Chapter XII.196    Comp. The Apology, c. xvi.—The Charge of Worshipping a Cross. The Heathens Themselves Made Much of Crosses in Sacred Things; Nay, Their Very Idols Were Formed on a Crucial Frame.

As for him who affirms that we are “the priesthood of a cross,”197    Crucis antistites. we shall claim him198    Erit. as our co-religionist.199    Consacraneus. A cross is, in its material, a sign of wood; amongst yourselves also the object of worship is a wooden figure. Only, whilst with you the figure is a human one, with us the wood is its own figure.  Never mind200    Viderint. for the present what is the shape, provided the material is the same: the form, too, is of no importance,201    Viderit. if so be it be the actual body of a god.  If, however, there arises a question of difference on this point what, (let me ask,) is the difference between the Athenian Pallas, or the Pharian Ceres, and wood formed into a cross,202    Stipite crucis. when each is represented by a rough stock, without form, and by the merest rudiment of a statue203    Solo staticulo. The use of wood in the construction of an idol is mentioned afterward. of unformed wood? Every piece of timber204    Omne robur. which is fixed in the ground in an erect position is a part of a cross, and indeed the greater portion of its mass.  But an entire cross is attributed to us, with its transverse beam,205    Antemna. See our Anti-Marcion, p. 156. Ed. Edinburgh. of course, and its projecting seat. Now you have the less to excuse you, for you dedicate to religion only a mutilated imperfect piece of wood, while others consecrate to the sacred purpose a complete structure. The truth, however, after all is, that your religion is all cross, as I shall show. You are indeed unaware that your gods in their origin have proceeded from this hated cross.206    De isto patibulo. Now, every image, whether carved out of wood or stone, or molten in metal, or produced out of any other richer material, must needs have had plastic hands engaged in its formation. Well, then, this modeller,207    Plasta. before he did anything else,208    In primo. hit upon the form of a wooden cross, because even our own body assumes as its natural position the latent and concealed outline of a cross. Since the head rises upwards, and the back takes a straight direction, and the shoulders project laterally, if you simply place a man with his arms and hands outstretched, you will make the general outline of a cross. Starting, then, from this rudimental form and prop,209    Statumini. as it were, he applies a covering of clay, and so gradually completes the limbs, and forms the body, and covers the cross within with the shape which he meant to impress upon the clay; then from this design, with the help of compasses and leaden moulds, he has got all ready for his image which is to be brought out into marble, or clay, or whatever the material be of which he has determined to make his god. (This, then, is the process:) after the cross-shaped frame, the clay; after the clay, the god.  In a well-understood routine, the cross passes into a god through the clayey medium. The cross then you consecrate, and from it the consecrated (deity) begins to derive his origin.210    Comp. The Apology, c. xii.: “Every image of a god has been first constructed on a cross and stake, and plastered with cement. The body of your god is first dedicated upon a gibbet.” By way of example, let us take the case of a tree which grows up into a system of branches and foliage, and is a reproduction of its own kind, whether it springs from the kernel of an olive, or the stone of a peach, or a grain of pepper which has been duly tempered under ground. Now, if you transplant it, or take a cutting off its branches for another plant, to what will you attribute what is produced by the propagation?  Will it not be to the grain, or the stone, or the kernel? Because, as the third stage is attributable to the second, and the second in like manner to the first, so the third will have to be referred to the first, through the second as the mean. We need not stay any longer in the discussion of this point, since by a natural law every kind of produce throughout nature refers back its growth to its original source; and just as the product is comprised in its primal cause, so does that cause agree in character with the thing produced. Since, then, in the production of your gods, you worship the cross which originates them, here will be the original kernel and grain, from which are propagated the wooden materials of your idolatrous images. Examples are not far to seek. Your victories you celebrate with religious ceremony211    Veneramini. as deities; and they are the more august in proportion to the joy they bring you. The frames on which you hang up your trophies must be crosses: these are, as it were, the very core of your pageants.212    Tropæum, for “tropæorum.” We have given the sense rather than the words of this awkward sentence. Thus, in your victories, the religion of your camp makes even crosses objects of worship; your standards it adores, your standards are the sanction of its oaths; your standards it prefers before Jupiter himself. But all that parade213    Suggestus. of images, and that display of pure gold, are (as so many) necklaces of the crosses. In like manner also, in the banners and ensigns, which your soldiers guard with no less sacred care, you have the streamers (and) vestments of your crosses. You are ashamed, I suppose, to worship unadorned and simple crosses.

12. Crucis qualitas, signum est de ligno; etiam de materia colitis penes vos cum effigie; quanquam sicut vestrum humana figura est, ita et nostrum propria. Viderint nunc liniamenta, dum una sit qualitas; viderit 0577D forma, dum ipsum sit dei corpus. Quod si de 0578A hoc differentia intercedit, quanto distinguitur a crucis stipite Pallas Attica et Ceres Pharia, quae sine forma rudi palo et solo staticulo ligni informis repraesentatur ? Pars crucis, et quidem majus, est omne robur, quod de recta statione defigitur. Sed nobis tota crux imputatur, cum antemna scilicet sua et cum illo sedilis excessu . Hoc quidem vos incusabiliores, qui mutilum et truncum dicastis lignum quod alii plenum et structum consecraverunt. Enimvero de reliquo integra est religio vobis integrae crucis, sicut ostendam. Ignoratis autem etiam originem istam deis vestris de isto patibulo provenisse. Nam omne simulacrum, seu ligno seu lapide desculpitur, seu aere defunditur, seu qua cumque alia locupletiore materia producitur, plasticae manus praecedent 0578B necesse est; plasta autem lignum crucis in primo statuit, quoniam ipsi quoque corpori nostro tacita et secreta linea crucis situs est. Quod caput emicat, quod spina dirigitur, quod humerorum obliquatio . . . Si statueris hominem manibus expansis, imaginem crucis feceris. Huic igitur exordio, et velut statumini argilla desuper intexta paulatim membra complet, et corpus struit, et habitum, quem placuit argillae, intus cruci ingerit; inde circino et plumbeis modulis praeparatio simulacri in marmor, in lutum, vel aes, vel quodcunque placuit deum fieri, transmigratur. A cruce argilla, ab argilla deus; quodammodo transit crux in deum per argillam. Crucem igitur consecratis a qua incipitur consecratus. Exempli gratia dictum erit, nempe de olivae nucleo et nuce persici et grano piperis sub terra temperato arbor exsurgit in ramos, 0578C in comam, in speciem sui generis. Eam si transferas, vel de brachiis ejus in aliam subolem utaris, cui deputabitur quod de traduce provenit? non illi grano aut nuci aut nucleo? Nam cum tertius gradus secundo adscribibitur, aeque primo secundus, sic tertius redigitur ad primum transmissus per secundum. Nec diutius super isto argumentandum est, quando naturali praescriptione omne omnino genus censum ad originem refert, quantoque genus censetur, tanto origo convenitur in genere. Si igitur in genere deorum crucum originem colitis, hic erit nucleus et granum primordiale, ex quibus apud vos simulacrorum silvae propagantur. Ad manifesta jam : Victorias ut numina, et quidem augustiora quanto laetiora, 0578D veneramini. Con. . . . . . . . one quid melius extollant, 0579A cruces erunt intestina quodammodo tropaeorum. Itaque in Victoriis et cruces colit castrensis religio, signa adorat, signa dejerat, signa ipsi Jovi praefert. Sed ille imaginum suggestus et totius auri cultus monilia crucum sunt. Sic etiam in cantabris atque vexillis, quae non minore sanctitate militia custodit, siphara illa vestes crucum sunt. Erubescitis, opinor, incultas et nudas cruces colere.