316 ON THE DEDICATIONS OF ENGLISH CHURCHES. gratitude or fulfilled vows of ransomed captives, or to the piety of those who interceded through this saint in behalf of relatives detained in captivity by the Saracens or other nations; and S. Mary Magdalen would be a very obvious dedication for penitents. No doubt, too, many dedications have their origin in the patron saints of the founders, it being an almost universal custom in the middle ages for each person to place himself under the peculiar invocation of some particular saint. Thus King Henry VI. being born on S. Nicholas' day, chose that saint as his patron, and we find his two noble foundations of King's College and Eton dedicated in the joint names of SS. Mary and Nicholas; this is believed to have been partly in reference to S. Nicholas as the patron of children and schoolboys. There are four other Churches in England thus named, and it is worthy of enquiry whether they have connection with either of these traditions. Guilds or societies of handicraftsmen, &c., may also have exercised some influence in Church dedications. Thus the woolcombers would naturally select S. Blaize, nor would the cordwainers be unmindful of S. Crispin, or the sailors (as mentioned already) of S. Nicholas. All these and similar circumstances appear to us to have exercised more or less influence upon the choice of medieval dedications, but there are many which we do not scruple to acknowledge are not assignable to any of the causes we have cited. PART III. ON EMBLEMS. 1. EARLY CHRISTIAN SYMBOLS. "OBJECTS PLEADING THROUGH THE VISUAL SENSE ARE STRONGER THAN DISCOURSES TO THE EAR, The Baptistery. E. Early Christian Symbols. THE representations found on the tombs of the early Christians in the catacombs at Rome, may perhaps be considered as authority for the subjects that may with propriety be used in decorating the walls or the windows of fabrics belonging to the Anglican Church, which is professedly reformed on the model. of the Christian Church in the three first centuries. It may therefore be useful here to enumerate those most commonly met with. "Among the first Christians, the instrument of God's suffering and man's redemption, the cross, was made the chief emblem of their faith, the chief mark of their community, their standard and their watchword. It was carefully imprinted alike on the habitations of the living and the receptacles of the dead. It was frequently composed of foliage or ornamented with gems a." a Hope's History of Architecture. At a later period the plain cross was considered as the cross of shame, the ornamental cross as the cross of glory. "At first the simple cross was sufficient-crux im misse or capitata; crux decussata; and crux commissa -the Lamb standing under a blood-red of the Saviour's bust at the head or foot of the cross, while the lamb lay in the centre, was the next step towards the crucifix; and afterwards Christ Himself was represented clothed, His hand raised in prayer, but not yet nailed. At last He appeared fastened to the cross by three nails, (sometimes by four b,) and on the From Sherborne Abbey Church, Dorsetshire. older crucifixes alive, with open eyes; on the latter ones (from the tenth to the eleventh century) sometimes dead; Christ was often clad in a robe, having the regal crown on His head; more recently the b In the Greek Church, and in most of the early examples, the feet are nailed together on the cross by one nail, as at Sherborne. In the legend of S. Helena, and in the emblems of the Crucifixion, three nails only are represented. In the modern Roman Church it is customary to separate the feet and employ four nails. |