According to the strained mode of interpretation of Roman Catholic writers on this subject, the gift of the mantle of Elijah to his successor in office is a type of Christ’s bestowment of authority upon St. Peter as the “Prince of the Apostles,” and his especial representative on earth. “It would certainly,” says Dr. Northcote, “have reminded the Roman Christians of the _pallium_, the symbol of jurisdiction worn by the bishops of Rome, and given by them to metropolitans as from the very body of St. Peter--_De Corpore Sancti Petri_.”[489] A more improbable assumption it would be difficult to 296 imagine. Nobler in conception, which, as well as more scriptural, is the interpretation of this type given by St. Chrysostom: “Elias, in ascending into heaven, let his mantle fall on Elisha: Jesus, when he, too, ascended thither, left the gift of his graces to his disciples--graces which constitute not merely a single prophet, but an infinite number of Elishas, much greater and more illustrious than that one.”[490] [Illustration: Fig. 77.--The Three Hebrew Children.] The persecuted saints who dared to encounter death and danger in their most dreadful forms rather than deny their faith, found great consolation in the remembrance of God’s deliverance of his servants in the days of old. With the bloodthirsty cry of the ribald plebs of Rome--_Christiani ad leones_--still ringing in their ears, and, it may be, with the roar of the savage beasts of prey crashing on their shuddering nerves, they were sustained by the thought of the fidelity of those ancient worthies who, for their integrity to God, braved the flames of the fiery furnace and the perils of the lions’ den. The three Hebrew children are generally exhibited with the oriental _tiara_ and tunics. In the foregoing example from the 297 cemetery of St. Priscilla, a dove is shown bringing an olive branch, the pledge of victory and peace. [Illustration: Fig. 78.--The Three Hebrew Children.] In Fig. 78, from the cemetery of Hermes, they are shown as standing in a “burning fiery furnace,” whose flames, though heated seven times hotter than their wont, play lambently around them without even singeing their garments. In the following example from the Catacomb of St. Agnes the furnace is reduced to a shallow vessel in which the Hebrews stand unhurt. This has been incorrectly interpreted as a representation of martyrdom by boiling in oil. Its association, however, with the figure of Daniel in the lions’ den, and its general resemblance to other groups of the same subject, unquestionably indicate its true character. 298 [Illustration: Fig. 79.--The Three Hebrew Children.]