLAVERY.

act by requiring that their emancipation should be an-
nounced hij the bishop before the assembled Ghurch. Many
honours have been^ since that day, bestowed upon Church
dignitaries by the powers of the earth. What higher
dignity than this could be conferred by them on a mi-
nister of Jesus Christ ?

The institution of slavery fell throughout Europe,
not with a sudden crash, but gradually, before the ad-
vance and extension of Christianity. No one can put
his finger on the period and say, Then and there ended
slavery but slavery, in Western Christian Europe at
least f is extinct.^ In the Augustan age, out of twenty-
eight millions of Europeans, at least half of that number
are estimated to have groaned under the most cruel
bondage. Athens, the most refined city in the world —
the boasted home of freedom — at the height of her pros-
perity, possessed 421,000 inhabitants^ 400,000 of whom
vjere slaves, f Of the numerical predominance of slaves
over freemen at Rome, I have already spoken. Where
are they now ? If you travel from the Pillars of Her-
cules to the Danube, from the Icy Cape to the foot of
Italy, not one is to be found. We can afi'ord to bear
with the taunt of the opponent of Christianity, having
such a fact to appeal to ; but I have another to point out
no less conclusive.

Christianity, as you will learn, kept not its first estate.
The fine gold became dim, and many of the old evils
crept back to afflict mankind; amongst them slavery,

* This Lecture was delivered before the abolition of serfdom
in the Eussian Empire, by which 25,000,000 serfs, who had
neither wives, children, or property to call their own, were
liberated in the year 1862.

t Lecture by Professor Alison, on the " Influence of Chris-
tianity." London : Seeleys, 1852.

CHRISTIANITY.

like a bird of evil omen^ scented tlie corruption^ and re-
turned to its congenial pursuits. Tlie slave-trade with
Africa sprang up^ and a legalized traffic in flesh and
blood v^as carried on by many nations professing Chris-
tianity. Not_, however_, to be acquiesced in silently, as
to Pagan times ; the advocates of the wrong were doomed
to listen to the murmurs, the complaints, and, afterwards,
the indignant declamation, the withering denunciation,
of Christian patriots and statesmen. The Statute 3 & 4
William IV., chapter 73, was the proud result, passed on
the 28th August, 1833. By this Act, slavery, previously
unlawful in Britain, became illegal throughout her vast
dominions. Let me request you to bear in mind this
statute — as Englishmen you may well indulge an honest
pride that you can identify yourselves with such a mea-
sure. It furnishes a striking comment on the power of
Christianity. A nation taxing itself voluntarily, almost
unanimously, to the amount of twenty millions of pounds,
in order ihat it might be for ever free from the crime of
slavery, conferred upon itself, by that act, more real dig-
nity and glory than it acquired by its conquests by sea
and land — all its accumulated triumphs of science, lite-
rature, and commerce.

Slavery is now repudiated by all the European States
(Spain excepted), and treaties of mutual co-operation exist
between them for its prevention. It requires not the
prophet's vision to foretell its early downfall elsewhere ;
its chains are loosening, its yoke is falling from the neck,
before the silent but irresistible force of Christian
opinion. Whether its abettors will have the wisdom to
perceive their peril and avert their own ruin, or whether
they will be involved in the coming destruction of
slavery, is for themselves to determine by timely action.

SLAVERY.

As certainly as the sun rising dispels the midnight vapours,
so certainly luill the extending doctrine of the Sun of
Righteousness proclaim ^' liberty to the captive, and the
opening of the prison to them that are hound.'' *

If Christianity has eflPected such changes in the habits,
tastes_, and condition of men ; if it has accomplished all
that I have indicated in this lecture — and my conscience
acquits me of having at all overstated its results — then
I would say_, in conclusion, do not let us lightly reject its
claims to be Divine, or be ungrateful for what it has
already effected. Eather let us evince our gratitude by
studying more earnestly its character, and drinking more
deeply of its spirit, depending unhesitatingly upon its
power to accomplish ultimately all that it came to pjerform.

* This was first written in 1851. The fall of slavery in the
United States, predicted as above, was, in the good providence
of God, accomplished as a result of the Civil War by which the
blind advocates of slavery destroyed themselves, and brought
about the liberation of four millions of slaves. The Constitu-
tional Amendment abolishing slavery was ratified by the States,
and on the ISth of December, 1865, proclamation was issued ac-
cordinsjly. The following beautiful poem was written by J. G.
Whittier, on hearing the bells ring on that happy occasion : —

LAUS DEO !

It is done !

Clang- of bell and roar of gua
Send the tidings up and down.

How the belfries rock and reel,

How the great guns, peal on peal,
Fling the joy from town to town.

Pang, 0 bells !

Every stroke exulting tells
Of the burial-hour of crime.

Loud and long that all may hear

Ring for every listening ear
Of Eternity and Time !

CHRISTIANITY.

Let us kneel :
God's own voice is in that peal,

And this spot is holy l' round.
Lord forgive us ! What are we,
That our eyes this glory see,

That our ears have heard the sound ?

For the Lord

On the whirlwind is ahroad ;
In the earthquake He has spoken :

He has smitten with his thunder

The iron walls asunder,
And the gates of brass are broken !

Loud and long,
Lift the old exulting song ;

Sing with Miiiam by the sea :
He hath cast the mighty down ;
Horse and rider sink and drown ;

He hath triumphed gloriously !

Did we dare

In our agony of prayer
Ask for more than He has done?

"When was ever his right hand

Over any time or land
Stretched as now beneath the sun !

How they pale,
Ancient myth, and song, and tale.

In this wonder of our da}s.
When the cruel rod of war
Blossoms white with righteous law,

And the wrath of man is praise !

Blotted out !

All within and all about
Shall a freslier life begin ;

Freer breathe the universe

As it rolls its heavy curse
On the dead and buried sin !

It is done !

In the circuit of the sun
Shall the sound thereof go forth.

It sliall bid the sad rejoice.

It shall give the dumb a voice,
It si. all belt with joy the earth !

Ring and swing
Bells of joy ! on morning's wing

Send the song of praise abroad :
With a sound cf broken chains
Tell the nations that He reigns

Who alone is Lord and God !

LECTURE III.

THE CATACOMBS.

"They wandered in dens and caves of the earth," — Heb. xi. 38.

My last lecture extended to such lengthy that I was con-
strained to postpone mention of many interestiug points
connected with the Catacombs. I propose bringing them
before you this evening, previously to replying to a com-
mon objection_, which must occupy our attention during
the remainder of our course.

When you call to memory the statement of the Apostle
Paul,* that Dot many wise (learned) men after the flesh,
not many mighty, not many noble were called/' to pro-
fess Christianity, you will be prepared to hear that the
inscriptions of the Catacombs are not to be studied as
models of classic elegance ; on the contrary, they are
often rude in the extreme, and betray ignorance of letters
in those who dictated, as well as in those who executed
the work.

In one case the inscription has been entirely reversed,
excepting the letter w, so that it must be spelt backward
to make sense of it. It is an epitaph set up to Elia
ViNCENTiA, THE WIFE OF ViEGiNius ; the husbaud, if hving,
must have been unable to read, and he does not appear to
have had any friend capable of pointing out the blunder.

* 1 Cor. i. 26.

THE CATACOMBS.

Orthograpliy^ or spelling, is generally found very defec-
tive_, and the grammar is often as bad as the spelling, and
consequently the meaning is frequently difficult to de-
termine. B is very commonly put for v. One specimen
will suffice for an example. [ 82- ]

The inscription, of which I show you a fac-simile,
reads thus :

SABINl BISO
. " MUM SE BIBUM

FECIT SIBI IN GYMI
lERIUM B^AnBINAE
IN CRYPTA NOBA.

The meaning is, " The bisomum (grave for two) of Sabi-
nus; he made it for himself during his lifetime, in the
cemetery of Balbina, in the new crypt."*^

Here h is put for v in hihum, um is put for o as the
termination of that word, which should be vivo ; cemeterio
is spelt cymiierium ; halhiyioe had been spelfc correctly, ex-
cepting that the I is upside down, but some ill-informed
critic has interpolated an r and an /, which has made
matters worse ; while in the last word nova, the v is again
displaced by a I shall not dwell longer upon the
literary part of the subject, as more important and interest-
ing matter demands our attention. I will only observe,
that words dictated in Greek are often found written in
Roman letters, while Roman words are sometimes written
in Greek letters, and occasionally the languages are oddly
mixed.

Thus : Peima Irene soe is Greek couched in Latin
letters, meaning " Prima, peace to thee/'

It does not appear to have been a general practice to

sab;a/i Biso

rEOT^lBllNCrWf

EMPTVM lOCUM A BARTEMISTVM
VlSOMVMHOC-EST-ETPRE>IVM
DATVMAFOSSORI -H I LARO-ID- EST

FoIai

rOSS-ET- LAV RENT

rX3 0 PRKENTIA
SEVERI

A FOSSOR- WITH INSCRIPTION.

SYMBOLS RELATING TO N A M E. S

FOSSOKS.

place dates upon the gi-avestones ; many of them, how-
ever_, give the names of the Roman Consuls in office, by
which names the date can be ascertained, as lists of the
Consuls have been preserved to our times. The earliest
slab containing the consular date appears to have been
set up A.D. 98 — that is, about sixty-one years from the
death of Christ ; the next is dated a.d. 102, about the
period of the death of the beloved Apostle John ; another
is inscribed a.d. Ill ; and others, various dates, of the
second, tliird, and fourth centuries. It must not be con-
cluded that no Christians were buried in the Catacombs
before the year 98, but that no earlier date has been left
upon record. Thousands of graves contain nothing more
than a name, and some symbol of faith in Christ and
hope in the resurrection.

A body of men existed whose office it was to construct
the graves and regulate all matters relating to interments.
They were called /os507'.s, or sextons ; probably they were
originally the sand-diggers and quarrymen^ converted to
Christianity by witnessing its effects upon those who
professed that faith, brought as they were into close
and immediate contact with its persecuted professors and
martyrs. They became afterwards a regularly organized
body of excavators and guides, and had charge pro-
bably of the lamps which have been found in niches at
certain intervals, and not only made tombs, but sold and
conveyed them.

Here is a painting from the cemetery of Calhstus.
The inscription at the top reads [ 82. ] —

DIOGENES THE FOSSOR. BURIED IN PEACE ON THE EIGHTH BEFORE
THE KALENDS OF OCTOBER

THE CATACOMBS.

In one hand lie holds a pick^ in the other a lamp^ fur-
nished with a spike to drive into the rock ; on the ground
are his cutting implements, hammer, and compasses for
marking out the graves ; the recess behind him is lined
with tombs, covered with slabs ; at his feet is an open
grave ; while the Grreek X (Chi) on his dress, the initial
letter of Christ, indicates his Christian profession, and
the doves with olive-branches the peace in which he rests.

Here is another slab, from which we learn that the
fossors sold and conveyed the graves, and we gather
something of the prices paid for them : [ 82. ]

THE PLAGE BOUGHT BY BARTEMISTUS, THAT IS, A BI80MUM, AND THE
FRIGE PAID TO THE FOSSOR HILARUS.THE SUM OF FOURTEEN HUNDRED
FOLLES, IN THE PRESENGE OF THE FOSSORS SEVERUS AND LAURENCE.

This perfect but very concise form of conveyance might
be studied with advantage by our modern conveyancers.
The price paid for the grave in our money would be
£1 2s. 7d.

I have told you already that not many learned were
gathered to Christ in the earlier ages of the Church, con-
sequently very many could not read the inscriptions.
How, then, were friends and survivors to distinguish the
graves of those they loved and mourned ? They availed
themselves of the use of pictures, symbols, or signs. This
is very clear, for the connection of the symbol with the
name or trade of the person buried is easily traced in
many cases. For instance, here are four epitaphs of this
kind, each of them having some representation as a
symbol in addition to the inscription. [ 83. ]

NAVIA IN PEAGE-A SWEET SOUL, WHO LIVED SIXTEEN YEARS AND
FIVE MONTHS-A SOUL SWEET AS HONEY. THIS EPITAPH WAS MADE
BY HER PARENTS-THE SIGN A SHIP.

TRADE SYMBOLS.

Now iiavis is the Latin for ship, and a ship is repre-
sented as the best phonetic symbol for Navira. Again :

PONTIUS LEO MADE THIS FOR HIMSELF WHILE LIVING. HE AND HIS WIFE,
PONTIA MAXIMA, MADE THIS FOR THEIR WELL-DESERVING SON APOLLINARIS.

Here leo is the Latin for lion^ and a lion is used accord-
ingly to point out the tomb of Pontius Leo and his son.
Again : here are two casks, and the inscription :

DOLIENS THE FATHER TO JULIUS HIS SON.

•

Bulium is Latin for cask, a cask is put to symbolize
the name of Doliens.

Once more : here is an inscription with a pig, and we
find it is the tomb of a little girl named Porcella, which
means in Latin a little pig. It reads :

HERE SLEEPS PORCELLA IN PEACE; SHE LIVED THREE YEARS, TEN MONTHS,
THIRTEEN DAYS.

Roman Catholic writers have invented many super-
stitious stories to account for these S3'mbols, which they
regarded as evidences of martyrdom. The spread of
learning since the last century has dispelled, however,
much of this ignorance.

It was a common practice with many nations of anti-
quity to represent the pursuits of life, tools, or working
implements, upon the tombs of the dead; and also to
place such articles in the graves. This accounts for many
such articles found in graves in the Catacombs, and also
for another class of symbols represented on the grave-
stones, referring evidently to the trades and occupations
of the deceased.

Here is a gravestone with the inscription [ 84 ] —

BAUTO AND MAXIMA MADE THIS DURING THEIR LIFETIME.

THE CATACOMBS.

A saw, cliiael, and adze evidently tell that a Bauto
was a carpenter by trade.

Anotlier, with two mallets and a knife, is evidently the
grave of one engaged in a trade which cannot, however,
be fixed with any certainty. It reads : —

CONSTANTIA, BURIED IN PEACE, ON THE LORD'S DAY THE SIXTH BEFORE
THE KALENDS OF JULY, IN THE FIFTH C:NSULATE OF HONORIUS AUGUSTUS
WHO LIVED SIXTY YEARS, MORE OR LESS. TO THE WELL-DESERVING, IN

PEACE.

The date of this grave, a.d. 402, long after the per-
secutions ceased, proves that the symbols had nothing to
do with martyrdom.

A broken slab, with the simple inscription, the place
OF ADEODATus, has representations of the implements of a
woolcomber.

Another, to veneria, in peace, would indicate that she
was in the same trade ; a very common one at Eome,
where almost all classes wore woollen garments.

Another gravestone is erected to the wife of a shoe-
maker, two slippers being scratched thereon. The in-
scription, the first line of which is missing, reads [ 85 ] :

TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS, SIX MONTHS, ELEVEN DAYS, AND EIGHT

HOURS. MARCIANUS, TO HIS MOST WORTHY WIFE, IN PEACE.

An ancient bushel-measure, filled with grain, scratched
upon another stone, would seem to indicate that it closed
the grave of one who dealt in corn. It reads :

VICTORINA, IN PEACE, AND IN CHRIST.
One more illustration upon the subject must suffice.

TRADE SYMBOLS.

A slab represents a stonemason at work upon a sarco-
phagus; a boy is helping him, by working the drill em-
ployed in boring the stone ; the other implements of the
trade are on the ground ; and the finished sarcophagus,
with a name on it agreeing with the name in the inscrip-
tion, informs us that Eutropus was engaged in the trade
of a sculptor and maker of sepulchral monuments. He
stands in a praying attitude, with a cup in his hand. The
inscription, which is in Greek, reads :

THE HOLY WORSHIPPER OF COD, EUTROPUS, IN PEACE. HIS SON MADE
THIS. HE DIED ON ThE TENTH KALENDS OF SEPTEMBER.

It would be an interesting inquiry, but beside my pur-
pose, to ascertain how far these endeav^ours to inscribe,
symbolically, names and professions led to the general
adoption of family s^^mbols, such as crests and armorial
bearings ; which very commonly consist of some allusion
to or play upon the family name or occupations. This
practice— subsequently reduced into system, as the science
of heraldry — has usually been attributed to the inscribing
of symbols on the shields of those who engaged in the
Crusades in the Holy Land during the middle ages ; but
it is quite evident the practice was not then originated,
but merely revived, for traces of it exist not only in the
Catacombs at Rome but upon the tombs of the Armenian
Christians to this day ; it was adopted by wealth}^ families
in the Augustan age ; by Mecsenas, for instance, whose
crest was a frog, and may be detected in the graves of the
kings of Egypt, and on the cylinders and seals of ancient
Assyria,

I must now proceed to explain another and most in-
teresting class of symbols universally prevalent in the

TETE CATACOMBS.

Catacombs, namely, tliose whicli relate to tlie reliijlous
helief of the early Christians.

Ignorant as they mainly were of both reading and
writing, and persecuted for their faith in Christ, it was
obviously necessary that some symbol should be found
which should enable them to express their belief, and be
at the same time unintelligible to their persecutors.
Hence arose the use of two common symbols ; one of
which is called the Monogram (that is, one character
composed of more than one letter), and the other is called
the Fish. It is thought that the monogram came first
into use, but its signification being discovered, it was no
longer capable of shielding the Christian tombs from
insult and desecration ; the other more occult symbol was
consequently employed.

The monogram, in its earliest form, consisted only of
the two Greek letters, X (Chi) and P (Rho),
the initial letters of XPISTO^^ the Greek
name of Christ. These letters were like
our X and P, and we find the X with the P
drawn standing within it, Thus :

Here is a rude illustration, which reads

TASARIS, IN CHRIST, THE FIRST AND THE LAST. [ 86 ]

The monogram is here used for " Christ/^ and the Greek
letters Alpha and Omega being added to it to express
" the first and the last,^^ as the titles of the Lord Jesus
Christ, adopted by Himself in the Book of Revelation.^'

Here is another example of the sj-mbol, and also of
the prevailing ignorance upon literary points. A frag-
ment of stone containing part of a date, the first before

* Kevelation i. 8, 11, etc.

RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS.

THE IDES_, lias the monogmmj with, the Alpha and Omega^
surrounded by a circle, which device the sculptor has re-
presented upside (loicn.

Observe also two other forms of this symbol_, each of
them surrounded by a circle, evidently intended to ex-
press belief in the eternity of Christ, the circle being a
significant and very ancient symbol of eternity in use
among the ancients. In the one case the monogram is
represented simply with the Alpha and Omega ; in the
other case, the letters e s D E i s are found encircling the
monogram, which is supposed to signif}^ CJiristus est Deiis
(Christ is God).

A. transition from the Greek Chi to the upright cross
was likely soon to be suggested, as representing symboli-

Dcally the instrument of our Lord^s cruci-
fixion. This took place in course of time,
^MH. M^^Mi and is seen frequently on more recent monu-
ments j the head of the Rho being affixed to
the upper limb of the cross. Thus :
Two instances I point out to you; one, of them simple,
the other enclosed in an equilateral triangle, supposed to
signify the faith in the doctrine of a Triune God.*

The other symbol, which had reference to the faith in
Christ, was a fish — difficult to unriddle, had it not been
that inscriptions with the Greek word I%5f9, a fish, as
well as the representation itself, occurred, pointing out
that the significance rested with the letters of tJie word, as
as well as with the object itself. The explanation is that
the word is formed from the iuitials of the Greek words
describing the names, titles, and office of the Lord Jesiis

* This instance is derived from Twinings's " Early and
Mediaeval Christian Art."

100

THE CATACOMBS.

Cliristj viz., Irjcrov^ XpicrTo^;, ©eov Tlos, Scorrjp (Jesus
Christy Son of God, the Saviour).

Here are illustrations from tlie Lapidarian Gallery ;
one of the Fish, and the other of the word IX0T2, on
uu inscription, which reads : [ 87 ]

iK*0Y2 (IN CHRIST). TO THE GOOD AND INNOCENT SON OF PASTORUS
WHO LIVED X YEARS AND Nil MONTHS,

You will recollect that I referred to the fact of Jews
being in Kome at the period of the introduction of
Christianity there, and to the statement of Suetonius that
they raised tumults respecting that faith. The concluding
chapter of the Acts of the Apostles informs us of the
same fact, for Paul, on his arrival at Rome,t sent for the
Jews, and reasoned with them on the subject of Christi-
anity; but finding them generally averse to its receptioD,
he turned to the Romans, saying, ^' Be it known there-
fore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent unto the
Gentiles, and that they will hear it.''^ Now, it may be
interesting to you to know that, unlikely as it may appear,
the Catacombs afford evidence of this state of things;
that Jews were at Rome ; that, being confounded with
the Christians, naturally enough they participated in
their persecutions, and sought refuge with them in the
Catacombs, but, nevertheless, kept themselves apart from
the Christians as it regarded their religious services.

In one of the galleries on the Via Portuense, con-
taining no Christian inscription whatever, there was found
by Bosio a lamp, having on it a representation of the
golden candlestick of the Temple of Jerusalem, and upon
the wall over it the word Synagogue, in Greek letters.

* K ignorantly for X.

t Acts xxviii. 17—28.

RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS.

EELIGIOUS SYMBOLS.

101

evidently indicating the place of meeting for Jewish
worship. [ 87 ] It is clear^ notwithstanding, that some
of Jewish origin were converted to the Christian faith^
for there has been found, an exceedingly curious epitaph,
" written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latiu/^ which doubtless
marks the resting-place of a Christianized Jewess. The
inscription in Greek letters reads here lies Faustina. At
the foot is a very rough attempt to inscribe the Hebrew
Shalom, peace. The Jewish candlestick is in the centre
the slab, on one side an oil- vessel, and on the other a
palm-branch. The explanation would seem to be, that a
Jewess, upon conversion, took as her Christian name the
Latin Faustina, and her friends at her death recorded
upon her tomb her Hebrew origin, as well as her Christian
faith.

In another instance, a female with a Jewish name,
Eliasa, sets up a slab to the memory of a Roman hus-
band, SoRicius, inscribed

TO OUR GREAT COD-ELIASA TO SORICIUS.

The centre of the slab exhibits the monogram of Christ,
with the ends of the side branches turned up to form the
figure of the candlestick, ingeniously combining, in a
small compass, as in the former case, the idea of Jewish
origin with Christian belief.*

The phonetic and trade symbols, and those which ex-
pressed faith in Christ, were not by any means the only
symbolic figures made use of. In an ignorant age, it was
needful to express in signs many things which in our
times are conveyed without difficulty in writing.

* See Maitland's " Church in the Catacombs," pp. 76 — 78
and 210.

MATITYRS^ GKAVES.

103

mentioned in tlie Book of Revelation. Tliere is no reason
to conclude tliat tliese symbols marked particwlarly tlie
graves of martyrs ; the reference is to tlie triompli of the
Christian over sin, the world, and the devil, rather than
over the weakness of the flesh in the hour of persecution.

Here is an illustration, in v.hich the monogram of
Christ is surrounded by the palin-branches of triumph,
and surmounted by a crown, which shows to whose
strength the victory was attributed by these early Chris-
tians.

The inscription reads : [ 87 ]

FLAVIA JOVINA, WHO LIVED THREE YEARS AND THIRTY DAYS, A NEOPHYTE.
IN PEACE. DIED THE II BEFORE THE KALENDS.

In closing this account of the symbols used by these
illiterate Christians, I must guard myself against being
understood as approving of the use of symbolical repre-
sentations of Divine things. A vast amount of idolatr}^,
both in Pagan and in professing Christian countries, can
be traced to the use of symbols, which are quite un-
necessary now that education is so universal.

I now proceed to notice the subject of martyrs' graves.
The Christian will always take a deep interest in all that
concerns those who, at any period of the world^s history,
have laid down. their lives rather than surrender the faith
and hope of the Gospel, and deny the Lord who bought
them; but particular interest attaches to those who sus-
tained the brunt of the conflict with the powers of dark-
ness in the infancy of Christianity. Unfortunately, ignor-
ance and superstition have done much to render researches
into the subject distasteful to many, and difficult to all.
Every scratch on a gravestone has been construed into a

104

THE CATACOMBS.

sign of martrydom, every symbol of trade into an imple-
ment of torture, and every bone found into a martyr's
remains. Sucli was the zeal and sucli the ignorance of
the professors of the Eomish faith when the Catacombs
were re-opened, that a great part of the bones found were
carried away as precious relics, to sanctify, as it was
believed, the churches in which they were deposited. Of
Christians, therefore, whether martyrs or otherwise, very
few remains are to be found. Happily, the search for
bones was more zealously pursued than that for inscrip-
tions j and we can well spare the Romanists the bones, as
they have permitted us to draw sermons in stones''
from the inscriptions which have been preserved, and
which, being printed, are now imperishable.

There is reason to believe that very few perfect in-
scriptions relating to martyrs now exist ; indeed, it does
not appear to have been the practice of the early Christians
to obtrude their own sufferings upon others; their inscrip-
tions almost always point to a glorious immortality, and
seldom dwell upon present or past suffering. The idea
expressed by the Apostle* appears to have been ever
before them : For our light affliction, which is but for a
moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal
w^eight of glory." ''Peace'' is inscribed on thousands of
graves j " Suffering'' on but very few. With the excep-
tion of a few fragments, on which the word ^'Martyr"
appears, and the case of Alexander already alluded to
(page 76), there have been found in the Catacombs only
four well-attested instances of inscriptions alluding to
martyrdom.

Here are fac-similes of two and copies of two. Let

* See 2 Cor. iv. 8-18.

martyrs' graves.

105

me speak of the copies first. One displays the palm-
branch and monogram of the Saviour. The Emperor
Adrian's name fixes the date at about the year a.d. 130 :
[90]-

IN THE TIME OF THE EMPEROR ADRIAN, MARIUS, A YOUNG MILITARY
OFFICER, WHO HAD LIVED LONG ENOUGH, WHEN WITH BLOOD HE GAVE
UP HIS LIFE FOR CHRIST, AT LENGTH HE RESTED IN PEACE. HE
WELL-DESERVING SET UP THIS WITH TEARS AND IN FEAR, ON THE SIXTH
BEFORE THE IDES OF . IN CHRIST.

This inscription was evidently erected in a time of
actual persecution, " in tears and in fear."

Here is another inscription set up by a martyr's
widow, telling, in few and touching words, of the suffer-
ings of the flesh, and also of the pangs which must have
racked the bosoms of those united in bonds of the
tenderest affection. A class of suffering perhaps the
most actually felt, but too much overlooked in our con-
sideration of martyrs' trials in all ages.

PRIMITIUS IN PEACE. AFTER MANY TORMENTS, A MOST VALIANT MATRYR.
HE LIVED THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS, MORE OR LESS. HIS WIFE RAISED THIS
TO HER DEAREST HUSBAND, THE WELL-DESERVING.

Here, again, is a fac-simile of an inscription found by
Boldetti; it is the sole known record in the Catacombs of
the fearful Diocletian persecution. Its value is increased
by the letters E p s, proving that the slab closed the
actual resting-place of Lannus and his family. It reads :

LANNUS, CHRIST'S MARTYR, RESTS HERE. HE SUFFERED UNDER THE
DIOCLETIAN PERSECUTION,
(E. P. S,) THE CRAVE IS FOR HIS POSTERITY.
The last inscription, of which I show you a fac-simile.

106

THE CATACOMBS.

is of too mucli interest to be passed over without a more
detailed notice.

It is written in an unusual Greek character, but tlie
words are Latin. It reads :

HERE LIES GORDIANUS, DEPUTY CF CAUL, WHO WAS EXECUTED FOR THE
FAITH, WITH ALL HIS FAMILY. THEY REST IN PEACE. THEOPHILA A
HANDMAID. SET UP THIS,

A palm-brancli is added at the foot.

This epitaph, discovered by Aringhi in 1650, has
caused much learned speculation. Why it should have
been written in Greek characters unlike all others in the
Catacombs, and why a maid-servant from Gaul (ancient
France) should write in Greek at all, have been questions
difficult to decide. It is thus satisfactorily explained by
Dr. Maitland. f

'''About thirty years after the time of Aringhi, Mabillon
crew attention to an observation made by Julius Caesar, }
that the Gallic Druids were accustomed to use Greek
letters in their secular transactions, and that they had the
management of the education of youth. This accounts
for Theophila^s Greek, some letters of which can scarcely
be admitted within the pale of the standard alphabet.
She afterwards learns Latin, but only by ear; this ill-
assorted learning does not enable her both to write and
speak any one language. Theophila has one resource, to
express Latin words in Druidical Greek letters : in this
v. ay she contrives to record the martyrdom of her master.
We are here met by a difficulty : we have made out,

* Hic GoRDiAXUs Gallle xuxcius jugulatus peo fide. CUil

FA:UILIA TOTA; QUIESCrXT IX PACE, THEOPHDLA AXCILLA EECIT.

t " Church in the Catacombs," pp. 134—136.
;|; CcEsar, De Bello Galileo, lib. vi.

MARTYRS^ GRAVES.

107

npon the streiigtli of an obscure inscription^ the story of
a lloman legate^, a man higli in office^ martyred for tlie
faith. We have placed the incident in Rome, and fixed
upon the Catacombs as his burial-place. We have given
him a household, and, in particular, a faithful Christian
handmaid, who raises a monument to his memory. But
does history contain no notice of so remarkable an occur-
rence ? Aringhi, who discovered the epitaph, knew of
none. About ninety years before Aringhi wrote, Surius
published a manuscript, entitled ^ The Martyrdom of St.
Gordianus.^ In this tract is described the conversion of
a Eoman nobleman named Gordianus, through the preach-
ing of Januarius the presbyter, who suffered in the time
of Julian ; also, the baptism of Gordianus and his wife
Marina, together with a large part of his household,
amountiug to fifty-three persons. Gordianus was mar-
tyred, and his body exposed before the temple of Minerva,
from which indignity it was soon rescued by one of the
household, who buried it in the Catacombs, in the Latin
Way. A coincidence more complete can scarcely be
desired."

The almost filial affection of this Christian maid-
servant for her martyred master reminds us strongly of
Mary of Bethany, her love for the Saviour and her fearless
avowal of her faith when she anointed Him in the house
of Simon the leper ; * while the notoriety which has been
given to the loving and courageous act of Theophila the
handmaid reminds us also of the prediction of the Saviour
on that occasion: ^^Wheresoever this Gospel shall be
preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that
this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her.^^

* Matt. xxvi. 6—13.

108

THE CATACOMBS.

The Catacombs contain many representations of men
and women standing with their hands outstretched ; which
figures were supposed by Roman Catholics to iudicate the
graves of martyrs. It is clear^ however, that the assump-
tion is unfounded, and that the position of the figures re-
presents rather a sentiment than a fact ; the standing
with hands outstretched being the universal posture for
prayer in the early Church at Rome.

I show you two representations, out of a great many
which have been preserved [ 91 ] ; one is that of a
female, and the other represents the Apostle Paul. If
you look also at the sarcophagus of Eutropus [ 85 ],
before alluded to, and at Daniel in the Lion^s den [ 94
you will perceive that both are represented in the same
attitude.

This posture in prayer was common to both Pagans
and Christians, as may be seen by reference to Virgil, a
Pagan poet, as well as to TertuUian, a Christian writer.
The latter, in his Apology, says : For the emperors we
supplicate the true, the living, the eternal God, in whose
power they are : to whom they are second, after whom
first. With hands extended, because harmless ; with heads
uncovered, because not ashamed ; without a prompter,
because from the heart we ask long life and every blessing

for him Then, while we stand ijraijing before

God, let the lingular tear us, the crosses bear our weight,
let the flames envelope us, the sword divide our throats,
the beasts spring upon us ; the very posture of a praying
Christian (i.e., erect, with hands outstretched like a cross)
is a preparation for every "punishment/'^

Christians in the Catacombs are universally repre-

* Tertullian, Apol., cap. 30.

PRAYING FIGURES.

LOVE-FEAST. FRESCO PAINTING.

POSTURE IN Pi'vAYEK.

100

sented as praying in this position^ tlie practice of kneeling
in prayer having been introduced as a genei^al practice at
a later date.* This fact affords valuable corroborative
evidence of the antiquity of the sculptures and works of
art found in the Catacombs ; for^ had fraud been attempted
to be practised_, it would have displayed itself by incon-
sistencies similar to those which declare so unequivocally
certainly literary forgeries professing to be works of the
early Church.

Do not suppose that because I have pointed out to
you the primitive practice of the Church, as it regards
the posture for devotion^ that I attach any weight to the
position of the body, or sympathise with those who treat
such matters as essentials of Christianity. It is lamentable
to reflect how often Christian has been estranged from
Christian, in consequence of a different practice as it re-
gards the form in which a spiritual worship should bo
rendered. Religion has long ceased to be a matter of
time, or place, or posture, as it was among lagans ; it is
now of the heart and not of the knees, luhether bent or

* According to the authorities cited in the E,ev. Lyman Cole-
man's "Antiquities of the Christian Church" (p. 100), the practice
of kneeling in public prayer was introduced as a penance, hneeliuq
being termed the less penance, in distinction from prosf ration, pre-
scribed for greater offenders ; standing in prayer was denied to
those who were under the Church's censure, it being esteemed
the prerogative and privilege only of consistent believers. It is
easy to trace the connection between the original practice of
causing penitents to kneel, and the feeling of humility so generally
connected with the kneeling posture in more modern times.
Kneeling in prayer was absolutely forbidden on the Lord's day
and on the Sabbath day, that is, the Saturday. See great variety
of authorities cited in that work, under chapter x., section 12,
notes 2 — 11.

110

THE CATACOMES

iinhent. Three thousand years have been insufficient to
teach men the truth promulgated, even in the days of
Samuel the prophet, that the Lord seeth not as man
seeth ; for man looketh on the ouhvard appearance, hut the
Lord loolceth on the heart J' ^

The inscription, which is affixed to one of the slabs
under consideration, reads —

BELLICIA, A MOST FAITHFUL VIRGIN WHO LIVED EIGHTEEN YEARS. IN
PEACE. ON THE FOURTEENTH BEFORE THE KALENDS OF SEPTEMBER.

Bellicia is represented clothed in the dress then proper
to unmarried females, the stola instlta, or fringed cloak.
In the other case, the only inscription is —

PAUL . PASTOR . APOSTLE.

Here the primitive simplicity of the early Church is
observable ; no prefix of Saint had then been added to
any of Christ^s followers exclusively, but the term was
applied, as in the Scriptures, to all alike who were sancti-
fied by a true and living faith in Him.f Neither do we
find any '"'nimbus,'^ or " glory,^^ or ^^aureole^^ sur-
rounding the head of the Apostle, nor indeed the head
of any Christians represented in the Catacombs. The
practice. Pagan in its origin, had its commencement
amongst Christians in the fifth century. J The simple

* 1 Sam. xvi. 7.

t See Rom. i. 7 ; 1 Cor. i. 2 ; 2 Cor. i. 1 ; Eph. i. 1 ; Phil. i. 1 ;
Col. i. 2, etc., etc. There are fifty-seven instances in the New
Testament, in -which believers, as a class, are called " Saints," but
no instance of the term applied to an individual to separate him
from other believers.

J The earliest instance extant of the nimhus, i.e., circle sur-
rounding the head, as used by Christians, is found in a church at
Eavenna, built in the fifth century ; it is affixed to a figure of

LOVE- FEASTS.

Ill

and scriptural titles of " pastor^^ or slieplicrd, and
" apostle/^ with a cross indicating union with Christ,
were considered sufficient distinction for the great Apostle
of the Grentiles, in a city in which some of his so-called
apostolic successors have permitted to be attributed to
them the titles and prerogatives which belong to God.

It is interesting to notice that, among other primitive
practices of the early Church, the Catacombs afford illus-
tration of the agapoB, or love-feasts. This practice is
twice referred to in the New Testament : 2 Peter ii. 13,
and Jude, 12th verse. It consisted of a social meal,
generally connected with the reception of the Lord's
Supper, in imitation of the example of our Lord and His
disciples, who partook of the Passover Supper imme-
diately before the institution of the Christian ordinance.*
The love-feast usually formed part of the festival on the
occasion of baptism or marriage, and was observed also
at burials. In process of time, excesses were committed
and abuses crept in, until the feasts were first banished
from the Churches, and subsequently altogether abolished
in Europe, t In the early ages of the Church, these
meetings doubtless promoted Christian intercourse and
brotherly love. Tertullian gives a particularly favourable

Christ. — See Twiniog's "Early and Medio3val Christian Art,''
plate 15, fig. 9, and plate 93, fig, 1. — Illustrations of it, as used
hjf Farjans, may be seen in Pompeii, where it is aSixed to the head
of Circe and others. — Vide " Library of Entertaining Knowledge
— Pompeii," vol. ii. pp. 92, 93, and amusing note as to its origin.
* Ignatius, Epist. ad Srayrn., c. 8.

t It is interesting to notice that the practice was found to exist
among the Nestorian or Chaldean Christians of Central Asia, by
Dr. Asahel Grant, and appears never to have been interrupted
fciuce apostolic times. — Yide Dr. Grant's *' Nestorians," p. 57.

112

THE CATACOMBS.

picture of tliem in his Apology.* He represents the
meal as frugal and temperate ; the conversation conducted
under the conviction that God was present ; prayer was
offered, tlie Scriptures read and explained, and hymns
sung ; the kiss of peace and brotherhood, and a collection
for those who were in want, accompanied the ceremony.
It appears likely that the custom of celebrating wakes
over dead bodies, as practised in Ireland and elsewhere,
may be traced to this observance. The practice of holding
feasts of charity has been of late years revived by some
bodies of Christians, particularly by the Methodist
Churches, and as "the cup which cheers but not ine-
briates'^ has been wisely substituted for the wine-cup,
excess is avoided, and the practice is not exposed to the
odium which once rested on it.

Here is an interesting painting, representing one of
these feasts, found in a subterranean chapel in the ceme-
tery of Marcellinus and Peter. [ 92- ]

Three guests are seated at table ; a young man sup-
plies food from a table in the centre, while two matrons
appear to preside ; personifying, as the inscription would
infer, " Peace'^ and " Love.''^ On the table are seen a
lamb, bread, and a cup, and a wine-flagon stands on the
ground. Over the heads of the presidents are two con-
tracted Latin inscriptions, which read peace, give hot
WATER. LOVE, MIX FOR ME, referring to the almost uui-
versal custom in those days of drinking wine mixed with
water, t

At the side of this painting are represented two cups,
found elsewhere in the Catacombs, referring doubtless to
the Lord^s Supper ; one of them contains cakes of bread.

* Apol., p. 93. t Yide " Church in the Catacombs," p. 268.

LOVE-FEASTS.

113

I have now fulfilled my promise^ by explaining to you
tbat which is difficulfc and bringing before you that which
is most interesting in relation to the inscriptions in the
Catacombs; and now allow me, in conclusion, to say,
admire the wise providence of God in His doings with re-
gard to this subject.

He prepared beforehand a hiding-place for the Truth,
a cradle for His persecuted church ; or rather, I should
say. He caused the Roman Emperors unwittingly to do
so. Before Christianity arrived at Rome, the extensive
quarries, which afterwards became the Catacombs, were
excavated ; but beyond this it is certain that some of the
Roman Emperors condemned Christian soldiers to hard
labour in digging sand and stone. This was the case
in the reign of Maximian, and tradition states that the
baths of Diocletian were built with material procured by
the Christians.* This practice made these Christians
acquainted with the intricacies of the galleries, and thus
enabled them, in times of violent persecution, to become
guides to those who resorted to these subterranean refuges,
and facilitated that which must have been a dangerous
and difficult task — the supply of the sufferers with food.
We learn thus how God can make the wrath of man to
praise Him,^^ ^^and the remainder of wrath^^ He can
restrain. t

* "Church in the Catacombs," p. 34. f Psalm lxx\i. 10.

LECTURE IV.

POPERY ;

DEBASED, OR SPURIOUS CHRISTIANITY.

" I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured beast ....
having seven heads and ten horns .... The seven hea-ls
are seven hills, on which the woman sitteth .... And tlie
woman which thou sawest is that Great City, which reigneth over
the kings of the earth." — Eev. xvii. 3, 9, 18.

I NOW arrive at my concluding lecture^ and apply myself
to ansv^er an objection which has been made, and nc-t
without some plausibility — If Christianity is a Divine
remedy, why has it not effected more completely its
mission by removing evils which still afflict our world V

That it has accomplished enough to vindicate its
Divine character, I think will be conceded by most of you
who have listened attentively to my preceding statements.
That it might have effected more^ I cannot deny ; that it
will accomplish more, I fully believe ; but I think that
you are entitled to an answer to the objection I have in-
dicated, and shall proceed to supply one/ so far as my
humble ability and limited time will permit.

Now, my answer to the objection is, simpl}' — Chris-
tianity WAS CORKUPTED, AND IS, TO A GEEAT EXTENT, COR-
RUPTED STILL.

To make use of a familiar figure, the Great Physician
left behind Him ^prescription adequate to the remedy of

POPERY.

115

the evils of a sinful aud wretched world. It gave evi-
dence of its efficacy hy its wondrous effects when first
administered ; but it was tampered with : one ingredient
was omitted here, another was added there, until it bore
little resemblance to the original, which at last was put
quite out of sight. Little wonder, then, that it ceased to
cure !

The question arises. How do you prove this ? I
answer by bringing forward evidence as to the original
treatment ; the gravestones op the Catacombs will be
MY witnesses. They have furnished us with a contrast
with Paganism ; they shall witness to the existence of a
primitive, a pure, and an efficacious Christianity. As we
call an aged man to prove, at law, a practice sanctioned
by long usage, so we summon these silent witnesses, who
will step forth from their hiding-places of from fifteen to
eighteen centuries, and speak of the religion of Christ.

I am not about to speak of men but of a system ; I
assert that a bastard, debased, spurious Christianity has
usurped very extensively the place of the genuine faith.
Xot that I believe that there has ever been a time since
its introduction when true Christianity has not had
some sincere and true professors, but rather, admitting
that true Christians have, in different places and under
different names, held fast their faith in Christ, and formed
a Church, whose names are recorded in heaven yet 1
assert that a very wide- spread and general apostasy has
prevailed throughout the length and breadth of professing
Christendom, which has for many ages substituted a
spurious for a genuine Christianity, even as it was clearly
predicted in the passage placed at the head of this lecture
and elsewhere in the sacred Scriptures.

Now, adhering to this figure, I ask, how would you

116

POPERY,

proceed to try a piece of doubtful coin which I might
tender to any of you in the way of business ? You will
wisely submit it to such tests as you may possess. You
ring it : has it the sound which nature has given to silver ?
You place it between your teeth : is it soft or hard ? You
pass it through a gauge : do jou. find it of the standard
thickness ? You weigh it : is it due and lawful weight ?
If you still doubt, you can look it closely in the face :
does it really look what it professes to he ? If not, submit
it to a still closer scrutiny, assisted by such tests as the
chemist will supply, to detect the counterfeit, if it be one.

Now, in all this you would do wisely ; and should we
not be equally, nay more, anxious to bring to the strictest
test all that which claims to be genuine Christianity, so
as to discover the spurious form, if it exist ?

Now, we have the means at hand to test that which I
assert is debased Christianity. We can try it by History,
and inquire what have been the practices of its professors
— what its effects on the comfort, the happiness, the
morality of mankind. History tells a tale of oppression,
cruelty, persecution, avarice, and ambition, committed in
the name of Christ and His religion ; of conversion at
the point of the sword ; of confession extorted by the
rack ; of slaughter and destruction carried on against
both infidels and Christians, in the name of Him who
came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them.'''
The system of Avhich I speak is charged by history with
these and many other grievous crimes ; that it has caused
and fomented war and bloodshed ; has deposed kings,
and absolved their subjects from their allegiance ; pro-
moted treason and rebellion, effected revolutions to aug-
ment its power ; that it has ever persecuted, when it was
strong enough to persecute with impunity and effect ;

TESTED BY HISTORY.

117

that it has invented more tortures, and exercised more
ingenuity and refinement in cruelty, than any other
system the world has heard of, not excepting ancient
Paganism itself*.

It is charged by history with falsehood the most un-
blushing, frauds and forgeries the most indecent, impos-
tures the vilest. It is charged by history, and stands
convicted now before all eyes, as the great enemy to
human liberty and progress. Liberty of speech it denies
wherever it has the power. Liberty of inquiry it forbids ;
take the cases of Copernicus and Galileo — one of whom
was excommunicated, and the other died in the Inqui-
sition, for pursuing scientific inqu'ry. Liberty of the
subject to share in Government it has thwarted. Liberty
of the press it has always shackled. Liberty of conscience
it laughs to scorn. The most stupendous and brilliant
woi^ks of human genius are closed and forbidden to those
who submit to its thraldom. With true consistency, it
has iucluded in its list of prohibited books The Word of
God. Science, literature, a free press, free conscience,
and the Bible being alike forbidden, the system of which
I speak stands condemned by the voice of history, as a
gigantic political conspiracy against the happiness, the
purity, the liberty, and rights of mankind.*

As claiming to be from God, this system should be
tried by God's Word. We can test it therefore by Scrip-
TURE — can weigh it in the balances of the Sanctuary. You
have the balances in your own hands ; weighed in them,
as it has been, again and again, it will be found grie-
vously wanting. It is needless, however, to press this

* A concise outline of this subject will be found in a little work
published by the Heligious Tract Society, "The Testimony of
History against the Church of Rome."

118

POPERY^

point_, for the standard of comparison having been re-
moved out of siglit by tliose who would pass the spurious
article, tliey by this their own act of withholding the
Scriptures from their followers, admit that their system
cannot stand the test of God^s Word.

Now, it is not my intention to undertake this analysis
either by the aid of history or of the Bihle — time would
not permit my doing so with any advantage, and indeed
it has been done most effectually by others. But refer-
ring only to those tests incidentally, it is my purpose
rather to make use of the inscriptiovs, sculptures, and
paintings of the early Christians^ in my reply to the
objection which, we have in view.

And here you must allow me to remark that it is
exceedingly difficult to name and to define exactly this
system of which I speak ; just as it would be impossible
to denominate and classify all kinds of spurious coin in
circulation amongst us. It has assumed different forms
in different ages and countries, and does so still. It
corrupts the truth in proportion as it is furnished with
facilities for so doing by the darkness ofignoranc3 around
it. It is by no means exclusively confined to one pro-
fessing Christian Church, but, in different degrees, does
afflict, or may afflict, several organiza,tions of professing
Christians. Its name is legion, but its principles are one.
But though difficult to define in all its workings, this
system can be traced home without difficulty to its source.
•Tust as disease of contagious or virulent character is
usually accompanied by sickness of a modified but kin-
dred type — the cholera, for instance, which sprang from
its bed in the Ganges, and spread around the world, with

TESTED BY HISTORY.

119

its attendant maladies — so this evil system of wliicli I
speak can be traced to its origin^ altliongli its accumulated
consequences can never be fully defined.

The chief guilty "the head and front of this offend-
ing/' lies at the door of Papal Eome.

In speaking henceforth of Popery, Rome,, Romanism,
or of Roman Catholicism, as it is absurdly called,* I
must again state that I speak of a system, and not of
persons. There may be, and doubtless are, many who
are identified outwardly with this system who are not, in
heart;, of it ; just as there may be, and doubtless are,
those who do not profess to hold with this system, and
yet, in spirit, their principles are one with it. I con-
demn the system, as I believe it contrary to Christ and
His Gospel, and the greatest hindrance to the triumph of
His religion on the earth ; but I entertain no animosity
towards the victims of the system. We may pity, and
even love, the victim, while w^e denounce the system.
We show no ill-will tow^ard the slave when we denounce
the evils of slavery ; so I would be clearly understood as
speaking with all Christian affection of those who are
deluded by the falsehoods of Popery, while I use the
words which truth compels towards the system itself.

It will be clear that, if I confine myself to the evi-
dence furnished by the inscriptions, I shall not be able

* The word Catholic means imwersaZ; while Eome, and that
which belongs to it, is local. Eoman Catholic, therefore, is a con-
tradiction in terms, beiug equivalent to "universal local" — an
absurdity. There can be but one universal or Catholic Church,
and that is confined to no nation, or kingdom, or people, or
tongue : it is " the Church of the firstborn, whose names are re-
corded in heaven " (Heb. xii. 23) ; those who compose it are
known there only with certainty.

120

POPERY,

to point out every error in the Eomish system : a complete
body of divinity cannot be expected to be extracted from
gravestones. It is remarkable, indeed I may say provi-
dential, that in this case so much can be gathered from
such a source.

I will endeavour, so far as my limited time will permit,
to make plain to you how so great a corruption of the
truth as I have indicated came about.

The corruption of Christianity arose from various causes.

I need hardly say Christianity suffered from the in-
herent corruption of the human heart; but as it was
specially adapted to meet this evil and overcome it, we
must find some other cause which acted upon the instru-
mentality itself, and rendered it feeble in its operation.

Then : Christianity suffered from the persevering and
unceasing efforts of those who sought to mingle with it
expiring Judaism. Unable to comprehend the spiritual
character of Christ's religion, they strove to bring it
into subjection to the ceremonial law, which was intro-
ductory to it — the Schoolmaster" dispensation, as Paul
terms it ; of this evil you can read for yourselves in the
Acts of the Apostles, and in almost all of Paul's Epistles.

Christianity likewise suffered from the speculations^
the refined subtleties of Greek and Roman philosophy.

Against all these sources of corruption the Scriptures
warned the early Church, as well as Christians of all
times. Again and again we find Paul expressing his
fears, his anxious solicitude on these points. " I fear,''
says he, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled
Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be cor-
rupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." Again :
*^ Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and

A SYSTEM.

121

vain deceit, after the traditions of mcri, after the rudiments
of the world, and not after Christ.""*

Notwithstanding repeated warnings, tlie Church be-
came corrupted from the simplicity of Christ's teaching,
by reason of the influences I have just alhided to ; but
that corruption was as nothing compared with that which
arose from another source, the attempt to harmonize Chris-
tianity and Paganism.

That no such attempt should be made while the two
religions were in actual conflict is likely enough ; but,
when Constantino became favourable to Christianity, and
both religions were tolerated, that which before was im-
possible now became practicable, and men were found
who, from well-meant but mistaken motives, urged such
a compromise as desirable.

Augustine thus writes : When peace was made, the
crowd of Gentiles (Pagans) who were anxious to embrace
Christianity were deterred by this — that whereas they
had been accustomed to pass the festivals in drunkenness
and feasting before their idols, they could not easily con-
sent to forego these most pernicious yet ancient plea-
sures. It seemed good, then, to our leaders to favour
this part of their weakness, and for those festivals which
they relinquish to substitute others in honour of the holy
martyrs, which they might celebrate with similar luxury,
though not with the same impiety/' t ^ passage in Fos-

* All reference to the effects, for good or for evil, produced
upon Christianity by its connection wiih the secular power is ad-
visedly omitted ; I entertain decided views on this point, but I
conceive I shall most conduce to the usefulness of this little work
by silence, on this occasion, upon a point so differently viewed by
Christians.

t Augustine, Epist. 29.

122

POPERY.

brokers Encyclopa3dia informs us of tlie same fact, with
more of detail. " The heathen were much delighted with
the festivals of the gods, and unwilling to part with those
delights ; and therefore Gregory (Thaumaturgus), who
died A.D. 2Gd, and was Bishop of Xeociesarea, to facilitate
their conversion, instituted annual festivals. Hence the
festivities of Christians were substituted for the Baccha-
nalia and Saturnalia ; the May games for the Floralia
(games in honour of Flora) ; and the keeping of festivals
to the Virgin Mary, John the Baptist, and divers Apos-
tles, in the room of the solemnities at the entrance of
the sun into the signs of the zodiac, according to the old
Julian calendar.'^ *

Of the truth, in the main, of these ste.tements there
can be no doubt, as evidences of the coincidence of Chris-
tian festivals wiih traces of Pagan practice remain to this
day.t

I think I have said enough to satisfy you that there
were causes enough at work to corrupt Christianity. I
now proceed to the proof of the fact, from the evidence
furnished by the Catacombs. In proceeding with the
argument, my first object will be to satisfy you that the
Cliurch of Rome does not now resemhle the primitive Chris-
iian Church ; while, incidentally, I shall point out that
the corruptions generally consisted in the introduction of

* Fosbroke's " Encyclop£edia of Antiquities, Classical and
Mediasval," vol. ii., pp. 571—591.

f For instance : The name of Easter, from the Saxon goddess
"Eastor;" the ceremonies practised in Cumberland, Scotland,
Ireland, etc., on St. John's Eve, which consist of offering cakes
to the sun, and sometimes passing children through the smoke of
a bonfire ; the use of the Druid symbol, the misletoe, at Christ-
mas, and of buns on Good Friday ; and, in Roman Catholic
countries, the Carnival, or modern Saturnalia, at Easter, etc., etc.

CHRISTIANITY^ HOW CORRUPTED. 123

Pagan iDradices and ideas into the Christian system. The
proof must often be of a negative cliaracter j no evidence
being found of a practice^ it may reasonably be assumed
tliat it did not exist^ provided it be such a practice as^
under the circumstances^ would have left traces of its
existence.

And, first, with respect to the ministry of the Gospel.
Various orders of men were, from the earliest ages of
Christianity, set apart for ministering the Word of God
and prayer, and for guiding, instructing, and edifying
the Churches. These ministers of the Churches were
of various orders, and were styled by different names.
Respecting the standing, style, and office of these minis-
ters in primitive times, much diversity of opinion exists
among Christians, and much external division of the
Churches unhappily arises from this cause. I am not
about, then, to enter on this debatable ground, nor to
raise questions upon points which, to my mind, appear
to be of minor importance. The ordinary ministers of
the early Church are termed, both in Scripture and
elsewhere, bishops — otherwise overseers or superin-
tendents ; presbyters — otherwise elders, ministers, pas-
tors; and deacons — otherwise church stewards or ser-
vants.*

Now, what I would have you notice is that, amongst
all these terms applied to Christian ministers, there is no

* No reference is here made to the extraordinary ministrations
of the Gospel in early times by apostles, prophets, or evangelists.
In giving the names by which the ordinary ministers of the
Gospel were called, I must be understood as being altogether
silent upon the question of the number of distinct offices, and
how far one name was used interchangeably for another.

124

POPERY.

reference at all to a priesthood. To my mind, tlie most
iufluential corruptions of Christianity arose from the
gradual introduction of the idea of a mediaiorial sacrifi-
cial officer, similar to the priest of the Jewish or the
Pagan economy. It is clear that no such institution can
be traced to any teaching of our Lord, or of His inspired
Apostles, who never, in the New Testament, speak of
any priesthood in the Christian Church but in a sense
which includes every true believer united to Christ — the
last, the great, the High Priest of our 'profession/' *
Now, this is not an unimportant point, as it might, at
first sight, appear ; for if a priesthood (I speak of the
office in the Pagan or Jewish sense) be granted, then a
train of consequences follow — as, indeed, they have fol-
lowed, to the grievous corruption of " the simplicity that
was in Christ/'

A sacerdotal priesthood being granted, an altar must
follow, and usurp the place of a table in the Sapper which
Christ appointed ; a sacrifice must accompany the altar,
as it has done in the recent Church of Rome ; and sacer-
dotal and mediatorial officiators at the altar must step
between the believer and his great High Priest, who
encouraged all to come unto the Father through Himself.
In this way Christ, in the Pomish Church, is dishonoured ;
His office of Priest and Mediator is ignored ; His perfect
sacrifice, offered once for all,'' is continually re-offered,
as it is alleged, in that Church; His people are taught to
confess to, and to rely upon, their fellow -sinners for for-
giveness, while they possess the inestimable privilege of
personal access to Himself.

* See all the passages in the ISTew Testament, in which the
words " priest " or " priesthood " are used in reference to Chris-
tiauity, viz., 1 Peter ii. 5 ; ii. 9 ; Uev. i. 6 ; v. 10 ; xx. 6.

CHRISTIANITY^ HOW CORRUPTED.

125

" For now one offering, ne'er to be renew'd,

Hath made our peace for ever. This now gives

Free access to the throne of heavenly grace.
No more base fear and dark disquietude :

He who was slain — the accepted victim — lives,
And intercedes before the Father's face."

In making these remarks upon wliat I consider to be
a great fundamental corruption in the Church of Rome,
I have no intention of reflecting upon the name of
priest assumed by ministers of certain of the Re-
formed Christian Churches, provided the idea be not im-
ported with the name. Unhappily, for the elucidation of
this point_, the poverty of the English language affords
us no term which answers to the sacerdotal office of the
Jews or Pagans ; * and the word priest, which is merely
a contraction of presbyter, an elder, is the only English
word we have to convey ideas altogether dissimilnr.
Upon this point, rather than express my meaning in my
own words, I would quote those of one who dignified the
office to which 1 refer. f "Deeply as Rome dishonours
Christ as the Prophet, she still more deeply dishonours
Him as the Priest of His people. Take away the priestly
office of Christ, and the Gospel is the Gospel no more ;
for nothing, therefore, should we be more jealous, than
for the sole, sovereign priesthood of Jesus. This, Rome
miserably mangles. She does so, in the first instance,
by perpetuating a pretended order of priests, to co-
operate with Christ in His priestly functions — an order,
in her view, just as essential to salvation, as is the great
High Priest of our profession. I enter my protest most

* 'lepevs in the Greek, and Sacerdos in the Latin,
t The Very Kev. Canon Stowell, M.A., Lecture, " Popery :
How it Dishonours Christ."

126

POPERY.

solemnly and deliberately against the idea tliat, under
tlie Gospel, there is any such character on earth as what
is properly" called a ^'^ricst. Human priesthood belonged
to a symbolical, material economy, which is passed ; it
belonged to the letter, it does not belong to the spirit.
Priests, in the proper sense of the word, are no more ;
they ceased when the true Priest came. It were happy
if, by our own beloved Church, the word ''priest^ had
never been used, because it is liable to misconstruction ;
though every candid scholar well knows that in her
Rubrics the word is never employed in its ancient mean-
ing ; it is but pvpshyter shortened to iiresteVj and then,
for condensation's sake, to iiriest. That the Church
uses the word in no other sense must be evident to every
unbiassed mind ; because she uses it inter clianrieahly with
the word minister, clearly indicating that one term is used
as the equivalent of the other. In vain have the inge-
nuity and sophistry of those who, while their foot is
within our pale, have their hearts within the pale of
Rome, striven to torture the use of the word priest into
an indication that our branch of Christ's primitive Church
holds anything like the wretched figment of Rome, that
a sacrificing priesthood is still in existence. Rome has
transmuted the simple evangelist, the herald of grace,
the apostle or messenger, the pastor or shepherd, the
fisherman casting his net to catch souls, the steward of
the household that should give the servants their portion
of meat in due season — into a splendid sacrificing sacer-
dotal hierarchy. And, if you ask me, whence sprang
the monstrous structure of popish heresy and enormity ?
I answer, from priestly ambition,'"

Upon this important point, which I trust I have
cleared from difficulty, what say the inscriptions in the

SACERDOTAL PETESTHJOD.

127

Catacombs at Eome ? No such terms as answers to the
sacerdotal officer of the Pagans or the Jews has been found.
The names used to designate Christian ministers are those
I mentioned as being used in the Scriptures, viz., bishops,
presb3^ters, pastors, deacons ; while lectors, i.e., Scripture
readers, fossors, i.e., sextons, and exorcists, who took part
in baptisms, have been also found as officers in the early
Church.

Settle then, my friends, as you will, the particular
form of Church government which you conceive to come
nearest to the primitive type ; form each of you, as nearly
as you can, correct ideas as to the offices, style, and
functions of the various orders of the Christian ministrj^ ;
regard all faithful ministers of Christ as holding an office
the most dignified and honourable, and esteem them
very highly for their work sake but be careful not to
derogate from the honour which belongs to the Lord
Jesus Christ. Look to Him continually as your Great
High Priest — man^ to sympathize with your infirmity, and
God, able and willing to pardon your sin. Regard Him
as the great sacrifice offered for you, and look for no
other. Behold Him as the great Mediator of the Nevf
Covenant, who ever liveth to make intercession^^ for
you. Value His ministers for their instruction and their
guidance ; hut rely on Christ for the salvation of your
souls.

" I other priests disclaim,

And laws and offerings too :

None but the bleeding Lamb

The mighty work can do.
He shall have all the praise, for He
Hath loved, and lived, and died for me."

As the Church of Rome has altered the character of the

128

rOPERY.

Christian ministers^ so she hasvaried their condition; " for-
bidding to marry/^ as was predicted of a coming apos-
tasy.* Thus a virtue was made of constrained celibacy.
Nothing of this kind had been introduced in apostolic
times. The New Testament tells us that Apostles and
Evangelists were married men_,t while Paul expressly
asserts his liberty in this respect, J and enjoins that a
Christian minister should be the husband of one wife.§

The Catacombs declare unequivocally that the practice
of the Roman church is novel, and prove that all orders
of the clergy in primitive times were accustomed to marry.
Dr. Maitland has furnished us with examples of inscrip-
tions applicable to each order. ||

Here are several, gathered from many, which prove
this point ; and firstly, a Bishop's epitaph : —

MY WIFE. LAURENTIA, MADE ME THIS TOMB; SHE WAS EVER SUITED TO
MY DISPOSITION, VENERABLE AND FAITHFUL AT LENGTH DISAPPOINTED
ENVY LIES CRUSHED; THE BISHOP LEO SURVIVED HIS 80TH YEAR.

Again : a presbyter's epitaph : —

TH: PLACE OF BASIL THE PRESBYTER, AND HIS (WIFE) FELICIThS, THEY
MADE IT FOR THEMSELVES.

Again : the epitaph of 2i preshijter's daughter : —

ONCE THE HAPPY DAUGHTER OF THE PRESBYTER GABINUS. HERE LIES
SUSANNA, JOINED WITH HER FATHER, IN PEACE.

The epitaph of a deacon's wife I have already given
(p. 74). I need not here repeat it.

* 1 Tim. iv. 3.

t 1 Cor. ix. 5 ; Matt. viii. 14 ; 1 Pet. v. 13 ; Acts xxi. 9.

+ 1 Cor. ix. 5. § 1 Tim. iii. 2, 11, 12 ; 1 Titus i. 6.

H Church in the Catacombs, pp. 247 — 251.

THE SACRIFICE OP THE MASS. 129

Here is reference to the wife of an exorcist : —

JANUARIUS THE EXORCIST MADE THIS FOR HIMSELF AND HIS WIFE.

Again : the epitaphs of a lector snad afossor, and their
wives.

CLAUDIUS ATTICIANUS, A LECTOR, AND CLAUDIA FELICISSIMA, HIS WIFE.
TERENTIUS THE FOSSOR, FOR PRIMITIVA HIS WIFE, AND HIMSELF.

It will hardly be needful for me to tell you, after what
has been said respecting a sacerdotal priesthood, that
there can be no more sacrifice for sin in the Christian
Church. The sacrifice of the mass had not then been
invented, nor indeed was it thought of until the ninth
century, that is, some four hundred years after the Cata-
combs were closed. You will be quite prepared to hear
that no trace of any such sacrifice can be found in them.
And so with respect to an altar in this sense. A Chris-
tian poet, Prudentius,* who wrote in the fourth century,
speaks of the table {mensa) on which the sacramental
elements of bread and wine were placed in the Catacomb
chapels, and he only uses the word altar {ara) when he is
referring to prayer and praise, which is spoken of in
Scripture under the figure of a spiritual sacrifice. f

How the table became the slab which closed the grave
of a martyr, how the tombstone became elevated into an
altar, and how in course of time the simple commemo-
rative supper became a sacrifice — a meal became a mass,
it would be unprofitable to narrate in detail. Such
changes, however, took place, and such continues to be
the corrupt practice of the Church of Rome. The Re-
formed Churches, however, have retraced their steps,

* Church in the Catacombs," p. 342. f Heb. xiii. 15.

130

POPEEY.

and follow the scriptural and primitive practice of ob-
serving tlie Supper as instituted by their Lord; have
discarded the unmeaning and inappropriate altar, and
have reinstated the primitive table.

Am I not justified in affirming that^ in all these
respects_, a great departure has taken ]3lace from the
simplicity which was in Christ/^ and that the Church of
Rome presents us with a corrupted^ paganized form of
Christianity ?

I now pass to another point. Rome not only dis-
honoured Christ as it regarded His office of Priest,, but
by degrees she exalted one human being after another^
to share in the dignity of His office as Mediator. Apostles^
martyrs, the Virgin Mary, disembodied spirits of men
and women, also angels, she clothed with the omni-
present attributes of God, and taught that they should
be addressed in prayer as intercessory mediators. This
corruption of Christianity, the introduction of demon or
spirit -worship, can also be directly traced to a Pagan
origin — the regard shown, and worship often rendered to
the Divine Manes, or disembodied spirits of great men,
supposed to be deified under that system.

That such an error should have crept in very early in
the history of Christianity is not to be wondered at,
when we consider how the primitive Christians were cir-
cumstanced ; retaining naturally some of the traditional
ideas of Paganism, and associated as they were in the
Catacombs with the remains of those they loved and
honoured in life.

On the gravestones of their hiding-places we read
the history and discern the first buddings of this cor-
ruption, but it did not reach its height until long

SAINT MANUFACTURE.

131

after the Catacombs were closed as Christian ceme-
teries.* First came a pious sentiment breathed in prayer
over the grave, and rudely scratched upon the stone by
the hand of a loving and mourning friend — ^^such as —

SWEET FAUSTINA MAY YOU LIVE IN COD.

ZOTICUS, BE OF GOOD CHEER.

BOLOSA, MAY COD REFRESH THEE,

Then, having thus accustomed themselves to address
the dead, came the next step in the declension — the
expression of hope that the departed, being in Christ,
might use his influence on behalf of those left behind in
the flesh.

The only inscription of this character in the Lapi-
darian Gallery reads : —

CENTIANUS, A BELIEVER, IN PEACE, WHO LIVED XXI YEARS, Vlll MONTHS,
AND XVI DAYS, ALSO IN YOUR PRAYERS PRAY FOR US FOR WE KNOW
THAT YOU ARE IN CHRIST,

Then came actual praying at the grave of the de-
parted, and seeking an interest in his intercessory
prayers, which evidently began to be practised before
the end of the ffth century ; then followed, naturally
enough, when the light of the glorious Gospel came to
be hid, the removal of the bones of the deceased to sanc-

* "In the Lapidarian Gallery (if it be not rash to pronounce
summarily upon the contents of so vast a collection), the name of
the Virgin Mary does not once occur. Nor is it to be found o?ice in
any truly ancient inscription contained in the works of Aringhi,
Boldetti, or Bottari. Should any exception be discovered, it will
not weaken the astonishing contrast existing between the ancient
and mediaeval churches in this particular." — " Church in the
Catacombs," p. 333.

132

POPERY.

tify some church, and to render efficacious the prayers
offered near them ; last of all came the worship of the
image, or 'picture of the deceased_, and the idolatry of the
degraded and ignorant Pagan was revived in all but the
name. Well says Dr. Maitland_, the Pantheon at Eome,
originally devoted to Jujpiter and all the gods, was dedi-
cated to the Virgin Mary and all the saints : the building
seemed to be Christianized^ but in truth it was Chris-
tianity that was Paganized. Provided men are wor-
shipped there^ it matters little by what names they are
invoked.^^*

My friends^ so easy is it to descend when we have
once entered upon a downward course. Let us cling
more closely than we have ever yet done to spiritual
worship^ never forgetting the promise of the Great Me-
diator to those who believe on Him : " Whatsoever ye
shall ask the Father in my name He will do it for you
and that it is declared in inspired Scripture that ''He
ever liveth to malce intercession for us.''

But I have not yet done with saint worship ; in the
lowest depth which we have explored, there is even '' sl
deeper still.'''' The Church of Eome having abandoned
the guidance of the Holy Scriptures, forsaken '' the
e^uide of her youth/^ and forgotten '' the covenant of her
God/^ she appears to have been left to fall into error so
palpable and obvious, that it might act as a warning to
deter Christ^s true followers from being allured by her
blandishments or deceived by her lofty pretensions.

From the worship of the disembodied spirits, the
mortal remains, and then the representations of saints, she
fell into the absurdity of setting up imaginary mediators,
who never had any real existence at all. The statements
* " Church in the Catacombs," p. 301.

MANUFACTURED MARTYRS.

133

whicli I 'shall bring before you would,, under other and
less serious considerations, provoke laughter ; but they
might well draw tears on behalf of ignorant and fallen
human nature j they are derived all of them from Roman
Catholic writers.

The origin of this error also can be traced to the
remains found in the Catacombs of Rome.

Mabillon, speaking of these remains, says, There
are dug up two sorts of bodies, the one with neither
name nor inscription, the other with one or both. Saints
of the first kind have names given them by the Cardinal
Vicar, or by the Bishop, who presides over the Pontifical
Chapel. Saints of this description are said to be bap-
tized

But poor human bones were not only made into saints,
and named, but they were many of them elevated into
martyrs as well. A " Holy Congregation of Relics,''
held in the year 1668, issued a decree : ^^The Holy Con-
gregation having carefully examined the matter, decides
that the palm and vessel (cup) tinged with blood are to
be considered most certain signs of martyrdom. The in-
vestigation of other symbols is deferred for the present.'' f-

While antiquarians are at issue as to the substance
found staining certain cups placed in the graves, being
divided in opinion between wine, blood, and fragrant spices,
" the Holy Congregation" steps in and settles the matter,
by raising the owners of the graves to the crown of
martyrdom; it exhibits unlooked-for moderation and
wisdom in postponing " for the present " the considera-
tion of the other symbols.

Raoul Rochette tells us of one of these manufactured

* Mabillon's Posthamous Works, vol. ii. pp. 251, 287.
t '* Church in the Catacombs," p. 174.

134

POPERY.

martyrs^ and_, altliougli a Romanist^ expresses grave
doubts as to tlie genuine cliaracter of the article. This
new saintj adopted so recently as 1803^ was transported
from Rome to Perugia; on his gravestone was repre-
sented a pair of forceps,, and the words —
D. M. s. (Sacred to the Divine Manes — a Pagan formula).

BERNERUS LIVED XXlll YEARS AND VII MONTHS.

On this inscription M. Pochette remarks^ '''' In the
absence of any certain signs of Christianity ^ this instru-
ment may be considered as belonging to his profession.
Bernerus therefore may have been a poor hlacksmith,
Christian if you will, or Pagan, which supposition accords
better with the character of his epitaph, excepting for
the vessel of blood (?) found in his grave, which is con-
sidered an indubitable sign of Christian sanctity.''^ *

Poor Bernerus — or more probably Yenerius — was
doubtless a Pagan blacksmith, and is now " indubitably^'
a martyr in glory — let us charitably hope that he is so ;
at all events, let us learn to be careful how, with our
fallible judgments and ignorance of men's hearts, we
follow such examples, and exercise God's prerogative of
separating and distinguishing saints from sinners, other-
wise than by God's test ; t and let all Christians be
thankful that their acceptance or rejection will not de-
pend upon guessing antiquarians, or even a " Council of
Relics," but rather that it is surely written, The Lord
hioweth them that are His/' J

Two more instances of blundering in this unholy work

* Memoires de 1' Academie des Belles Lettres et d'Inscriptions,
torn, xiii., cited in " Church in the Catacombs," p. 181.

f " By their fruits ye shall know them," Matt. vii. 16, 20.
+ 2 Tim. ii. 19.

MANUFACTURED SAINTS.

135

of making mediators are mentioned by Mabillon, and
quoted by Dr. Maitland.* One blunder^ you will per-
ceive,, arose from ignorance of the Latin grammar^ and
tlie otlier from a defective knowledge of Roman anti-
quities.

An inscription was found in the Catacombs :
D. M. (To tlie Divine Manes — a Pagan formula)

JULIA EUODIA THE DAUGHTER MADE THIS TO HER CHASTE AND WELL-
DESERVING MOTHER, WHO LIVED LXX YEARS.

Never was a saint more carelessly manufactured ; not
knowing, or not lieeding, tlie difference between the
nominative and dative cases, the finder of the inscription
concluded that the grave contained the i^mains of Julia
Euodia, and established Saint Julia Euodia accordingly.
This occurred at Tolosa; but the light of the Latin
grammar subsequently dispelled the illusion, and deprived
Julia of her saintship, by showing that it was not her
tomb, but that of her ^' chaste and lu ell -deserving mother.^'

The other case was equally unfortunate. An ancient
fragment of stone having been found inscribed thus,
S. VIAE, it^was taken to be the epitaph of a Saint
Viar, and certain well-meaning persons, says Dr. Mait-
land, ^''nothing daunted by the singularity of the name,
or the total want of evidence in support of his sanctity,
boldly established his worship.^^ Having subsequently
applied to Pope Urban for indulgences (that is, remission
of punishment for sin on account of prayers addressed
to the saint), the antiquarians, those troublesome people,

* Church in the Catacombs," pp. 182, 183.

136

POPEEY.

SO diflScult to satisfy without full inquiry, sent for tlie
stone, wlien it was immediately found to be a fragment
with part of the title of Surveyor of the Highways ; the
S being the last letter in Prcefedus/^ and the VIAE, being
the four first letters of Viarum ; it formed, doubtless,
part of a milestone. f

Another instance must be quoted, because it shows a
boldness of invention which throws these individual
instances into the shade. If any of you have been to
Cologne, on the Rhine, or have read of that ^^holy city,^^
you will know that it is unrivalled for the number and
sanctity of the remains of saints, apostles, and prophets
which it possesses — a huge museum of mouldering
anatomy, useless alike to the living and the dead, and
only commemorative of the weakness, darkness, igno-
rance, and superstition of the human mind;^^ thus writes
a recent traveller. Dr. James Johnson. The Doctor is
incorrect, however, in saying that the remains are use-
less alike to the living and the dead/^ the dead are,
doubtless, beyond the reach of their influence, but the
living reap a fine harvest from the gifts of the super-
stitious ; and the payments made, I am ashamed to say,
by curious Protestants, who constantly visit this bone-
house, are sufiicient to keep swarms of priests and monks
in idleness and luxury, and to perpetuate, if continued,
fraud and superstition to the end of time. The Doctor

* Or the genitive or plural of Curator Viarum, an office fre-
quently referred to in the Catacomb inscriptions. — See " Aringhi,
Roma Subterinea," vol. ii., pp. 338, 339, etc.

f The lecturer, to make this plain to an uninformed audience,
should copy the inscription thus, as a diagram: PrcEfeduS YIARwrn,
or CuratoriS VIARwm. The same remark applies to the inscrip-
tion next referred to.

SAINT MANUFACTURE.

137

himself admits tliat he was silly enough to spend some
days and dollars in exploring these mummeries indeed,
keeping a bone-shop is the best business going in
that holy city. It would be quite impossible for me to
enumerate all the wonders of this kind that it contains ;
suffice it to say, that there is some of the milh of the
Virgin Mary, the head of the Apostle Peter, ^' les en-
trailles^' of Queen Mary de Medicis, and the skulls of
the three wise men who offered gifts and adoration to
the infant Saviour. I need not say that the brains of
the wise men are not at Cologne, but the skulls are as
empty as the heads of those who pay for a sight of them.

But all these relics are inconsiderable, compared with
the vast collection in the Church of St. Ursula; here
repose the mortal remains of a vast ^' army of martyrs
no less than the bones of eleven thousand English virgins.
How they came there is somewhat uncertain, and state-
ments respecting their history are very contradictory.
It is reported that they were on their voyage to Rouen,
and either took the veil, or sacrificed their lives, to avoid
marriage with the barbarous Huns, who then possessed
the city. What eleven thousand young, unmarried ladies
had to do at Rouen at all, or why, in such times, or
indeed at any time, they forsook the shelter of the
maternal roof, and in what fleet they crossed the sea, are
points upon which history does not inform us. There
are the bones, however ; the Church of Rome has deter-
mined their sanctity, and instituted a service to their
honour.*

* The Salisbury Breviary of 1555 (that is, service-book of that
diocese previous to the Reformation) gives the following prayer
for the feast of the eleven thousand virgins : *' 0 God, who, by the
glorious passion of the blessed virgin, thy martyrs, hast made

138

POPERY.

All tliis history of the eleven thousand virgin saints
and martyrs is, doubtless, to be traced to the same origin
as the other instances which have been brought forward
— an incorrect rendering of an obscure inscription.

There is nothing/^ says Dr. Maitland, " to contra-
vene the supposition that the whole story is founded upon
a mistaken rendering of the inscription — Ursula. . et .
XI . MM . vv — interpreted ' Ursula and eleven thousand
virgins/ ms>ie2idi of Ursula and eleven virgin martyrs' *
Indeed, in a list of relics, published in the year 1117, some
of the remains of the eleven virgins are mentioned ;
these bones had not then increased, as they did after-
wards, a thousand-fold.

I am fearful that I have wearied you with the recital
of these instances of saint-manufacture, and conclude
this part of the subject by informing you, very briefly,
of a well-known invention of a saint, still worshipped by
the Church of Rome, notwithstanding the forgery has
been rendered apparent, and has been exposed by learned
men of that faith. I refer to the case of St. Yeronica,
whose name and existence are derived from the words
Vera icon (a true likeness), formerly inscribed under
pictures which purported to be representations of Christ.
These certified copies came in time to be called Veronicce,
and were known by that name to Christian writers. It
was not until the fourteenth century that Rome con-

this day a holy solemnity to us, hear the prayers of thy family ;
and grant that we may be freed by the merits and intercessions of
those whose feast we this day celebrate," etc. (" Church in the
Catacombs," p. 163). Nothing could more clearly prove that the
Church of Rome makes intercessory mediators of saints than this
passage.

* " Church in the Catacombs," p. 163.

SATNT MANUFACTURE.

139

structed out of legends^ based upon the ignorant use of
the word Veronicee, the saintship and history of Saint
Veronica^ and established her worship. There is a
colossal statue of this supposed saint in St. Peter^s, at
Rome ; a prayer, issued by Pope John XXII., in which
the representation of Christ is addressed, obtains for those
who use it ten thousand days^ indulgence. " The hand-
kerchief of Saint Veronica is publicly worshipped in
Rome on stated occasions, and the ceremony is performed
with the utmost splendour j no part of the Romish ritual
is more calculated to strike the imagination." *

Alas ! " how has the faithful city become an harlot ! "
In place of the worship of her Lord and Saviour, we
find the Church, whose faith was spoken of throughout
the world,-*^ f and whose early professors joyfully went
to the flames, the beasts, or the torture, rather than com-
mit the remotest act of idolatry, now glorying in her
shame, tendering homage and worship to departed saints,
disembodied spirits, and disentombed remains of mor-
tality, even imaginary men and women, who exist only
in the lying legends she has invented.

Said I not truly that the religion which Rome pre-
sents to her votaries is a debased, paganized, spurious
form of Christianity ?

I have spoken of the dishonour done to Christ by
the Church of Rome, as it regards his office of Priest
and Mediator. I have also hinted at the dishonour done
to the sacrifice which He ofi'ered of Himself, by the in-
stitution of a perpetually-recurring sacrifice, that of the
mass. I now come to speak of dishonour done to Him

* Church in the Catacombs," pp. 160, 161. f Eom. i. 8.

140

POPERY.

by another doctrine introduced by the Church of Rome,
that which teaches that there is a lourgatory, in which
Christians,, after death, are cleansed or purged from the
temj)oral punishment due to them. I need not pause to
convince you that in Scripture there is no foundation for
such doctrine. Complete, immediate pardon and salva-
tion are there offered to ail true believers iu Jesus Christ,
without any reservation ; not on account of their merits,
but by virtue of the perfect sacrifice which Christ oiffered
for them. We are assured that " the blood of Jesus
Christ cleanseth from all sin;^'* the sacrifice was com-
Ijlete — "a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation,
and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.-'^ t

Now Eome" asserts the insufficiency of that sacrifice,
and tells us, that what the Saviour could not do, and did
not do, her priests have power to accomplish, that is to
release suff'ering souls from punishment. This is a serious
subject, and not to be spoken of lightly. The Bible
speaks of two states or conditions after death : one of
everlasting destruction from the presence of God, and
the other of eternal and unalloyed happiness. No inter-
mediate state, such as the Romish purgatory, is ever re-
ferred to. Those who are blessed enough to attain to
heaven are assured that its blessedness is immediate and
complete. Absent from the body, present with the
Lord,^-* is the Scripture doctrine. J

No such comforting doctrine to pardoned sinners is
held out by the corrupt system of which I speak. To the
believer Rome can only promise that, when '^absent from
the body,^^ the soul descends, for a period more or less

* 1 John i. 7.

t Communion Service of the Church of England.
+ 2 Cor. V. 8.

SALE OP PARDON.

141

protracted^ into purgatorial flames_, there to make up in
punishment that which was deficient in the atonement
made bj Christ. This false doctrine places in the hands
of the priest a power such as no earthly potentate
possesses ; over the ignorant and superstitious he wields
the powers of the world to come-/' he assumes the pre-
rogative of Christ, who openeth and no man shutteth,
and shutteth and no man openeth.^^ * In fact, this
doctrine places in the hands of the priest the key of the
prison-house, and he has not been loath to use it as the
key to this world^s treasure. To teach that there was a
purgatory, that the duration of the detention there is un-
certain, that it can be shortened or prolonged at the will
of the priesthood, is the most daring assumption of power,
and, at the same time, the most profitable scheme of priest-
craft, which the world has witnessed.

But you will ask me as to the extent or duration of
this assumed punishment due to Christians. I can only
answer the question by informing you of the amount of
remission of this punishment, which diverse Popes have
awarded, by way of indulgence, on certain prescribed
terms. This will give you some idea of the probable
extent of this purgatorial process, and of the comfort
which Christians dying in that Church must enjoy in the
prospect of death.f

Pope John XXII. granted on one occasion 300 days
of pardon ; Pope Boniface to all who say a lamentable
contemplation for our blessed Lady,^^ etc., seven years
and forty Lents of pardon. John XXII., on another

* Eev. iii. 7.

f I gather these instances of indulojence or remission of punish-
ment from the " Collection of Records," in Part II. of Bishop
Burnet's " History of the Eeformation," pp. 38 — 58.

142

POPERY.

occasion^ oflPered 3000 days of pardon. Another indul-
gence granted by five holy fathers, Popes of Rome, con-
confers 500 years and so many Lents of pardon. Pope
Boniface YI. was more indulgent still, and granted, for
the repetition of certain prayers called Agnus Dei, 10,000
years of pardon. Pope Sixtus, in consideration of a
prayer to be devoutly repeated before the image of the
Virgin, granted 11,000 years of pardon. Burnet men-
tions another case, in which there was granted to all
them that before this image of pity devoutedly say five
Paternosters, five Ave-Marias, and a Credo, piteously
beholding those arms of Christ's passion, 32,755 years
of pardon j and Sixtus the Fourth, I*ope of Rome, hath
made the fourth and fifth prayer, and hath doubled his
foresaid pardon;'' that is, he extended his forgiving
power to 65,510 years. What, let me ask, comes of the
forgiveness of all sin by the blood- shedding of Christ, if
there can remain to believers (Christians, mark you), sixty-
five thousand years of ijurgatorial punishment ?

I need hardly point out to you that this doctrine re-
introduces that which Christ condemned and denounced
— the sale of ]oardon, for pardons and indulgences are
sold in the Church of Rome to those who can pay for
them.* Among Pagans, the rich could procure that
which the poor could not; but the Gospel of the Saviour
was to be communicated to the poorest without money
and without price ;" and, when John the Baptist sent
from his prison to inquire as to the truth of the Messiah's
claims, Christ pointed, as evidence, to the novel fact that
^''the poor have the Gospel preached to them." The
religion of Jesus Christ, in its pure form, is a religion

* See a little work entitled " The Religion of Money," by
Eoussel. Seeleys and Co.

PtJRGATOKY.

143

especially for the jpoov man ; and you may be certain that
is spurious religion which exacts a toll as the condition of
entering heaven. The most costly sacrifice which could
be offered has been slain for you_, and if you offered all
the gold which the world contains^ it would be but dross,
and valueless, compared with the nnsearchahle riches of
Christ. Obtain an interest in that offering ; " hold fast
the profession of your faith without wavering and you
may laugh to scorn all the idle and crafty tales of a pur-
chasable exemption from purgatory.

Before I state what the Catacombs tell us of purga-
tory, allow me to inform you that this Romish doctrine
does not even possess the merit of originality ; it is a
clumsy but crafty imitation of a Pagan idea, which is as
clearly written in the ^neid of the Pagan Virgil, as if
that poet had been a Roman Catholic. He thus writes : —

"ISTor death itself can wholly wash their stains ;
But long-contracted filth e'en in the soul remains.
The relics of invet'rate vice they wear ;
And spots of sin obscene in every face appear.
For this are various ^penances enjoined ;
And some are hung to bleach upon the wind ;
Some plung'd in waters, oihQrs pur q'd in fires,
Till all the dregs are drain'd, and all the rust expires.
Then are they happy, when by length of time
The scurf is worn away of each committed crime ;
No speck is left of their habitual stains.
But the pure ether of the soul remains." *

And now for the witness of the Catacombs. Of all
the doctrines of which I have to speak, none would so
certainly have been referred to on gravestones as the doc-

* "^neid," Dryden's Version, Book vi , pp. 998—1011; see
Original, Book vi., pp. 736 — 747.

144

POPERY.

trine of purgatory, if any sucli ideas had then been en-
tertained by tbe early Christian Church. What expres-
sions of desire for the prayers and alms of the liWng to
extricate souls from the flames would have been inscribed !
Now what is the fact ? No mention ivliatever, not even the
most incidental reference to the state of purgatory ^ has been
found in the Catacombs. In God. In Cheist. In Peace.
In Refreshment. In the home op the Eternal God.
Borne Away by Angels. Resting. Sleeping. It is
Forbidden to Weep. He Lives above the Stars.
Such are the invariable echoes of the galleries of the
Catacombs. No condemnation to them who are in Christ
Jesus'^ ^'Absent from the body, present with the Lord"
^'Having a desire to depart and be with Christ." Such
were the doctrines and the faith of the early Christians.
They believed in the gracious words once spoken to a
poor_, wretched sinner, snatched from a sinful world and
ignominious death, to grace the Saviour^s triumphant
entry into the world of spirits, there to show Himself a
Redeemer, " mighty to save " — This day shalt thou be
with Me in Paradise."

Again, I ask, am I not justified in saying that a cor-
rupt, a debased, a spurious, a Paganized Christianity has
been introduced? That each of the corruptions to which
I have referred — the sacerdotal priesthood, the sacrifices,
the mediators many, the doctrine of purgatory — are to
be attributed mainly to the reintroduction of Paganism,
to the dishonour of primitive and vital Christianity ?

You were told, in the outset of this lecture, that of
which you were doubtless well aware — that Rome practi-
cally shuts up the Holy Scriptures to her followers. It is
needless to detain you by attempting to prove that which

PURGATORY.

145

I am convinced you all believe — tliat the Scriptures con-
tain commands and encouragements to read^ to searcli^
and to understand what is contained in them, according
to the ability which God shall confer upon each one of us.

Now_, that which we believe and practise on this
point was the belief and practice of the early Church.
The Bereans were commended for searching the Scrip-
tures.* Timothy was congratulated that he had known
them from cJiildhoodj and enjoined to give attention to
reading them.f But we are not confined to Scripture
for proof of this fact. I have already quoted the words
of Tertullian (p. 112), who lived in the second century :
he informs us that at love-feasts '^the Scriptures were
read and explained." Also, Justin Martyr says, " Upon
the day called Sun-day, J all that live either in city or
country meet together at the same place, where the writ-
ings of the apostles and prophets are read, as much as the
time will give leave. ■'^ §

The fact, also, of the office of lector (reader) existing
proves that the public service of religion consisted largely
of Scripture-reading. But the fact is so notorious that
the Scriptures formed the chief study of the early Chris-
tians, that it must be quite unnecessary for me to say
more, except it be that every Christian writer of the first

* Acts xxvii. 11. t 2 Tim. iii. 15, 16; 13.

X The apologist is addressing Pagans, and therefore uses the
Pagan term " Sun-day " {Dies Solis). It were well that this term
were less used amongst us, and that the primitive term, and that
used in the Scriptures and found in the Catacombs, were substi-
tuted for it, viz., " The Lord's Day " {Dies Domini). la times in
which the Divine origin of the institution, and the perpetual
obligation of its observance, are brought into question, the
change would neither be unmeaning nor without its effects.

§ Justin Martyr's " First Apology."

146

POPERY.

three centuries quotes largely from the Scriptures,, wliich
he must have possessed ; indeed^ it has been asserted
with much truth, that if the sacred writings had been
lost or destroy edj nearly the whole could have been re-
covered from the Christian writings of the first three
centuries.

But you will inquire — What say the Catacombs on
this point ? The evidence is as abundant and satisfactory
as could be desired. The galleries of the Catacombs
afford us fictorial illustration of the fact. Christian
artists of the Catacombs drew upon Scripture history for
their inspiration ; it was the only history they were ac-
quainted with or cared to know.

Were we altogether in ignorance of the early develop-
ments of Christian art at Rome, there would be four
things which we should picture to ourselves as probabili-
ties in relation thereto : —

First'l^ Considering the abundance of suitable ma-
terial, the perfection to which the fine arts had attained,
and the national aptitude of the Romans for sculpture,
we should expect to find traces of art left, even by the
humble Christians of the Catacombs.

Secondly. We should expect to find that their religion
formed very much the theme upon which they exercised
their artistic genius.

Thirdly. Amidst persecution, suffering, and uncer-
tainty of life, we should expect that they would select such
subjects as would depict them own position, or shadow it
forth by the parallel suffering or triumphs of others.

Fourthly. Reflecting that they were many of them
Pagans by education, we should be prepared to expect
some blending of ideas. Pagan and Christian, in the de-
signing of their works of art.

EARLY CHRISTIAN ART.

147

Now it is interesting to discover tliat in all these
respects tlie fine arts^ as developed in the Catacombs^
answer exactly to tlie conditions wliich we sliould have
predicted concerning them. Much artistic merit in treat-
ment and execution is often apparent ; Scripture history-
is almost invariably the subject of illustration. The suf-
ferings of God's people^ or their deliverances from death^
are the predominant topics (with matchless delicacy of
feeling tlieir own are n-ever obtruded) : while Pagan incon-
sistencies occasionally peep out, affording gratifying ai-
teria of the genuine character of the works discovered.

I now proceed to review some few of these interesting
works of art, remarking very briefly upon each in passing,
and, first, of the Old Testament subjects.

Noah, delivered in the ark, the type of those who had
sought refuge in the Christian Church, was not likely to
be forgotten. He is very often represented, generally in
the act of receiving the dove with the olive-branch, sig-
nifying peace, hope, and reconciliation. Here is one
representation of him [93], which may be taken as a
specimen of a very numerous class. The ark is reduced
to a mere chest, and the patriarch is alone. The artistes
type is evidently derived from a Pagan coin then in
existence,* and as it was his intention to convey an idea
or sentiment, and not to produce an historical painting,
it was more easily accomplished by representing Noah
and the bird only, than by surrounding him with his
family and the representatives of the aiiimal world.

Next to Noah, perhaps Jcnah is the general favourite.
His history was considered typical of death and the re-
surrection. " In subterranean chapels,^^ says Dr. Mait-
land, when the living were separated from the dead by

* The Apamean medal.

148

POPERY.

a mere tile or slab of stone^ and sometimes liable to be
mingled with tliem by the violence of tlieir enemies, even
before the conclusion of their worship, the hope of a future
b'fe naturally occupied a prominent place in their creed

* * * and all that could help a trembling faiih to
seize the joyful reality was eagerly adopted. Jonah
escaping from the whale, or reclining beneath the gourd,
may be everywhere seen ; at first scratched on the walls,
and afterwards sculptured on the sarcophagi. In the
emblem of a risen saint, the sins and sorrows of the
original hero were forgotten. * * * But there is yet
further meaning in this oft-repeated sculpture : ' a greater
than Jonah is here.^ It was the Divine application of
this figure to the death and resurrection of Christ that
gave to it peculiar interest ; for, by a happy inference,
the Church saw, in the rising of her Head, the certain
resuscitation of his members. In this small fragment
of marble the Christian of ancient times traced
his own career; his passage from the unstable ele-
ment too well expressing his present life through the
gate of death, not inaptly represented by the terrible
monster, suffered to engorge though not to retain his
prey.''*

Here [ 93 ] are two representations of Jonah, one of
them combined with that of Noah just referred to ; they
are both of them sculptured on sarcophagi. The upper
drawing represents his ejection from the ship into the
mouth of the great fish, and his subsequent escape from

• the sea monster. The lower sculpture shows his escape
from the jaws of the fish to repose peacefulh", which is
well told, beneath the overhanging gourd. The whole is
evidently symbolical, emblematical, and not strictly his-

* " Church in the Catacombs," pp. 303—305.

MIRACLES.

149

torical. The very roch to which Jonah clings has pro-
bably reference to the common Scripture emblem for
Christ.

Here are other Old Testament subjects, all of which
will bear a similar explanation. Daniel delivered from
the lions,, a fresco painting [ 94 ] ; also the three youths,
unharmed, in the furnace at Babylon, from a fragment of
a sarcophagus ; they are represented in the attitude of
prayer, before referred to [ 97 ] ; and Elijah's triumphant
entry into heaven in a chariot, his mantle, disproportionate
in size, descending to Elisha, who, to tell the story of his
comparative youth, is represented as a child [ 95 ] . This
latter subject exhibits great boldness of treatment as a
work of art. All these subjects are of a cheerful and
encouraging class. The ancient Church never repre-
sented scenes of a painful character : the deliverance of a
Jew from the lions of Babylon was preferred to the de-
struction of a Christian by those of the Colosseum; and
the three Hebrews preserved from the rage of Nebuchad-
nezzar was a more consolatory subject than the victims of
Neronian cruelty wrapped in pitchcloth, and used as
torches to illuminate the circus.^^*

And now to pass from the Old Testament to the New :
there is no occasion to reiterate the observations made,
for they are also applicable here. The raising of Lazarus
from the dead is a very frequent subject upon sarcophagi ;
its appropriateness is at once apparent. Here is an in-
stance [ 95 ] in which the Eoman-shaped tomb and the
mummy of Lazarus after the Egyptian fashion, show the
Pagan artist, or, at all events, Pagan ideas. At the feet
of the Saviour is a figure^ either Mary the sister of

* Church in the Catacombs," p. 311.

150

POPERY.

Lazarus, or it may possibly be intended to represent the
latter, bound hand and foot with grave-clothes.''^

A great variety of our Lord^s miracles are found re-
presented. Here are two [ 99 ]j intended for the mira-
cles of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, and
changing of the water into wine at Cana of Galilee.

It was one of the arguments of the infidel school of
the last century, that if the early Christians had believed
in the miracles of Christ, they would more frequently
have appealed to them in their controversies with their
Pagan adversaries. Much learning and ingenuity is exer-
cised, upon the reply to this objection, by Dr. Paley, in
his Evidences of the Truth of Christianity.''* Had
the Doctor been as well acquainted with the Christian
Catacombs as some are in the present day, he might have
spared himself some labour, and cut very short the argu-
ment, by pointing to the sculptured ^'evidences'' cut in
the rock with an iron pen for ever.

Christ in his Scripture character of the Good Shep-
herd,'' is a very favourite decoration of the Catacombs.
In three representations which I show you, the subject is
slightly varied [ 96 ] . He is represented carrying home
the lost, the tender, or the weakly sheep. He is habited
in the Roman dress. In one case the Pagan '' Pan's
pipes " are represented to indicate his office ; in another
you will notice the monogram on the head, to remove all
doubt as to the person intended. You will observe, also,
the great diversity of age and personal appearance in
these representations. It is evident that the Christians
of the early Church never attempted any likeness of their
Divine Master, of whose appearance, although traditional

* Part III. chap. v.

THE RAISING OF LAZARUS, & ELIJAH TRANSLATED.

THE GOOD SHEPHERD.

EARLY CHRISTIAN ART.

151

accounts may liave been transmitted^ no reliable likeness
had been preserved.

As with regard to their own sufferings, so the early
Christians appear to have been equally indisposed to dwell
upon those of their Lord. The best and most plausible
reason which can be assigned for this conduct is,, that the
Christians of that day regarded, more than we have done
in after ages, the sufferings of Christ and of his people
as matter for glorying. The Apostles counted themselves
liappy that they were permitted to suffer persecution for
the sake of their crucified Saviour ; and Paul could ex-
claim, " God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross
of our Lord Jesus Chnst V They looked upon such
subjects in a cheerful light, as matters for rejoicing ; it
was a much later and colder age which introduced the
painful representations of the sufferings of Christ's human
nature, to aid flagging and almost expiring faith.

Amongst the very few allusions to the last hours of
our Lord upon earth are two, which I show you [97^ 98] :
one of them represents Pilate, his wife, and an attendant ;
the former is washing his hands after the Oriental mode,
as related by ^latthew (chap, xxvii. 24). The subject
would seem, as Dr. Maitland suggests, to have reference
to the declaration of our Lord^s freedom from guilt, I am
innocent of the blood of this just person and by in-
ference, the innocence of the Christians, as it concerned
the charge of treason brought against them by their
Pagan persecutors.

The other sculpture is from a sarcophagus, the subject
being Peter denying his Master, and the cock crowing.
This work of art is of a date somewhat later than the
time of Constantine, as one of the Roman Basilicfe, or
courts of Justice — made over to the use of the Christians

152

POPEEY.

in tliat reign as places of worship^ — appears in tlie back-
ground. These buildings serve to point out tlie origin
of ecclesiastical arrangements wbich have since then come
very generally into use.*

Although incidentally referred to^ as in the t"wo cases
pointed out, it does not appear that the early Christians
ever took pleasure in portraying the actual scenes of suf-
fering through which their Lord and Saviour passed. It
is uncertain whether this arose from a repugnance to
represent scenes in which his human form must have
figured prominently^ and which, considering also his
divine nature, prompted by reverent feelings, they shrunk
from attempting, or whether, as has been already sug-
gested, they overlooked to a great extent the sufferings
of Christ in their earnest appreciation of the glory that
followed.

The monogram, already explained, or a cross of two
lines scratched on a gravestone, were at first the simple
modes adopted for expressing faith in a crucified Lord.
The transition from the simple to the elaborate, the
peaceful to the horrible, is well traced in the following
extracts : — The primitive symbols were also as rudi-
mentary as they were cheerful : tivo crossed lines recorded
the whole story of the Passion. In course of time, faith
begins to cool ; the sculptor finds it necessary to suggest
rather more strongly the meaning of the symbol. About

* The origin of the arrangements of ecclesiastical architecture
will be found fully and satisfactorily examined in Dr. Maitland's
" Church in the Catacombs," 2nd edit., pp. 339—349. The Cata-
comb chapel and the Eoman court of law having each of them
contributed its share towards the development of church archi-
tecture, this point was reached in the fourth century ; towers and
spires were added at a later date.

.MIRACLES OF OUR LORD.

EARLY CHRISTIAN ART.

153

the year 400^ there appears at the foot of the cross a
white lamb ; by the help of this sacrificial emblem^ man-
kind contrives to remember the atonement for three
# hundred years longer. In the year 706 the Quinisextan
Council took away the lamb^* and painted in its place
a living man, at first seen standing beneath tho cross_,
with arms extended as if in prayer. This affecting repre-
sentation seems to have lasted out that century. In the
ninth the painter raised Christ to the transverse beam ;
the darkened sun and moon now appear above the cross ;
but He still prays with hands unconfined. In the tenth
century Christ is first represented as dead, the nails being
driven into the hands and feet. About the thirteenth the
head drops on one side. * * * The painter haviDg
developed the symbol of the Passion from the simple
cross to the complete painting, was followed by the
sculptor^ who beginning in the eleventh century with a
mere bas-relief^ in the fourteenth arrived at the poidahle
crucifix. This ivas material enough: faith had been super-
seded by sight, and sight by touch.'^-f We learn in passing
what I have before hinted at, the danger of employing
symbols in relation to Divine things ; there is a tendency
in man, evidenced by his history in all ages_, to abuse the
use of symbols and incur peril of idolatry.

I close this reference to the fine arts of the Catacombs
with a quotation, which well and concisely sums up all
that I have stated. " On the whole, it may be safely
assumed that the Catacombs^ destined to be the sepulchre

* 82nd Canon.

t The symbolism was further degraded, and the living crucifix,
with its '* stigmata" or five wounds, was eventually produced by
the Church of Eome. — The " Church in the Catacombs," pp. 204
-208.

154

POPERY.

of the first Christians, for long periods peopled by mar-
tyrs, decorated during the persecutions of the Church
and under the immediate dominion of sad thoughts and
agonizing duties, do really offer on all sides nothing but
heroism in the historical pictures, and in the purely orna-
mental part nothing but graceful and cheering subjects ;
as representations of the vintage, of pastoral scenes, of
love-feasts, of fruits, flowers, palm-branches, laurel crowns,
lambs, doves, and does ; in a word, nothing hut ivhat
suggests a feeling of joyous innocence — such as the world
hiew when it was young — and charity, such as the Larah
of God first brought into the world. Here are no figures
agonizing on the cross, no pictures of the cross and
passion, the agony and bloody sweat, the precious death
and burial. For the crucifixion you must go to other
cemeteries, which were not decorated in the first ages of
Christianity. In the midst of their agitated lives, and in
contemplation of a painful death, these first converts of
the faith regarded the grave only as a sure and short
road to eternal ]iaj)2nness. Far from associating with it
images of torture and horror^ they endeavoured to enliven
the tomb with bright and cheerful colours ; to present
death under the most agreeable symbols, to wreathe it
with foliage and flowers. In these dark crypts, among
all these funereal fragments and remnants of the dead,
you see no sinister symbol, no image of distress and
mourning, no sign of resentment, no expression of hatred
or revenge ; on the contrary, all these objects breathe
sentiments of composure, gentleness, afiection, and bro-
therly love. * * * Also in the first churches, when
pictures were attempted upon the walls or cupolas, the
subjects were all taken from Holy Writ. The painters
who worked above ground had the same source of inspi-

EEPEESENTATIONS OF GOD.

155

ration as the artists who decorated these Catacombs ;
and that soiirce was the Bible.

That word reminds me of the point at which we had
arrived in tracing the corruption of Christianity in the
Romish system^ when I commenced the digression upon
the fine arts in the Catacombs.

I think I may now return to our argument^ and ask
you whether_, in withholding the Scriptures from the
people, and keeping them in ignorance of that which is
the Christianas chai'ter — the inspired Word of God — the
Church of Rome has not again afforded evidence that she
has substituted a debased for a primitive and pure Chris-
tianity j the Scriptures themselves, the early Christian
writers, and the Catacombs of Rome being our wit-
nesses ?t

Before leaving the subject of the fine arts in the
Catacombs, one more testimony they will afford against a
practice which Rome has introduced to her infinite dis-
honour, that of representing, like her Pagan predecessors,

* Macfarlane's " Catacombs of Eome," pp. 124 — 26.

t Farther evidence of the possession of the Scriptures by the
early Christians is to be found in the fact that there were, in times
of persecution, persons who gave them up, who were termed tra-
ditors accordingly, i.e., traitors to God, who had committed to
their custody a sacred gift. Traditors were, by their act, con-
sidered as lapsed persons, that is, apostates from Christianity. At
a synod held at Cirta, in Numidia, for instance, one Paul was
deposed from his office as a traditor, and upon proceeding to con-
secrate a successor, it appeared, unhappily, that others present
had committed the same crime. Optatus de Schismat. Donatist.
lib. i. p. 39 ; Augustine Cont. Cresc, lib. iii. cap. 26 — 28. Many
other references to the offence of giving up the Scriptures are
contained in the writings concerning the early Church. See also
the testimony of Fenelon (a Roman Catholic), Q^uvres S'pirituels,
tom. iv., p. 241.

156

POPERY.

the great God — the eternal, immortal, and invisible
Jeliovah — under the form of "corruptible manJ'' The
early Christians, although with all reverence and delicacy
of feeling they portrayed their Lord in human form,
never ventured to design God the Father in the likeness
of flesh. In cases in which the subject required allusion
to the interference of God, they hinted at it by intro-
ducing a symbolical hand. Here are two instances
[100] : in one of which Moses is represented taking the
tables of the Law from a hand veiled in " clouds and
darkness in the other, the outstretched hand of God is
represented as interposing to stay the sacrifice of Isaac
by the patriarch Abraham. This symbolic hand became
the germ from which sprang the disregard of the Second
Commandment, which grew with the growth of Romish
corruption, until it became so flagrant and apparent, that
it became necessary for that Church to drop, as she did,
the command from the Decalogue. There is found in a
French MS. of the ninth century, a representation of
God the Father as an aged man — precisely the Jupiter of
the Pagans revived. In two MSS. of the Apocalypse, of
the fourteenth century, one of which is in the British
Museum, there appear representations of Christ, as a
lamb standing on its hind legs, and taking the book with
the seven seals from " Him that sat upon the throne,^'
represented in each case as a man. These subjects would
be ridiculous if they were not painfully blasphemous ; it
is quite out of the question afibrding illustrations of
them.* In later times this ofience became more frequent ;
and in Roman Catholic churches both pictures and carvings
to this hour afford evidence that God^s laws are dis-

* See Twining's *' Symbols and Emblems," Plate xi., figs.
3 and 5.

REPRESENTATIONS OF GOD.

157

regarded and set at nought in this, as in other respects.
If any of you were to cross the Channel to Calais, and
visit there the chief church, you would see a representa-
tion of the Virgin Mary as a young woman, Christ as a
young man, and the Eternal Father as an old man, and
the Holy Spirit as a dove. You will picture to yourselves
that the Virgin would be represented as offering adoration
to the representations of the persons in the Trinity — no
such thing ; the Divine persons are crowning the head of
the Virgin. And so at Paris, in the church called The
Madeleine,^^ God the Father is represented as a man
reclining on a couch. The Eternal Jehovah, who faint-
eth not, neither is weary,^^* is actually represented talcing
rest after the fatigues of creation ! ! Wherein is such a
system better than that of the Pagans of old? Is not
that a deeply -debased Christianity, if Christianity it can
be called, which substitutes such religion for the spiritual
worship of a Spirit God. In this respect also I would
have you notice that the Catacombs witness clearly against
Romanism that it is neither primitive nor pure.

One more illustration of my argument, and I conclude.
In nothing was the religion of Jesus Christ more distin-
guished from all that the world had then known of reli-
gion, than in its loving and Messing spirit. Its existence
was based upon an act of love unparalleled. In love to
God and to human nature all its laws are included and
summed up. Those laws, as expounded by their Great
Author, forbade cursing, and enjoined blessing ; bless,
and CURSE not.''' With severity of reproof unusual with
the meek and gentle Saviour, He condemned the sjnViY of
persecution when it appeared in the behaviour of his dis-

* Isaiah xl. 28.

158

POPEEY.

ciples. " Ye hioiv not what manner of spirit ye are of;
for the Son of Man is not come to destroy men^s lives, hut to
save them/'^ was his reply, wlien tliey suggested tlie pro-
pagation of Ms Gospel by other means than by kindly
persuasion and the force of Christian example.

This is not the spirit in which his religion has been
set before the world by the recent Church of Rome. Alas !
in this respect especially, she has shown herself the parent
of unfaithful daughters,]- who have often followed her
pernicious example, and persecuted those who differed
from themselves. But Rome stands pre-eminently con-
spicuous as a cursing and a fersecuting Church; she
curses systematically, awfully, in terms which I dare not
repeat to you. And with respect to persecution and
blood- shedding, she has emulated her Pagan predecessors,
and earned for herself the character accorded to her in
Inspired Writ, ^' drwiken ivith the hlood of the saints."
It would weary you were I to attempt even to enumerate
the slaughter she has committed in the name of the reli-
gion of the loving Jesus. In the valleys of Piedmont,
Switzerland, the Tyrol, and Bohemia, the blood of Albi-
genses, Yaudois, Yfaldenses, and others who protested
against Rome^s corruptions, was poured out like water.
In the sixteenth century, France affords an illustration of
the fiendish spirit of persecution; men, women, and
children were indiscriminately slaughtered by the sword,
by hanging, roasting over slow fires, cast from high rocks,
or upon pikes. Sucking infants, who could not know
their right hand from their left, were not spared, but
killed with bludgeons before the eyes of their mothers ;

* Luke ix. 55, 56.

f " The Mother of Harlots," or unfaithfulness, she is called in
Holy Writ.

rERSECUTlNG_, CURSING.

159

nor did tlie sex of woman shield her. On one occasion
five hundred women were forced into a barn, which was
set on fire, and all were destroyed. This was but de-
sultory and ineffectual persecution ; a design was formed,
deliberately, for the utter extinction of pure religion in
France, and carried out on the 24th August, 1572, and
lasted seven days. It is known by the name of the Mas-
sacre of St. Bartholomew ; more than 5000 persons were
slaughtered in Paris, and at least 20,000 more in other
parts of France. The Pope rejoiced in this bloody deed,
publicly returned thanks to God for its success, and con-
gratulated the French king on the accomplishment of a
purpose so long meditated and go happily executed.'^
He even struck a medal, on which he represented him-
self, Gregory XIIL, on the obverse, and on the reverse
the Massacre, with the inscription, the slaughter of
THE HUGONOTS, 1572.''^* Our own country has not escaped,
although it has been, by God's mercy, visited more
leniently than others. The Netherlands were literally
drenched in blood. The Duke of Alva boasted of having
put to death 18,000 Protestants in six weeks, and the whole
number massacred in that country, solely on account of
their religion, fell little short, if at all, of 100,000. In
Italy, Spain, Portugal, Mexico, turn where you will, you
will read the history of Rome's authority in letters of
blood.

The Inquisition — an institution established to put a
stop to the Reformation — has, since its establishment,
sacrificed its hundreds of thousands, or, as some writers
assert, its millions of victims ; the total will never b

* This medal is described in the Numismata Pontificum
Romanorum," torn. i. p. 336.

160

POPERY.

known nntil the earth shall disclose her blood, and no
more cover her slain.-'^ Carrying on its proceedings in
darkness and secresy — violating the sanctity of domestic
life, and even of connubial attachment, in obtaining its
victims — condemning without a charge, and often without
a hearing — by fearful tortures, extorting evidence to incul-
pate and bring into the same condemnation those who are
nearest in relationship or dearest in affection — it appears,
in my humble judgment, the masterpiece of Satan's
cruelty ; permitted to exist only to warn us to come
out of^^ and keep clear of Eome and her system. And
think not, my friends, to deceive yourselves by saying,
" This is an old story, and a state of things long past and
gone.''^ Tell me which of the persecuting and cursing
canons of Rome has been repealed, and my charity will be
prepared to admit that she has changed her character ;
let me see that, although unrepealed, she has ceased to
use them, and I will, even then, admit it. But her bloody
statutes are on her books ; her persecuting pictures adorn
the walls of the Pope^s palace; her sanguinary medals are
in the Pope^s collection ; and blood is even now on her
hands in the middle of the nineteenth century. England
was once a persecutor for conscience sake. On her statute
books were laws enjoining the burning of heretics ; the
imprisonment, multilation, and execution of non-con-
formists ; she sanctioned the use of the torture to extort
evidence. Had these laws remained unrepealed, how
could she have replied to the charge of persecution and
cruelty ? But Eome, in this respect, since she fell, is
unchanged and unchanging. Even while I address you,
her recognized organs are justifying persecution, and in-
timating that she still thirsts for blood. I will not read to
you what Protestants say of Rome, but I will read what

LOVING SPIEIT OP EAELY CHURCH. IGl

Rome, speaking in the Univers/^ her recognized organ
on the Continent, says about us.*

A heretic, examined and convicted by the Church,
used to be dehvered over to the secular power and
punished with death. Nothing has ever appeared to us
more natural or more necessary. More than 100,000
perished in consequence of the heresy of Wicliflfe ; a still
greater number by that of John Huss; it luould not he
possible to calculate the bloodshed caused by the heresy of
Luther, and it is not yet over. After three centuries, ive
are at the eve op a eecommencement.-'^

And now, what say the Catacombs to the spirit of
their Christian occupants ? Surely, if ever there were men
entitled to curse, to retaliate, and to revenge, it was these
poor outcasts ; proscribed for no crime, persecuted and
put to death, without law, without trial, and without
mercy. But mark the fact, not one word of hatred, re-
venge, dislike, is ever expressed against their persecutors
and enemies ; not even a stray scrawl is to be found on
the walls of their prison, implying a desire to retaliate,
to curse, or to avenge. Such inscriptions as the following
ha,ve been found, but they breathe a different spirit : —

MAXIMINUS, WHO LIVED XXIII YEARS; FRIEND OF ALL MEN.

IN CHRIST, ON THE FIFTH BEFORE THE KALENDS OF NOVEMBER SLEPT
CORGONIUS, FRIEND OF ALL, AND ENEMY OF NONE.

The history of their triumph under Constantino tells
the same tale. When released from the persecutions of

* Yide "L'Uuivers," August, 1851. Also articles written in
August, 1872, the tercentenary of the massacre of St. Bartho-
lomew, justifying that act.

162

rOPERY.

the Pagans, and armed with the powers of the State,
they turned not those powers against their enemies and
persecutors ; they were more busied in the manumission
of slaves, and in putting down the bloody games of the
circus, than in recording or revenging the injuries they
had received. Would that it were in the power of the
historian to trace the same line of conduct in after
times !

Again, I ask, am I not justified in asserting that
Christianity has been corrupted; that the Romish system
has largely borrowed the cursing, persecuting, and blood-
thirsty spirit of Paganism ? that for the Christian religion
of the Catacombs and the Bible, there has been sub-
tituted a false, a spurious imitation, which does not bear
the impress of the Divine original ?

To the objection, If Christianity is a Divine institu-
tion and remedy f why has it not effected more completely
its mission hy removing evils which still afflict our
world ? " I have replied, " Because Christianity was

CORRUPTED, AND IS, TO A GREAT EXTENT, CORRUPTED STILL/^

Had time permitted, the proof could have been much
extended, but I have preferred confining myself to the
fundamental errors of the system ; all others matters are
mere accessories and sequences. I have made plain, I
trust, that these fundamental corruptions consist in a
derogation from the honour, a usurpation of the rights of
the Lord Jesus Christ, by setting aside his teaching and
infringing upon his various oflflces : of Priest, by sub-
stituting an unauthorized priesthood ; of Saviour, by
supplying a supplementary sacrifice ; of Mediator, by
adding a host of unnecessary intercessors ; of Prophet,
by withholding the inspired Word of God. And, as a

RECAPITULATION.

163

consequence^ Rome having reverted to the Pagan system
in all these respects, she has naturally come to display
the worst features of Pagan spirit.

Why this corruption of truth, and consequent sus-
pension of the hopes of the world, has been permitted, I
again repeat it is not for us to determine. Suffice it to
reply, that it was forehiown and clearly predicted, and
that the true Church of Christ, from the days of the
Apostles to this hour, has known the fact, and been con-
soled also by the knowledge that the destruction of the
system is also determined upon, and that it will be sudden,
fearful, and complete.*

In this view of the subject, how important is it for us
to understand clearly the principles of the system, so as
to keep clear of its corruptions ; for the Word of inspira-
tion, in telling of its coming judgment, informs us also of
a " YoicQ^' which is loudly to sound, and which even my
feeble and unworthy utterance may be permitted even
now to swell : Gome out of her, my 'people, that ye he not
partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her
plagues.'^ t

The number of those who still submit themselves to
the teachings of Rome is very great, and she has many
admirers who in secret bow the knee to her without openly
professing it. This being so, it may be asked by some of
you, "How comes it that so many are deceived, and

* See "Apostolic School of Prophetic Interpretation," by Dr.
Maitland, in which the belief that Rome is the predicted Babylon
of the Apocalypse is shown to have been the faith of the Christian
Chnrch in every age.

f Rev. xviii. 4.

164

POPERY.

claim for Romanism that it is 'primitive^ Jioli/j universalj
and a]iostolic ?

I must first remind you that a numerical majority
(even if Rome possessed it) could not determine a
question of truth or error. When Christianity arrived in
the world_, Paganism was all but universal : that fact did
not^ however_, prove Paganism true and Christianity false.
At the present moment it is believed that the worshippers
of Buddha in India and China outnumber the professors
of any other religious sect_, but you will perceive that that
fact cannot determine the truth of Buddhism. Thus the
number of those who are deceived by error cannot con-
vert error into truth. And so with regard to pertinacious
reiteration of a statement : a falsehood^ however often re-
pestedj is a falsehood still. The Ephesians of old con-
tinued by the space of two hoars to reiterate Great is
Diana of the Ephesians^" without establishing the dignity
of their imaginary divinity. The progress of truth is
ever slow^ while error moves with rapid steps : the
reason is obvious; error is seized upon by those who
ask no evidence^ while the searchers after truth, hitherto
a small minority of mankind_, adopt it only after delibe-
rate examination.

I will tell you, however, another secret of the power
of Romanism. I have said that a falsehood, however
often reiterated, can never become truth ; but it is also a
lamentable fact, that by the constant reiteration of a^ false-
Jioodj it acquires in our iintliinMng world the force of
truth. This is the reason why the system I speak of has
so many adherents, notwithstanding its flagrant depar-
tures from primitive and pure Christianity. It is un-
happily the case in this world of ours, both in commerce

FALSEHOOD.

165

and m religion^ tliat the corrupted, debased, adulterated
article passes too frequently for the genuine and
the pure, upon the word of the loudest and boldest
asseverator.

This tendency in falsehood to pass unchallenged and
the true reason of its success are so well stated by a living
poet, that I cannot forbear quoting him : —

" Build a lie — yes, build a lie,

A large one — be not over tender ;
Give it a form, and raise it high,

That all the world may see its splendour ;
Then launch it like a mighty ship

On the restless sea of men's opinion,
And the ship shall sail before the gale

Endued with motion and dominion.

Though storms may batter it evermore,

Though angry lightnings flash around it,
Though whirlwinds rave, and whirlpools roar,

To overwhelm and to confound it.
The ship shall ride, all wrath of time

And hostile elements defying :
The winds of Truth are doubtless strong,

But great 's the buoyancy of lying.

And though the ship grow old at last.

Leaky, and water-logged, and crazy.
Yet still the hulk endures the blast,

And fears no weather, rough or hazy ;
For should she sink, she'll rise again.

No strength her rotten planks shall sever ;
Give her hut size and (he ivorst of lies

May float about the world for every *

I must, however, conclude with a remark or two
* Dr. Mackay.

166

POPERY.

by way of lessons wliich we may derive from the subject
we Lave been considerinor.

First. I will suggest another answer with which, from
to-night_, you may be furnished, when Romanists ask you,
as they are very fond of doing in their ignorance, " Where
was your religion before the Reformation?" There have
been two answers usually given to this question ; one of
them distinguished by its wit, and the other by its sound-
ness. The first reply is, in fact, a counter- question —
Where was your face this morning, before you washed
it Now, this reply I do not recommend you to use. I
would rather advise you to reply, It was in the New
Testament]^-' where, if your faith be sound, it will
assuredly be found. But from to-night you can reply
also, It ivas in the Catacombs of Rome.'' There was
primitive and pure Christianity, and that will be "primitive,
holy, universal, and apostolic religion which resembles it.

Then, secondly, notice the wise providence of God
with regard to the preservation of the antiquities of the
Catacombs. Hidden from the world during a thousand
years, they came forth just as the corruption of Rome was
complete and the reformation from error commenced, as
important witnesses in the controversy which was hence-
forth to be maintained ; but the state of learning was not
then favourable for the full development of their testi-
mony. The Popes, however, preserved the stones in
their museum ; eminent antiquarians (Roman Catholics)
copied and published the inscriptions, and thus preserved
them from being lo?t, until this day, when the enemy
coming in like a fiood," Christians are permitted to lift

IMrROVEM£NT.

1G7

them up as a standard against error and false religion.
This is not the first time in the world's history that a
culprit has treasured up the evidence wJiicli has ultimately
proved the means of his conviction.

Lastly. If you loould hiow Cliristiawty, learn it from
the Bible. Which of you, having the option of drinking
at the fountain-head of the river, or of slaking your
thirst from its turbid and polluted waves after it has
scoured some mighty city, would not rather prefer the
pure crystal draught from the unpolluted source ? Study,
then, this Divine institution, where its features are truth-
fully delineated in the pages which record the words and
actions of its Divine Founder, and attend the teaching of
those who draw water the purest from these wells of
salvation.'^ Do not be so unwise or so unjust as to con-
demn that which is in itself pure and holy, and calculated
to make you unspeakably happy, because some have forged
counterfeits, and passed them for the true. You act not
so with respect to the secular affairs of life. Money still
possesses its value, and fine gold is still esteemed by you,
notwithstanding it is sometimes counterfeited by baser
metal. Pictures by eminent artists command and main-
tain their price, even though copies, unworthy of the
original, are abroad. Oh! that it were thus with regard
to the more important concerns of our souls. We take
up, unthinkingly and without examination, anything pre-
sented to us as the religion of Christ, and either reject it
altogether, because of some unattractive and repulsive
feature which belongs not to it, or, if receiving it, we
render homage to some distorted representation, to the
dishonour of the Divine Originator.

168

POPERY.

May it be your lot and minej so to learn Clirist from
tlie inspired reflection He has left behind Him, that we
all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the
Lord, may be changed into the same likeness from glory
to glory, e^en as by the Spirit of the Lord/^*

* 2 Cor. iii. 18.

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Full text of "The contents and teachings of the catacombs at Rome : being a vindication of pure and primitive Christianity, and an exposure of the corruptions of popery, derived from the sepulchral remains of the early Christians at Rome"

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