"The crucifixion is _not_ one of the subjects of early Christianity. The death of our Lord was represented by various _types_, but _never in its actual form_. "The _earliest_ instances of the _crucifixion_ are found in illustrated manuscripts of various countries, and in those _ivory and enameled forms_ which are described in the Introduction. Some of these are ascertained, by historical or by internal evidence, to have been executed in the _ninth century_, there is one also, of an extraordinary rude and fantastic character, in a MS. in the ancient library of St. Galle, which is ascertained to be of the _eighth century_. _At all events, there seems no just grounds at present for assigning an earlier date._"[202:2] "Early Christian art, such as it appears in the bas-reliefs on sarcophagi, gave but one solitary incident from the story of Our Lord's Passion, _and that utterly divested of all circumstances of suffering_. Our Lord is represented as young and beautiful, free from bonds, with no '_accursed tree_' on his shoulders."[202:3] The oldest representation of Christ Jesus was a figure of a _lamb_,[202:4] to which sometimes a vase was added, into which his blood flowed, and at other times couched at the foot of a cross. _This custom subsisted up to the year 680, and until the pontificate of Agathon, during the reign of Constantine Pogonat._ By the sixth synod of Constantinople (canon 82) it was ordained that instead of the ancient symbol, which had been the LAMB, _the figure of a man fastened to a cross_ (such as the _Pagans_ had adored), should be represented. All this was confirmed by Pope Adrian I.[202:5] A simple cross, which was the symbol of eternal life, or of salvation, among the ancients, was sometimes, as we have seen, placed alongside of the _Lamb_. In the course of time, the _Lamb_ was put on the cross, as the ancient _Israelites_ had put the paschal lamb centuries before,[202:6] and then, as we have seen, they put a _man_ upon it. Christ Jesus is also represented in early art as the "Good Shepherd," that is, as a young man with a lamb on his shoulders.[202:7] This is just the manner in which the Pagan Apollo, Mercury and others were represented centuries before.[203:1] Mrs. Jameson says: "_Mercury_ attired as a _shepherd_, with a _ram_ on his shoulders, borne in the same manner as in many of the Christian representations, was no unfrequent object (in ancient art) and in some instances led to a difficulty in distinguishing between the two,"[203:2] that is, between _Mercury_ and _Christ Jesus_. M. Renan says: "The Good Shepherd of the catacombs in Rome is a copy from the _Aristeus_, or from the _Apollo Nomius_, which figured in the same posture on the _Pagan_ sarcophagi; and still carries the flute of _Pan_, in the midst of the four half-naked seasons."[203:3]