20 PRIMITIVE PATERNITY 



in their descriptions, as if they had made an obstetrical 

 examination. In their zeal for the virginity of the 

 Saviour's mother they insisted that he was conceived 

 and born without any physical changes in the body 

 that bore him. 1 This naturally led to speculation on 

 the manner of this conception. Grave divines like 

 Saint Augustine asserted that " God spake by the 

 angel and the Virgin was impregnated through the 

 ear." 2 The hymn of Saint Bonaventura phrases it : 



Gaude Virgo, mater Christi, 



Quae per aurem concepisti, 



Gabriele nuntio. 



Painters represented the Holy Ghost as entering at 

 Mary's ear in the shape of a dove, or hovering over 

 her while a ray of light along which the babe is de- 

 scending passes from his beak to her ear. 3 Other 

 opinions, however, seem to have contended for 

 popularity with this. In the chapel of the Palazzo 

 Pubblico at Siena, for example, are benches carved 

 by Domenico di Niccolo, the backs of which are 

 inlaid with intarsia work illustrating the Nicene Creed. 

 One of them shows the Annunciation with a full- 

 formed babe descending in rays from the Father's 

 outstretched finger. The Church of the Magdalen at 

 Aix in Provence contains a picture, attributed to 



1 Lucius, Anfange, 427. The context of the passage just cited 

 from the Shih King asserts the same phenomenon of Hau Ai's 

 birth : " There was no bursting nor rending, no injury, no hurt ; 

 showing how wonderful he would be." 



2 Several passages from the Fathers are collected by Maury, Leg. 

 Pieuses, 179 note. 



8 Lecky, Rationalism, i. 232; El worthy, Evil Eye, 322. The 

 hymn was popular, whether written by the gentlest or the most 

 arrogant of mediaeval saints. 



