In an epitaph of the year 449 we read, RECEPTA CAELO MERVIT OCCVRRERE |XPO| AD RESVRRECTIONEM PRAEMIVM AETERNVM SVSCIPERE DIGNA--“Received into heaven, she deserved to meet Christ at the resurrection, worthy to receive an everlasting reward.” In the following example from the Catacomb of Naples, Christian confidence adopts the sublime language of Job: CREDO QVIA REDEMPTOR MEVS BIBIT (_sic_) ET NOBISSIMO DIE DE TERRA SVSCITABIT ME IN CARNE MEA VIDEBO |DOM|. I believe, because that my Redeemer liveth, and in the last day shall raise me from the earth, that in my flesh I shall see the Lord. More briefly is this cardinal doctrine asserted in the following: IVSTVS CVM |SCIS| XPO MEDIANTE RESVRGET--“Justus, who will arise with the saints through Christ.” HIC IN PACE REQVIESCIT LAVRENTIA QVAE 433 CREDIDIT RESVRRECTIONEM--“Here reposes in peace Laurentia, who believed in the resurrection.”[707] The very idea of death seems to have been repudiated by the primitive Christians. “_Non mortua sed data somno_,” sings Prudentius in paraphrase of the words of Our Lord, “She is not dead but sleepeth.”[708] Hence the Catacomb was designated the _coemeterium_,[709] or place of sleeping, and the funeral vault the _cubiculum_, or sleeping chamber. The dead were not “buried,” as the pagan expressions _conditus_, _compositus_, _situs_, indicate; but _depositus_, “laid down” in their lowly beds till the everlasting morn should come, and the angel’s trump awake them; consigned as a precious trust to the tender keeping of mother earth, and “lying in wait for the resurrection.”[710] The saints were “fallen asleep” in Jesus, and on the bridal morning of the soul they should awake with his likeness and be satisfied. The primitive Christians believed that the power which called a Lazarus from the tomb could wake to life again the slumbering millions of this valley of dry bones, vaster far than that 434 of Ezekiel’s vision, till they should stand up upon their feet an exceeding great army. But this sleep was a sleep of the body only, not of the soul. The ancient Christians were assured, as we have seen, of the immediate happiness of those that died in the faith. They believed that being absent from the body they were present with the Lord; that as soon as they passed from earth’s living death they entered into the undying life and unfading bliss of heaven. Though surrounded by the mouldering bodies of the saints in Christ, the eye of faith beheld their glorified spirits, starry-crowned and palm-bearing, among the white-robed multitude before the throne of God. They admitted no thought of a long and dreary period of forgetfulness, nor probation of purgatorial fires, before the soul could enter into joy and peace.