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CANON J. A. MacCULLOCH, D.D., ON 



were calmed by the same sign, and even a dog bound by a chain 

 had its bonds loosed when the sign was made over it.* 



In the Gospel of Nicodemus Christ signs Adam and all the others 

 rescued from Hades with a Cross on their foreheads, and the two 

 sons of Simeon, who narrate the story of Christ's descent, made 

 the sign on their faces (or, in the Latin version, on their tongues) 

 before beginning. 



The use of crosses of wood is also referred to in these Apo- 

 cr}^hal writings. In the History of John we learn how he wore 

 such a Cross round his neck. Occasionally he brought it out 

 and kissed it, or with it he signed the congregation, saying : 

 " I have made this Cross a bulwark for you, that Satan may not 

 come and assemble his demons, and make sleep enter into you or 

 heedlessness of mind." This Cross was found on his body at death, 

 and from it fiery tongues broke forth, when the pagan onlookers 

 would touch it, and burned their hands. t He had also a Cross 

 which he planted in the ground before him at Ephesus.f He 

 also set up a Cross and lit the lamps with it.§ The Acts of 

 Xantippe teU how she made a Cross of wood, and in the same 

 Acts the servants of the man to whom Polyxena was entrusted 

 went forth to meet the hosts who came against them, saying : 

 " Let us go forth to meet them, raising the sign of the Cross." 

 " Then raising the precious Cross they went forth, about thirty 

 men, and slew five thousand." The Coptic Legend of Bartholo- 

 mew describes how the apostle took three vines, and fastened 

 them in the form of a Cross to a tree, when they gave forth 

 valuable fruit. 



Orthodox Christians had to defend themselves against the 

 pagan taunt that they worshipped the Cross as an idol. Minucius 

 Felix expressly denies such a worship. There is little doubt, 

 however, that something very like such a worship, and certainly 

 invocation of the Cross, was practised by Gnostics, as appears 

 from passages in the Apocryphal Acts. S. Matthew is said by 

 his persecutors to have called upon Christ and to have invoked 

 His Cross, and so to have put out the fires kindled for his mar- 

 tyrdom. While this might be a pagan misunderstanding, other 

 passages show that such an invocation was a usual practice 



* Lipsius and Bonnet, ii, 2, 92 ; Lewis, p. 21. 

 t Lipsius, op. city i, 437. 

 X Lewis, p. 157. 

 § Wright, ii, 32. 



