The Non-Christian Cross Part 4

But the author of _De Mortibus Persecutorem_, a work said to have been written during the reign of Constantine, and attributed to Lactantius, refers to the alleged vision as follows:--

"Constantine was admonished in his sleep to mark the celestial sign of G.o.d on the s.h.i.+elds, and thus engage in battle. He did as he was commanded, and marked the name of the Christ on the s.h.i.+elds by the letter X drawn across them with the top circ.u.mflexed. Armed with this sign his troops--"[36]

and the differences between these two accounts are greater than would at first sight appear.

Let us however return to the story of the Bishop of Caesarea, who tells us that the morning after the Christ appeared to Constantine, the Emperor told this second marvel to his friends, and, sending for the workers in gold and precious stones who are a.s.sumed to have accompanied the Gaulish army, directed them to overlay with gold a long spear

"On the top of the whole of which was fixed a wreath of gold and precious stones, and within this the symbol of the Saviour's name, two letters indicating the name of the Christ by means of its initial characters, the letter P being intersected with the letter X in its centre."[37]

Several questions naturally arise at this point of our enquiry, and it is not easy--nay, it is impossible--for us Christians to honestly dispose of all of them and yet retain our cherished opinions upon this matter. Only one such question need be stated, and it is this: Is it likely that the Infinite Ruler of the universe, either at mid-day or at mid-night, went out of his way to induce a Sun-G.o.d wors.h.i.+pper who would not enter the Christian Church till a quarter of a century later and ere then was to become a murderer of innocent persons like the boy-Caesar Licinius, to adopt a symbol which he warranted would enable Constantine to lead on the Gauls to victory?

Pursuing the narrative of Eusebius we find that he, alluding to the symbol which he describes as a monogram but calls a cross, states that, setting this "victorious trophy and salutary symbol" in front of his soldiers, Constantine continued his march against Maxentius; and, with his forces thus "divinely aided," overthrew the Emperor just outside the Imperial City, entered Rome in triumph, and thanked G.o.d that He had enabled him to defeat and slay its ruler and a.s.sume the purple in that ruler's stead.[38]

Eusebius then tells us that Constantine, who did not dispose of all his rivals and become sole emperor till some twelve years later, as victor in the fight with Maxentius and master of Rome though not as yet of the whole empire, at once

"By loud proclamation and monumental inscriptions made known to all men the salutary symbol, setting up this great trophy of victory over his enemies, and expressly causing it to be engraven in indelible characters that the salutary symbol was the safeguard of the Roman Government and entire people. Accordingly he immediately ordered a lofty spear in the figure of a cross to be placed beneath the hand of a statue representing himself in the most frequented part of Rome, and the following inscription engraven on it in the Latin tongue:--'By virtue of this salutary sign which is the true test of valour, I have preserved and liberated your city from the yoke of tyranny, and I have also set at liberty the Roman Senate and People, and have restored to them their ancient distinction and splendour.'"[39]

Now, as we have already seen, what Eusebius referred to as the "cross"

observed above the mid-day sun (and accompanied by a miraculous inscription in, presumably, to agree with the monogram, the Greek language; which was, well, "Greek" to the Gaulish soldiers) was the so-called Monogram of Christ {image "monogram1.gif"} or {image "monogram3.gif"} or {image "monogram2.gif"} or {image "monogram4.gif"}.

That, too, was what Eusebius tells us the Christ afterwards told the Gaulish leader Constantine to model his military standard after. That, therefore, was the "salutary symbol" and "trophy of victory" referred to in the above pa.s.sage from the same authority.

It is therefore clear that this "lofty spear in the figure of a cross"

which Eusebius tells us was placed under the hand of the statue of Constantine in the central place of honour in Rome, was referred to by Eusebius as a "cross" because it was shaped like or in some way connected with some form or other of the so-called Monogram of Christ.

And such a conclusion is borne out by the fact that spears with cross-bars had been in use among both Gauls and Romans for centuries, whereas this one is referred to as something out of the common.

It should also be noted that it was as a victorious military standard, and not as either a monogram of the Christ or a representation of the _stauros_ upon which Jesus was executed, that Constantine caused this {image "solarwheel1.gif"} or {image "asterisk.gif"}, or {image "monogram1.gif"} or {image "monogram3.gif"}, or {image "monogram2.gif"} or {image "monogram4.gif"} (all which variations occur upon the coins of Constantine and his successors), to become a symbol of the Roman Empire.

Further on in his history of the Emperor, Eusebius tells us that whenever Constantine saw his troops hard pressed, he gave orders that the "salutary trophy" should be moved in that direction, and that victory always resulted.

The Bishop of Caesarea then goes on to relate that Constantine selected fifty men of his bodyguard, the most distinguished for piety, valour, and strength, whose sole duty it was to defend this famous standard; and that, of the elect fifty, those who fled were always slain, and those who stood their ground were always miraculously preserved.[40]

One would imagine from all this that there was only one labarum. Many different kinds are, however, represented upon the coins of Constantine; as also almost every variety of ordinary cross, except, perhaps, such as might conceivably have been a representation of an instrument of execution, like that which has since come into vogue among us.

Eusebius also tells us that Constantine caused to be erected in front of his palace a lofty tablet, on which was painted a representation of himself with the "salutary sign" over his head and a dragon or serpent under his feet.[41]

He also informs us that inside the palace and in the princ.i.p.al apartment, on a vast tablet in the ceiling, Constantine caused "the symbol of our Saviour's pa.s.sion to be fixed, composed of a variety of precious stones inwrought with gold."[42]

Which of all the "salutary" signs that appear upon the coins of Constantine these particular crosses were, we do not know; but it is, at any rate, obviously unlikely that a wors.h.i.+pper of Apollo who refused to enter the Christian Church till he was dying, and on his coins always attributed his victories to the Sun-G.o.d, elevated either as a representation of an instrument of execution.

As to the alleged finding at Jerusalem, by Helena the mother of Constantine, of three stakes with transverse bars attached, all of which were ancient instruments of execution and one of which was shown by the occurrence of a miracle to have been a cross to which Jesus was affixed three centuries before, it is clear that this is a fairy tale.

The story cannot be traced further back than to St. Cyril of Jerusalem about A.C. 350; and Eusebius, who gives an account of Helena's visit to Jerusalem, does not mention any such occurrence as that in question; a sure sign that it was an invention of later date.

The Christian Church, however, in a weak moment vouched for the truth of this ridiculous story; and while what was suffered to remain in Jerusalem of the true cross became the treasure of that city and a trophy captured by its foes but afterwards secured from them and once more placed in its holiest shrine, what was broken up into relics for the faithful throughout Christendom multiplied into a thousand fragments; one of which forms the centre of the Vatican Cross, and such few others of which as survive would not if examined, 'tis said, even prove to be all of the same kind of wood, or even limited to the two kinds for the presence of which a supposed cross-bar of another kind of timber might be held accountable.

The same Christian Bishop to whom this fairy tale can be traced, in a letter to one of the Emperors that succeeded Constantine declared that on the seventh of May A.C. 351 he and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem saw a brilliant cross in the heavens, stretching from Mount Golgotha to the Mount of Olives, and _s.h.i.+ning like the Sun for several hours_.[43]

And this marvellous vision is vouched for by St. Jerome, Socrates, Matins, and the Alexandrine Chronicle, as well as by St. Cyril; and is still kept in memory by the Greek Church, a solemn festival being held upon anniversaries of the day in question. But which particular "salutary sign" thus shone in the sky like the Sun for hours, is uncertain.

These painfully obvious inventions cannot but incline broad-minded Christians to the belief that our Church went to great lengths in order to induce people to believe that the cross was essentially a _Christian_ symbol; which tends to show that there was a danger of their thinking otherwise.

It is also clear from the evidence already quoted concerning the adoption by Christians in the fourth century of a symbol they denounced in the third, that whether Jesus was executed upon a cross-shaped instrument or not, that was not the chief reason why the phallic symbol of Life became recognised as the symbol of the Christ.

The striking fact that though, as will be shown, the cross of four equal arms (a cross which, as we have seen, preceded the Latin cross as a Christian symbol, and one form of which is still the favourite symbol of the Greek Church; while even in the other two great divisions of Christendom its numerous variations, wheel-like and otherwise, as a whole dispute the supremacy with the Latin cross) occurs many times upon the coins of Constantine, yet it was the so-called Monogram of Christ or adapted solar wheel of the Gauls which the Christians of the fourth century were most careful to claim as a Christian symbol, should also be noted. For though the cross of four equal arms was also put by Constantine upon his coins as a solar symbol, yet that, being then, as for ages previously, a symbol of the Sun-G.o.d of world-wide acceptation, and one which as we shall see had already appeared as such upon Roman coins, it was not so much a Gaulish symbol as the other; and it was evidently because that other was the symbol followed by the triumphant leader of the Gauls and his victorious army, that the Christians wished to specially identify it with the Christ.

In any case, whether the so-called Monogram of Christ was more or less forced upon Christianity when Constantine made our faith the State Religion of his empire, or whether it was adopted by Christians of their own volition, it was a politic move (than which few possible moves could have done more to secure the triumph of our faith) to accept as the symbol of the Christian Church what was at one and the same time the symbol of Constantine, of the Roman State, and of the universally adored Sun-G.o.d.

That the more generally accepted symbol of the Sun-G.o.d, the cross of four equal arms, should in time supplant the more local one, was of course only to be expected; as was the adoption of a cross with one arm longer than the others, as being the only kind which could possibly be connected with the story of Jesus as the Christ incarnate.

As to the possible objection that what has been dealt with in this chapter has been rather the origin of the Christian custom of manufacturing and venerating material representations of the sign or figure of the cross than the origin of the Christian cross itself, the answer is obvious. And the answer is that the first cross which can _justly_ be called "Christian," was the one which was the first to be considered, to use Dean Farrar's expressions, "mainly," if not "only,"

a representation of an instrument of execution; which cross was undoubtedly not a transient sign or gesture but a material representation of the cross with one arm longer than the others and was introduced after such representations of the cross of four equal arms and of the so-called Monogram of Christ had come into vogue among Christians as a consequence of the influence of Constantine.

CHAPTER VII.

THE ESTABLISHER OF THE CHURCH.

Having already shown not a little cause for believing that the adoption of the cross as our symbol is due to the fact that we Christians helped to secure the triumph of the ambitious ruler of the Gauls, and after receiving numberless smaller favours from Constantine during the years he was ruler of Rome but not as yet sole emperor eventually obtained from him the establishment of Christianity as the State Religion of the Roman Empire, adapting the victorious trophy of the Gauls and the various crosses venerated by them and other Sun-G.o.d wors.h.i.+ppers to our faith as best we could, it is desirable that we should pause to trace the career of the man we hail as the first Christian Emperor.

To do this properly we must commence by referring to Constantine's father, Constantius Chlorus; and to the favour shown to Constantius Chlorus by his patron the Emperor Diocletian.

Finding the supreme rule of the almost worldwide Roman Empire too much for one man in ill-health to undertake successfully, Diocletian in the year A.C. 286 made Maximian co-emperor. And in A.C. 292 Diocletian followed this up by conferring the inferior position and t.i.tle of Caesar upon Galerius and Constantius Chlorus.

In A.C. 305 Diocletian relinquished power altogether, forcing Maximian to abdicate with him; Galerius and Constantius Chlorus thus obtaining the coveted t.i.tle of Augustus, and sharing the supreme power.

Galerius now ranked first, however; for it was to the ruler of Illyric.u.m and not to that of Gaul that Diocletian gave the power of appointing Caesars to govern Italy and the East.

Constantius Chlorus died in Britain A.C. 306, the year after Diocletian abdicated; and Galerius, who had married a daughter of Diocletian, naturally thought that under the circ.u.mstances he ought to become sole emperor.

The legions of Gaul, however, proclaimed the son of Constantius Chlorus as Augustus in his stead; and as Constantine thus became ruler of Gaul and a power to be reckoned with, Galerius thought it best to give way so far as to grant Constantine the inferior t.i.tle of Caesar.

Soon afterwards Galerius conferred the t.i.tle of Augustus upon Severus; and a little while after that the Eternal City was lost to Galerius through the revolt of his son-in-law Maxentius, the son of Maximian.

The Senate of Rome then asked Maximian to re-a.s.sume the purple, and he and Maxentius shared the power between them, both taking the t.i.tle of Augustus.

Upon this Severus at the request of Galerius marched upon Rome. He was, however, defeated and slain.

After being more or less expelled by his son Maxentius, Maximian in the year A.C. 308 marched to Gaul and married his daughter Fausta to Constantine; at the same time conferring upon him the t.i.tle of Augustus. About this time Galerius made his friend Licinius an Augustus in the place of Severus; whereupon Maximin, the Governor of Syria and Egypt, demanded and was granted that t.i.tle also.

There were thus in the year A.C. 308 some half-a-dozen Roman Emperors instead of one; there being Constantine and Maximian in the west, Maxentius at Rome, and Galerius, Licinius, and Maximin elsewhere; not to mention Diocletian, who was content to remain in retirement.

This decided break-up of the Roman Empire was Constantine's opportunity; and he was favourably placed, for he had a warlike and faithful people under him.

Moreover by reversing so far as lay in his power as ruler of Gaul the traditional policy of Rome towards Christianity, and setting himself forward as a champion of a non-national religion which had been persecuted because it was non-national, Constantine was secure of the enthusiastic backing of all the Christians to be found in the dominions of his various rivals.

In A.C. 310 Constantine either executed his father-in-law the Emperor Maximian, or caused him to commit suicide; and the first of his five rivals was disposed of.

In A.C. 311 the Emperor Galerius died from disease, and Constantine's most formidable compet.i.tor, and one who undoubtedly had a better claim than himself to the position of sole emperor, thus opportunely made way for the ruler of Gaul.