Of similar character are also the following: SALONICE ISPIRITVS TVVS IN BONIS--“Salonice, thy spirit is among the good;” REFRIGERAS SPIRITVS TVVS IN BONIS--“Thou refreshest thy spirit among the good;” ΠΡΩΤΟϹ ΕΝ ΑΓΙΩ ΠΝΕΥΜΑΤΙ ΘΕΟΥ ΕΝΘΑΔΕ ΚΕΙΤΑΙ--“Here in the Holy Spirit of God lieth Protus;” CORPVS HABET TELLVS ANIMAM CAELESTIA REGNA--“The earth has the body, celestial realms the soul;” ΓΛΥΚΕΡΟΝ ΦΑΟϹ ΟΥ ΚΑΤΕΔΕΨΑΣ (_sic_) ΕΣΧΕΣ ΓΑΡ ΜΕΤΑ ϹΟΥ ΠΑΝΑΘΑΝΑΤΟΝ--“Thou didst not 431 leave the sweet light, for thou hadst with thee Him who knows not death,” literally, “the all-deathless one;” AGAPE VIBIS IN ETERNVM--“Agape, thou livest forever;” DORMIT ET VIVIT IN PACE XO, (_sic_)--“He sleeps and lives in the peace of Christ;” MENS NESCIA MORTIS VIVIT ET ASPECTV FRVITVR BENE CONSCIA CHRISTI--“The soul lives unknowing of death, and consciously rejoices in the vision of Christ;” PRIMA VIVIS IN GLORIA DEI ET IN PACE DOMINI NOSTRI XR.--“Prima, thou livest in the glory of God, and in the peace of Christ, Our Lord.”[704] The glorious doctrine of the resurrection, which is peculiarly the characteristic of our holy religion as distinguished from all the faiths of antiquity, was everywhere recorded throughout the Catacombs. It was symbolized in the ever-recurring representations of the story of Jonah and of the raising of Lazarus, and was strongly asserted in numerous inscriptions. As the early Christians laid the remains of the departed saint in their last long rest, the sacred words of the Gospel, “I am the Resurrection and the Life,” must have echoed with a strange power through the long corridors of that silent city of the dead, and have filled the hearts of the believers, though surrounded by the evidences of their mortality, with an exultant thrill of triumph over death and the grave. This was a recompense for all their pains. Of this not even the malignant ingenuity of persecution could deprive them. Although the body were consumed and its ashes strewn upon the waters, or sown upon the wandering winds, still, still the Lord knoweth them that are his, and keeps the dust of his chosen. 432 Tertullian ridicules the heathen for believing the doctrine of metempsychosis and rejecting that of the resurrection.[705] “God forbid that he should abandon to everlasting destruction,” he exclaims, “the labour of his hands, the care of his own thoughts, the receptacle of his own Spirit!”[706] The hope of the resurrection is often strongly expressed, as in the following examples: HIC REQVIESCIT CARO MEA NOVISSIMO VERO DIE PER |XPM| CREDO RESVSCITABITVR A MORTVIS. (A. D. 544.) Here rests my flesh; but at the last day, through Christ, I believe it will be raised from the dead. RELICTIS TVIS IACES IN PACE SOPORE MERITA RESVRGES TEMPORALIS TIBI DATA REQVIETIO. You, well-deserving one, having left your (relations), lie asleep in peace--you will arise--a temporary rest is granted you.