elements[909] were sent to any who were sick, by the hands of deacons or acolytes, as is still the practice in the Greek and Armenian churches. In the Acts of St. Stephen, we read of a young martyr who chose to be beaten to death by a Roman mob, rather than disclose the sacred treasure entrusted to his care. This practice in time degenerated into the superstitious administration of the viaticum as a preparation for the soul’s journey to the spirit-world. Some of the gilt glasses, before described, are thought to have been used as patens and chalices for the celebration of the eucharist. With the increasing wealth and more gorgeous ritual of the church, gold and silver vessels, adorned with costly gems and rarest workmanship, took the place of the humbler material of the primitive ages.[910]
Another beautiful institution generally associated with the celebration of the eucharist in primitive times is that of the agape, or love-feast. In a subterranean chapel in the Catacomb of Marcellinus and Peter is an
exceedingly interesting representation of the observance of this custom, shown in the following engraving.
Fig. 134.—Ancient Agape.
Three guests, it will be perceived, sit at the semicircular table, at the ends of which preside two matrons personifying peace and love, with their names written above their heads. An attendant supplies them with food from a small table in front, on which are a cup, platters, and a lamb. The inscriptions, according to Dr. Maitland, should be expanded thus: IRENE DA CALDA[M AQVAM]—“Peace, give hot water;” and AGAPE MISCE MI [VINVM CVM AQVA]—“Love, mix me wine with water;” the allusion being to the ancient custom of tempering wine with water, hot or cold.
Numerous other representations of this devout feast at which Love and Peace preside attest its general observance. It would be a touching symbol of Christian unity to the persecuted saints, and would unite still closer hearts bound together by common dangers and
a common hope. All the distinctions of rank were then forgotten. Gathering by stealth in these subterranean crypts from the imperial palace and the lowly abode of poverty, they break bread together in the solemn presence of the dead in token of their common brotherhood in Christ. The slave of a Roman master, but the freedman of Christ, and the patrician convert, the intellectual Greek and the once bigoted Jew, together
Celebrate the feast of love,
Antedate the joys above.