Daniel in the lions’ den and the three children in the fiery furnace are constantly represented in the Catacombs as types of the persecutions of the church and the fortitude under them. The phœnix or palm-bird occurs as a symbol of immortality, and was graven on the tomb of Maximus by order of St. Cecilia.[153] The peacock also signified immortality, and came to be so used from being the bird of Juno, or the supposed emblem of the apotheosis of the Roman empresses. In one fresco in the cemetery of St. Sixtus, we find SS. Peter and Paul represented as standing on either side of a crowned tower, doubtless a symbol of strength, figurative of the church. Perret also tells us that God the Father, “himself invisible, while his power is manifested by his works,” is typified “with singular aptitude by a hand coming forth from the clouds.” This is in a picture of Moses striking the rock.
A very beautiful representation of the Lamb, Jesus Christ, of later date however than the Catacombs, but not so late as to have lost their informing spirit, occurs in a mosaic that formerly decorated the apse of the basilica of St. Peter in Rome. The Lamb stands at the foot of a jewelled cross, on a rock, with four streams, one running from each of its feet, and a fifth from the foot of a chalice into which the blood of the Lamb spurts down from its wounded breast. An evident allusion to the five wounds of the Lord is here combined with the type of the Holy Eucharist (for the cup suggests the latter). The cross, as such, is rarely found in the Catacombs, but the Acts of the Martyrs mention a soldier, St. Orestes, who, while playing at throwing the disc, let fall from his garments a small cross (which, discovering his religion, procured him the glory of martyrdom), so that we may suppose that this sign of Christianity was sometimes secretly worn about the person during the early centuries. St. Augustine, St. Hilary, St. Jerome, St. Chrysostom, and our own countryman, Venerable Bede, agree in the cross being “the sign of the Son of Man” of which Jesus himself speaks in the Gospel. Tertullian quotes the vision of Ezechiel (ix. 4), and interprets thus the sign Tau: “Now, the Greek letter Tau and our own T is the very form of the cross, which he predicted would be the sign on our foreheads in the true Catholic Jerusalem.” Dr. Northcote tells us that the number 300, “being expressed in Greek by the letter Tau, came itself, even in apostolical times, to be regarded as the equivalent of the cross.” We know how St. Paul speaks of the cross, as meaning the whole Christian faith. The sign of the cross, however, was contained in or appended to the monogram ΧΡ. (the first two letters of the Greek word Christ—ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ). This was sometimes written P, while in some ancient manuscripts the Tau itself was written +, forming an exact Greek cross. Sometimes to this monogram (worn to this day as a badge by the Passionist Friars) was added the letter Ν, the initial of Νικητής, the Greek for conqueror. This is something similar to the inscription translated “In hoc signo vinces,” seen by Constantine in his vision outside the gates of Rome. It was in this shape that the inscription was afterwards put on the “Labarum” or banner of the cross, and also on many coins struck during the reign of Constantine.[154]
Not to prolong the subject of the Catacombs too indefinitely, let us end with these words of Dr. Northcote: “Nothing was likely to be more familiar to the early Christians than the symbolical and prophetical meaning of the Gospels and the Old Testament, so that the sight of these paintings on the walls of the subterranean chapels was probably as a continual homily set before them.... Indeed, it is scarcely too much to say that some of these artistic compositions might be made to take the place of a well-ordered dogmatic discourse.”
When the immediate fear of persecution was removed, the church gradually added to her alphabet of symbols. The cross became more general, at first ornamented and wreathed, jewelled and gilt, as it was by order of Constantine, then by an easy transition becoming a simple crucifix, with the image of the Redeemer plainly wrought upon it. Constantine forbade the cross to be any longer used as an instrument of torture or punishment; while the finding of the true cross and the honor paid to it soon familiarized the people with its exclusively divine associations. From Mrs. Jameson’s researches we gather that the “fashion of decorating the cross with five jewels, generally rubies, typified the five sacred wounds.”[155] We also learn from her the origin of the nimbus, or glory, so generally used after the fifth century as an attribute of holiness. At first it was borrowed from pagan sources, the “luminous nebula” of Homer—that, is the divine essence standing “a shade in its own brightness”—being, as she informs us, the first trace of it to be found in antiquity. Rays or plates of brass were sometimes fixed to the heads of imperial busts and statues in Rome, and later on it is seen round the heads of Christian emperors (Justinian in particular) who were not canonized. It strikes one as curious that Mrs. Jameson should have omitted all mention of Moses and the horns or rays of light that adorned his countenance as he came down from Mount Sinai. In the transfiguration, our Lord’s face “did shine as the sun,”[156] and the angel that sat over against the sepulchre on the morning of the resurrection had a “countenance as lightning.”[157] After the fifth century the nimbus became universal, and was adopted as a symbol of holiness. A cruciform glory was the distinctive emblem of God, and also a triangular one, which typifies the Trinity, and was often used later round the head of figures representing God the Father, and entirely surrounding the Holy Spirit, who was painted as a dove.
It would be quite impossible to go through the cycle of all the symbols now in use. They have varied very little since the days of Constantine, but they cover so vast a field that it would take a lifetime to study each one in detail.
The chief service of the church, the Mass, naturally strikes us first. Nearly every ceremony is connected with it, and is only complete when preceded or followed by it. Churches (often symbolical in their form and arrangement), vestments with their many hidden meanings, lights, incense, holy water, music, processions, group themselves as mere accessories round the sacrificial act which gives them their importance. The word Mass is supposed by some to be derived from the Hebrew Missach, a voluntary offering,[158] but the most widely received opinion is that it comes from Missa or Missio, the dismissal of the catechumens before the most solemn part, the consecration. The word itself is of very ancient use, as appears from the letters of St. Ambrose, St. Leo, and St. Gregory.[159] The Gloria Patri, which is often used in the liturgy as well as constantly in the hours of the divine office, was introduced in 325 as a protest against the Arian heresy which contended that the Son was not equal to the Father.[160] The custom of standing during the gospel signifies our readiness to defend its truths and practice its precepts. We sign our foreheads, lips, and breast in token of our resolve not to be ashamed of the cross of Christ, to profess it always in words, and to keep it for ever in our hearts. At the “Incarnatus est” in the Credo we kneel in reverence to the mystery of the God made man, and at the “Domine non sum dignus” we strike our breasts in token of penance and humiliation, as we have before done at the Confiteor. This has always been the conventional sign of sorrow, as we read of the publican in the gospels.
Of the use of lights, St. Jerome says in his letter against the heretic Vigilantius: “Throughout all the churches of the East, when the gospel is to be recited, they bring forth lights, though it be at noonday, not certainly to drive away darkness but to manifest some sign of joy, that under the type of corporal light may be indicated that light of which we read in the Psalms—‘Thy word is as a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.’”[161] Everywhere in the Old and New Testaments, light is the type of knowledge; in the parable of the virgins, it is also the symbol of fidelity. In Rome, torches were carried at weddings as a sign of honor. St. Chrysoston says that lights are carried before the dead to show that they are champions and conquerors. What more natural than that these usages should have been transferred to the Christian churches? “Within the sanctuary and in front of the altar,” says the anonymous author of the Explanation of the Sacrifice and Liturgy of the Mass, “a lamp is kept day and night, to warn us that Jesus Christ, the light of the world, is present on our altars, ... and that our lives should, by their holiness, shine like a luminary.” Candles are used in several mystical senses by the church during the ceremonies of Holy Week, as chiefly the Paschal candle. This is fraught with many meanings. Unlighted, it is an emblem of Christ in the tomb, while the five grains of incense put into it in the shape of a cross typify both the five wounds of our Blessed Lord and the spices with which his dead body was buried. Contrary to the usual custom, which requires a priest to bless any holy thing, the Paschal candle is blessed by the deacon, to denote that Christ was buried by his disciples (Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus), not by his apostles. When lighted, the candle prefigures Christ arisen. The Pavia Missal makes it signify, while unlighted, the pillar in the cloud which guided the Israelites by day through the desert, and, after being lighted, the fiery column that directed them at night. The columnar shape of the candlestick in many Italian churches is thought to refer to this part of the interpretation. The triple candle, which is lighted with new fire on Holy Saturday, signifies the Trinity, and in connection with this we are reminded of a curious ceremony in the Greek ritual, which consists in the benediction given by a bishop whenever he says Mass. He holds in each hand a candle—one triple, denoting the Trinity; and the other double, and symbolizing the union of two natures in Jesus Christ.[162] The manual of Holy Week tells us that the fifteen candles on the triangular candlestick, used during the office of Tenebræ, represent the “disciples whose fervor cooled at the approach of danger, and who dispersed here and there, wavering in faith, forgetful of their promises, and all seeking safety in flight, abandoning their Master. The candle that remains lit and is finally concealed behind the altar is a figure of Jesus Christ. He came to enlighten the world; but ungrateful, perverse men made every effort to obscure and extinguish his glory. When they fancied they had succeeded, he rose from death to an immortal life, more glorious than the former.”
The whole of the ceremonies of Holy Week are nothing but a literal “showing forth of the death of the Lord until he come”—a yearly rehearsal, as it were, of the great drama of human life and destiny, of the rejection of the elder and the adoption of the younger branch of the family of men—that is, the choice of the Gentiles after the trial of the Jews. Incense, the recognized emblem of prayer, and spoken of as such in the well-known passages of the Apocalypse,[163] also reminds us of the perfumes used in the East as a sign of honor towards kings and princes, and of the gift of the Magi to the infant Saviour. Dr. Rock says that “a venerable antiquity (522) informs us that the incense burning round the altar, whence, as from a fountain of delicious fragrance, it emits a perfume through the house of God, has ever been regarded as a type of the good odor of Jesus Christ which should exhale from the soul of every true believer.”[164] The frequent use of holy water is above all typical of purity, the great preparation of the soul for any holy action.
Salt is a preservative against corruption, and also reminds us of the miracle of Eliseus,[165] when, to make the drought cease, he asked for a vessel with water and salt. The apostles are called the “salt of the earth,” and salt is recognized as the emblem of wisdom. Oil, used in many functions, is typical of sweetness and mildness, in consideration of its natural powers of healing, and from time immemorial anointing has been considered a consecration to God.[166] Oil was also used in the old Hebrew sacrifices, together with cakes as well as salt.[167] The “Agnus Dei” perhaps requires a fuller explanation than the former symbols. It is a waxen cake stamped with the figure of a lamb. The Pope blesses a certain quantity of these cakes every seventh year of his reign. “The origin of this rite seems to have been the very ancient custom of breaking up the Paschal candle of the preceding year and distributing the fragments among the faithful. Alcuin, a disciple of the Venerable Bede, describes the blessing in these words: ‘In the Roman Church, early on the morning of Holy Saturday, the archdeacon comes into the church and pours wax in a clean vessel, and mixes it with oil; then blesses the wax, and molds it in the form of lambs; ... the lambs which the Romans make represent to us the spotless Lamb made for us; for Christ should be brought to our memories frequently by all sorts of things.’”[168] The Asperges, or sprinkling with holy water before Mass, reminds us of the sprinkling of the blood of the Paschal lamb on the door-posts of the Israelites—a ceremony which was to be performed with a bunch of hyssop.[169] It also refers to the Psalm Miserere, in which we pray to be “sprinkled with hyssop, and we shall be cleansed”—a prayer which forms part of the prescribed orisons to be repeated during the Asperges.
Of the symbolical meaning of the sacred vestments, and their colors, we will only speak briefly. The most obvious apology for them is their use as prescribed in the Old Testament, where they are made the subject of the most minute directions. Many things came to us through the Temple traditions, the Gregorian chant, for instance, which closely resembles that still used in the orthodox synagogues of our own day. It is not improbable that something of Hebrew traditions entered into the custom, early adopted by the Christians, of wearing specified and holy garments during the celebration of Mass. But the church, ever mindful of her mission of teaching, could not let such vestments be mere ornaments, however fitting and seemly. The author of the Explanation of the Mass says that “ceremonies are a kind of illustration of our sacred mysteries; they represent them to the eye, to a certain extent, as a look or a discourse do to the ear or mind, especially to the uneducated, who are always the greater number.” The vestments are a very prominent part of the externals of the Mass; their color announces at one glance whether a virgin or a martyr is being commemorated, whether we are to join in prayer for some unknown brother deceased in Christ, or to lament in a penitential spirit the sins of mankind and our own. Green, very seldom used, is the normal color for Sundays, denoting hope and joy in the promise of the new spring. There are two meanings attached to the different component parts of the holy vesture. The “amice” which covers the head (in ancient times entirely) represents the “helmet of salvation,” divine hope; the “alb,” innocence of life, because it clothes the celebrant from head to foot in spotless white; the “girdle,” with which the loins are girt, purity and chastity (also referring to the text of St. Luke, “Let your loins be girt”),[170] and possibly bearing some allusion likewise to the journey of life, and the command anciently given to the Jews at the first Pasch, “You shall gird your reins”;[171] the “maniple,” which is put on the left arm, patience under the burdens of this mortal life; the “stole,” which is worn on the neck and shoulders, the yoke of Christ; and the “chasuble,” which, as uppermost, covers all the rest, charity—according to the saying of St. Peter, that “charity covereth a multitude of sins.”[172] The author of The Following of Christ, speaking of the duties and dignity of the priesthood, thus beautifully interprets the ecclesiastical apparel: “A priest clad in his sacred vestments is Christ’s vicegerent, to pray God for himself and for all the people in a suppliant and humble manner. He has before him and behind him the sign of the cross of the Lord, that he may always remember the passion of Christ. He bears the cross before him in his vestment, that he may diligently behold the footsteps of Christ, and fervently endeavor to follow them. He is marked with the cross behind, that he may mildly suffer, for God’s sake, whatsoever adversities shall befall him from others. He wears the cross before him that he may bewail his own sins, and behind him that through compassion he may lament the sins of others, and know that he is placed, as it were, a mediator between God and the sinner.”[173]