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Remarkable indeed, in our days, is the fortune of this oft-repeated apology. Every one has heard of the "Theory of Development." We do not refer to those latest follies of vagrant mind in the department of physical inquiry, the dreams of planetary creations, still in course, from nebulous matter; or of organic natures once kindled into life by electricity, and gradually ascending to higher and more exquisite forms. Lord Rosse's telescope has well served as the instrument of vindicating astronomical truth; and science points to the confutation of other rhapsodies, as found in complex organizations which are undoubtedly prior to many that are simpler, -for instance, in the oldest fossil fish that geology knows; and in the burning mineral, which is unanimously considered a vegetable mass, "the first and most ancient Flora." As this subject is introduced, we will have the pleasure of citing the judgment of an able contemporary, that this truly infidel speculation is one "which has not a single fact in its favour; which stands in direct opposition to all the analogies of nature; which is repugnant to the best feelings of mankind, and subversive of all their most cherished convictions ;" and of which the maintenance is " a fraud committed upon the reason, and an insult cast on the dignity, of our species." But our point, from which we have been diverted, is an alleged "development" of theological truth. Attention has been called to the silence of the New Testament, a silence rendered the more significant by many an occasion fitted to elicit utterance,—on the questions magnified in mediæval divinity. Tractarians have been pressed by Continental researches in the history of doctrines. Primitive Christianity knows not their system. The unhappy man who was their leader, and who has at length sought in the “infallible" Church a port after stormy seas, comes to the rescue. His theory has astounded a land not yet quite infatuated or un-Protestantized; and against it our higher periodical literature has contended with remarkable unanimity, and force absolutely crushing. For an exhibition of "catholic consent," Mr. Newman directs you to the principal Divines of the fourth and fifth centuries. The perfect "development" is later still. Christianity was advancing to full manifestation, while the nations were degenerating into barbarism! The earlier Fathers, as well as the sacred writers, are to be improved-upon. The religion of Apostles is susceptible of great advancement. At least, their writings,-profoundly silent, nevertheless, as to the future unfolding of new mysteries,-need to be supplemented from oral tradition. Additions, which the theorist calls "preservative," are to be made to the OBJECTIVE TRUTH; and for the examination of these he offers seven tests. Ingenuity so misguided,-cultivated mind intent, with bewildering toil, to throw the hue of probability on a scheme utterly erroneous and perilous, is a melancholy spectacle.

Hæc germanus Eryx quondam tuus arma gerebat:
Sanguine cernis adhuc sparsoque infecta cerebro.

The attempt confesses that THE CHRISTIANITY OF TRACTARIANS AND ROMANISTS IS NOT THE CHRISTIANITY OF INSPIRED MEN AND PRIMITIVE CHURCHES. A statement like this needs no expansion. Let the world hear the single trumpet-note, and take warning.

In full concord with this acknowledgment, are the particulars of information supplied in Dr. Maitland's deeply-interesting work. Its precise value, in relation to ecclesiastical questions, arises from evidence adduced of the low date of Romish superstitions. If the silence of pagan foes is justly alleged against the early existence of Mariolatry and other corruptions, Dr.

Maitland pleads yet more forcibly the silence of Christians in their monumental records. Of the church existing in Rome, during the first four centuries, he draws his description from the remains belonging to the catacombs, including the contents of the Lapidarian Gallery of the Vatican, and other unpublished collections. The materials were obtained during a two years' residence in Rome; and the work is illustrated with numerous engravings.

The subterranean galleries which penetrate the soil surrounding the city of Rome, after having for four centuries served as a refuge and a sanctuary to the ancient Church, were nearly lost sight of during the disorder occasioned by barbarian invasions. As the knowledge of their windings could be preserved only by constant use, the principal entrances alone remained accessible; and even these were gradually neglected and blocked up by rubbish, with the exception of two or three, which were still resorted to, and decorated afresh from time to time. In the sixteenth century, the whole range of catacombs was re-opened, and the entire contents, which had remained absolutely untouched during more than a thousand years, were restored to the world at a time when the recent revival of letters enabled the learned to profit by the discovery. From that time to the present, Romanist writers have been suffered to claim identity in discipline and doctrine with the church

that occupied the catacombs; while an attempt has scarcely been made to show from these remains the more striking resemblance existing between our Reformed Church and that of primitive Rome.

It is difficult now to realize the impression which must have been made upon the first explorers of this subterranean city. A vast Necropolis, rich in the bones of saints and martyrs; a stupendous testimony to the truth of Christian history, and, consequently, to that of Christianity itself; a faithful record of the trials of a persecuted Church ;such were the objects presented to their view; and so great was the enthusiasm with which they devoted themselves to the research, that two of the earliest writers on the Catacombs of Rome, Bosio and Boldetti, occupied thirty years each in collecting materials for their respective works, which in both instances remained to be edited by their survivors. (Pages 1, 2.)

In the fourth century, Jerome and his youthful companions were accustomed "to visit on Sundays the sepulchres of the Apostles and martyrs; and often to go down into the crypts dug in the heart of the earth, where the walls on either side were lined with the dead." After long oblivion, a diligent examination of these recesses was undertaken at the close of the sixteenth century. Epitaphs were published, and antiquarian information spread; but, meanwhile, the subterranean galleries were robbed for the adorning of museums.

It is steadfastly maintained by all modern writers, that the Christian cemeteries are free from all admixture of pagan bodies; [but] it is allowed that the excavation of the catacombs was not begun by the Christians, but that they appropriated to their own use the subterranean galleries, originally dug to provide the materials for building Rome. The complete occupation of them by Christian sepulchres, the absence of pagan monuments, and the entire concurrence of all the contemporary writers on

the subject, speak so decisively in favour of their exclusively Christian character, that it is difficult to imagine how any further evidence could be adduced concerning a question never agitated till the seventeenth century. The testimony of Prudentius, a writer of the fourth century, is of great weight: he alludes to the catacombs continually, without seeming to conceive the possibility of their having been defiled by a single pagan

corpse.

(Pages 6, 7.)

That Christians and Pagans buried apart, there is reason of every kind to believe. To this last office both parties attached great importance; and if, for the sake of a little illustration, we leave Dr. Maitland at this point, the pathetic interest of the general question will be our apology. The senti

ment which prevailed in Greece and Italy is well known. It is sufficient to allude to the fable which described the souls of the unburied, excluded from the Elysian Fields, and wandering in joyless uncertainty; to the law, of most humane intention, which required the passenger to cast earth on a dead body casually seen; to the erection of cenotaphs for those whose relics could not be found; to the claim of the dead, as admitted in the very significant phraseology that was current in the classical nations; and to the success of many an appeal to drooping patriotism, by the monuments of their ancestors. Christianity hallowed the feeling. The ancient churches were willing to expend wealth, and to brave fearful danger, in burying the dust of saints and confessors. It was the solemn, the precious ruin of a temple which had been inhabited by the Holy Ghost, and which was destined to be restored by Him in beauty incorruptible. Earth, to which the loan was confided, is well accounted by good Bishop Hall God's "cabinet or shrine, wherein " He pleases "to lay up the precious relics of" His "dear saints, until the jubilee of glory."

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INTERMENT best agrees with the terms of the divine decree. This method, which is doubtless primitive, has been followed by Jews and Christians. BURNING prevailed in some ancient communities; but not to any great extent among the Easterns. In Persia it was thought impious to consume the dead in the element that was adored. Both modes were practised by the celebrated nations of the West; the one gradually superseding the other. Burning, which had been almost universal under the Roman empire, yielded to the earlier custom as Christianity prevailed. Cemeteries adjoining places of public worship seem peculiar to our holy religion. The contact of the dead has been commonly thought to defile. Places of Jewish burial (at least, of all but regal) were "without the gate." So, in historical times, with most of the Greeks; so with the Romans,-allowing the exceptions of Emperors and vestal virgins; and so with the early Christians, who willingly observed the Roman law. Subsequently chapels or oratories were built over the graves of martyrs; or the inurned ashes of these faithful men were removed to the city-churches. According to Bingham, (Antiq., xxiii., 1,) the ancient Christians "often met in times of persecution to celebrate divine service at the graves and monuments of their martyrs." Hence the interchange, in their language, of the terms signifying burial-place and church. A step was thus taken toward interring near their ordinary sanctuaries. The reader is probably aware that Constantine was the first buried in the atrium or church-porch. Churchyards appeared in the sixth century, and became general in the ninth or tenth. Meanwhile Bishops and other eminent persons were allowed to rest within the sacred walls.

To return :-For information in regard to the catacombs, the treasures of the Vatican must be searched.

First, there is the Christian Museum properly so called, containing a number of sarcophagi, bas-reliefs, inscriptions, and medals, most of them published in the works of Roman antiquarians........ Besides this, at the entrance to the Vatican Museum is a long corridor, the sides of which are completely lined with inscriptions plastered into the wall. On the right hand are arranged the epitaphs of Pagans, votive tablets, dedications of

altars, fragments of edicts and public documents, collected from the neighbourhood of the city; and opposite to them, classed under the heads of Greek, Latin, and Consular monuments, appear the inscriptions of the ancient Christians. These have been collected indiscriminately from the catacombs round Rome, and have hitherto remained unpublished. To this gallery, from the circumstance of its containing little more than sepul

chral stones, the name of Lapidarian, or delle Lapidi, has been given. The inscriptions, amounting to more than three

thousand, were arranged in their present order by Gaetano Marini.

(Pages 7, 8)

For us Dr. Maitland's investigation is full of interest. Its charm is not artistical, indeed; nor is it classical, though the vernacular language of Rome may receive some little illustration. The attraction is deeper and holier. More impressive than even the wayside from the Piræus to Athens, though crowded in many parts with memorials of the noble dead, is the corridor of the Vatican; and many a simple record there, of rudest sculpture, wakes higher associations than the famous couplet inscribed on a monument dear to bravery :

Ω ξεῖν, ἀγγέλλειν Λακεδαιμονίοις ὅτι τῇδε

Κείμεθα, τοῖς κείνων ρήμασι πειθόμενοι.*

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These monuments " express the feelings of a body of Christians, whose leaders alone are known to us in history. The Fathers of the church live in their voluminous works; the lower orders are only represented by these simple records, from which, with scarcely an exception, sorrow and complaint are banished; the boast of suffering, or an appeal to the revengeful passions, is nowhere to be found. One expresses faith, another hope, a third charity. The genius of primitive Christianity, To believe, to love, and to suffer,' has never been better illustrated. These sermons in stones' are addressed to the heart, and not to the head-to the feelings rather than to the taste; and possess additional value from being the work of the purest and most influential portion of the catholic and apostolic church' then in existence." We wonder not to find M. Raoul Rochette lingering for many entire days in such a scene,-a sanctuary of antiquity, where the sacred and profane stand facing each other, in the written monuments preserved to us, as in the days when Paganism and Christianity, striving with all their powers, were engaged in mortal conflict."

66

..It would appear that the better class of Christians, especially those of the third and fourth centuries, were more in the habit of adding dates to their epitaphs, than those of lower condition, or an earlier period.

On the walls thus loaded with inscriptions belonging to professors of the rival religions, we may trace a contrast between the state of pagan and that of Christian society in the ancient metropolis. The funereal lamentation, expressed in neatly-engraved hexameters, the tersely worded sentiments of Stoicism, and the proud titles of Roman citizenship, attest the security and resources of the old religion. Further on, the whole heaven of Paganism is glorified by innumerable altars, where the epithets, unconquered, greatest, and best, are lavished upon the worthless shadows that peopled Olympus. Here and there are traces of complicated political orders; tablets containing the

names of individuals composing a legion or cohort; legal documents relating to property, and whatever belongs to a state, such as the Roman empire in its best times is known to have been. The first glance at the opposite wall is enough to show, that, as St. Paul himself expressed it, "not many mighty, not many noble," were numbered among those whose epitaphs are there displayed............... .An incoherent sentence, or a straggling misspelt scrawl,......inscribed upon a rough slab destined to close a niche in caverns where daylight could never penetrate, tells of a persecuted, or at least, oppressed community. There is also a simplicity in many of these slight records not without its charm; as in the annexed,

BIRGINIVS PARVM STETIT AP. N. "Virginius remained but a short time with us.

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* "Go, traveller, and tell at Lacedæmon, that we lie buried here for obeying her Jaws."-Herod., vii., 228,

The slabs of stone used for closing Christian graves average from one to three feet in length. In this they differ remarkably from the sepulchral tablets of the Pagans, who, being accustomed to burn their dead, required a much smaller covering for the cinerary urn. The letters on Christian monuments are from half an inch to four inches in height, and coloured in the incision with a pigment resembling Venetian red...

The custom of cutting in the stone is alluded to by Prudentius in his hymn in honour of the eighteen martyrs of Sara

gossa; in which he calls upon his fellow-
Christians to wash, with pious tears, the
marble tablets erected to them.

Nos pio fletu, date, perluamus
Marmorum sulcos

The orthography of these epitaphs is generally faulty, the letters irregular, and the sense not always obvious. These characteristics the author has been anxious to preserve, and has therefore spared no pains in executing copies in exact fac-simile, though much reduced in size. (Pages 9-12.)

Many of our readers are aware that the pagan Romans were accustomed richly to adorn the sepulchres of their dead; and that the Antonines found it meet to restrain this extravagance by law. It is in beautiful agreement with the simplicity of holy living, that the Christians were content with the briefest memorial. They aimed not, in early ages, at the mausoleum, -which might seem to mock the "heap of dust" which it encumbers. Humbly hoping for immortality itself, they willingly resigned its shadow; and for their deserted clay they welcomed a resting-place, quiet and sheltered as the cave of Machpelah. Their works were their sufficient monument; and surviving love was pleased with the simplest index to their graves. It deserves remark, that, unlike the Pagans, whose designations were numerous, the Christians in general confined themselves in their inscriptions to the name which had been received in baptism.

The Christian archeologist seeks for the simple remains of a persecuted church. When these are overlaid by decorations, bestowed by the superstition of later times, the charm is dissolved. Dr. Maitland is aware of the need of caution in deciding, from these sources, as to points of doctrine : but he premises generally, "that in the inscriptions contained in the Lapidarian Gallery, selected and arranged under Papal superintendence, there are no prayers for the dead (unless the forms, 'May you live,'' May God refresh you,' be so construed); no addresses to the Virgin Mary, nor to the Apostles or earlier saints; and, with the exception of eternal sleep,' 'eternal home,' &c., no expressions contrary to the plain sense of Scripture. And if the bones of the martyrs were more honoured, and the privilege of being interred near them more valued, than the simplicity of our religion would warrant, there is, in this outbreak of enthusiastic feeling towards the heroic defenders of the faith, no precedent for the adoration paid to them by a corrupt age." In the sepulchral tablet he finds a more favourable representation of the ancient church, than in the pages of historians or the rebukes of Bishops. And delightful it is to feel solemn kindred with the sainted of earlier days, whose precious memorials here meet the eye,"In peace," ," "In peace and in Christ," " In Christ the First and the Last,” *"Servant of God," "Friend of all men," ""Enemy to none," "Handmaid

of God."

Besides the gentle and amiable spirit everywhere breathed, the distinctive character of these remains is essentially

Christian: the name of Christ is repeated in an endless variety of forms, and the actions of His life are figured in

* Dr. Maitland elsewhere infers, from the continual use of the language, "In Christ the Alpha and Omega," the general reception of the Apocalypse in the ancient church.

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