Psal. cxviii. 11. Act. 6. Euseb. Lib. vii. cap. xviii. Εθνικῇ συνηθεία. August. contr. Adimant. cap. xiii. ii. cap. ii. Dan. iii. The hea- sunt sacra, quæ primitus fuerant assumpta solatia1: "Images were first drawn, thens fa- thereby to keep the countenance of the dead in remembrance. Upon occasion thers of thereof things grew at length unto holiness, that at the first were taken only for images. solace." Therefore St Ambrose saith: Gentes lignum adorant, tanquam imaginem Ambros. in Dei: "The heathens worship wood as the image of God." And Gregorius the Concil. Nic. bishop of Neocæsarea: Gentilitas inventrix et caput est imaginum3: Heathenness was the first deviser and head of images." Likewise Eusebius saith, speaking of the images of Christ, of Peter, and of Paul: Hoc mihi videtur ex gentili consuetudine observatum; quod ita illi soleant honorare, quos honore dignos duxerinta : "This seemeth to be the observation of the heathenish custom; for with such images they used to honour them whom they thought worthy of honour." Therefore St Augustine, writing against Adimantus, saith thus: Simulant se favere simulacris; quod propterea faciunt, ut miserrimæ et vesanæ suæ sectæ etiam paganorum concilient benevolentiam5: "They would seem to favour images; which thing they do to the intent to make the heathens to think the better of their most miserable Lactant. Lib. and lewd sect." For of the heathens Lactantius writeth thus: Verentur, ne..... religio vana sit, si nihil...videant, quod adorent: "They are afraid (as they also are of M. Harding's side) their religion shall be but vain, if they see nothing that they may worship." Therefore Daniel saith that Nabucodonozor the heathen king appointed a solemn dedication-day for his golden image, with all kinds and sorts of minstrelsy. And the prophet Baruch thus openeth and uttereth the religion of Babylon: Sacerdotes barba capiteque raso et aperto sedent, et coram diis suis rugiunt: “The priests, being shaven both head and beard, and sitting bare, roar out before their gods." Thus Heliogabalus, Adrianus, and Alexander Severus, being infidels and heathen princes, had in their chapels and closets the images of Abraham, of Moses, of Christ, and of others". Thus the heretics called Gnostici and Carpocratiani, for that they savoured of the heathens, Quod vultd. had and worshipped the images of Christ, of Paul, of Pythagoras, and of Homers. By these few authorities and examples it appeareth that the first erection of images came not from God, but from the heathens that knew not God. And therefore Athanasius saith: "The invention of images came not of good, but of ill." As for the Jews, that had the law and the prophets amongst them, and therefore should best know God's meaning in this behalf, they had no manner andya, image, neither painted nor graven, in their temples, as Dion saith 10; and, as amò Kakías Origen saith, they could not abide any painter or graver to dwell amongst them11. But M. Harding replieth: God commanded Moses to make the cherubins and the brasen serpent. These examples make little against my assertion. Orig. contr. For God commanded not either the cherubins or the serpent to be set up to the intent the people should worship them; which is the whole and only state of this question. The same objection the old idolaters laid sometime against Tertullian. For thus he writeth: Ait quidam:... Cur ergo Moses in eremo simulacrum serpentis ex ære fecit 12? "Some one or other, that maintaineth idolatry, will say," as M. Bar. vi. Lamprid. Epiph. Iren. Lib. i. Athanas. j Twv el δώλων εΰρεσις οὐκ θοῦ, ἀλλ ̓ γέγονε. Dion. Lib. xxxvii. Cels. Lib. iv. Tertull. de [ Cypr. Op. Oxon. 1682. De Idol. Vanit. p. 11; where primitus for primis.] ... ad errorem gentilium, qui ligna venerantur. -Ambros. Op. Par. 1686-90. In Psalm. cxviii. Expos. Serm. viii. 23. Tom. I. col. 1064.] [ Gregor. Neoc. in Ref. fals. Nom. Def. Tom. IV. in Concil. Nic. 11. Act. vi. in Concil. Stud. Labb. et Cossart. Lut. Par. 1671-2. Tom. VII. col. 457.] ... [^ ὡς εἰκὸς τῶν παλαιῶν ἀπαραφυλάκτως οἷα [ Lactant. Op. Lut. Par. 1748. Div. Instit. Lib. [El. Lamprid. in Hist. August. Script. Lat. pp. 328, 350. Heliogabalus wished to unite all religions into one; and Adrian would have had temples erected to Christ.] [8 Epiph. Op. Par. 1622. Adv. Hær. Lib. 1. Hær. xxvii. Tom. I. p. 108. August. Op. Ad Quodvultd. Lib. de Hær. 7. Tom. VIII. col. 7. Iren. Op. Par. 1710. Contr. Hær. Lib. 1. cap. xxv. 6. pp. 104, 5.] [ Athanas. Op. Par. 1698. Orat. contr. Gent. 7. Tom. I. Pars I. p. 7.] [10 οὐδ ̓ ἄγαλμα οὐδὲν ἐν αὐτοῖς ποτὲ τοῖς 'Iepoσolúμois eoxov. - Dion. Cass. Hist. Rom. Hanov. 1606. Lib. xxxvii. p. 37.] ... [11 · οὐδεὶς τῶν εἰκόνας ποιούντων ἐπολιτεύετο. οὔτε γὰρ ζωγράφος οὔτ ̓ ἀγαλματοποιὸς ἐν τῇ πολιτείᾳ αὐτῶν ἦν, ἐκβάλλοντος πάντας τοὺς τοιούτους ἀπ' αὐτῆς τοῦ νόμου. — Orig. Op. Par. 1733-59. Contr. Cels. Lib. IV. 31. Tom. I. p. 524.] [12 Tertull. Op. Lut. 1641. De Idol. 5. p. 106.] The • He seemeth dixit for Harding now saith: "And why then did Moses make the image of the brasen serpent in the wilderness?" Hereby we see that M. Harding is not the first that brasen devised this objection. The old idolaters found out and used the same above serpent. fourteen hundred years ago; and M. Harding hath learned it at their hands. But The chehereto Tertullian maketh this answer: Bene, quod idem Deus et lege vetuit simi- rubins. litudinem fieri, [et] extraordinario præcepto serpentis similitudinem *interdixit: "Well and good; one and the same God, both by his general law forbade any to use interimage to be made; and also by his extraordinary and special commandment edixit. willed an image of a serpent to be made." He addeth further: Si eundem Deum observas, habes legem ejus: Ne feceris similitudinem. Et si præceptum factæ postea similitudinis respicis, et tu imitare Mosen; ne facias adversus legem simulacrum aliquod, nisi et tibi Deus jusserit 13: "If thou be obedient unto the same God, thou hast his law: Make thou no image. But if thou have regard to the image of the serpent, that was made afterward by Moses, then do thou as Moses did: make not any image against the law, unless God command thee, as he did Moses." For God is free, and subject to no law. He commandeth us, and not himself. He giveth this general law: "Thou shalt not kill;" yet he said unto Abraham : Gen. xxii. "Take thy son Isaac, and kill him." Likewise he saith: "Thou shalt not steal;" and yet the people of Israel, by his commandment, stale away the Egyptians' Exod. xi. goods without breach of the law. The same answer may also serve for the images of the cherubins. Howbeit, the cherubins stood not in the temple in the sight and presence of the people, but within the veil in the tabernacle, into which place it was not lawful for any one of the people to cast his eyes: and therefore there was in it no danger of idolatry. But, like as when the brasen 2 Kings xviil. serpent was abused by idolatry, the godly king Ezechias took it down and brake it in pieces, notwithstanding God had commanded Moses to set it up; even so, notwithstanding it were sufferable to have images in the church of God, without breach of God's law, yet, when they be abused and made idols, as they are throughout the whole church of Rome, it is the duty of godly magistrates to pull them down, like as also it is ordered by the council of Mens 14. Concil. Mo gunt. cap. 42. Ezek. ic. In Commentar. in Ezechielem. The sign of the cross commended to men by God's providence. It were not much beside our purpose here to rehearse the place of Ezechiel the prophet, where God commanded one that was clothed in linen, and had an inkhorn by his side, to go through the midst of Hierusalem, and to print the sign of Tau, that is, the sign of the cross (for that letter had the similitude of the cross among the old Hebrew letters, as St Hierome witnesseth), in the foreheads of the men that mourned, and made moan over all the abominations of that city 15. Touching the sign, image, or figure of the cross in the time of the new testament, God seemeth, by his providence and by special warnings in sundry revelations and secret declarations of his will, to have commended the same to men, that they should have it in good regard and remembrance. When Constantine the emperor had prepared himself Eusebius, Eccle- to war against Maxentius the tyrant, casting in his mind the great dangers that might thereof ensue, and calling to God for help, as he looked up, [he] beheld (as it were in a vision) the sign of the cross appearing unto him in heaven as bright as fire; and as he was astonied with that ÉV TOÚTY Víka. strange sight, he heard a voice speaking thus unto him: "Constantine, in this overcome 16" siast. Hist. Lib. ix. cap. ix. After that Julian the emperor had forsaken the profession of christian religion, and had done sacrifice at the temples of painims, moving his subjects to do the like; as he marched forward with his army on a day, the drops of rain that fell [13 Id. ibid. p. 107; where qui lege, indixit, and si et præceptum.] [ Synod. Prov. Mogunt. cap. 42. in Crabb. Concil. Col. Agrip. 1551. Tom. III. p. 938.] [15...antiquis Hebræorum litteris, quibus usque hodie utuntur Samaritani, extrema Thav littera cru cis habet similitudinem.-Hieron. Op. Par. 1693- [16 Hist. Eccles. Par. Lib. 1x. cap. ix. fol. 101. down out of the air in a shower formed and made tokens and signs of the cross, both in his and also in the soldiers' garments1. Sozomen. Tri part. Hist. Lib. v. cap. 1. Eccles. Hist. Lib. x. in fine. Rufinus, having declared the strange and horrible plagues of God, whereby the Jews were frayed, and letted from their vain attempt of building up again the temple at Hierusalem, leave thereto of the emperor Julian in despite of the Christians obtained, in the end saith that, lest those earthquakes and terrible fires, which he speaketh of, raised by God, whereby as well the workhouses and preparations toward the building, as also great multitudes of the Jews, were thrown down, cast abroad, and destroyed, should be thought to happen by chance; the night following these plagues, the sign of the cross appeared in every one of their garments so evidently, as none, to cloke their infidelity, was able by any kind of thing to scour it out and put it away. When the temples of the painims were destroyed by Christians3 in Alexandria, about the year of our Lord Hist. Tripart. 390, in the chief temple of all, which was of the idol Serapis, the holy Lib.ix.cap. xxix. and mystical letters, called iepoyλvpixà, by God's providence were found ypaμuara graven in stones, representing the figure of the cross, the signification lepoyλupika. whereof after their interpretation was, "Life to come." Which thing espied by the Christians, and by the painims present at the spoil, served marvellously to the furtherance of the christian faith, no less than the inscription of the altar at Athens, Ignoto Deo, "Unto the unknown God," served to the same purpose Acts xvii. through St Paul's preaching. Which altogether was before wrought by God's holy providence, as Socrates, one of the writers of the ecclesiastical stories, reporteth5. Cap. xvi. Eccles. Hist. Lib. Thus it appeareth plainly, how God's providence hath commended unto true believers the sign of the cross. For which cause, and for remembrance of our redemption, it hath been in old time and always sithence much frequented and honoured. For beside that we read hereof in Tertullian, who was near the apostles' time, in Apologetico, we find in the writers of the ecclesiastical stories, that the christian people of Alexandria, after they had pulled down and taken away the arms and monuments of Serapis the idol, every man caused the sign of our Lord's cross in place of them to be painted ri. cap. xxix. and set up in their posts, entries, windows, walls, and pillars; that, wheresoever the eye was turned, it should light on the holy sign of the cross". Constantine the emperor loved and honoured this sign so much, that he caused the same to be painted in all his flags and banners of war, to be strucken in his coins and monies, to be pourtraited in his arms, scutcheons, and targets. Of this Aurelius Prudentius maketh mention: Christus purpureum gemmanti textus in auro auctore Rufino. Hist. Tripart. Lib. i. cap. ix. Lib. i. contra The sense whereof is thus11 much in English: "The chief banner, which was of purple, had the image of Christ in it wrought in gold and stones; the targets were painted all over with Christ; the cross shined fire-bright in the crests of their helmets." That the banner commonly borne before the emperor in war, in Latin called labarum 12, was of this sort, it appeareth by an epistle that St Vide Hist. Tri-13 Ambrose wrote to Theodosius the emperor 14. Neither was the figure of Lib. v. Epist. 29. the cross then only in flags and banners painted, woven, embroidered, [3 The Christians, H. A. 1564.] [1 1565, and H. A. 1564, omit the.] [5 Hist. Tripart. Lib. 1x. cap. xxix. foll. S. viii. T. See also Socrat. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Lib. v. cap. xvii. pp. 226, 7.] [6...qui crucis nos religiosos putat, &c.-Tertull. Op. Lut. 1641. Apol. 16. p. 17.] [7 Hist. Eccles. Lib. XI. cap. xxix. fol. 130.] [ Stroken, 1565, and H. A. 1564.] part. Lib. i. cap. v. [9 Hist. Tripart. Lib. 1. cap. ix. foll. A. viii. B. See also Sozom. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Lib. I. cap. viii. p. 336.] [10 Aur. Prud. Op. Hanov. 1613. Contr. Symm. Lib. I. vv. 488-90. p. 275.] ["This, H. A. 1564.] The or otherwise wrought, in gold or precious stones; but also made in whole gold, and set upon a long staff or pole, and borne before men, (202) (as the manner is now in Cross. processions), as it seemeth plainly by these verses of Prudentius: Agnoscas, regina, lubens mea signa necesse est; In quibus effigies crucis aut gemmata refulget, The two hundred and second untruth. For Prudentius speaketh not of procession in the church, but of march fields. "It behoveth 16 you, madam, that gladly you acknowledge mine ensigns, in which the figure of the cross is either glittering in stones, or of whole gold is borne on long ing in the staves before us." Thus1 much have I gathered out of the ancient fathers' writings concerning the sign of our Lord's cross, the sight whereof the professors of this new gospel cannot abide, to the intent the diversity of our time and of old time may appear, to the manners of which, for a perfect 18 reformation, these preachers would seem to bring the world again. THE BISHOP OF SARISBURY. Deut. xxi. The sign of the cross, I grant, among the Christians was had in great regard; and that the more, both for the public reproach and shame that by the common judgment of all the world was conceived against it, and also for that most worthy price of our redemption that was offered upon it. It is written: "Accursed be Gal. iii. all they that are hanged upon the tree." And Chrysostom saith, the infidels used commonly to upbraid the Christians with these words: Tu adoras cruci- Chrysost. in Epist. ad fixum 19? "Wilt thou worship a man that was hanged upon a cross?" They Rom. Hom. 2. thought great villany in that kind of death; for it was most odious and shameful of all others; and also they thought it great folly to think well of it. Therefore St Paul saith: Verbum crucis pereuntibus stultitia est: "The word of the cross 1 Cor. i. unto them that perish is but a folly." Again: Prædicamus Christum crucifixum, Ibid. Judæis quidem scandalum, gentibus autem stultitiam: "We preach Christ crucified, a great offence unto the Jews, and unto the heathens a great folly." Likewise St Augustine calleth the cross ipsam ignominiam, . . . quam pagani derident 20 "that very shame that the heathens laugh to scorn.” Likewise also Chrysostom: Mors Christi apud Judæos maledicta, apud gentiles abominanda21: “The death of Chrysost. de Christ among the Jews is holden accursed, among the heathens it is holden Ho abominable." : August. in Psal. exli. Laud. Paul. Therefore the faithful that believed in Christ, in all their talks, and in their whole life and conversation, used so much the more to extol and magnify the same, in reproach of the enemies of the cross of Christ, both Jews and gentiles. For that cause St Paul saith: "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is Rom. i. the power of God unto salvation ;" and, "God forbid that I should rejoice in any Gal. vi. thing, but only in the cross of Jesus Christ;" and, "I reckon myself 22 to know 1 Cor. ii. nothing, but only Jesus Christ, and the same Christ crucified upon the cross." Thus St Paul triumphed of that thing that in the world was so deeply despised: as if he would have said, This is that infirmity that hath conquered the world; this is that villany and reproach that hath led captivity away captive, that hath Eph. iv. spoiled the principalities and powers of darkness. Thus, as Theodoret recordeth, Theodor. Lib the Christians every where in their common resorts, and in the open marketplaces, published and proclaimed the victory and triumph of the cross 23; which, as Chrysostom saith, "they were not ashamed to set, as a posy, to any thing that Chrysost. in they did, and to any thing that they possessed 24" Likewise God, that the world Christus est might the more deeply think of the death of Christ, wrought oftentimes strange miracles by the same, as he did by Paul's napkins, by Elizeus' bones, and by Acts xix. Cel. ii. iii. cap. xxvii. Hom. Quod Deus. 2 Kings xiii. The Cross. Acts v. Cassiod. Lib. i. cap. ix. Ezek. ix. ix. cap. ix. Sozom. Lib. v. cap. 1. Rufin. Lib.ii. Socrat. Lib. v. cap. xvii. Sozom. Lib. vii. cap. xv. cap. xxix. Peter's shadow. Then the first christened emperor Constantinus, seeing that thing became so glorious that before had been so slanderous, to increase the estimation thereof, commanded straitly by a law, that from thenceforth no offender should suffer upon a cross1. These things had in remembrance, we grant all that M. Harding hath here alleged: the vision of Ezechiel, and the marking of the men's foreheads with the Hebrew letter Tau; the sight of a cross Euseb. Lib. offered unto Constantinus in the air2; the staining of crosses in the soldiers' coats in the time of the renegade emperor Julian3; the printing or burning of the crosses in the apparel of the Jews at Hierusalem; the finding of the holy hieroglyphical letter bearing the form of the cross in the temple of Serapis in Egypt5; and, to conclude, we grant that the people, being newly brought to the knowledge of the gospel, after they had pulled down the scutcheons of the idol Serapis, and other like monuments of idolatry, in the place thereof straightway set up the Rufin. Lib. ii. cross of Christ in token of conquest, in their entries, in their walls, in their Cassiod. Lib. windows, in their posts, in their pillars, briefly, in their flags, banners, arms, i. cap. ix. scutcheons, targets, and coins7. All these things, I say, we yield unto M. Harding without exception. Even so christian princes this day use the same cross in their arms and banners, both in peace and in war, of divers forms and sundry colours, as in token they fight under the banner of Christ. Labarum among the old Romans was the imperial standard of arms, richly wrought in gold and beset with stone, carried only before the general of the field, and therefore reverenced of the soldiers above all other3. Sozomenus, as a Greek writer, and therefore not able to guess rightly of the Latin tongue, seemeth to call it laborum; for thus he Sozom. Lib. writeth: θάτερον ... τῶν σκήπτρων, ὃ Λάβωρον Ῥωμαῖοι καλοῦσι: “ The one of the standards which the Romans call laborum:" unless there be an error in the Greek. Notwithstanding, it may be thought the emperor Severus had some respect unto the same, when he gave this watchword unto his soldiers: Laboremus 10: "Let us labour." Likewise St Gregory writeth: Christum belli socium habuisti, cujus labarum insigne gestasti, ipsam dico vivificatricem crucem11. This standard the christian emperor Constantinus so blazed with the cross, as others before him had done with minotaurus or with aquila. And, notwithstanding Eusebius say, "Constantinus used this cross as a preservation of his safety12;" yet stant. Orat. 1. doubtless his affiance was only in Christ, and not in the material cross. For TOUTO... Nicephorus saith, Constantius 13 caused these words to be graven in the cross: αμυντηρίῳ dia Tavros 'Inσoûs Xpiσròs vikậ: Jesus Christus vincit11: "Jesus Christ conquereth,” and not the ἐχρῆτο. cross. Otherwise St Ambrose writeth thus: "Helena the empress, by whose means the cross was found out," Invenit... titulum: regem adoravit, non lignum Ambros. in utique; quia hic gentilis est error, et vanitas impiorum 15: "She found out the Theod. title; but she worshipped Christ the King, and not the wood; for that is an heathenish error, and the vanity of the wicked.” Tertull. in ix. cap. iv. El. Spart. Gregor, ad Concil. Nic. Euseb.şin Vit. Con Niceph. Lib. xxxii. 4 Last of all, whereas M. Harding saith, the professors of this new gospel cannot abide the sign of our Lord's cross; let him understand, it is not the cross of Christ, nor the sign thereof, that we find fault withal, but the superstitious ['Hist. Tripart. Par. Lib. I. cap. ix. fol. A. viii. 2. See also Sozom. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Amst. 1695-1700. Lib. 1. cap. viii. p. 336.] [2 Hist. Eccles. Par. Lib. Ix. cap. ix. fol. 101. See before, page 647, note 16.] [3 Hist. Tripart. Lib. v. cap. 1. fol. K. viii. 2. See before, page 648, note 1.] [ Hist. Eccles. Lib. x. capp. xxxviii, xxxix. fol. 119.] [ Socrat. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Lib. v. cap. [ Hist. Eccles. Lib. XI. cap. xxix. fol. 130.] [8 Diximus originem deorum vestrorum a plastis Apol. 16. p. 17. See also before, page 648, note 6.] [Sozom. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Lib. IX. cap. iv. p. 651.] [10 El. Spart. in Hist. August. Script. Hanov. 1611. Sever. p. 302.] [1] ...ἡγεῖσθαι προστάξας ἐν τῇ παρεμβολῇ τῆς Χριστοῦ βασιλείας τὸ ἔνδοξον ὄντως καὶ ἐπίσημον λάβαρον, τὸν ζωοποιὸν λέγω σταυρόν. Gregor. ad German. Epist. in Concil. Nic. 11. Act. Iv. in Concil. Stud. Labb. et Cossart. Lut. Par. 1671-2. Tom. VII. col. 284. See also in Crabb. Concil. Col. Agrip. 1551. Tom. II. p. 526.] [12 Euseb. De Vit. Constant. in Hist. Eccles. Script. Lib. I. cap. xxxi. p. 347.] [13 Constantinus, 1565, 1609.] [14 Niceph. Call. Hist. Eccles. Lut. Par. 1630. Lib. VIII. cap. xxxii. Tom. I. p. 601.] [15 Ambros. Op. Par. 1686-90. De Ob. Theodos. Orat. 46. Tom. II. col. 1211.] |