[426] Nomen ipsum crucis absit non modo a corpore civium Romanorum, sed etiam a cogitatione, oculis, auribus.--Cicero, _pro Rabirio_. [427] Crudelissimum et teterrimum ... arbor infelix, infame lignum.--Cic., _pro Rabirio_. [428] Now in the Museum of the Collegio Romano. [429] Τὸν ἀνεσκολοπισμένον ἐκεῖνον σοφιστήν.--_De Morte Peregr._ Tertullian mentions as a common heathen delusion the idea that the God of the Christians had an ass’s head. He also speaks of a heathen picture of a figure having the ears of an ass, hoofed in one foot, carrying a book and wearing a toga, to which was affixed the inscription, “The God of the Christians, born of an ass.”--_Apol._, c. 16. Probably such caricatures were common. On a slab recently discovered in the Vigna Nussiner is a representation of an ass with the inscription, “Hic est Deus Hadriani,” apparently a satirical allusion to that emperor’s favourable disposition to Christianity. [430] Eph. iii, 18. [431] Ipsa species crucis quid est nisi forma quadrata mundi?... Aves quando volant in æthera, formam crucis assumunt; homo natans per aquas, vel orans, forma crucis vehitur. Navis per maria antenna cruci similata sufflatur.--Hieronym. _in Mark_ XV. [432] _Apol._, i, 72. See also Minuc. Felix, cap. 29. [433] Ego Christianus ... et vexillum crucis in mea fronte portans.--Hieron., _Ep._ 113. [434] Tolle crucem qui vis auferre coronam. [435] Crucis religiosi.--Tertul., _Apol._, 16. [436] Signum Christi, τὸ κυριακὸν σημεῖον.--Clem. Alex., _Strom._, vi, 11. [437] Ad omnem progressum atque promotum, ad omnem aditum et exitum, ad vestitum, ad calceatum, ad lavacra, ad mensas, ad lumina, ad cubilia, ad sedilia, quæcunque nos conversatio exercet, frontem crucis signaculo tenemus.--Tertul., _de Coron. Mil._, c. iii. [438] Crucis signum est, cum homo porrectis manibus Deum pura mente veneratur.--Minuc., _Dial._, p. 90. Expansis manibus in modum crucis orabat.--Paulin., _Vit. Ambros._, p. 12. Hic habitus orantium est, ut manibus in coelum extensis precemur.--Apuleius.--According to Eusebius, Constantine was thus represented on the coins of the empire.--Ὡς ἄνω βλέπειν δοκεῖν ἀνατεταμένος πρὸς Θεὸν, τρόπον εὐχομένου.--_Vit. Const._, l. iv, c. 15. [439] Chrys. in Psa. cxli, 2. Compare Paul’s expression about “lifting up holy hands” in prayer.--1 Tim. ii, 8.