Another painting, representing a man inclosed in an ark and receiving the olive branch from the mouth of the dove, painted upon the walls of a chapel in the Catacombs, was intended to show that the faithful, having obtained the remission of their sins through faith in Christ and baptism, had received from the Holy Spirit the gift of divine peace, and are saved in the mystical ark of Christ from the destruction which awaits the world. And if the same picture be rudely scratched on a single tomb, it denotes the same fact and the hope of the survivors that the deceased, being a faithful servant of Christ and a member of His body, had died in the peace of God, and had now entered into His rest. The passage of the Red Sea was also represented as a figure of baptism, in accordance with the words of the Apostle Paul: "Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea." (1 Cor. x. 1, 2.) In his thirty-ninth sermon, Gregory of Nazianzen* says: "Moses truly baptized in water by causing the Israelites to pass through the sea and under the cloud. The sea represents the waters of baptism, and the cloud the Holy Spirit." Augustine,† in his three hundred and fifty-second itur: eadem dispositione spiritualis effectus, terræ, id est, carni nostræ, emergenti de lavacro post vetera delicta, columba sancti Spiritus advolat, pacem Dei afferens, emissa de coelis, ubi Ecclesia est arca figurata. Gregory of Nazianzen, also called the Theologian, from his erudition in sacred literature, was born A.D. 328, and became one of the first orators, and most accomplished and thoughtful writers of his time. His surviving works consist chiefly of about fiftythree orations, two hundred and forty-two letters, and one hundred and fifty-six poems, besides meditations, descriptions, etc. † Augustine, one of the most illustrious Fathers of the Latin Church in the fourth century. His works are comprised in eleven volumes; one of the best editions is that of the Benedictines of St. Maur. Sermon, says: "Per mare transitus baptismus erat," and then, developing this figure, he adds: "The Red Sea typifies baptism; Moses leading through the sea, Christ himself; the Israelites passing through represent the faithful; and the death of the Egyptians, the destruction of our sins." (De Pænitentia.) Prosper, an ecclesiastical writer of the fifth century (De Promiss. pars. i. c. 38), and the Venerable Bede* (Quæst. sup. Exod. xx.), make remarks of a similar character. A picture of the passage of the Red Sea was lately discovered on a sarcophagus of the Catacomb of the Vatican, a reproduction of which may be seen in Bottari.† The triumphal arch of Santa Maria Maggiore contains a celebrated mosaic on this subject. But the symbol to which the Fathers of the Church seem to have attached the greatest importance, as bearing directly upon the subjects of baptism and the Lord's Supper, was that of the Fish. In the language of the Christian writers, both in the East and the West, from the second century onwards, our Lord is spoken of as IXOTX, or "Piscis," "Piscis Noster," and the like, and that for a variety of reasons. First, the fish, blessed to the feeding of great multitudes and of His own disciples, by our Lord Himself while on earth, was regarded as a type of that heavenly food which He gave for the life of the world, Secondly, as fish was, in primitive times, very generally in use as an ordinary article of food, it served to designate the wholesome doctrine of Christ, and particularly the words of truth contained in Holy Scripture. Thus Jerome, on Bede (672-735), surnamed the Venerable on account of his learning, piety, and talents. He wrote several theological books, commentaries on the Holy Scriptures, homilies, lives of saints, and an ecclesiastical History of England. † Bottari, Sculture e Pitture sacre estratte dai Cimiteri di Roma. Jerome (331-420), one of the most learned and eloquent of the Latin Fathers. He translated or revised the Vulgate; wrote commentaries on most of the books of Scripture, controversial treatises, and lives and works of preceding ecclesiastical writers. His opinions are often exaggerated and fanciful. Matt. xiv. 17 (Op. t. iv. p. 60), and again (ibid. t. vii. p. 119), says: "In the seven loaves and the small fishes are found the types of the gospel of Christ. The seven loaves are the seven books of the Old Testament, which we call the Heptateuch, and the small fishes are the smaller books of the New Testament." Clemens Alexandrinus, in his Stromata (lib. vi.), speaks of the fishes and barley loaves, as typifying the Tроπаideíα, or preparatory teaching of the Greeks and the Jews. This practice of figuratively designating our Lord as IXOTX, or Piscis, led the Fathers naturally to speak of the waters of baptism. The earliest example of this is the well known passage in Tertullian: "We, smaller fishes, after the example of our Fish, are born in the water, and it is only by continuing in the water that we are safe.” (De Baptismo, c. 1.) Melito, Bishop of Sardis (about A.D. 160), is the earliest writer who furnishes us with an authority for the application of the term pisces to the Christians, when he says: "Fishes are the holy ones of God," Pisces sancti; for so it is written: "Traxerunt rate plenum piscibus magnis," John xxi. 11. (Clavis, xl. 2.) Elsewhere (cap. xii. n. 25), he refers to the same: "Centum quinquaginta tres omnes electi." Hilary† (In Matt.), Optatus‡ (De Schism. Donat. 1. iii. c. 2), and Augustine (Confessionum, lib. xiii. c. 23), express the same idea. The second-named writer informs us that the Greek ix@ús represents the first letters of «Ιησοῦς Χριστὸς Θεοῦ Υίος Σωτήρ,” “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour," and adds that, owing to the presence * Sed nos pisciculi secundum ixovv nostrum Jesum Christum in aqua nascimur; nec aliter quam in aqua permanendo salvi sumus. + Hilary (305-368), Bishop of Poitiers, occupies an important part in the patristic literature of the Western Church. His most valuable work is that on the Trinity; he wrote also on the Councils, against the Arians, and a commentary on the Psalms and Matthew. Optatus, Bishop of Milevi (about A.D. 370), a celebrated ecclesiastical writer. in the waters of the Fish, the basin containing the baptismal waters was called "piscina," a fishpond.* A remarkable inscription of great antiquity was discovered a few years ago, buried in the soil of an ancient cemetery in the vicinity of Autun (Augustodunum), a town in France, where many ruins of Roman temples, gates, and triumphal arches still exist. This inscription, represented in the above engraving, is of the fourth century, or The following is the passage referred to: "Hic (i.e. Christus) est piscis, qui in baptismate per invocationem fontalibus undis inseritur, ut quae aqua fuerat, à pisce etiam piscina vocitetur. Cujus piscis nomen secundum appellationem Græcam, in uno nomine per singulas litteras turbam sanctorum nominum continet IXOYE, quod est latinum Jesus Christus Dei Filius Salvator. (De Schism. Donat. lib. iii. c. 2.) perhaps of the fifth. It is a sepulchral one, in memory of a certain Pectorius, a son of Aschandeius, and seems to have been placed near the baptistery of a church, and to have been designed as an invitation, first, to receive the ordinance of baptism, and next, to partake with earnest desire and devout reverence of the Lord's Supper. This inscription is as follows: Ιχθύος ο[ὐρανίου θε]ῖον γένος, ἤτορι σεμνῷ Χ ρῆσαι λαβὼ[ν ζω]ὴν ἄμβροτον ἐν βροτέοις Εσθιε πινε [λαβ] ὼν, Ἰχθὺν ἔχων παλάμαις. and has been translated thus :- "O thou divine offspring of the Heavenly Ichthus (Christ), use with a reverent heart when thou hast received the immortal life of Divine Waters among mortals. O my friend (who hast been baptized), quicken thy soul with the ever-flowing waters of wealth-giving wisdom. Come, and receive the honey-sweet food of the Saviour of the saints. Take, eat, drink, holding Ichthus in thy hands." In the primitive Church, and down to the fourteenth century, the ordinary mode of baptism was by the immersion of the whole body in water. The original term baptizo conveys the meaning of immersion, and no other. On this point we have most valuable testimony from the Fathers of the Church, and other ecclesiastical writers. They invariably designate baptism as the act of dipping, bathing, or washing, and following the language of the Apostle Paul, who calls baptism the washing of regeneration (Titus iii. 5), use these two terms as equivalents. Thus Barnabas, a companion of Paul, in an epistle ascribed to him, says: "We go down into the water full of sins and pollutions, but come up out |