These two chapels are the only ones which it is necessary to dwell upon here in detail. The rest of the catacomb is shown in varying order, and explained in different ways. Three points are of historic interest. 1. The roof-shaped tomb of Pope St. Melchiades, who lived long in peace and died A.D. 313. 2. The Cubiculum of Pope St. Eusebius, in the middle of which is placed an inscription, pagan on one side, on the other a restoration of the fifth century of one of the beautiful inscriptions of Pope Damasus, which is thus translated:—
"Heraclius forbade the lapsed to grieve for their sins. Eusebius taught those unhappy ones to weep for their crimes. The people were rent into parties, and with increasing fury began sedition, slaughter, fighting, discord, and strife. Straightway both (the pope and the heretic) were banished by the cruelty of the tyrant, although the pope was preserving the bonds of peace inviolate. He bore his exile with joy, looking to the Lord as his judge, and on the shore of Sicily gave up the world and his life."
At the top and bottom of the tablet is the following title:—
"Damasus Episcopus fecit Eusebio episcopo et martyri,"
and on either side a single file of letters which hands down to us the name of the sculptor who executed the Damasine inscriptions.
"Furius Dionysius Filocalus scripsit Damasis pappæ cultor atque amatot."
3. Near the exit, properly in the catacomb of Sta. Lucina, connected with that of Calixtus by a labyrinth of galleries, is the tomb of Pope St. Cornelius (251, 252) the only Roman bishop down to the time of St. Sylvester (314) who bore the name of any noble Roman family, and whose epitaph, (perhaps in consequence) is in Latin, while those of the other popes are in Greek. The tomb has no chapel of its own, but is a mere grave in a gallery, with a rectangular instead of a circular space above, as in the cubicula. Near the tomb are fragments of one of the commemorative inscriptions of St. Damasus, which has been ingeniously restored by De Rossi thus:—
"Aspice, descensu extructo tenebrisque fugatis
Corneli monumenta vides tumulumque sacratum
Hoc opus ægroti Damasi præstantia fecit,
Esset ut accessus melior, populisque paratum
Auxilium sancti, et valeas si fundere puro
Corde preces, Damasus melior consurgere posset,
Quem non lucis amor, tenuit mage cura laboris."
"Behold! a way down has been constructed, and the darkness dispelled; you see the monuments of Cornelius, and his sacred tomb. This work the zeal of Damasus has accomplished, sick as he is, in order that the approach might be better, and the aid of the saint might be made convenient for the people; and that, if you will pour forth your prayers from a pure heart, Damasus may rise up better in health, though it has not been love of life, but care for work, that has kept him (here below)."[211]
St. Cornelius was banished under Gallus to Centumcellæ—now Civita Vecchia, and was brought back thence to Rome for martyrdom Sept. 14, A.D. 252. On the same day of the month, in 258, died his friend and correspondent St. Cyprian, archbishop of Carthage,[212] who is consequently commemorated by the Church on the same day with St. Cornelius. Therefore also, on the right of the grave, are two figures of bishops with inscriptions declaring them to be St. Cornelius and St. Cyprian. Each holds the book of the Gospels in his hands and is clothed in pontifical robes, "including the pallium, which had not yet been confined as a mark of distinction to metropolitans."[213] Beneath the picture stands a pillar which held one of the vases of oil which were always kept burning before the shrines of the martyr. Beyond the tomb, at the end of the gallery, is another painting of two bishops, St. Sistus II., martyred in the catacomb of Pretextatus, and St. Optatus who was buried near him.