Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/286

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

[9< s. n. OCT. i,

natural reasoning ; but I cannot help think- ing that in a few minutes the learned author might have been once and for all convinced of its delusiveness. It is based upon an erroneous conception of the sharpness of the lines of demarcation environing the early Christian, and it attributes to him a higher degree of delicacy than that to which we have any evidence that he was entitled.

Symbolism, the language by which the infancy of all religious cults has expressed itself, was precipitated, in the case of the early Christians, directly from pagan mythology. The earliest symbol of the Crucifixion itself reveals this fact, being a dolphin and a tri- dent. Every one knows-of the frequency in the catacombs of the representation of Christ by Orpheus and Apollo. But in the early cata- comb of Flavia Domitilla (from a Christian point of view an extremely important one) we see Mercury with his caduceus gracefully flying above the heads of the fiery steeds which are conducting Elijah to heaven. It has been the fashion in referring to these somewhat startling discoveries to explain them as curious mistakes on the part of the artist, or to say that he has copied a pagan de- sign, &c.

Now is it not more probable that although there were nuclei of very strict and fanatical Christians, these were surrounded by numbers of converts who, by ignorance, by tradition or environment, were quite unable to fully assimilate the forms of Christianity placed before them, who occasionally worshipped with their masters "in the house of Rim- mon" who, in fact, wished to be on distinctly good terms with the elder gods though calling themselves Christians? Even as late as in the time of Dante, Hecate and Diana* were regarded as powerful tutelary demons whom it was better not to offend. The dif- ference between a respectful negative and a stinting affirmative may sometimes offer difficulties of distinction obviously requir- ing an ultra - delicacy of discrimination. It is hardly possible to say that the latter was a shining quality arnom? the early Christians. It would, perhaps, be unnatural to expect that it should be so in a sect so anti-social and pessimistic.t Moreover, is it not likely that, in order to swell the number of converts, the elders among the Christians, even as in our own day, found it best to be tolerant and content with major facts and con- cessions, and, like the country priests in Italy,

t Witness, too, the frequency among them of the
 * This was the real Diana " of the crossways."

disgusting baptismal names Scercoria, Stercorinus

/fee.

and remnants of polytheism, provided they confessed and came to meetings ?
 * o forbear disabusing the minds of certain of
 * heir flock of absolutely pagan superstitions

At least, it is not likely to be denied that, ooking broadly back over the rise and pro- gress of Christianity, there sprang up in the

arliest periods variations of its development
 * rom some of which dominant types have

)een since evolved types which regard with lonest abhorrence and indignation the idea stages totally at variance with their present notions of Christian dignity just as one may say that the mature eucalyptus tree forgets
 * hat they have ever been through historic
 * hat for many years it bore leaves of a type

will henceforward produce.
 * otally different from those it bears now, and

At one time, then, there will have been men who may have intermingled pagan and Christian tokens and emblems in a spirit of

pmbinative toleration a sort of Conserva- tive-Unionist spirit and, again, there were sure to have been deliberate trimmers, deter- mined by diplomatic methods to secure the lenient judgment of the gods of the winning dispensation. The men in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries who secured the prayers of various congregations by leaving their bones to the Dominicans, their bowels to their parish church, and their hearts to the Franciscans, exemplify the same human methods.

One may, therefore, conclude that the owner of trie villa at Frampton was this sort of Conservative-Unionist, innocent of strict moral bearing towards central Christian policy at a time when its own adherents were tearing the Gospels to pieces like wild beasts ; or else that he was a deliberate trimmer, per- haps nervous of too patently expressing his Christian beliefs in a colony where the pagan spirit (as is shown by the great prevalence of cremation over burial) remained dominant. ST. CLAIR BADDELEY.

OLDEST PARISH REGISTER (8 th S. xi. 108, 215 ; 9 th S. ii. 35, 133, 176). In answer to your correspondent, ante, p. 133, I may mention that I have not seen the original registers of Alfriston. My authority for stat- ing that the registers dated from 1512 was a ' Handbook for Eastbourne,' by Mr. George F. Chambers, F.R.A.S., 1873, p. 68, a book principally compiled from the volumes pub- lished by the Sussex Archaeological Society. I believe I have also seen it stated in one of those volumes, but which one I cannot at the moment say. I should very much like to know which is correct, being particularly interested in the villase and church of