65*2 
CJiatcauhriand''s Travels in Greecet Palestine^ Kc. 
to Golgotha to pray, ^vntild appear to 
be paying adoration to tt)e daughter of 
Jupiter. This is a striking proof or' tl.e 
perfect knowledge of liie sacred places 
retained by tiie church ot Jerusaiem. 
We now arrive at an epoch when the 
holy. places begin to shine witli a lustre 
no more to be effaced. Cdnsraiuine, 
having placed tlie Christian religion upon 
the throne, wrore to Jlacanns, bisiiop 
of Jerusalem, He ordered liim to cover 
the tomb of our Saviour with a magnifi¬ 
cent church. Helena, the eniperoi's 
mother, went herself to Palestine, and 
directed search to tie made for the Holy 
Sepulchre. It h.ad been buried under 
the foundation of Adrian’s editices. A 
Jew, apparent!Y a Christian, who, ac¬ 
cording to Soxoinenes, had preserved 
memorials of his foi efaihers, pointed out 
the place w here the tomb must have tieen. 
Helena had the glory to lestore to reli¬ 
gion the sacred monument, bhe likewise 
discovered three crosses, one of which is 
said to have been ‘tcognise*!, by its mi¬ 
racles, as tlie cross on which the Redeemer 
suffered. Not only w-as a tnagnificent 
church erected at the Holy Sepulchre, 
but two others were built hv Helena ; one 
over the manger of the Messiah, at Beth¬ 
lehem, and the other on the Mount of 
Olives, in memory of the ascension of 
theLord. Chapeis, oratories, and altars, 
by degrees marked all the places conse¬ 
crated by the acts of the Son of man : 
the oral traditions were committed to 
■writing, and thus secured from the 
treachery of memory. 
St. Jerome, who retired to Bethlehem 
about the year 385, has left us, in va¬ 
rious parts of his works, the most com¬ 
plete delineation of the sacred places. 
“ It would be too long,’^ says he, in one 
of his letters, “ to go throuiih all the 
ages, from the ascension of the Lord, to 
the time in which we live, to relate how 
many bishops, how many martyrs, how 
many teachers, have visited Jerusalem, 
for they would have thought themselves 
possessed of less piety and learning had 
they not adored Jesus Christ on the very 
spot where the gospel began to diffuse its 
light from the summit of the cross.” 
St. Jerome declares, in tiie same letter, 
tliat pilgrims from India, Ethiofiia, Bri¬ 
tain, and Hibernia, resorted to Jerusa¬ 
lem, and sung in their various languages 
the praises of Christ, around liis tomb. 
He savs that aims were sent fritm all parts 
to Calvary ; he mentions the principal 
places of devotion in Palestine, and adds 
that, in the city of Jerusalem alone, there 
w'ere so many sanctuaries that it was im¬ 
possible to visit them all in one day. 
This letter is addressed to Marcella, and 
IS conjectured to have been written by 
Sc. Paula and St. Lu-stochiurn, thougli it 
is ascribed in rnanubcnpts to St. Jerome. 
Could then tiie believers, who, from, the 
days of the apostles to the conclusion of 
the fourtti centurv, had frequented the 
tomb of our Saviour, — could they, I ask, 
be ignorant of tiie situation of that 
tomh ? 
The same fatlver of the church, in his 
letter to Eustocliiom, on the death of 
Panin, thus describes the stations visited 
by the pious limnau lady 
“ She pro-trated herself,** says he, 
“ before the cross, on rfu- top of Calvary ; 
at the Holy Sepulciire she embraced the 
stone which the angel rolled away, and 
kissed, with particular reverence, the 
spot w iiere the body of Christ was laid. 
She saw on Mount Sinn, the pillar where 
our Saviour was bound and scourged with 
rods; the pillar then supported the por¬ 
tal of a church. She desired to be con¬ 
ducted to the place where the disciples 
w'ere. assembled, when the Holy Ghost 
descended upon them. She then repaired 
to Bethlehem, and stopped by the way 
at Rachael’s sepulchre. She adored the 
manger of the MeS'iah, and pictured to 
lierseif the wise men and the shepherds 
as still present there. At Bethphage 
she found the monument of Lazarus, and 
the habitation of Martha and Mary. At 
Sichar she admired a church erected over 
Jacob’s well, where Christ conversed with 
the Samaritan woman; and lastly, she 
found at Samaria the tomb of St, John 
Baptist.” 
This letter is of the year 404 ; conse¬ 
quently more than fourteen centuries 
have elapsed since it was written. Read 
all the accounts of the Holy Land, all the 
travels from Arculfe’s to mine, and vou 
will see that the pilgrims have invariably 
found and described the places marked 
by St. Jerome. Surely this is at least a 
high and imposing antiquity. 
It was not only priests, recluses, 
bishops, and doctors, that docked trom 
all quarters to Pale.'tine at the period of, 
whicli we are treating; but likewise fe¬ 
males of high rank, even princesses and 
empresses. I have already mentioned 
Paula and Eustocliium, and must not 
omit the two Mela. ias. 1 he nionasteiy 
of Bethieliem was filled with the most il¬ 
lustrious families of Rome, who ded thi¬ 
ther from Alaric. Fifty years before, 
Eutropia, widow of 3ilax!niiau Hercules, 
hud 
