ANTICIPATORY USE OF THE CROSS.
(Vol. vii., pp. 548. 629.)
I think The Writer of "Communications with the Unseen World" would have some difficulty in referring to the works on which he based the statement that "it was a tradition in Mexico that when that form (the cross) should be victorious, the old religion should disappear, and that a similar tradition attached to it at Alexandria." He doubtless made the statement from memory, and unintentionally confounded two distinct facts, viz. that the Mexicans worshipped the cross, and had prophetic intimations of the downfall of their nation and religion by the oppression of bearded strangers from the East. The quotation by Mr. Peacock at p. 549., quoted also in Purchas' Pilgrims, vol. v., proves, as do other authorities, that the cross was worshipped in Mexico prior to the Spanish invasion, and therefore it was impossible that the belief mentioned by The Writer, &c. could have prevailed.
On the first discovery of Yucatan,—
"Grijaha was astonished at the sight of large crosses, evidently objects of worship."—Prescott's Mexico, vol. i. p. 203.
Mr. Stephens, in his Central America, vol. ii., gives a representation of one of these crosses. The cross on the Temple of Serapis, mentioned in Socrates' Ecc. Hist., was undoubtedly the well-known Crux ansata, the symbol of life. It was as the latter that the heathens appealed to it, and the Christians explained it to them as fulfilled in the Death of Christ.
Mr. Peacock asks for other instances: I subjoin some.
In India.—The great pagoda at Benares is built in the form of a cross. (Maurice's Ind. Ant., vol. iii. p. 31., City, Tavernier.)
On a Buddhist temple of cyclopean structure at Mundore (Tod's Rajasthan, vol. i. p. 727.), the cross appears as a sacred figure, together with the double triangle, another emblem of very wide distribution, occurring on ancient British coins (Camden's Britannica), Central American buildings (Norman's Travels in Yucatan), among the Jews as the Shield of David (Brucker's History of Philosophy), and a well-known masonic symbol frequently introduced into Gothic ecclesiastical edifices.
In Palestine.—
"According to R. Solomon Jarchi, the Talmud, and Maimonides, when the priest sprinkled the blood of the victim on the consecrated cakes and hallowed utensils, he was always careful to do it in the form of a cross. The same symbol was used when the kings and high priests were anointed."—Faber's Horæ Mosaicæ, vol. ii. p. 188.
See farther hereon, Deane on Serpent Worship.
In Persia.—The trefoil on which the sacrifices were placed was probably held sacred from its cruciform character. The cross (
In Britain.—The cross was formed by baring a tree to a stump, and inserting another crosswise on the top; on the three arms thus formed were inscribed the names of the three principal, or triad of gods, Hesus, Belenus, and Taranis. The stone avenues of the temple at Classerniss are arranged in the form of a cross. (Borlase's Antiquities of Cornwall.)
In Scandinavia.—The hammer of Thor was in the form of the cross; see in Herbert's Select Icelandic Poetry, p. 11., and Laing's Kings of Norway, vol. i. pp. 224. 330., a curious anecdote of King Hacon, who, having been converted to Christianity, made the sign of the cross when he drank, but persuaded his irritated Pagan followers that it was the sign of Thor's hammer.
The figure of Thor's hammer was held in the utmost reverence by his followers, who were called the children of Thor, who in the last day would save themselves by his mighty hammer. The fiery cross, so well known by Scott's vivid description, was originally the hammer of Thor, which in early Pagan, as in later Christian times, was used as a summons to convene the people either to council or to war. (Herbert's Select Icelandic Poetry, p. 11.)
Eden Warwick.
Birmingham.