In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. _______
THE SIGN OF THE CROSS
IN THE
NINETEENTH CENTURY
BY MGR. JEAN-JOSEPH GAUME,
Prothonotary Apostolic
IN HOC VINCE
By this sign thou shalt conquer. † (Euseb. Vlt. Const , 1, 22.)
With the Brief of His Holiness, Pope Plus IX
(who attaches, to the Sign of the Cross, an Indulgence of Fifty Days.)
and Translator’s Dedication.
TRANSLATED FROM THE LAST FRENCH EDITION
BY A DAUGHTER OF ST. JOSEPH
_________
PHILADELPHIA:
PETER F. CUNNINGHAM, PUBLISHER, 216 SOUTH THIRD STREET
_______
1873
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iii
Contents
Dedication to the Glorious St. Joseph .......vii
Preface to the Second Edition ...............viii
Preface to the First Edition ................xii
FIRST LETTER
State of the Question — The Present World does
not make the Sign of Cross, or makes it seldom,
or makes it badly — The Primitive Christians
made it, they made it frequently, they made it
well — We are right, and they were wrong, or we
are wrong, and they were right; which is true?
............................................01
SECOND LETTER
Examination of the Question — Prepossessions in favor of the early
Christians — First prepossession, their lights — Second, their sanctity
— Third, the practice of true Christians in every age — Were the
Fathers of the Church great geniuses? .............................................03
THIRD LETTER
Continuation of the third prepossession: The Doctors of the East and
West — Constantine, Theodosius, Charlemagne, St. Louis, Bayard, Don
John of Austria, Sobieski — Fourth prepossession, the conduct of the
Church — Fifth prepossession, those who do not make the Sign of the
Cross — Summary ...........................................................................06
FOURTH LETTER
Answer to one objection: the times are changed — Reasons in favor of
the primitive Christians, drawn from the very nature of the Sign of the
Cross — The Sign of the Cross is five things — A divine sign which
ennobles man — Proofs that the Sign of the Cross is divine ...........10
FIFTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross ennobles us — It is the exclusive sign of the elite
of humanity — It is the escutcheon of Catholicity — What a Catholic is
— By ennobling us, the Sign of the Cross teaches us the respect due to
ourselves — Importance of this lesson — Disgrace of those who do not
make this sign — Picture of the contempt they have for themselves .....13
SIXTH LETTER
Continuation of the preceding letter — The Sign of the Cross is a book
which instructs us — Creation, Redemption, Glorification: three words
which contain all the science of God, of man, and of the world — The
iv
Sign of the Cross says these three words with authority, with clearness,
with sublimity — It says them to every one, everywhere, and always...16
SEVENTH LETTER
The place which the Sign of Cross holds in the world — What the
human race was before it knew how to make the Sign of the Cross —
What becomes of the world when it ceases to make it — Another point
of view – The Sign of the Cross is a treasure that enriches us.........18
EIGHTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross known and practiced since the beginning of the
world — Contradictions only apparent — Seven ways of making the
Sign of the Cross — Testimonies of the Fathers — David, Solomon, and
all the Jewish nation made the Sign of the Cross, and knew its value —
Proofs ...............................................................................................22
NINTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross among Pagans — New details of an exterior form
of the Sign of the Cross among the first Christians — The Martyrs in the
Amphitheatre — Etymology of the word “adore” — The Pagans adored
by making the Sign of the Cross — How they made it — First manner ..26
TENTH LETTER
8econd and third way in which the Pagans made the Sign of the Cross —
Testimonies — The Pietas Publica — The Pagans acknowledged a
mysterious power in the Sign of the Cross — Whence came that belief
— Great mystery of the moral world — Importance of the Sign of the
Cross in the sight of God — The Sign of the Cross in the physical world
— Words of the Fathers and of Plato — Inconsistency of the ancient and
modern Pagans — Reason of the especial hatred of the demon for the
Sign of the Cross ..............................................................................29
ELEVENTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross is a treasure that enriches us, because it is a
prayer: proofs — A powerful prayer: proofs — A universal prayer:
proofs — It supplies all our wants — For his soul man needs lights —
The Sign of the Cross obtains them: proofs — Examples of the Martyrs....35
TWELFTH LETTER
Perpetual necessity of the Sign of the Cross to obtain strength — Its
recommendation and practice by the chiefs of the spiritual combat —
The Sign of the Cross in temptations — The Sign of the Cross at death
— Examples of the martyrs — Examples of true Christians dying a
natural death — The dying caused the Sign of the Cross to be made on
them by their brethren ......................................................................41
v
THIRTEENTH LETTER
Effects of the Sign of the Cross in the temporal order — It cures all
diseases, and removes whatever can harm us — It gives sight to the
blind, hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, the use of their limbs to
the lame and paralyzed; cures other maladies, and restores life to the
dead ..................................................................................................46
FOURTEENTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross a preservative against all that could injure life or
health — It appeases tempests — Extinguishes fire — Protects us
against accidents — Opposes a barrier to floods — Causes the waters to
return to their bounds — Keeps ferocious beasts at a distance —
Preserves from poison, from thunderbolts — Makes creatures the
instruments of prodigies...................................................................52
FIFTEENTH LETTER
Answer to a question — The Sign of the Cross is a weapon which
repulses the enemy — Life is a warfare — Against whom? — Necessity
of a weapon within the reach of every one — What is that weapon? —
Proofs that the Sign of the Cross is the special weapon, the most forcible
weapon against the evil spirits .........................................................58
SIXTEENTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross breaks idols and expels the demons from them:
examples — It expels them from the possessed: examples — Recent
anecdote — Other proofs: exorcisms — It renders vain the direct attacks
of the demons: examples — Their indirect attacks: proofs — All
creatures subject to the demons serve as their instruments to harm us —
The Sign of the Cross delivers them, and prevents their being injurious
to our body, or soul — Profound Philosophy of the early Christians —
The use they made of the Sign of the Cross — Tableau by St.
Chrysostom ......................................................................................64
SEVENTEENTH LETTER
Summary — Nature of the Sign of the Cross — How it is valued at the
present day — What the contempt and forgetfulness of the Sign of the
Cross announce — Spectacle of the present world — Satan returns —
To remain faithful to the Sign of the Cross — Principally before and
after meals — Reason, honor, and liberty command it — Is reason for or
against those who make the Sign of the Cross over food? — Examples
and arguments ..................................................................................69
vi
EIGHTEENTH LETTER
Honor commands us to pray before and after meals — Prayer over food
is as ancient as the world, as wide-spread as the human race — Proofs:
Benedicite and Grace of every people — Not to say them is to liken
ourselves to beings which do not belong to the human species — The
blessing at table is a law of humanity ..............................................73
NINETEENTH LETTER
Reasons for the blessing of the table — It is an act of freedom — Three
tyrants; the world, the flesh, the Devil — Triple victory of the Sign of
the Cross and prayer over food — Victory over the world: proofs —
Over the flesh: proofs — Over the demon: proofs — Remarkable
testimony of Porphyrius — Facts cited by St. Gregory — Conclusion ....78
TWENTIETH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross is a guide that conducts us — Necessity of a guide
— State of man here below — The Sign of the Cross conducts man to
his end by remembrance, and by imitation — Remembrance which it
recalls — General remembrance — Particular remembrance —
Particular imitation...........................................................................82
TWENTY-FIRST LETTER
General imitation — Imitation of the sanctity of God — What sanctity is
— The Sign of the Cross, the sanctifier of man and of creatures —
Imitation of the charity of God — What charity is in God — What it
should be in us — In teaching it to us, the Sign of the Cross is an
eloquent and sure guide — Incontestable proofs .............................86
TWENTY-SECOND LETTER
Sentence of the judgment between us and the first Christians — First
obligation, to make the Sign of the Cross boldly, to make it often, and to
make it well — Reasons for making it boldly — Disgrace and danger of
not making it — State of the physical and moral health of the world at
the present day..................................................................................89
TWENTY-THIRD LETTER
Reasons of the power and exalted mission of the Sign of the Cross —
Fundamental dogma — What happens in the political order a figure of
what takes place in the moral order — The Reformation, first daughter
of Paganism, throws down all the crosses — The French Revolution,
second daughter of Paganism, imitates her sister — Second obligation,
vii
to make the Sign of the Cross frequently — Reasons drawn from our
present state — Third obligation, to make it well, condition — The Sign
of the Cross, eternal sign of victory — Constantine — Praises of the
Sign of the Cross ............................................................................93
________________________
viii
DEDICATION
TO
THE GLORIOUS ST. JOSEPH
O Blessed Father St. Joseph; Guardian of the Incarnate Word, Spouse of the Immaculate Mother of
God, and Patron of the Universal Church; with sentiments of the deepest love and gratitude, I dedicate
to thee this work, destined, I hope, to enkindle, in many hearts, devotion to the Cross of Jesus, the
shadow of which brooded so heavily, yet withal so gloriously, over thy life in Bethlehem, Egypt, and
Nazareth. Deign, O Holy Patron, to accept and bless it, that through thy intercession it may become to many the
channel of the graces promised herein. By the memory of the agony thou didst undergo during the three days’ loss, I beseech thee to take pity on those myriads of souls who have willfully lost their God, have separated themselves from Him and His Church, and rush blindly to destruction, ignorant or unmindful of their loss.
Thou art, according to St. Teresa, the Minister Plenipotentiary, the Treasurer General of the Most
High. Open, then, those heavenly treasures; shed them on the children of the Church committed to thy
care, and grant that by means of the Sign of the Cross, we may pass through life untainted by the vice
and infidelity of the world. Let us not “glory, save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,” the
instrument of our Redemption, the pledge of our eternal salvation.
THE TRANSLATOR.
Feast of the Presentation of our Lady, Nov. 21st, 1872.
ix
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
One word on the publication of this little work, and the unexpected success it has obtained. How did
the idea of this book occur to us? Who arranged the unforeseen circumstances to which it owes its
origin? Why does a work, destined to reawaken the faith of the Catholic world in the Sign of the Cross,
appear at this time, and not two or three centuries ago? Why is it, that until now, no pope thought of
attaching a spiritual favor to that formula, the most venerable, most ancient, and most customary of our
religion? How is it, that amidst so many solicitudes, Pius IX has deigned to listen to our feeble voice,
and hastened to admonish the Christians of our day to have recourse as frequently as possible to the
Sign of the Cross, conformably to the example of their primitive ancestors? Why, in order to encourage
them, has he enriched its use with an indulgence doubly precious? To all these questions we knew not,
at first, what to reply. But now the light is made.
All comes to the point in the Church, for Divine Providence never gropes in the dark. Accustomed
as it is, to use that which is not, to confound that which is, it shows itself no less admirable in small
things than in great. The Sign of the Cross is, then, the arm of power against the demon. Instructed by
the apostles themselves, the early Christians knew it. In continual warfare with Satan in all the power
of his reign, and the cruelty of his rage; the regulator of morals, ideas, arts, theatres, festivals, and laws;
the master of altars and thrones, sullying all, and making of all an instrument of corruption, they had
incessant recourse to this infallible means of dispelling the fascinating charm, and warding off the fiery
darts of the enemy. Hence, the continual Sign of the Cross became for them an exorcism of every
moment.
If, then, there appears now, without any premeditated design on the part of the author, a work
designed to make the Christians of our day retake the victorious weapon of their ancestors; if,
notwithstanding so many adverse circumstances, this work spreads so rapidly; if it wins, even in Rome
itself, the most august and precious of all suffrages; if, in fine, after eighteen centuries, the Vicar of
Jesus Christ, the Chief of the eternal combat, by a solemn act, urges the Catholic world to have
recourse incessantly to this sign, so victorious over paganism: — is it not reasonable to conclude that
we find ourselves, in many respects, in a position analogous to that of the primitive Christians?
If they were confronted with Satan, the king and god of that age; if they lived in the midst of a
world that was not Christian, that wished not to become such, that wished no one to be such, that
persecuted those who continued to be such; — are not we confronted with Satan, who, unchained on
the Earth, is inciting nations to rebel against Jesus Christ, and making them cry out incessantly: “We
will not have Him reign any longer over us”? And amidst what do the Christians of our day live? Are
they not surrounded by a world that is ceasing to be Christian; that does not wish to return to
Christianity, that does not wish others to belong to it, that persecutes in every possible way those who
persist in doing so?
Cunning, violence, calumny, injury, blasphemy, sarcasm, spoliation, exile, death itself, — are not
all employed against the children, as they were against the fathers? Arts, theatres, books, feasts, laws,
sciences, — are they not now, as formerly, employed as weapons against Christianity? Is it, then,
astonishing that the Sentinel of Israel, the Sovereign Pontiff, has come, by an act unknown in his
predecessors, to reawaken the faith of Christians, by this sign, the protector of the Church and of
society? The analogy is so striking that Protestants themselves are amazed at it. In their view, as in
ours, there is no salvation for the present world but in the Cross. In the beginning of October a Prussian
journal, the Gazette of the Cross, published a long article entitled: By this sign thou shalt conquer: In
hoc signo vinces. “Today,” said the Protestant writer, “we are engaged in spiritual warfare with the
same antichristianism which Constantine, of old, vanquished with the material sword. Doubtless we
should again say: ‘Thou shalt conquer by this sign: in hoc signo vinces.’ The hidden and cruel powers
of darkness rise to assault that Crown, by the grace of God, the key of the arch of the social Christian
order.”
Must not then the evil and the remedy be equally incontestable, when we see those same Protestants
who formerly repudiated the sign of the cross as an act of idolatry, proclaiming the necessity of having
recourse to it in these days, as a weapon, indispensable to us, if we wish to conquer the hidden and
cruel powers, whose triumph would be that of barbarism?
The appearance, in some manner providential, of The Sign of the Cross in the Nineteenth Century,
alone explains the rapid success which it has obtained. The first French edition was sold in a few
months. Three translations of it have been made into different European languages — one in Rome,
one in Turin, and one in Germany. Catholic papers have vied with one another in recommending its
perusal, and many letters have been sent to us, bearing the congratulations of the most respectable men
of France and foreign countries: Soli Deo honor et gloria, to God alone be honor and glory.
All agree to show the fitness of our humble work, and to enhance the greatness of the pontifical
grace which is the eternal result of it. Let us quote only a few lines, begging those who wrote them to
receive the expressions of our sincere gratitude.
The learned Neapolitan review, Scienza e Fede, concludes its long analysis by saying,
What profit, will our society, immersed in materialism, exclaim, what profit can humanity draw from this new
work of Mgr. Gaume? Will it give help to the poor laboring classes, whom the revolution has deprived of
work? Will it enroll volunteers for Poland? Will it exterminate the brigandage which is desolating Italy? ... It
will do more than all this. It will give the bread of faith to those in want of it. It will enroll the Christians of the
nineteenth century under the standard of the Cross, in the furious war which they have to sustain against the
infernal brigand; under this divine standard, which has saved the world, and which alone can again preserve it
... Whatever the future may be, it will teach them how to be noble victors or noble victims; in hoc vince.
Overjoyed at seeing an indulgence attached to the Sign of the Cross, the venerable Dean of the
Catholic Chair writes:
An indulgence granted to the Sign of the Cross at your request! . . What will so many persons, whom I do not
wish to name, say? The Holy Father has repaid with usury the pains you have taken in order to stop the
paganism which invades us. By you and through you the whole Church receives the signal favor of an
indulgence, extensive as the universe and durable as ages, which shall fall at every hour, at every second, as a
refreshing dew upon the souls in Purgatory!
How many blessings will those souls call down upon you! And if, at the time of your death, you be called on
to pay them a short visit, what a reception will there await you!
Let us pass to other testimonies, and come to those which have emanated from Rome. The
Commission charged with the care of the regionary schools has thought it necessary to address the
following circular to those who direct them:
Among many books, useless and dangerous, particularly for youth, there are not wanting some that are useful,
and well calculated to spread in the souls of youth the beautiful maxims of our august religion, and the love of
its holy practices.
xi
One of those works is, unquestionably, that lately published by Tiberine, entitled The Sign of the
Cross in the Nineteenth Century, which has been highly eulogized by many Catholic journals.
The undersigned, while strongly recommending teachers not to permit in their schools any work not approved
by the Commission, equally recommends them to cause the aforesaid work to be bought and read by their
pupils. They may also use it as a premium at the annual Distributions which they are accustomed to have in
their respective schools.
Rome, from the Office of the Secretary of the Commission. L. PIERANO, Deputy.
__________________
LETTER OF HIS EMINENCE, CARDINAL ALTIERI
Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of the Index, to Mgr. Gaume, Prothonotary Apostolic.
Rome, August 7th, 1863.
MOST ILLUSTRIOUS LORD:
By the publication of your admirable work, The Sign of the Cross, you have rendered a new and
signal service to the cause of the Church of Jesus Christ. In effect, you have made known to the
faithful in the most attractive manner, all that is clearly contained, all that is taught, all that is operated
in a most sublime manner of what is holy, divine, and consequently, sovereignly useful to souls in this
sacred formula, as ancient as the Church herself.
The august Chief of this same Church, the Vicar of Christ, the Sovereign Pontiff, could not but
receive most joyfully, a work so precious and useful to Christian people. Therefore, not only did he
express his great satisfaction when I gave into his sacred hands the copy you hastened to offer him by
my means, but he has, moreover, been pleased to grant, with kindness, the desire you expressed of
seeing the practice of the Sign of the Cross enriched with an indulgence, thereby to incite them to
make use of it for the defense of their souls, without any human respect, and as frequently as possible.
In the following Brief, you will see how bountiful the Holy Father has shown himself by the
concession of such a grace, and how much it will cause its value to be appreciated. It is highly
important that this new favor of the supreme dispenser of heavenly treasures, granted for the advantage
of the Church militant, be universally known, at the same time that your excellent book shall be more
widely spread and better appreciated. In the Italian translation made of it by the incomparable Angel of
Aquila, will be found the Brief, and it ought to be inserted in the new editions which certainly cannot
fail to succeed each other. In this manner shall be filled the void which you have signalized in the
Racolta delle Indulgenze.
Thus, your Excellency shall receive the worthy recompense, and certainly, that most desired by your
heart, in seeing the treasures of Redemption opened for the good of souls still living on Earth, or
already descended into Purgatory, by the effects of the work you have composed with a view to draw
the attention of every one to the first sign of the worship which all should render to the principal
instrument of our Redemption.
Receive the expression of the sincere and high esteem with which I am, Most illustrious Lord,
Your affectionate Servant, L. CARDINAL ALTIERI.
xii
BRIEF OF HIS HOLINESS PIUS IX, POPE
FOR ETERNAL REMEMBRANCE.
Being fully certain that the salutary mystery of the redemption and the divine virtue are contained
in the Sign of the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, the faithful of the primitive Church made the most
frequent use of this sign, as we learn from the most ancient and notable monuments. It was even by
this sign that they began all their actions.
“At all our steps, all our motions, our incomings and outgoings, lighting the lamps, sitting down to
table, taking a seat; whatever we do, or whithersoever we go, we mark our foreheads with the Sign of
the Cross,” says Tertullian.
Considering these things, we have judged proper to reawaken the piety of the faithful towards the
salutary sign of our Redemption, by opening the heavenly treasures, in order that, imitating the
beautiful example of the early Christians, they may not blush at making frequently, openly, and
publicly the Sign of the Cross, which is the standard of the Christian militia.
Therefore, confiding in the mercy of the Almighty God, and in the authority of His blessed apostles,
Peter and Paul, we grant, in the accustomed manner of the Church, to all and every one of the faithful
of both sexes, every time that, at least, contrite in heart, and adding the invocation of the Blessed
Trinity, they make the sign of the cross, fifty days indulgence for the penances which would have been
imposed or that they should do for any reason whatever; we moreover grant mercifully in the Lord,
that these indulgences may be applied, in the way of suffrage, to the souls who have departed this life
in the grace of God. Notwithstanding all things to the contrary, these presents shall be in perpetuity.
It is also our will that the same credit be given to any written or printed copy of these presents,
signed by a public notary, having the seal of an ecclesiastical dignitary, as would be given to these
presents themselves, if they were shown or exhibited.
Also, that a copy of these letters be taken to the Office of the Secretary of the Sacred Congregation
of Indulgences and Holy Relics, under pain of nullity, conformably to the decree of the said
Congregation, dated January 19th, 1756, approved by our predecessor of holy memory, Pope Benedict
XIV, the 28th of the same month and the same year.
Given at Rome, at St. Peter’s, under the ring of the Fisherman, the 28th of July, 1863, the eighteenth
of our Pontificate.
N. CARDINAL PARACCIANI CLARELLI
These present apostolic letters, in the form of a Brief, dated July 28th, 1863, were presented at the
Office of the Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences on the 4th of August of the same
year, conformably to the decree of the same Sacred Congregation, under date of the 14th of April,
1856.
In testimony of which, given in Rome at the same Office, the day and year as mentioned above.
ARCHBP. PRINZIVALLI, Substit.
____________________
xiii
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
of The Sign of the Cross by Mgr. Jean-Joseph Gaume
In the month of November of the year 1862, a young German Catholic – Frederic – of great distinction, arrived in
Paris to pursue his studies in the College of France. Faithful, according to the traditional usage of his country,
to make the Sign of the Cross before and after meals, he, on the first day, became the wonder of his school-companions. The next day, in virtue of the freedom of worship, he was the object of their mockeries. In one of his visits he begged us to tell him what we thought of the practice, of which his companions were trying to make him ashamed, and of the Sign of the Cross in general.
The following letters are intended as an answer to those two questions from Frederic.
______________________
Note in the early 21st century by the Catholic who did this particular electronic format
To follow are the 23 Letters from Msgr J J Gaume to Frederic [the young German student in
Paris], back in the 19th century. While each Letter was for the edification and spiritual benefit of
Frederic, these Letters provide that same edification and spiritual benefit for all Catholics of all ages.
Little less than 150 years after Frederic, the world has become a far more spiritually dangerous
place in which the Faith is not only challenged at every turn, but actually desecrated by a global
society controlled by perniciously evil anti-Catholic persons.
Feel free to disseminate this book now in its unbound format in which photocoping is convenient.
It may also be possible to obtain this paper in electronic format from origins@ev1.net or by going to
the web site http://users2.ev1.net/~origins
Oremus

---

The Sign of the Cross – 23 Letters to Frederic from Msgr. Jean-Joseph Gaume – 1862 A.D.
1
FIRST LETTER
State of the question — The present world does not make the Sign of the Cross, or makes it seldom, or makes it badly —
The primitive Christians made it, they made it frequently, they made it well — We are right and they were wrong, or we are wrong and they were right – which is true? Paris, November 25th, 1862
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Scarcely fifteen days have elapsed since the newspapers announced the shipwreck of Captain
Walker. This account, which we read together, was so much the more sorrowful, as by it we learned
the death of many of the passengers with whom we were acquainted.
The vessel had struck upon a rock; the waves rushed in through the breach. Notwithstanding the
efforts of the sailors, it was impossible to close it. In less than an hour the hold was flooded. The ship
visibly sank below the water-line.
In the hope of saving it, they began to throw all the merchandise into the sea. After the
merchandise, the munitions of war, the furniture and part of the rigging. Then followed the provisions,
excepting two or three casks of water, and a few bags of biscuits. All was useless. The vessel
continued to sink, and its total wreck became imminent. As the last resource, Walker ordered the
lifeboats to be lowered; every one rushed into them. Unfortunately, the greater number, instead of
safety, found there a watery grave.
With a few variations, this is, as you know, the history of every great shipwreck. The unfortunate
men, who, in such an extremity command the vessel, are perfectly excusable in casting into the sea
everything that they can make away with. Life before everything.
The world of our day, that world which still calls itself Christian, and to which, no doubt, your
young companions belong, presents more than one point of resemblance to a vessel damaged and about
to perish. The furious tempests, which for a long time have incessantly beaten upon the vessel of the
Church, I have made large breaches in it, through which have entered many waves of antichristian
doctrines, morals, customs and tendencies.
Woe, not to the vessel, which is imperishable, but to the passengers, who are not so! What has it
done? I speak not of the world openly pagan; its shipwreck is consummated. I speak of the world
which still pretends to be Christian. What has it done, what does it continue to do every day with the
munitions of war and the provisions of life, with the merchandise, furniture and rigging with which the
Church had supplied the vessel, that, notwithstanding the dangers of rocks and tempests, it might be
assured of a successful voyage into the port of eternity?
It has thrown them all, or nearly all, into the sea. Where are the prayers that were formerly said in
common in families? In the sea. Pious reading and meditation? In the sea. The blessing at meals? In the
sea. The habit of assisting daily at the Holy Sacrifice, the use of the scapular, and the beads? In the sea.
The serious sanctification of the Sunday, by assisting at all the offices and instructions, by visiting the
poor, the sick and the afflicted? In the sea. The regular reception of the holy sacraments, the obedience
to the laws of fast and abstinence? In the sea. The spirit of simplicity, of mortification, of modesty in
dress, amusement, furniture, food and lodging? Where are the crucifix, holy images, holy, water in
apartments? In the sea, all in the sea. And the vessel still continues to sink.
The Christian spirit is diminishing; the contrary spirit is increasing. They cast themselves into
skiffs, that is to say, into some kind of religion, which they make to suit their age, position,
temperament and taste, and they live in this way. Assisting at a Low Mass on Sunday; and how? At
High Mass, three or four times a year; at Vespers, never. Frequenting theatres and balls, reading
The Sign of the Cross – 23 Letters to Frederic from Msgr. Jean-Joseph Gaume – 1862 A.D.
2
everything that falls in their way, refusing themselves nothing but what they cannot get; — behold the
frail skiffs to which they entrust their salvation!
Can we be amazed at so many shipwrecks? Poor passengers, separated from the vessel, how much
you are to be pitied! How much more to be pitied is the rising generation! Among the Catholic customs
so imprudently abandoned by the present world, is one, precious among all others, which I would wish,
at every hazard, to save from shipwreck. It is that which your companions despise, without being
aware of it: I mean the Sign of the Cross.
It is time to provide for its preservation. Yet a little while, and it shall have met the fate of so many
other traditional practices, which we owe to the maternal solicitude of the Church, and to the intelligent
piety of Christian ages.
Would you wish to know, dear Frederic, what is now the Sign of the Cross with those who pretend
to be Christians? Place yourself on a Sunday at the door of a large church. Look at the crowd that
enters the house of God. A great number advance haughtily or foolishly, it is all the same, into the holy
place, without even casting a glance at the holy water font, and without making the Sign of the Cross.
As great a number pretend to take or receive holy water, and make the Sign of the Cross. You will see
them dip their gloved hand into the holy water font, a thing as much against the liturgy, as to go to
Confession or Holy Communion with gloves on.
As to their manner of making the Sign of the Cross, it would be better to say nothing about it; it is
capable of puzzling the most learned explainer of hieroglyphics. A motion of the hand, careless,
hurried, mechanical, and imperfect, to which it is impossible to assign a form, or give a signification,
unless that the actors themselves do not attach the least importance to what they do; — behold their
Sign of the Cross every Sunday.
Among that crowd of Christians you will scarcely meet any who make this venerable sign of
salvation carefully, correctly, and religiously. If, then, in a public place and under such solemn
circumstances, the greater number of persons do not make the Sign of the Cross, or make it badly, I
can scarcely persuade myself that they make it, and make it well, in other cases, where there are,
apparently, fewer motives to do so.
It is, then, an indisputable fact, that the Christians of our day do not make the Sign of the Cross, or
make it but seldom, and very carelessly.
In this point, as in so many others, we are diametrically opposed to our ancestors, the Christians of
the primitive Church. They made the Sign of the Cross, they made it well, they made it very often. In
the East as well as in the West, in Jerusalem, in Athens, and in Rome, the old and the young, the rich
and the poor, priests and laymen, all classes of society, religiously observed this traditional custom.
History affirms nothing more strongly. All the Fathers of the Church who were eye-witnesses, assert it,
all historians prove it. Nothing would be easier than to cite their words. You will find them in the work
De Cruce, by your learned countryman, Gretzer.
In the name of all, hear the words of Tertullian:
At every motion and every step, entering in or going out, when dressing, bathing, going to meals,
lighting the lamps, sleeping or sitting, whatever we do, or whithersoever we go, we mark our
foreheads with the Sign of the Cross.
From this we are to understand, that at every moment our ancestors made the Sign of the Cross in
one way or another, that they made it not only on the forehead, but also on the eyes, mouth, and breast.
Hence it follows, that if the first Christians were to reappear in our houses or public places, and do today
what they did eighteen centuries ago, we should be tempted to regard them as lunatics. So true it
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is, that in the use of the Sign of the Cross we are directly opposed to them. They were wrong, and we
are right; or they were right, and we are wrong; either the one or the other; there is no medium. Which
is true?
Such is the question. It is grave, very grave; much more so than your companions, and those like
them, think. I hope to convince you of this in my succeeding letters.
________________
SECOND LETTER
Examination of the question — Prepossessions in favor of the early Christians — First prepossession, their lights —
Second, their sanctity — Third, the practice of true Christians in every age — Were the Fathers of the Church great geniuses? November 27th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
In ordinary cases, the exterior circumstances play an important part. They often have the value of
direct testimonies in contributing to form the opinion of judges. You know that they thus examine the
antecedents, position, and moral character of persons interested in the debate. Why should we pass
them over in the case which occupies us? Therefore, before adducing the motives of the early
Christians drawn from the very nature of the Sign of the Cross, let us examine together the
prepossessions which militate in favor of their conduct.
First prepossession in favor of the early Christians: — They were contemporary with the apostles.
The apostles had conversed with the Incarnate Word Himself, the Truth in person. They had seen Him
with their eyes and touched Him with their hands. They were the depositaries and infallible organs of
His doctrine. They had been commanded to teach it fully and entirely, nothing more, nothing less. In
their turn, the primitive Christians had seen and heard the apostles, and their disciples. From their lips
they had received the faith, from their hands, baptism. They had imbibed truth at its very fountain.
With this truth, to which they owed everything, they nourished themselves; they made it the rule of all
their actions, and preserved it with inviolable fidelity; perseverantes in doctrina apostolorum.
Evidently, none have had better opportunities of knowing the thoughts of the apostles, and even of our
Savior Himself.
If then the primitive Christians made the Sign of the Cross at every instant, we are forced to
conclude that they obeyed an apostolic recommendation; otherwise the apostles and their immediate
successors, the infallible guardians of the triple deposit of faith, morals, and discipline, would have
speedily interdicted a useless and superstitious custom, so well calculated to expose the neophytes to
the mockery of the ignorant pagans. Therefore, I repeat it, in making so frequently the Sign of the
Cross, the Christians of the primitive Church acted on very good reasons. This is the first
prepossession in favor of their conduct.
Second prepossession in favor of the primitive Christians: — Their sanctity. Not only were they
well instructed in the doctrine of the apostles, but they were, moreover, most faithful to put it in
practice. The proof of this is that they were very holy. Nothing is more clearly established, than that a
high degree of sanctity was the general character of the early Christians.
First, they preferred to lose everything, their property and life itself, in the midst of tortures, rather
than offend God. Their heroism lasted as long as the persecutions, that is, for three centuries.
Secondly, they were very charitable. Heaven and Earth have united in eulogizing their mutual
love, unparalleled in the annals of the world. They had but one heart and one soul: Cor unum et anima
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una, has God himself said. Behold how they love one another, and how ready they are to die for one
another! Vide ut invicum se diligant et ut pro a1terutro mori sint parati! exclaimed the pagans.
Thirdly, they were filled with respectful love for the apostles, whom they obeyed with filial
submission.
Saint Paul, who paid no compliments, writes to the Christians of Rome, that their faith is
celebrated throughout the entire world; and to those of Asia, that they loved him so much, that had it
been possible, they would have plucked out their eyes to give them to him. At his request, all the
churches fly to the help of the brethren of Jerusalem, and Philemon receives Onesimus. Fourthly, the
Fathers of the Church, who were eye-witnesses, have continually rendered the most brilliant testimony
to their sanctity. Addressing himself to the judges, prætors, and proconsuls of the Empire, Tertullian
gave them this solemn challenge:
I appeal to your law processes, O magistrates charged with the administration of justice. Among
the multitudes of accused who are daily arraigned at the bar of your tribunals, is there a poisoner,
an assassin, a profaner, a corrupter, or a thief, who is a Christian? It is your people who fill
your prisons; it is yours that fill the mines; it is yours that
fatten the beasts of the Amphitheatre, it is yours who form your
troops of gladiators. Among them there is not one Christian,
unless he be there for the sole crime of Christianity.1
Fifthly, the pagan historians recognized their innocence, and their very persecutors rendered
homage to their virtue. Tacitus, that author far too exacting and unjust with regard to our fathers,
relates the frightful butchery of the Christians under Nero. “An immense multitude,” says he,
“multitudo ingens, perished amid the most frightful torments. They were innocent of that with which
they were charged, but they were worthy of the hatred of mankind, odio generis humani.” Behold the
word!
What was this mankind of Tacitus? He himself tells us: — It was living filth, living cruelty. What
caused its hatred? Because evil is the irreconcilable enemy of good. The sanctity of our fathers was the
relentless condemnation of the monstrous crimes with which the pagans sullied themselves. Thence
came Nero’s butchers and his living torches.
Forty years after Nero, Pliny the Younger, governor of Bithynia, is charged by Trajan to inform
against the Christians. Zealous courtier, he rigorously executes his master’s orders, and causes our
ancestors to be sought after. When put to the torture, he himself interrogates them. What is the result of
his bloody proceedings? Writes he to Trajan,
All the crime of the Christians consists in assembling together on a certain day before dawn, in
order to sing the praises of Christ as of a God; in binding themselves by oath not to commit any
crime, but to fly theft, robbery, adultery and perjury. I have caused them to be put to the
torture, and have found them guilty of nothing but an evil and
excessive superstition.2
I have been expatiating, my dear Frederic, on the sanctity of our ancestors. In my mind, it forms
the most powerful prepossession in favor of the Sign of the Cross. When men of this character, living
in the face of death, show themselves invariably faithful to a usage, it must be that that usage is a little
more important than your new companions believe.
1 Apol., c. 44.
2 Epist., lib. x, epist. 97.
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Third prepossession in favor of the primitive Christians: — The practice of true Christians in the
following centuries.
At a very early period there began to be formed, both in the East and in the West, religious
communities of men and of women. It is in those asylums, separated from the world, that we find the
true spirit of the Gospel and the pure tradition of apostolic teachings, if not permanent, at least
perpetuated with the greatest fidelity. The Sign of the Cross figures among the number of ancient
customs preserved with jealous care. Writes one of their historians:
Our fathers, the ancient monks practiced the Sign of the Cross most frequently and religiously.
They made it principally at rising, retiring to bed, before their work, in coming out of their cells
and the monastery, or returning into it; they made it at table, over the bread, the wine and every
dish.3
In the world, in like manner, we find the traditional usage of this saving sign. All those great men,
who, during more than five hundred years succeeded one another in the East and in the West; those
incomparable geniuses whom we call the Fathers of the Church — Tertullian, Cyprian, Athanasius,
Gregory, Basil, Augustine, Chrysostom, Jerome, Ambrose, and so many others who swell the list so
terrible to pride, which it crushes by its weight; all those great intelligences practiced the Sign of the
Cross most assiduously, and they incessantly recommended all Christians to make it on every
occasion.
I have called the Fathers of the Church great geniuses and great men. If, as such, you compare
them to your companions, expect a smile of pity; be not angry with them. Poor young men! They know
the Fathers of the Church as they know their antipodes. In your turn, ask them what they understand by
great men. In default of their reply, here is mine; it may be useful to you. I call great men those, who,
by the elevation, depth and extent of their genius, embrace the immense horizons of the world of truth;
who know sciences, men, and things, not on the surface, but in their principles, end, and intimate
nature; not only the matter below, but the spirit above; not only the man, but the angel; not only the
creature, but the Creator; not only what is on this side of the grave, but what is beyond it; not one
detail, but the whole; not one isolated law of creation, but the whole system, from which they cause to
spring, unexpectedly, luminous applications for the perfection of humanity.
Behold genius, and behold the Fathers of the Church! You can challenge your companions to find
among the ancients or modern, any who have verified better, or as well, the definition of a great man.
However renowned they may be in particular departments, in chemistry, physic, mechanics, or art,
they are neither geniuses nor great geniuses. The man whose ideas embrace only one law, secondary to
universal harmony, deserves not the name of genius; no one calls great the musician who can draw but
one sound from his instrument, but only him who strikes harmoniously every chord.
Time does not permit me to finish my letter tonight; I will resume it tomorrow.
________________
3 Martène. De antiq. monach. ritib., Lib. i, c. i, n. 25, etc.
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THIRD LETTER
Continuation of the Third Prepossession: the doctors of the east and the west — Constantine, Theodorus, Charlemagne, St.
Louis, Bayard, Don John of Austria, Sobieski — Fourth Prepossession: the conduct of the Church — fifth, those who do
not make the Sign of the Cross — Summary. November 28th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Now, then, my dear friend, all those great geniuses, without any exception, made the Sign of the
Cross like little children.
They made it frequently, and unceasingly recommended Christians to make use of it on every
occasion. “To make the Sign of the Cross,” says one of them, “over those who place their hope in Jesus
Christ, is the first and best known thing amongst us, primum est et notissimum.1 Another: “The Cross is
found everywhere; with princes and their subjects, with men and women, with slaves and freemen; and
all mark it on the most noble part of the body, the forehead . . . Never cross the threshold of your
houses without saying, I renounce Satan, and devote myself to Jesus Christ; accompanying these
words with the Sign of the Cross: cum hoc verbo et crucem in fronte imprimas.2
Another says: “We should make the Sign of the Cross at each action of the day, Omne diei opus in
signo facere Salvatoris.”3 Others again: “Let the Sign of the Cross be continually made on the heart, on
the mouth, on the forehead, at table, at the bath, in bed, coming in and going out, in joy and sadness,
sitting, standing, speaking, walking; in short, in all our actions, verbo dicam in omni negotio. Let us
make it on our breasts and all our members, that we may be entirely covered with this invincible armor
of Christians; armemur hac insuperabili christianorum armatura.”4
Even to their last sigh, confirming their words by their example, we see those great geniuses die,
like the illustrious Chrysostom, the king of eloquence, in making the Sign of the Cross. Formed in their
school, the noblest Christians follow in their footsteps.
Speaking of St. Paula, the grand-daughter of the Scipios, Saint Jerome says: “When she was at the
point of death, and we could with difficulty hear her speak, she placed her thumb on her mouth, and,
faithful to usage, imprinted the Sign of the Cross upon her lips.”5
Let us go back some centuries, and point out some brilliant links in the traditional chain. Without
speaking of those immortal emperors, legislators, and warriors, Constantine, Theodosius and
Charlemagne, so faithful to the use of the Sign of the Cross, let us come to the greatest of our kings, St.
Louis. His friend and historian, the Sire de Joinville, has left us the following testimony: “At table, in
the council, in the combat, and in every action, the king always began by the Sign of the Cross.”6
Bayard, the knight “without fear and without reproach,” is mortally wounded. Worthy of his life, his
last act is the Sign of the Cross, which he makes with his sword. Represented by two fleets of more
than four hundred ships, the Catholic and Mussulman powers meet each other in the Gulf of Lepanto.
On the combat depends the safety of civilization or the triumph of barbarism. The destinies of Europe
are in the hands of Don John of Austria. Before giving the signal for attack, the Christian hero makes
the Sign of the Cross. All the commanders repeat it, and Islamism suffers a defeat from which it never
recovers.
1 S. Basil. De Sp. S. c. xxvii.
2 S. Chrys., Quod Christus sit Deus: et Homil. Xxi, ad popul. Antioch.
3 S. Ambr., Ser. XLIII.
4 S. Gaudent. Epics. Brixien., Trait de lect. Evang.; S. Cyril. Iiier., Catech., iv. N. 14; S. Ephrem. De Panoplia.
5 Ad Eustoch. De epitaph Paulæ.
6 Vic. c. xv.
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Nevertheless, a century later, it tries to repair its defeat. Its innumerable hordes advance even to
the walls of Vienna. Sobieski is called. Compared with those of the enemy, his forces are nothing. But
Sobieski is a Christian. Before descending into the plain, he makes the Sign of the Cross on his army;
he himself forms a living sign, by hearing Mass with his arms extended in the form of the Cross. It was
there, says a Christian warrior, that the Grand Vizier was overcome.
I should never conclude, my dear friend, were I to cite, one after the other, all the facts which
prove the perpetuity and frequent use of the Sign of the Cross among the true Christians of every age
and condition, in the world as in the cloister; in the East as in the West. Does not this glorious tradition
form a passably respectable proof in favor of our ancestors of the primitive Church? What do your
young companions think of it?
Fourth prepossession in favor of the primitive Christians: — The usage of the Church. Ages roll
by, and with the times, men change. Laws, customs, fashions, language, manners of seeing and
judging, all are modified. The Church alone changes not. Immutable as truth, of which she is the
mistress, that which she taught, that which she did yesterday, she teaches, she does today; she will
teach, she will do tomorrow and always.
What are her thoughts, what is her conduct with regard to the Sign of the Cross? There is no point
on which her divine immutability is more clearly manifested. For eighteen centuries we may say the
Church has lived on the Sign of the Cross. She has not, for a single instant, ceased to employ it. She
commences, continues, finishes everything by this sign. Among all her practices, the Sign of the Cross
is the principal, the most ordinary, the most familiar. It is the soul of her exorcisms, prayers and
benedictions.
What we see her do in our sight, in our basilicas, she did in that of our fathers in the Catacombs.
“Without the Sign of the Cross,” say they, “nothing is done validly, nothing is perfect, nothing is
holy.”7
The power of the Church, like that of her divine Founder, is exercised on creatures, and on man. It
extends to Heaven and Earth: Data est mihi omnis potestas in coelo et in terra. How does she exercise
it? By the Sign of the Cross. All that she destines for her use — water, salt, bread, wine, fire, stone,
wood, oil, balm, linen, silk, brazen figures, precious metals — all that belongs to her children; their
dwellings, fields, flocks, implements of labor, the inventions of their industry — she takes possession
of all by the Sign of the Cross.
If she wishes to prepare an earthly dwelling for the God of Heaven, first of all, the Sign of the
Cross must consecrate the site of the edifice. “Let no one,” say the Councils, “dare to build a Church
without calling the Bishop to the place, that he may make the Sign of the Cross” there, in order to
chase away the demons.8
The Sign of the Cross is the first thing she employs to bless the materials of the temple. She traces
it twenty times upon the pavement, on the pillars, on the altar. To render it permanent, she makes it of
iron, and places it on the summit of the edifice. When her children come into the house of God, what
do they do before crossing the threshold? They make the Sign of the Cross.
By what do the chiefs of prayer, the bishops and priests, begin to celebrate the praises of the Most
High? By the Sign of the Cross. Writes an ancient liturgist:
7 S. Cypr. De bapt. chr. — S. Aug., Tract 128, in Joan., n. 5.
8 Novella V. paragraph 1. Cap. Nemo de Consecrat. dist. 1.
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When at the beginning of the Office we make the Sign of the Cross, saying the words, O God,
come to my aid, it is as if we would say thy Cross, O Lord, is our help; the hand makes to
thee the Sign of it, and the tongue prays to thee in it. The demon is the chief of the enemies of our
salvation; he governs the world, he flatters the flesh in order to allure us. If then, O Lord,
thou wilt aid us by thy Cross, he and all our enemies shall
be put to flight.9
See principally the conduct of the Church towards man, the living temple of the Blessed Trinity.
The first thing she makes over him after his birth is the Sign of the Cross; the last, when he returns to
the bosom of the Earth is again the Sign of the Cross. Behold her first greeting, and her last farewell to
the child of her tender affection!
Within the time that intervenes between the cradle and the grave, how many times is the Sign of
the Cross made on man?
At his baptism, in which he is made the child of God, the Sign of the Cross; at his Confirmation, in
which he becomes the soldier of virtue, the Sign of the Cross; in the Holy Eucharist, in which he is fed
with the bread of angels, the Sign of the Cross; in Extreme Unction, in which he is strengthened for the
last combat, the Sign of the Cross; in Holy Orders and Matrimony, in which he is associated to the
paternity of God Himself, the Sign of the Cross. Always and everywhere, now as in former times, in
the East as in the West, the Sign of the Cross is made on man.10
All this is yet nothing. Behold what the Church does, when, in the person of the priest, she ascends
the altar. Armed with omnipotence which has been given her, she comes to command, no longer a
creature, but the Creator; no longer a man, but God. At her voice, the heavens are opened; the Word
again becomes incarnate, and renews all the mysteries of His life, death, and resurrection. Is there an
act which ought to be performed with more solemn gravity? An act from which should be more
carefully banished everything that might be foreign or superfluous?
Now, in the course of this, the action, by excellence, the Church, more than ever, multiplies the
Sign of the Cross; she clothes herself with the Sign of the Cross; she goes through it with the Sign of
the Cross; she repeats it so frequently, that the number of times would seem to be exaggerated, were it
not so profoundly mysterious. Do you know how many times the priest makes the Sign of the Cross
during Mass? He makes it forty-eight times! I am wrong; throughout the whole of the august sacrifice,
the priest is himself a living Sign of the Cross.
And the Catholic Church, the grave teacher of nations, the great mistress of truth, does she amuse
herself by repeating so frequently, in her most solemn act, a sign, useless, superstitious, or of minor
importance? If your companions believe this, they are wrong to call themselves unbelievers: it is not
credulity that is wanting to them.
The conduct of the Church and of true Christians in every age, is, then, a victorious prepossession
in favor of our primitive ancestors.
Fifth prepossession in favor of the early Christians: — Those who do not make the Sign of the
Cross.
There are on earth six classes of beings that do not make the Sign of the Cross.
9 Reasons for the Office, etc. p. 270.
10 S. Chrys., in Math. homil. 54, n. 4. S. Augus. in Joan. tract., 128, n. 5.
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First, pagans: — the Chinese, Hindoos, Tibetans, Hottentots, and the savages of Oceanica, adorers
of monstrous idols, nations most deeply degraded, yet not the less unhappy — they do not make the
Sign of the Cross.
Second, the Mahometans: swine by sensuality, tigers by cruelty, automata, by fatalism, — they do
not make the Sign of the Cross.
Third, the Jews: — deeply encrusted with a thick layer of superstition, the living petrifaction of a
fallen race — they do not make the Sign of the Cross.
Fourth, Heretics: — impertinent sectaries, who have pretended to reform the work of God, who, in
punishment of their pride, have lost even the last remnant of truth.
“I affirm,” said one of your Prussian ministers lately, “that I could write on my thumb nail all that
remains among Protestants of common belief:” — Protestants do not make the Sign of the Cross.
Fifth, bad Catholics, renegades to their baptism, slaves of human respect, haughty in their
ignorance, who speak of everything, yet know nothing; adorers of the god of their belly, of the god of
the flesh, of the god of matter; whose private life is like a sullied garment — they do not make the Sign
of the Cross.
Sixth, beasts, bipeds and quadrupeds of all kinds: — dogs, cats, asses, mules, camels, owls,
crocodiles, oysters, hippopotamuses — they do not make the Sign of the Cross.
Such are the six classes of beings that do not make the Sign of the Cross.
If, before tribunals, the moral character of the plaintiffs or defendants contributes powerfully to
form the opinions of the judges, even before the examination of the cause, I leave you to judge whether
the character of the beings who do not make the Sign of the Cross is a small prepossession in favor of
the early Christians.
In a word, with regard to the frequent use of the Sign of the Cross, the world is divided into two
opposite parties.
For it: — The admirable Christians of the primitive Church; the holiest and greatest geniuses of
the East and the West; the true Christians of every age; the Church herself, the Mistress of truth.
Against it: — Pagan, Mahometans, Jews, Heretics, bad Catholics, and beasts.
It seems to me that you can already decide; moreover, your convictions shall be more strongly
confirmed, when you learn the motives which justify the one, and condemn the other.
I will reveal them in the following letters.
________________
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FOURTH LETTER
Answer to one objection, the times are changed — Reasons in favor of the primitive Christians, drawn from the very nature
of the Sign of the Cross — The Sign of the Cross is five things — A divine sign which ennobles man — Proofs that it is
divine. November 29th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
“As for me,” I hear you say, my dear Frederic, “the question is decided. Never will I believe that
God has given truth and good sense to His enemies, and at the same time condemned his best friends to
error and superstition.”
This avowal rejoices, yet does not surprise me. Your mind seeks the truth, and your heart does not
reject it. If all were in the like dispositions, the apologist’s task would be easy. Unfortunately, it is
otherwise. In the greater part of controversies, particularly religious controversies, men, argue not
according to reason, but according to their passions. They combat, not for truth, but for victory. Sad
victory, which more strongly confirms them in the slavery of error and vice!
What I know of your companions, and so many other pretended Catholics of our day, gives me
reason to fear they are ambitious for this fatal victory alone. I love them too much not to contest it with
them. In order to remove the bandage with which they cover their eyes, as well as to strengthen yet
more your own convictions, I shall expose the intrinsic reasons which justify the inviolable fidelity of
true Christians to the frequent use of the Sign of the Cross.
Let us first do justice to the great object of modern contemners of the adorable Sign. “Other times,
other manners,” say they. “What was useful, nay, even necessary in the first ages of the Church, is not
so now. Times are changed; we must live according to the manners of the day.”
St Paul answers them: Jesus Christ yesterday, and today and the same forever.
Tertullian adds: The Incarnate Word calls Himself Truth, and not custom. Truth, then changes not.
What the apostles, the Christians of the primitive Church, and the true Christians of every age have
held to be useful, and to a certain extent, even necessary, has not now ceased to be so. I dare even
affirm it to be more necessary now than ever.
This is on account of the many points of resemblance which exist between the situation of the
primitive Christians, and that of the Christians of the nineteenth century.
What was the situation of our forefathers of the primitive Church? They were in the midst of a
world which was not Christian, which did not wish to become so, and which persecuted those who
persisted in being so.
And are not we in the midst of a world that is losing Christianity, that does not wish to return to it,
and that persecutes, sometimes by violence, those who persist in professing it?
If, in a like situation, the first Christians, formed in the school of the apostles, regarded as
necessary the frequent use of the Sign of the Cross, why should we abandon it? Are we stronger or
more skilful? Are our dangers less great, our enemies less numerous or perfidious? To propose such
questions is to decide them. Let us proceed.
Until now, my dear Frederic, I have established only the exterior circumstances of the cause: it is
necessary now to examine it in its depth, by adducing reasons drawn from the very nature of the Sign
of the Cross.
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For you, for me, for all sensible men, they may be summed up as follows: — We are children of
the dust, the Sign of the Cross is a divine Sign, which ennobles us; we are ignorant, it is a book which
instructs us; poor, it is a treasure which enriches us; soldiers, it is a weapon which puts the enemy to
flight; travelers on the way to Heaven, it is a guide that conducts us.
Assume the insignia of a judge, ascend your tribunal, and hear the cause.
We are children of the dust; the Sign of the Cross is a divine sign, which ennobles us.
Tell me who is that being that comes into the world weeping; who crawls like the worm, who, like
the smallest animal is subject to every infirmity, and for even a longer time than it, is incapable of
supplying his own wants?
Let the man who is called prince, king, or emperor; the woman who is called countess, duchess, or
empress, be not too proud.
One glance backward will tell them who that being is: it is man; a worm of the Earth in the cradle,
the food of worms in the tomb.1
That being so low, so useless, and during the first stages of his existence, so ignominiously
confounded with the weakest and vilest of animals, is, moreover, but too much inclined by his instincts
to resemble them. Nevertheless, that being is the image of God, the king of creation; he must not
degrade himself. God touches him on the forehead, and imprints a Divine Sign which ennobles him.
Nobility imposes obligations. Respected by others, he will respect himself.
This patent of nobility, this divine mark, is the Sign of the Cross. It is divine, since it comes from
Heaven, since the owner alone has the right to stamp his property with his image. It comes from
Heaven, since Earth avows that it did not invent it. Go through every country and every age, nowhere
will you find the man that invented it, the saint that taught it, the council that imposed it. “Tradition
teaches it,” says Tertullian, “custom confirms it, faith practices it.”2
In Tertullian you hear the latter part of the second century of the Church. Saint Justin speaks for
the first, and teaches not only the existence of the Sign of the Cross, but the manner in which it was
made.3 Behold us in those primitive times, days of eternal memory, called even by heretics the “Golden
Age” of Christianity, on account of the purity of its doctrine, and the sanctity of its morals. Here, then,
we find the Sign of the Cross in full practice, in the East and the West.
Let us go back a few steps and we shall clasp hands with St. John, the last survivor of the apostles.
See the venerable old man, making the Sign of the Cross over the poisoned cup, and drinking the
deadly liquor with impunity.4
A few steps farther, and we meet his illustrious colleagues, Peter and Paul. Like John, the beloved
disciple of the divine Master, Peter and Paul, the princes of the apostles, make religiously the Sign of
the Cross, and teach it from the East to the West, in Jerusalem, Antioch, Athens, and Rome, to Greeks
and barbarians. Let us listen to an unexceptionable witness of tradition. “Paul,” says Saint Augustine,
“carries everywhere the royal standard of the Cross. He fishes for men, and Peter marks the nations
with the Sign of the Cross.”5
1 Sap. vii., 34. — Plutarch, Lib. de amore prolis.
2 Tertullian, De Coron. Mil., c. iii.
3 Quæst. 118.
4 S. Simeon, Metaph. in Joan.
5 Serm. xxviii.
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They make it not only over men, but also over inanimate creatures, and cause others to do the
same. “Every creature of God is good,” writes the great Apostle, “and nothing to be rejected that is
received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.”6
Such is the rule. What is the sense? In the study of law, if we meet with an obscure passage, what
do we do? To elucidate it, we consult the interpreter best authorized and nearest to the legislator; his
word is law.
Listen to the best authorized interpreter of St. Paul, the great Chrysostom. “Paul,” says he, “here
establishes two things; the first, that no creature is unclean; the second, that supposing it to be so, the
means of cleansing it is at hand. Make the Sign of the Cross over it, render thanks and glory to God,
and at the same instant, all uncleanness shall disappear.”7 Behold apostolic teaching!
The princes of the apostles made the Sign of the Cross not only over inanimate creatures, and the
multitudes who received the faith from them, but on themselves also. This sign, then, existed before
them. Paul the persecutor is thrown down on the road to Damascus. He must become the apostle of the
God whom he pursues. What will be the first act of that victorious God? To mark the vanquished with
the Sign of the Cross. “Go,” says He to Ananias, “go, and mark him with my sign.”8
Who then is the author and institutor of the Sign of the Cross? To find him we must go beyond all
ages, all visible creatures, all angelic hierarchies; we must rise to the Eternal Word, the Truth in
person.
Listen again to a witness who was so situated as to know it perfectly, a witness so irreproachable
that he has sealed his testimony with his blood. I mean Saint Cyprian, the immortal Bishop of
Carthage. “O Lord, Holy Priest,” exclaims he, “thou hast bequeathed to us three imperishable things:
the chalice of thy blood, the Sign of the Cross, and the example of thy sufferings.”9
Saint Augustine adds: “It is thou that hast willed this Sign should be imprinted on our
foreheads.”10
It would be easy to cite twenty other witnesses, but as I am writing letters and not books, I will
stop. The Sign of the Cross is a Divine Sign: this is the first fact established in the discussion. There is
another, of which I shall speak tomorrow.
________________
6 I Tim. 4:4-5.
7 In Tim., Homil. xii.
8 S. Aug. serm. I. et xxv. de sanctis
9 Ser. de Pass. Chr.
10 In ps. 130.
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FIFTH LETTER.
The Sign of the Cross ennobles us — It is the exclusive sign of the elite of humanity — It is the escutcheon of Catholicity
— What a Catholic is — By ennobling us, the Sign of the Cross teaches us the respect due to ourselves — Importance of
this lesson — Disgrace of those who do not make this sign — Picture of the contempt they have for themselves.
November 30th
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
I have added, my dear Frederic, that the Sign of the Cross is a Sign which ennobles. It ennobles us
because it is divine. All that is divine is ennobling. This reason alone might dispense with every other,
nevertheless, I add that it ennobles us, because it is the exclusive Sign of the élite of humanity.
Have your companions ever reflected on this?
All who do not make the Sign of the Cross, and much more, all who are so unfortunate as to blush
at it, remain confounded with Pagans, Mahometans, Jews, Heretics, bad Catholics and beasts, that is to
say, with the very dregs of creation. What do you think of this? Have we not reason to be proud of that
which distinguishes us from those who do not bear it?
A child is proud of belonging to a family venerable for its antiquity, illustrious for its services,
respected for its virtue, powerful by its riches. Again, how jealous he is of his escutcheon! He carves it
in stone, marble, silver, gold, agate or ruby; he engraves it on his dwelling, sculptures it on his
furniture, enchases it on his plate, and marks it on his linen; he bears it on his seal, would wish to carry
it on his forehead. It is painted on the panels of his carriage, and even the harness of his horses is
decorated with it. Leaving vanity aside, he is right. His conduct proclaims the eminently social law of
solidarity. The glory of their forefathers is the glory of the children; it is the family patrimony.
Being a Catholic, the Sign of the Cross is my escutcheon. It proclaims to me and to every one, the
nobility of my race, its antiquity, its services, its glories and its virtues. And I not be proud of it? I
should then deny the illustrious blood that courses through my veins! Unworthy to bear a great name, I
should basely repudiate the law of solidarity, throw my coat-of-arms into the mire, and cast to the
winds the rich inheritance of my ancestors.
Men are proud of belonging to an aristocratic nation; The Spaniard is proud of being Spanish; the
Englishman, of being English; the Frenchman of being French, and so with other great nations.
Tell me, my friend, which is the grandest, the most aristocratic nation on the globe?
It is a nation more ancient, and which, in itself alone, has a greater number of citizens than all
those I have named; a nation which, by its light, shines in the world like the sun in the firmament; a
nation essentially expansive, which, at the price of its blood, has drawn the human race out of
barbarism and, at the same price, prevents it from falling back into it again, as is proved by history and
the map of the world; a nation among whose children alone are found all that man has known as great
by genius, virtue, science and courage; whole legions of doctors, virgins, martyrs, orators, poets,
philosophers and artists; the great legislators, good kings, and illustrious warriors in every part of the
world; a nation so much the more aristocratic, that to her all others owe their superiority. No matter
what may be said or done, history points this out as the great Catholic nation. I belong to it. The Sign
of the Cross is its escutcheon, and shall I be ashamed of it?
God Himself has deigned to show, by striking miracles, how honored in His sight are the person
and the member that make the Sign of the Cross.
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Saint Editha, daughter of Edgar, King of England, from her very infancy, bore the Sign of the
Cross in her heart. This little princess, one of the most beautiful flowers of virginity that have adorned
the former Isle of Saints, did nothing without first making this salutary sign on her forehead and breast.
Having caused a church to be built in honor of St. Dionysius, she begged St. Dunstan, archbishop
of Canterbury, to come to dedicate it. He did so willingly, and in several interviews which he had with
the Saint, he was struck at seeing her make so frequently the Sign of the Cross on her forehead with the
thumb, according to the custom of the early Christians.
This devotion pleased him so much that he begged God to bless that thumb, and even to preserve
it from the corruption of the grave. His prayer was granted.
The Saint died soon after, at the age of twenty-three years, and, appearing to the holy bishop, said:
Raise my body from the tomb. You will find it incorrupt, with the exception of those members, of
which, in the levity of my childhood, I made a bad use.
Those members were her eyes, feet and hands, which, in effect, were found to be decayed, except
the thumb, with which she had so often made the Sign of the Cross.1
As regards the point of honor, were our ancestors wrong in making such frequent use of the Sign
of the Cross? Are we right in not making it?
Alas! Far different from ours was the pride of their nobility, the feeling of their dignity! By
dwelling so much on the obligations of that dignity, I do not wonder at their having established a
society, which, for the heroism of its virtues, is without parallel in the annals of the world: you will
now begin to understand it.
The first sentiment with which the Sign of the Cross inspires us is respect for ourselves, because it
ennobles us. Respect for ourselves! Dear friend, what a great thing I have said. I look around me, I see
an age, a world, a rising generation which talks incessantly of the dignity of man, of emancipation, of
liberty. These words, either void of meaning, or filled with an evil one, render the age, the world, the
generation, ungovernable. Impatient of the yoke of all authority, divine, social, civil, or parental, they
continually cry out to all they meet: “Respect me!”
Very good; but if you wish to be respected, begin by respecting yourself. The respect of others for
us is proportioned to that which we have for ourselves. Cruelty, hypocrisy, debauchery, vice gilded,
gloved, painted, plumed, spurred and crowned, may inspire fear, but can never win respect. Now, then,
the man of the day, whether he be old or young, who does not make the Sign of the Cross, does he
respect himself? Let us make a trial by autopsy.
The noblest part of man is the soul; the noblest faculty of his soul is the intelligence. Precious
vessel, formed by the hand of God Himself to receive truth, and nothing but the truth! All that is not
truth defiles and profanes it. Does the man of our day respect it? Is it truth that he deposits therein? He
has nothing but disgust for the pure sources whence it flows. Divine oracles, sermons, books of
asceticism, or Christian philosophy, fill him with loathing.
If you descend into that baptized intelligence, you will think yourself to be in a storehouse of odds
and ends. There you find jumbled together, pell-mell, ignorance, idle tales, frivolity, prejudices, lies,
errors, doubts, objections, denial, impieties, silliness and trifles. A sad spectacle, which reminds me of
1 See her Life, viii.
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an ostrich that died lately in Lyons. You know that in the autopsy, one of the stomachs of the stupid
animal was found to be a regular storehouse of old iron, ends of ropes, and pieces of wood.
Such is the intellectual nourishment of the man who does not make the Sign of the Cross. Behold
how he respects it!
And his heart? Excuse me, my dear Frederic, from revealing to you its ignominy. Its emotions,
instead of being directed upward, tend downward. Instead of soaring like the eagle, it crawls like the
worm; instead of feeding like the bee on the perfumed juice of flowers, like the stercorary fly it rests
only on filth. There is no violation of the immaculate law from which it recoils, no pollution which it
avoids; and, as you know that from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks, the throat is, like the
vent-hole of a sepulcher, full of corruption.2
And his body? Young man, who think it beneath you to make the Sign of the Cross, you believe
yourself very clever; you are to be pitied. You think yourself independent; you are a slave. You refuse
to honor yourself by doing what the élite of mankind do; by a just judgment, you shall dishonor
yourself by the most shameful acts of the dregs of humanity.
Your hand will not trace the Divine Sign on your forehead, but it will touch what it should never
touch.
You will not defend your eyes, lips, or breast with this protecting Sign; your eyes shall be sullied
by looking at what they should never see; your lips, talkative yet dumb, loquaces multi, as says a great
genius,3 shall say nothing that they should, and everything they should not; your breast, a profane altar,
shall burn with a fire the very name of which is a disgrace. This is private history. You cannot deny it;
you cannot efface it. Written here with ink, it may be read on every part of your being, written with the
blood of sin, in sanguine peccati.
And his life? The man who does not make, or who has ceased to make, the Sign of the Cross loses
all esteem of his life. He despises it, he squanders it, for he never takes it in earnest. To turn night into
day, and day into night; to work little, sleep much, fare sumptuously; to refuse nothing to his appetites;
to spend time without any regard to eternity, that is to say, in weaving cobwebs, catching flies, and
building card-castles; in a word, using his life as if he were the proprietor of it: this is not taking life in
earnest. To take life in earnest is to use it according to the will of Him who gave it to us, and who will
demand a rigorous account of it, not as a whole, but in detail; not by the year, but by the moment.
When the despiser of the Divine Sign, which would ennoble his life by inspiring him with respect
for his soul and body, is wearied with the ways of trifling and iniquity, what does he do? Alas! He but
too often throws down life as an insupportable burden. Regarding himself as a beast, for which there is
neither fear nor hope beyond the grave, he kills himself. Here, my good Frederic, how can I express to
you my sorrow? That which the apostle, ravished with admiration, said of the marvels of Heaven, —
that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive, — we must
now say with fear, shame, and trembling. No; at no epoch, in no climate, among no nation, not even
pagans or cannibals, has man ever seen or heard, or his mind conceived, what we see, hear, and touch
with our hands. What is it? Suicide. Suicide on a scale without example in history. In France alone, one
hundred thousand within the last thirty years! One hundred thousand! And they continue still to
increase!
2 Sepulcrum patens est guttur eorum. (Ps. v. 11.)
3 S. Aug. Med. xxxv. 2.
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Now, I am almost certain, without having the proof, that of those hundred thousand persons who
died in despair, more than ninety-nine thousand had lost the custom of making the Sign of the Cross
frequently, seriously, and religiously. Hold this for the thirteenth article of your Creed. More tomorrow.
________________
SIXTH LETTER
Continuation of the preceding letter — The Zign of the Cross is a book which instructs us — Creation, redemption, glorification: three words which contain all the science of god, of man, and of the world — The Sign of the Cross says these three words with authority, with clearness, with sublimity — It says them to every one, everywhere, and always.
December 1st.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
A Divine Sign, the distinctive mark of the élite of humanity, the escutcheon of the Catholic; such,
my dear Frederic, is the Sign of the Cross, considered in its first point of view. If it be true that rank
imposes obligation, I know of no means more simple, easy, and efficacious to inspire men with
sentiments of dignity and respect for themselves, than the Sign of the Cross made frequently, seriously,
and religiously. This is one of the reasons of its being.
“This sign,” says a Father of the Church, “is a powerful protection. It is gratuitous, because of the
poor; easy, because of the weak. A benefit from God, the standard of the faithful, the terror of demons;
far from causing you to despise it, its being a free gift should even increase your gratitude.”1 I add, that
its eloquence is equal to its power.
What does it say to man? We shall see. We are ignorant; the Sign of the Cross is a book which
instructs us. Creation, Redemption, Glorification; all science, theological, philosophical, social,
political, historical, divine and human, is comprised in these three words. The science of the past,
present and future, is here, and here only. These three words are the lights of the world, the bases of
intelligence; suppose, for a moment, that the world forgets them, or loses their sense, what does it
become? An agglomeration of atoms, moving in empty space, without direction or aim. It becomes
blind without guide or staff; an inexplicable mystery to itself; unhappy, without consolation; a galleyslave
without hope: — behold man, behold society!
These three words, Creation, Redemption, Glorification, are, then, more necessary to the human
race than the bread which nourishes it, or the air that it breathes. They are necessary to every one, at
every hour and always. They alone direct a life and every life, an action and every action, a word and
every word, a thought and every thought, a joy and every joy, a sadness and every sadness, a sentiment
and every sentiment. This supposed, reason says that God owed it to Himself to establish a means,
universal, easy, and permanent, by which to give to all that fundamental knowledge; to give it not
once, and for a time only, but to renew it unceasingly, as He renews, at every instant, the air which we
breathe.
To what doctor shall be given the charge of this indispensable teaching? To St. Paul, St.
Augustine, St. Thomas, or any other great genius of the East or the West? No, those doctors die, and
we must have one that is immortal. Those doctors dwell in a certain place, and we must have one that
lives everywhere. They speak a language that cannot be understood by all; we must have one who
1 S. Cyril, Hier., Catech. xiii.
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speaks intelligibly to every one, to the savage inhabitants of Oceanica, as well as to the civilized
inhabitants of the old world. Who, then, shall be our teacher? You know it; it is the Sign of the Cross.
It, and it only, fulfils all the requisite conditions. It never dies; it dwells everywhere; its language is
universal. In an instant it can give its lesson; in an instant every one can understand it.
In proof of what I assert, allow me, dear friend, to discover a mystery to you. The Incarnate Word,
whom Isaias with reason calls the Teacher of mankind, had resolved to die for us. Many kinds of death
were presented to Him; stoning, decapitation, poison, being thrown from a high place, fire, water, and
what not? Amongst all these, why did He choose the Cross? A learned theologian answered this
question many centuries ago. “One of the reasons why Infinite Wisdom has chosen the Cross is
because a slight motion of the hand is sufficient to trace upon us the instrument of the divine torture:
bright and powerful Sign, which teaches us all that we have to know, and serves as a buckler against
our enemies.”2
Behold the Sign of the Cross, duly established as the catechist of mankind! Is it true, you ask, that
it performs its functions well? In other words, that it repeats, and repeats in a becoming manner, the
three great words, Creation, Redemption, Glorification? Not only does it repeat them, but it explains
them with an authority, sublimity, and clearness which belong to it alone.
With authority — divine in its origin, it is the organ of God Himself. With sublimity and clearness
— this you shall see presently. When you place your hand on your forehead while saying, “In the
name,” using only the singular number, the Sign of the Cross teaches you the indivisible unity of the
Divine Essence. By this word alone, be you a child or servant-maid, you know more than all the
philosophers of paganism. What progress in a single, momentary act! In saying, of the Father, what a
new and immense ray of light in your intellect! The Sign of the Cross has told you that there is a
Being, the Father of all fathers, the Eternal Principle of being, from whom proceed all creatures,
celestial and terrestrial, visible and invisible.3 At this new word are dissipated the thick mists which,
during twenty centuries, concealed from the eyes of the pagan world the origin of all things.
You continue to say — and of the Son. The adorable sign also continues its teaching. It tells you
that the Father of all fathers has a Son like Himself. While making you carry your hand to your breast,
when you pronounce His name, it teaches you that this Eternal Son of God became in time the Son of
man, in the womb of a Virgin, in order to redeem man. Man is then fallen.
What brilliant light does this third word cause to rise upon your intellect! The coexistence of good
and evil on the Earth, the terrible duality which you feel within yourself; that mixture of noble instincts
and base propensities, of sublime actions and shameful ones, the necessity of struggling, the possibility
and means of rehabilitation; all those mysteries whose depth so long puzzled and perplexed the pagan
philosophers, are no longer veiled from you.
You conclude by saying — and of the Holy Ghost. This word completes the teachings of the Sign
of the Cross Thanks to it, you know that there is, in God, Unity of Essence and Trinity of Persons. You
have a just idea of the Being par excellence, the complete Being. He would not be such, were He not
one and three. If the First Person is necessarily Power, the Second necessarily Wisdom, the Third is
necessarily Love. This Love, essentially beneficent, completes the work of the Father who creates, and
of the Son who redeems; He sanctifies man and conducts him to glory.
2 Alcuin, De divin. Office. c. xviii.
3 Ephes. 3:15.
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What clear teaching for the direction of the life of nations and individuals; for kings as well as for
subjects! If Aristotle, Plato, Cicero, or any of those ancient seekers after truth; those philosophers,
legislators, and moralists exhausted by study and tormented by insolvable doubts, had heard of a
master who taught with the depth and sublimity of the Sign of the Cross, we may hold it as certain that
they would have gone to the uttermost end of the world to see him, happy to spend their lives in
listening to him.
In pronouncing the name of the Holy Ghost, you have formed the Cross. You know not only the
Redeemer, but the instrument of Redemption. Thus, while the Sign of the Cross inundates the mind
with dazzling lights, it also opens in the heart an inexhaustible source of love; a new benefit, of which I
shall speak hereafter.
In the meantime, answer me — Is it possible to teach, in fewer words, with greater eloquence, and
in more intelligible language, the three great dogmas of Creation, Redemption, and Glorification, the
pivots of the moral world, the generating principles of the human intellect?
A being created, a being destined for eternal glory, a being redeemed; — man, behold what you
are!
What do you think of this, dear friend — is not this theology? But if theology is the science of
God, of man, and of the world; if philosophy, the rational knowledge of God, of man, and of the world,
is the daughter of theology; if from theology and philosophy flow all sciences, politics, ethics, and
history; it follows from this, that the Sign of the Cross is the most learned and the least diffuse doctor
that has ever taught.
Do you wish to know what place it holds in the world? I will tell you tomorrow.
________________
SEVENTH LETTER
The place which the Sign of the Cross holds in the world — What the human race
was before it knew how to make the Sign of the Cross — What becomes of the world
when it ceases to make it — Another point of view: the Sign of the Cross is a
treasure which enriches us. December 2nd.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
They who despise or contemn the Sign of the Cross have very little suspicion of the place it holds
in the world. They belong to that class of persons so numerous in our day, who suspect nothing,
because they doubt nothing.
Lay aside, for a moment, your office of judge; give me your hand; let us make a brief tour through
the ancient and modern worlds. Let us visit, first, the brilliant ages of antiquity, in which men knew not
how to make the Sign of the Cross; and, pilgrims of truth, let us travel through the East and the West.
Memphis, Athens, Rome, three great centers of light, call us to the schools of their wise men.
What say those illustrious masters on the points most important for us to know?
Is the world eternal, or has it been created? If created, by whom was it created? Is the author of
nature matter or spirit?
Is he eternal, free, independent?
Are there many?
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Answer: Hesitation, uncertainty, flagrant contradictions.
What is good? What is evil? What is their origin? How comes it that they are found in man and in
the world?
Is there a remedy for evil, or is it incurable? What is the remedy? Who possesses it? How can we
obtain it, how apply it?
Answer: Hesitation, uncertainty, flagrant contradictions.
What is man? Has he a soul? Of what nature is that soul? Is it a fire? A breath? A spirit? Æriform
matter? Is it subject to fate? If it survives the body, what is its destiny? What is the end of its
existence?
To all these questions, and to a thousand others, the answer is, — Hesitation, uncertainty, flagrant
contradictions.
Ah! Pretended great men and great nations, who cannot give the first word of answer to these
fundamental questions — you are but great ignoramuses. What matters it to us that you can invent
systems; sharpen sophisms; overwhelm the schools, the senate, and the Areopagus with your
inexhaustible eloquence; drive chariots in the circus, build cities; join in battles, conquer provinces,
make land and sea tributary to your concupiscence? As long as you are ignorant of what you are,
whence you came, and whither you are going, you are, to use the expression of one of your own, but
fattened swine of the herds of Epicurus, Epicuri de grege porci. Such was the world before the Sign of
the Cross.
But this eloquent Sign has appeared.
All those disgraceful darknesses have been dissipated. By making it, man, whether learned or
illiterate, has learned the science of himself, of the world, and of God. By repeating it unceasingly, he
has engraven it in the very depths of his soul, in such a manner that he can never forget it. Whatever
people may say, it was owing to the frequent use of the Sign of the Cross, in all classes of society, in
the city as well as in the country, that the Catholic world, of the primitive and middle ages, preserved
in a degree unknown, either before or since, the divine science, the mother of all others, and the light
of life.
Could it be otherwise? Let a man during forty years repeat seriously, ten times a day, any error,
whatever it may be, he will end by being completely imbued and identified with it. Why should not the
same happen with the truth?
Do you desire the proof of what I advance? Let us continue our journey; come with me through
the modern world. It has abandoned the Sign of the Cross. Hence it no longer has a monitor ever at its
side to repeat at every instant those three great dogmas so necessary to its moral life. It forgets them;
they are for it as if they were not. Now, see what becomes of it with regard to science. Like the ancient
world, you hear it stammer shamefully over the very elementary principles of religion, of right, of the
family, and of propriety. What grounds of truth maintain its conversations? What are contained in its
books of politics and philosophy? By the glimmer of what light does it direct its private life?
And the newspapers, those new Fathers of the Church, what do you think of them? Among the
torrent of words which they every day pour out on society, how many sound ideas regarding God, man,
or the world, do you find?
What does it know, this modern world, this age of enlightenment, which knows no longer how to
make the Sign of the Cross? Neither more nor less than the pagans, its masters and models. The god of
self, the god of commerce, the god of cotton, the god of the dollar, the god of the belly, deus venter. It
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knows and adores the goddess of industry, the goddess of steam, the goddess of electricity. As means
to satisfy its cupidity, it knows and adores the science of matter, chemistry, physic, mechanism,
dynamics, salts, essences, sulfates, nitrates and carbonates. Behold its gods, its worship, its theology,
its philosophy, its politics, its morals, its life.
Yet a little more improvement and it will know as much as the contemporaries of Noah,
condemned to perish by the waters of the Deluge.
For them, also, all science consisted in knowing and adoring the gods of the modern world; in
drinking, eating, building, buying, selling, marrying, and being married. Man had concentrated his life
in matter. He had become flesh, ignorant as flesh, foul as flesh.1
Of all those inclinations, which is wanting to the world of our day? Although less advanced than
that of the giants, is it not of the same nature? As for the rest, nothing better can be expected from it.
Knowing no longer how to make the Sign of the Cross, or refusing to make it, it materializes itself, and
in virtue of the law of moral gravitation, falls back into the state in which it was before it knew how to
make it.
We are ignorant; the Sign of the Cross is a book which instructs us. From this new point of view,
you can judge whether our forefathers were wrong in making it incessantly.
That the deplorable ignorance of the present world may, in a great measure, be ascribed to its
abandonment of the Sign of the Cross, you shall presently see.
What is ignorance? Ignorance is poverty of the mind. In matters of religion it is more frequently
called poverty of the heart. Poverty of the heart comes from its weakness in practicing virtue and
rejecting evil. Why this weakness? Because man neglects the means of obtaining grace, or rendering it
efficacious. The first, the most familiar, prompt and easy of those means, is, as you know, prayer. Of
all prayers, the easiest, shortest, most familiar, and perhaps the most powerful, is the Sign of the Cross.
A new meditation for you, a new justification for the early Christians.
We are poor; the Sign of the Cross is a treasure that enriches us. A beggar is one who goes daily
from door to door to beg his bread. Croesus was a beggar, Alexander was a beggar, Cæsar was a
beggar, all emperors and kings, all empresses and queens were beggars; crowned beggars indeed, but
always beggars.
Who is the man, no matter how opulent we may suppose him to be, who is not obliged to say
every day at the door of the great Father of the family, Give us this day our daily bread?
Can the most potent monarch make a grain of wheat? Man has received everything, physical and
moral life, and the means of preserving both, quid habes quod non accepisti? He possesses nothing of
his own, not even one hair of his head.
Again, what he has received, has not been given him once for all. He is in want every day, every
hour, every instant. If God, the giver of all, were to withhold His gifts for a moment, man should die.
Since then man has nothing, and is in want of everything, at every instant he must beg.
From this, my dear Frederic, arises a great law of the moral world, on which, most certainly, your
young companions have never reflected. I mean the law of prayer.
1 Matt. 14:37-39. Luke 17:28. Gen. 6:12. Ibid. 3.
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The pagans of the ancient world, the idolaters and savages of the present day, have lost more or
less of the patrimony of traditionary truths, but none have lost their knowledge of the law of prayer.
Man, from his first appearance on the globe, has invariably observed it under one form or another.
Stronger than all passions, more eloquent than all sophisms, the instinct of self-preservation told
him that on his invariable fidelity to it depended his existence: it did not deceive him. On that day, on
which no prayer, either human or angelic, would be raised to God, all relations would cease between
the Creator and the creature, between the Giver and the beggar; and the flow of the river of life would,
at that instant, be suspended.
Is not this the profound mystery revealed to the world by the Incarnate Word Himself, when He
said that we ought always to pray, and not to faint, Oportet semper orare et nunquarn deficere? Take
notice how imperative are these words. The law-giver does not invite; He commands, and the
commandment is of absolute necessity, oportet. He allows of no intermission, either day or night, in
the accomplishment of the law, oportet semper. As long as man shall be a beggar in the sight of God,
so long shall the law of prayer never be modified, never recalled, never suspended; and as man must
always be a mendicant, it follows that the law of prayer shall preserve its empire unto the last day of
the world: et nunquam deficere. The physical world itself has been organized with reference to the
perpetual observance of this conserving law of the moral world. Thanks to the successive passage or
the sun over one hemisphere or the other, one-half of mankind are always awake for prayer.
Now, one of the most powerful prayers is the Sign of the Cross. All mankind have believed this.
They believed it only because they had learned it; they could have learned it only from God Himself,
from whom they have learned everything. I say all mankind, designedly. Your young companions
believe, perhaps, that the Sign of the Cross dates from Christianity, or that, at least, its use has been
limited to the Jews and Catholics. In my next letter I will show you what confidence this opinion
deserves.
________________
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EIGHTH LETTER.
The Sign of the Cross known and practiced since the beginning of the world — Contradictions only apparent — Seven
ways of making the Sign of the Cross — Testimonies of the fathers — David, Solomon, and all the Jewish nation have the
Sign of the Cross, and knew its value — Proofs. December 3rd.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Your ears and those of many others will tingle at the first sentence of my letter — the Sign of the
Cross runs back to the very beginning of the world. It has been made by all nations, even by pagans, in
their solemn prayers on important occasions, when they desired to obtain some signal favors. Let me
first remark, that between this proposition and that which I advanced in my preceding letter, there is no
contradiction. Yesterday I spoke of the Sign of the Cross in its perfect form and fully understood, such
as we practice it since the Gospel. Today I speak of the Sign of the Cross in a form, elementary though
real, and more or less mysterious to those who made it before the Gospel. An explanation seems to be
necessary. I am about to give it.
The Sign of the Cross is so natural to man, that at no epoch, among no nation, and in no form of
worship, did man ever put himself in communication with God by prayer, without making the Sign of
the Cross. Do you know of any nation who were accustomed to pray with their arms hanging down?
As for me, I do not. All those that I know, and I know the Jews, the Pagans, and the Catholics, have, in
prayer, made the Sign of the Cross.
There are seven ways of making it:
With the arms extended: man then becomes an entire Sign of the Cross.
With hands clasped, the fingers interlaced, thus forming five Signs of the Cross.
The hands joined, one against the other, the thumbs placed one over the other; again, the Sign of
the Cross.
The hands crossed on the breast; another form of the Sign of the Cross.
The arms equally crossed on the breast; fifth way of making it.
The thumb of the right hand passing under the index finger and resting on the middle one; a Sign
of the Cross much in use, as we shall see hereafter.
And finally, the right hand passing from the forehead to the breast, and from the breast to the
shoulders; a more explicit form, which you know.
Under one or the other of these forms, the Sign of the Cross has been practiced everywhere and
always, in solemn circumstances, with a knowledge more or less clear of its efficacy.
Jacob lies at the point of death. Around him stand his twelve sons, the future fathers of the twelve
tribes of Israel. Inspired by God, the holy patriarch announces to each what shall happen to him in
succeeding ages. At the sight of Ephraim and Manasses, Joseph’s two children, the old man being
moved, invokes on them all the blessings of Heaven. To obtain them, what does he do? He crosses his
arms, says the Scripture, and places his left hand on the child at his right, and his right on the one at his
left. Behold, the Sign of the Cross, the eternal token of benediction!
In this, tradition is not deceived. Jacob was the type of the Messiah. In that solemn moment,
words, attitude, everything in the patriarch was prophetic.
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“Jacob,” says St. John of Damascus, “in crossing his hands to bless Joseph’s children, forms the
Sign of the Cross; nothing is more evident.”1
Even from apostolic times, Tertullian established the same fact, and gave it the like meaning. “The
Old Testament,” says he, “shows us Jacob blessing Joseph’s children, his left hand passed over on the
head of him at his right, and the right on the head of him at his left. In this position they formed the
Sign of the Cross, and foretold the blessings of which the Crucified should be the source.”2
Let us go back to the time of the servitude in Egypt, and pass on to Moses. Having reached the
midst of the desert, the Hebrews find themselves face to face with Amalec. At the head of a powerful
army, the hostile king stops their passage. A decisive battle is inevitable. What will Moses do? Instead
of remaining in the plain, to encourage, by his voice and gesture, the battalions of Israel, he ascends the
mountain which commands a view of the battle-field. What does the lawgiver, inspired by God, do
during the combat? He makes the Sign of the Cross, nothing but the Sign of the Cross, and the Sign of
the Cross during the whole of the combat. Nowhere do we learn that he pronounces any words. With
hands open, and arms extended toward Heaven, he makes himself a living Sign of the Cross. God sees
him in this attitude, and the victory is gained.3
This is not an idle supposition. Listen again to the Fathers of the Church. “Amalec,” cries out St.
John of Damascus, “those hands extended in the form of a Cross, have vanquished thee!”4 And the
great Tertullian: “Why does Moses, at the time that Joshua is about to combat with Amalec, do what he
never did before — pray with extended arms? In a circumstance so decisive, should he not, in order to
render his prayer more efficacious, bend his knee, strike his breast, and bow his head to the dust?
Nothing of all this. Why? Because that combat of the Lord in which Amalec was delivered up a prey,
prefigured the battles of the Incarnate Word against Satan, and the Sign of the Cross, by which He was
to conquer.”5
And St. Justin, the philosopher and martyr, who lived so near the time of the apostles, says:
“Moses with extended arms, upheld by Hur and Aaron, remaining on the mountain until sunset, what is
he but a living Sign of the Cross?”6
Insensible to the miracles of the paternal solicitude, of which they were the constant objects, the
Hebrews murmur against Moses and against God. Murmurs rise to revolt, and the revolt becomes
general and obstinate. The chastisement is not long delayed, and it assumes the same characteristics.
Royal serpents, frightful reptiles whose venom burns like fire, fall upon the guilty and wound them
with their fangs. The camp is filled with the dead and dying. At the prayer of Moses, God shows them
mercy. To put the serpents to flight and heal the innumerable sick, what means will He indicate?
Prayers? No. Fasts? No. An altar? An expiatory column? Nothing of all this. He orders him to make a
Sign of the Cross, permanent and visible to all; a sign that each of the sick shall make in his heart, only
by looking at it, and such shall be the power of this sign, that one look alone shall suffice to restore
him to health. The signification of this divinely commanded sign is not doubtful. The true Sign of the
Cross, the eternally living Sign of the Cross, our Lord himself, has revealed to mankind that the sign of
1 De Fib. orthod., lib. iv. c. 12.
2 De Baptism.
3 Exod. xvii. 10.
4 De Fid. orthod., lib. iv. c. 12.
5 Contr. Marcian., bib. III.
6 Dialog. cum Tryph., n. iii.
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the desert was a figure of Himself. “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son
of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in him may not perish, but may have life everlasting.”7
If the limits of a letter permitted, we might read together the annals of this typical people, and you
would see, my dear friend, that on all important occasions, the only ones which we know well, they
had recourse to the Sign of the Cross. I will cite a few of them. In the sacrifices, the priest first raised
the victim in the manner prescribed by law. He then carried it from east to west, as we learn from the
Jews themselves; thus was made the Sign of the Cross. It was by the same motion that the high-priest,
and even the simple priests, blessed the people after the sacrifice.8
From the Jewish Church, this sign passed to the Christian. The first faithful, struck by the ancient
manner of blessing with the Sign of the Cross, were easily instructed by the apostles on its mysterious
signification, and naturally inclined to continue it, adding the divine words which explain it.
In the time of the prophet Ezechiel, the abominations of Jerusalem were at their height. A
mysterious personage, says the prophet, received orders to traverse the city, and to mark the sign T on
the foreheads of all those who mourned over the abominations of that guilty capital. By his side walked
six other persons, each armed with a deadly weapon, who were commanded to kill indiscriminately all
those not marked with the salutary sign.9
How is it possible not to see here a striking figure of the Sign of the Cross which is made on our
foreheads? Thus it is understood by the Fathers of the Church, among others, by Tertullian and St.
Jerome. “As,” say they, “the sign Thau marked on the foreheads of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, who
grieved over the crimes of that city, protected them against the exterminating angel, so also the Sign of
the Cross, marked on the forehead of a man, is an assurance that he shall not become the victim of the
demon and the other enemies of his salvation, if he really grieve over the abomination which this sign
interdicts.”10
The Philistines have reduced the Israelites to the most humiliating servitude. Samson begins their
deliverance, but, unhappily, the strength of Israel allows himself to be surprised. They load him with
chains, after having caused his eyes to be pulled out. They make a plaything of him, to amuse them at
their feasts. Samson, however, meditates revenge. He plans how, with one blow, he may be able to
destroy thousands of enemies.
Providence has so arranged things that it is by the Sign of the Cross that he shall consummate his
design. “Placed between two of the pillars that support the edifice,” says St. Augustine, “the Strength
of Israel extends his arms in the form of a cross. In this all-powerful attitude, he shakes the pillars; they
give way, he crushes his enemies; and like the Great Crucified, of whom he is the figure, he dies,
buried in his own triumph.”11
David, overwhelmed with sorrow, is reduced to the greatest extremity in which a king can find
himself. A parricidal son, revolting subjects, an unsteady throne, old age fast coming on! What does
the inspired monarch do? He prays, by making the Sign of the Cross.12
7 John 3:15.
8 Duquet. Treat. of the Cross of our Lord, c. viii.
9 Ezech. 9:4, etc.
10 Tertull., adv. Marcion., lib. iii. c. 22; S. Hier. in Ezech. c. x.
11 Serm. 107, de Temp.
12 Expandi manus meas ad te. Ps. 83, 142, etc., etc.
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Solomon finishes the Temple of Jerusalem. The magnificent edifice is consecrated with a pomp
worthy of the monarch. He wishes to draw down the blessings of Heaven upon the new dwelling of the
God of Israel, and to obtain His favors for those who will come there to pray. What does Solomon do?
He prays, by making the Sign of the Cross. “And Solomon,” says the Sacred Text, “stood before the
altar of the Lord, in the sight of the assembly of Israel, and spread forth his hands toward Heaven, and
said: Lord God of Israel, there is no God like thee in Heaven above, or on Earth beneath. . . . Have
regard to the prayer of thy servant. . . . That thy eyes may be opened on this house night and day; . . .
That thou mayest hearken to the supplication of thy servant, and of thy people Israel.”13
To believe that the patriarchs, judges, and prophets, the kings and the seers of Israel were the only
ones who knew and practiced the Sign of the Cross, would be an error. All the people knew it, and in
times of public danger made religious use of it.
Sennacherib is advancing from victory to victory. The greater part of Palestine is invaded;
Jerusalem itself is threatened. Behold, what that entire nation, men, women, and children, do to repulse
the enemy. Like Moses, they make the Sign of the Cross; become living images of that holy sign. “And
they invoked the Lord of mercies, and spreading their hands, they lifted them up to Heaven. And the
Lord quickly heard them.”14
Another danger threatens them. Heliodorus, with a numerous band of soldiers, comes to pillage
the Temple. He has already entered the exterior enclosure; yet a few moments and the sacrilege shall
be consummated. The Priests lie prostrate at the foot of the altar, but nothing stops the spoliator. What
do the people do? They have recourse to their traditional weapon; they pray, making the Sign of the
Cross. You know the rest.15
If it is incontestable that to pray with outstretched arms is one form of the Sign of the Cross, you
see that from all antiquity the Jews have known and practiced it, with a mysterious instinctive feeling
of its power. We shall see tomorrow if the pagans were much less instructed.
________________
13 3 Kings 8:22. et seq.
14 Eccl. 48:2.
15 II Machab. 3:29.
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NINTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross among pagans — Hew details of an exterior form of the Sign
of the Cross among the first Christians — The martyrs in the amphitheatre —
Etymology of the word “ adore” — The pagans adored by making the Sign of the Cross
— How they made it — First manner. December 4th.
The Sign of the Cross among the pagans; such, my friend, is the subject of this letter. In order to
follow to the end the traditional chain which unites the synagogue to the church, I am going to say a
word to you about the Sign of the Cross among the primitive Christians. You are already aware that
they made it at every instant, but are, perhaps, ignorant, that in order not to interrupt it while they were
praying, they transformed themselves into Signs of the Cross. In any case, I would wager a hundred
against one, that your companions know nothing of it.
What Moses, Samson, David, and the Israelites did only at intervals, our forefathers did always;
you will understand the reason of this. Amalec, the Philistines, Heliodorus, were passing enemies,
while the Roman giant never laid down his arms. Between our fathers and him the struggle was
continual; it was carried to the extreme; it was without respite or intermission.
Under those circumstances, each became as another Moses on the Mount. Not for one day, but
during three centuries did their hands remain extended towards Heaven, asking, like those of the
Hebrew law-giver, victory for the martyrs in the arena, and the conversion of their persecutors.
Let us hear an eye-witness speak of their thoughts and attitude in prayer. Tertullian says:
We pray with our eyes raised toward Heaven, and our hands outstretched, because they are
innocent; our heads bare, because we have nothing to blush for; without a monitor, because we
pray from the heart. In this attitude we unceasingly implore that all the emperors may have a long
life, a peaceful reign, a palace free from snares, a valorous army, a virtuous people, a tranquil
world; in a word, for all the wishes of the man and the Cæsar.1
Thus prayed, in the East and the West, men, women, children, young men, young virgins, old
men, senators, matrons, the faithful of all conditions. This mysterious attitude they kept not only in
their meetings in the depths of catacombs, in pleading the interests of others, but they also took it with
them, when, dragged into the amphitheatre, they had to fight for themselves, under the eyes of
innumerable spectators, the great combat of martyrdom. Can you, my dear friend, imagine a more
affecting spectacle than that of which Eusebius gives us a description?
The persecution of Diocletian was raging with great violence in Phoenicia. One day a great number
of Christians, condemned to the wild beasts, were to be seen entering the Amphitheatre. The spectators
shuddered with deep emotion at the sight of that multitude of children, youths, and old men, stripped of
their garments, their eyes raised to Heaven, their arms extended in the form of a Cross, standing
immovable, without fear or surprise, in the midst of ravenous lions and tigers. The fear, which ought to
have agitated the condemned, had passed into the souls of the spectators, and even of the judges.”2
That attitude was not exceptional. Let us listen again to the same historian; none is more worthy of
credit, for he was an eye-witness of what he relates. “You should have seen in the midst of the
amphitheatre,” says he, “a young man not yet twenty years of age, freed from his bonds, standing
tranquilly, his arms extended in the form of a Cross, his eyes and heart fixed on Heaven, praying with
fervor, motionless in the midst of bears and leopards, whose fury threatened instant death; then those
1 Apol., c. xxx.
2 Hist. eccl., lib. viii c. 5.
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furious beasts, ready to tear his flesh, suddenly muzzled, as it were, by a mysterious power, hastily fled
away.”3
On account of the delicacy of the victim, the West offers us a still more affecting sight. It was in
the midst of the great city of Rome. Never had such multitudes crowded the steps of the Circus. The
heroine was Agnes, a noble virgin only thirteen years old. Condemned to the fire, she ascends the
funeral pile.
Do you see her,” says St. Ambrose, “stretching her hands towards Christ, and even in the midst of
the flame erecting the victorious standard of the Lord? With hands outstretched through the flames,
she offers to God the following prayer: O Thou whom we must adore, honor, and fear: Almighty
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, I bless thee, because, thanks to thine only Son, I have escaped
from the hands of impious men, and have passed unsullied through the impurities of the demon.
And behold, moreover, that by the dew of the Holy Ghost is extinguished the fire which surrounds
me; the flames are divided, and the burning heat of my pile threatens those who have enkindled
it.”4
Such was the eloquent form of the Sign of the Cross in use among the Christians of the primitive
Church, those Moseses of the new covenant. You may see another proof of this on the paintings in the
Catacombs. This form has lasted a long time. I saw it practiced about thirty years ago, by some of the
German people. But even if this form be in disuse among the faithful, the Church religiously preserves
it. The two hundred thousand priests who every day ascend the altar, in every part of the globe, are the
visible links of that traditional chain which extends from us to the Catacombs, from the Catacombs to
Calvary, from Calvary to Raphidim, and then is lost in the night of time.
Let us speak of the pagans. They also made the Sign of the Cross. They made it in prayer, and,
with good reason, believed it to be endued with mysterious strength of great importance. Ask your
companions for the etymology of the word adore, adorare. They will not be at a loss for the answer. If
this word were a creation of the Church, you might dispense yourself from asking the question, but it is
found in the Latin of the Golden Age, as they say in colleges, and they, bachelors just fresh from
college, ought to know it.
Analyzing it, then, we find that the infinitive verb, to adore, signifies, according to all
etymologists, to bring the hand to the mouth and kiss it, manum ad os admovere. Such was the way in
which the pagans honored their gods. Proofs of this abound.
“When we adore,” says Pliny, “ we bring our right hand to our mouth and kiss it; then we describe
a circle with our body, we turn ourselves around.”5
Hear Minutius Felix: “Cecilius saw the statue of Serapis, and, according to the custom of the
superstitious people, put his hand to his mouth and kissed it.”6
NOTE — “We turn ourselves around.” What means this kind of adoration? By carrying the hand to the mouth, man pays
the homage of his person to the divinity; by turning around, he imitates the motion of the planets, and offers to the divinity
the homage of the whole world, of which the celestial bodies are the most noble portion. This manner of adoring was a part
of Sabianism, or the worship of the stars, which dates back to the farthest antiquity. According to the Pythagoreans, this
form had come from Numa, who prescribed the turning around; Circumage te cum deos adoras. “It is said,” adds Plutarch,
“that it is a representation of the revolution which the heavens make in their motion.” This profoundly mysterious practice
was wide-spread in America, before its discovery; it is still in use among the turning dervishes in the East.
3 Ibid., c. 7.
4 Lib. I. de Virgin.
5 Hist. Nat. lib. xxviii.
6 In Octav.
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Apuleius: “Until now Æmilianus has prayed to no god; he has frequented no temple. If he passes
before a sacred place, he regards it as a crime to bring his hand to his lips to adore.”7
Why did this gesture express the sovereign worship, the worship of adoration? I will tell you in
two words. Man is the image of God. God is entire in His Word; by Him He does all things. Like God,
man is entire in his word; it is by it that he does everything. To carry the hand to the mouth is to
repress the word; it is, in some sort, to be annihilated.
To do it as the pagans did, to honor the demon, was to declare themselves his vassals, his subjects,
his slaves, and even to acknowledge him as God. You see that it was an enormous crime. Hence the
remarkable words of Job, pleading his cause:
If I beheld the sun when it shined, and the moon advancing in brightness; and my heart in secret
hath rejoiced, and I have kissed my hand with my mouth: which is a very great iniquity, and a
denial against the most high God.8
This mysterious gesture was so particular a sign of idolatry that, in speaking of the Israelites who
had remained faithful, God said:
And I will leave me seven thousand men in Israel whose knees have not been bowed before Baal,
and every mouth that hath not worshipped him, kissing the hands.9
The pagans adored by carrying the hand to the mouth and kissing it: the fact is incontestable; but
you will tell me that in all this you do not see the Sign of the Cross. You shall see it presently, in the
manner of kissing the hand.
Look at that pagan, his knee bent to the ground, or his head bowed before his idols. Do you see
him passing the thumb of his right hand under the index, and resting it on the middle finger, so as to
form a cross; then devoutly kissing that cross, murmuring a few words in honor of his gods? Repeat
this gesture yourself, and you will see that the Sign of the Cross could not be better formed. That such
was the manner of the adoring kiss among many other pagans, we learn from Apuleius:
A multitude of citizens and strangers were attracted by the noise of the ravishing spectacle.
Amazed at the admirable beauty of which they were the witnesses, they carried their right hand to
their mouth, the index resting on the thumb; and by religious prayers honored it even as the
divinity.10
This manner of making the Sign of the Cross is so true and so expressive, that it remains, even in
our day, familiar to a great number of Christians in every country. It was not the only one known to the
pagans. Such of them as were the most pious, made the Sign of the Cross by joining their hands over
the breast. We find this Sign of the Cross in one of the most solemn and mysterious circumstances of
their public life. I will leave your curiosity unsatisfied until tomorrow.
Restilit et pavido, faveas mihi murmure dixit
Dux mens: et simili, faveas mihi, murmure dixi.
________________
7 Apol. I., vers. fin.
8 Job, 31:20, 27-28.
9 3 Kings, 19:18.
10 Asin. Aur., lib. iv. As to the accompanying murmur, see Ovid vi., Metamorph.
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TENTH LETTER
8econd and third way in which the Pagans made the Sign of the Cross — Testimonies
— The Pietas Publica — The Pagans acknowledged a mysterious power in the Sign of
the Cross — Whence came that belief — Great mystery of the moral world —
Importance of the Sign of the Cross in the sight of God — The Sign of the Cross
in the physical world — Words of the Fathers and of Plato — Inconsistency of the
ancient and modern Pagans — Reason of the especial hatred of the demon for the
Sign of the Cross December 10th
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Coming out of college after ten years of Greek and Latin studies, we do not know the first word of
pagan antiquity. Education continually shows us the upper side of the cards, but never the under side.
What happens in France, I have reason to believe, happens also among our neighbors. Hence it comes,
my dear friend, that the fact with which I am about to entertain you, will be for many a strange novelty.
Here it is.
When a Roman army began to lay siege to a city, the first operation of the general, whoever he
might be, whether Camillus, Fabius, Metellus, Cæsar, or Scipio, was not to dig trenches, or raise lines
of circumvaliation, but to evoke the gods, the defenders of the city, and to call them into his camp. The
formula of evocation is too long for a letter; you will find it in Macrobius.
Now then, in pronouncing it, the general made the Sign of the Cross twice; first as did Moses and
the early Christians, and as the priest does now at the altar. With hands extended towards Heaven, he
pronounced in supplication the name of Jupiter. Then, full of confidence in the efficacy of his prayer,
he devoutly crossed his hands upon his breast.1 Behold here the Sign of the Cross under two forms,
incontestable, universal, and perfectly regular.
If this remarkable fact is generally ignored, there is another a little less so. The custom of praying
with outstretched arms was familiar to the pagans of the East and West. On this point there is no
difference between them, the Jews, and ourselves. Read your classics over again.
Livy says to you: “On their knees, they raised their suppliant hands to Heaven, and to the gods.”2
Dionysius of Halicarnassus: “Brutus, hearing of the misfortune and death of Lucretia, raised his
hands to Heaven, and invoked Jupiter and all the gods.”3
And Virgil: “Father Anchises on the shore, his hands raised, invoked the great gods.”4
And Athenæus: “Darius, having heard with what regard Alexander treated his captive daughters,
stretched his hands toward the sun, and begged that if he himself were not to reign, the empire might
be given to Alexander.”5
In fine, Apuleius declares formally that this manner of praying was not an exception, or, as some
young moderns would qualify it, an eccentricity, but a permanent custom. “The attitude of those who
pray,” says he, “is to raise the hands to Heaven.”6
1 Satur., lib. iii c.
2 Lib. xxxvi.
3 Antiquit., lib. iv.
4 Æneid, lib. iii.
5 Lib. xiii. c. 27.
6 Lib. de Mundo. vers fin.
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An instinct, which I will call traditional, for otherwise it would have no name, taught them the
value of this mysterious sign. To be able to make it at their last moments was for them an assured
pledge of salvation.
“If death,” says Arrian, “should surprise me in the midst of my occupations, it will be enough for
me that I be able to raise my hands to Heaven.”7
Take notice, that he does not say: If I can fall on my knees, or strike my breast, or bow my
forehead to the dust; but, If I can extend my arms in the form of a cross, and raise them towards
Heaven. And why this? Ask your companions.
Ask them why the Egyptians placed the cross in their temples, prayed before that adorable sign,
and looked upon it as an omen of future happiness. “When, in the time of Theodosius,” relate the
Greek historians, Socrates and Sozomen, “they were destroying the temples of the false gods, they
found that of Serapis, in Egypt, full of stones marked with the Sign of the Cross. This made them say
to the neophytes, that between Jesus Christ and Serapis there was something in common. They added,
that among them the cross signified the future age.”8
Among the Romans this same instinct was transferred by a fact, of which I would be inclined to
doubt, did I not have weighty proof of it in an antique medal placed before my eyes. Knowing, on the
one side, the efficacy of the Sign of the Cross, which I have described, yet on the other, not being
willing, like
At Pater Anchises, passis de littare palmis
Numina magna vocat.
Moses or the early Christians, to remain with their arms in the form of a cross during all their
prayers, what did they do?
They imagined a goddess, commissioned to intercede continually for the republic, and represented
her in the attitude of Moses on the Mount. Therefore in Rome, in the center of the Forum olitorium,
where are now to be seen the ruins of the theatre of Marcellus, was raised the statue of the goddess
called Pietas publica. She is represented standing, with her arms outstretched in the form of a cross,
absolutely like Moses on the Mount, or the early Christians in the Catacombs. She has, moreover, at
her left an altar, on which burns incense, the symbol of prayer.9
On the impetratory and adoring value of the Sign of the Cross, the far East agreed with the West,
the Chinese with the Romans.
Would you believe that Hien Yuen, an emperor of China, in times so ancient as to be almost
mythological, had, like Plato, foreseen the mystery of the Cross?
“To honor the Most High, that ancient emperor joined two pieces of wood together, one straight,
the other transverse.”10
Thus, of the seven ways of making the Sign of the Cross, three were known to the pagans, and
practiced religiously by them, particularly on important occasions. All this is very well, you will say,
7 In Epictet., lib. iv. c. 10.
8 Socrat., lib. v. c. 17. — Sozom., lib. vii. c. 15.
9 Gretzer, De Cruce, p. 33. Forcellini.
10 Prelim. Discourse of Chou-king by Premare, ch. ix. p. xcii.
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but did they know what they were doing? Was it not a sign purely arbitrary, and therefore insignificant,
from which we can draw no conclusions?
That the pagans understood the Sign of the Cross as we do is what I would not pretend to say. It
was, with them, as with the figures among the Jews. In their eyes it had a real signification, a
considerable value, although more or less mysterious, according to the places, times, and persons.
You know of letters written with sympathetic ink. At first sight, the characters, although really
traced, are scarcely apparent, but when brought near the fire, they immediately appear, and are
perfectly legible. Such was the Sign of the Cross among the pagans. When struck with the rays of
evangelical light, this clare-obscure no more changed its nature than did the figures of the Old
Testament, but like them it became intelligible to all; it discovered itself, it spoke.
To believe that among the pagans this sign was an arbitrary one is a supposition that falls of itself.
Anything universal is never arbitrary; the Sign of the Cross less so than anything else. Here, my dear
Frederic, we touch upon one of the most profound mysteries of the moral order.
Forget not that my present aim is to show in the Sign of the Cross a treasure that enriches us. To
be enriched, man must ask, and God must give. In order that God may hear man, man must be
agreeable in the sight of God: Deus peccatores non exaudi. No one is pleasing to God but His Son, and
those who are like Him.
Now, the Son of God, the only Mediator between God and man, is a living Sign of the Cross, a
sign eternally living, from the beginning of the world: Agnus occisus ab origine mundi. He is the great
Crucified, and the great Crucified is the new Adam, the type of mankind. In order to be agreeable to
God, it is necessary that man should resemble his Divine Model, and be crucified; be a living Sign of
the Cross.
Such, like that of the Word Himself, is his destiny upon Earth. As a beggar, this is principally the
position he must take when he presents himself before God to ask for alms.
Providence has not wished that he should be ignorant of this condition necessary for success. Man
has no more lost the knowledge of the instrument of his redemption than of his fall, and his hope in the
Redeemer. Hence the existence and practice of the Sign of the Cross in prayer, among all nations, from
the beginning of ages even to our own day. God has engraven the instinct of the Sign of the Cross on
the heart of man. In order to keep ever-present, even to his corporal eyes, the necessity of this salutary
sign, and to make him understand the sovereign part which it must play in the moral world, the Creator
has willed that, in the material world, everything should be done by this sign, that all in it should show
this necessary action and reproduce its image.
Listen to men who had eyes to see.
“It is exceedingly remarkable,” says Gretzer, “that, from the very beginning of the world, God has
been pleased to keep the figure of the Cross continually before the eyes of mankind, and has so
organized things that man can scarcely do anything without the intervention of the Sign of the Cross.”11
Gretzer is the hundredth echo of traditional philosophy. Listen to others. Say they:
Look, at everything in the world, and see if all is not governed and put in motion by the Sign of the
Cross. The bird that flies in the air, the man that swims in the water, or that offers a prayer, makes
the Sign of the Cross, and can act only by it.
11 De Cruce, lib. i. c. 52.
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To gain a fortune and to seek riches at the extremity of the world, the navigator needs a ship; the
ship cannot sail without a mast, and the mast and the sail-yards form the Cross; without it no
government is possible, no fortune is to be hoped for. The husbandman seeks food from the Earth,
the food of the rich and of kings. To obtain it, he must have a plough. The plough cannot open the
Earth unless it be armed with the ploughshare, and the plough with the ploughshare forms the
Cross.12
If this sign is the means by which man acts over nature, it is also the instrument of his actions over
his fellow-creatures. In battle, is it not the sight of the flag that animates the soldiers? What do we
see on the Roman Cantabra and Siparia of the standards, if not a Cross? Both one and the other
were gilded lances, surmounted with a piece of wood placed horizontally, from which depended a
veil of purple and gold. The eagles with outspread wings placed on the top of the lances, and the
other military insignia always surmounted by two extended wings, invariably remind us of the Sign
of the Cross.
The trophies and monuments of victories gained always formed a Cross. The religion of the
Romans was all warlike; they adored their standards, swore by their standards, preferred them to all
their gods; and all their standards were crosses: Omnes illi imaginum suggestus insignes monilia
crucium sunt.13
Therefore when Constantine wished to perpetuate the remembrance of the Cross by which he had
vanquished, he was not obliged to change the imperial standard; but contented himself with causing the
cipher of Christ to be engraven on it, as if it was only necessary to name Him of whom he had had the
vision, and not the object of that vision.14
Man, in his turn, is distinguished exteriorly from beasts, because he can stand and extend his arms;
and man, standing in this posture, forms the Cross. We are also commanded to pray in this attitude, to
the end that our members themselves should proclaim the Passion of the Lord. When our soul and
body, each after its manner, confess Jesus on the Cross, then it is that our prayers are more speedily
granted.
Heaven itself is disposed in the form of the Cross. What do the four cardinal points represent, if
not the four arms of the Cross, and the universality of its salutary virtue?
The whole creation bears the impress of the Cross. Has not Plato himself written that the Power
nearest to the first God is extended over the world in the form of a Cross?15
Hence the peremptory response of Minutius Felix to the pagans who reproached the Christians for
making the Sign of the Cross. “Is not the cross everywhere?” said he to them. “Your ensigns, your
banners, the standards of your camps, your trophies — what are they, if not crosses gilded and
ornamented? Do not you, as well as we, pray with extended arms? In that solemn attitude do you not
use formulas by which you proclaim one only God? Do you not, then, resemble the Christians, who
adore one only God, and have the courage to confess their faith in the midst of torments, with their
arms extended in the form of a Cross?
“Between you and us what difference is there, when with your arms outstretched in the form of a
cross, you say: ‘Great God, true God, if God wishes?’ Is this the natural language of the pagan, or
12 S. Hier. in c. xi. Mark. — Orig., Homil. viii. in divers — S. Maxim. Pourin., ap. S. Ambr. t. m. serm. 56. etc., etc. We
could cite many thousands of other applications.
13 Tertul. Apolog. xvi.
14 Euseb., lib. ix., Histor. 9.
15 S. Maxim. — Taurin. apud S. Amb. t. iii. ser. 56. — 3 Hier., In Marc xi.; Tertul., Apol. xvi. — Origen. Homil. viii. in
divers. — S. Just. Apol. ii, etc., etc.
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rather the prayer of the Christian? Then either the Sign of the Cross is the foundation of natural reason,
or it serves as the basis of your religion.”16
“Why, then,” added some other apologists, “why do you persecute it?” And I also, my dear
Frederic, can address the same question to the modern pagans. Why do you persecute the Sign of the
Cross? Why are you ashamed of it? Why do you pursue with your sarcasms those who have the
courage to make it? The answer is the same today as in former times. Satan, the great ape of God, put
himself in competition with the Sign of the Cross; he permitted the pagans to make it for his own
profit. The perfidious wretch! He was glad to see men employ for his worship and their own loss, even
that sign destined for the adoration of the true God, and their salvation. As to the Christians, it was
otherwise. By them the Sign of the Cross was brought back to its true destination. It honored the true
God, and, in particular, the Incarnate Word, the object of the personal hatred of Satan, from whom He
rescued man, his victim; then in the Christian, the Sign of the Cross became an object of raillery, a
crime deserving of death. Nothing has changed. Therefore in our day the Sign of the Cross is an object
of mockery with the slaves of Satan; but when employed in profane uses or occult practices, it
provokes neither their hatred nor sarcasm. Whence come, then, among the wicked of every age, those
dispositions, in appearance so contradictory, of love and hatred, of respect and contempt for this
adorable sign? Tertullian answers:
From Satan himself. Spirit of lies, it is his part to alter truth, and turn the most holy things to the
profit of idols. He baptizes his faithful, assuring them that water will remit their sins; in this way he
initiates into the worship of Mithras. He marks his soldiers on the forehead. He celebrates the
oblation of the bread. He promises resurrection, and a crown bought by the sword.
What do I say? He has a sovereign pontiff to whom he forbids a second marriage. He has his
virgins; he has his chaste ones. If we examine in detail the superstitions established by Numa, the
sacerdotal offices, the insignia, the privileges, the order and detail of the sacrifices, the sacred
utensils, even the vessels used for the sacrifices, all the objects employed for expiations and
prayers; is it not manifest that the Demon, the robber of Moses, has counterfeited all these? And
since the gospel, the imitation still continues.17
Satan goes still further. Knowing all the power of the Sign of the Cross, he has wished to make of
it a personal symbol, that by this substitution he may engross all the homage due from the world to the
Crucified God. Says Firmicus Maternus:
Instructed by the prophetic oracles, the implacable enemy of mankind has made that which was
established for the salvation of the world serve as the instrument of iniquity. What are those horns
which he boasts of having? The caricature of those of which the inspired prophet of God speaks,
and which you, Satan, believe you can adapt to your hideous figure. How can you seek in them for
ornament and glory? Those horns are but the figure of the venerable Sign of the Cross.18
Now the forehead marked with the Sign of the Cross makes him shudder with rage. He finds no
torments cruel enough to punish him who bears the image of the Incarnate Word. See, dear friend, how
he treats our fathers, our mothers, our brothers, and sisters, the martyrs of all times and all countries.
Sometimes he causes the skin to be torn off their foreheads, and on the naked bones to be stamped with
a red hot iron the marks of ignominy. Again, he causes others to be cloven through in the form of a
16 Ita signo crucis aut ratio naturalis innititur, au vestra religio formatur. (Octav.)
17 De prescript.
18 De error. profan. relig. xxii.
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cross; or to be compressed with ropes until they are entirely deformed; or to be beaten with ox’s sinews
until they are rendered unrecognizable.19
A great lesson! Let this hatred of Satan for the Sign of the Cross be the measure of our love for the
adorable sign, and our confidence in it.
You shall see, tomorrow, that it has other claims on these two sentiments.
________________
19 See Gretzer, De Cruce, lib. iv. c. 32, pp. 628-629.
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ELEVENTH LETTER.
The Sign of the Cross is a treasure that enriches us, because it is a prayer:
proofs — A powerful prayer: proofs — A universal prayer: proofs — It supplies
all our wants — For his soul man needs lights — The Sign of the Cross obtains
them: proofs — Examples of the Martyrs December 6th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
The Sign of the Cross is a treasure which enriches us; this is one of the reasons of its being. It
enriches us, because it is an excellent prayer. This is, my dear friend, as you have not forgotten, the
point of doctrine we have just established.
Half the proof has already been given. It is in the antiquity, the universality, the perpetuity of the
Sign of the Cross. In the midst of the shipwreck in which the idolatrous world allowed so many
primitive revelations to be lost or damaged, we see the Sign of the Cross floating on the surface. What
says this strange fact, new to you, incomprehensible to a great number, but most reasonable to the
Christian accustomed to reflect? It speaks eloquently of the high utility of the Sign of the Cross for
man, because it tells its powerful efficacy over the heart of God. From reasoning, let us proceed to
facts.
The Sign of the Cross is a prayer; a powerful, universal prayer.
It is a prayer. What is a man who prays? He is one who confesses his indigence before God; his
intellectual, moral, and material indigence. He is a beggar at the rich man’s door. Now, the beggar
prays with his voice, but more eloquently by his pale and emaciated face, by his infirmities, his tattered
clothes and his attitude. Thus prayed on the Cross the adorable Mendicant of Calvary. In that state, the
Son of God was more than ever the object of the infinite complacency of His Father. He Himself tells
us that that eloquent prayer, more in action than in words, was the powerful lever which drew all things
to Him.1
What does a man do when he forms the Sign of the Cross, either with his hand, or by extending
his arms? He impresses upon himself the image of the
Divine Mendicant; he identifies himself with Him. It is Jacob clothing himself with the garments
of Esau, that he may obtain the paternal benediction. What does he say to God? By this attitude of
faith, humility, and devotedness, he says: “Behold in me your Christ, respice in faciem Christi tui;” a
prayer more eloquent than all the words that could be spoken. “It ascends,” says St. Ambrose, “and the
alms descend.” Ascendit deprecatio et descendit Dei miseratio.
Such is the Sign of the Cross, even without a formula. It does not speak, yet it says all. It is a
powerful prayer. When an agent of the authorities, a commissary of police, mayor, or gendarme, lays
his hand upon a culprit, he says: “I arrest you in the name of the law.” In the words, “In the name of
the law,” the guilty man sees the authority of his country, the strength of the army, the judges, the king
himself; and he allows himself to be taken.
When, then, man, threatened by danger, assailed by doubts, persecuted by temptation, a prey to
suffering and sickness, pronounces these words of solemn authority, “In the name of the Father, and of
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,” and while pronouncing them makes the sign by which the world has
been redeemed, and Hell vanquished, how can you explain the continued resistance of evil? Has not
man fulfilled all the conditions of success? Is not God, in some way, obliged to intervene, and by His
intervention, to glorify His name and the power of His Christ?
1 John, 12:33.
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The particular efficacy of the Sign of the Cross has never been doubted, either by the Church, or
by Christian generations. The gravest theologians teach even that the Sign of the Cross operates of
itself, and independently of him who makes it. They give us several proofs: I will cite only two.
The first is the custom of incessantly repeating the Sign of the Cross. “If it did not produce,” say
they, “its effects of itself, Christians would have no reason for making use of it so frequently. What
good would it do to have recourse to it, when a motion of the soul, or any good action whatsoever,
would suffice to obtain or realize what they hope to obtain or realize by the Sign of the Cross?”2
The second rests on facts celebrated in history and of incontestable authenticity: I will relate a few.
The first, is that of Julian the Apostate. A deserter from the true God, that emperor becomes, by an
inevitable conclusion, an adorer of the Demon. To learn the secrets of the future, he seeks throughout
Greece for men in communication with the Evil Spirit. A sorcerer presents himself, who promises to
satisfy his curiosity. Julian is conducted into a temple of the idols. The conjurations are pronounced,
and the emperor sees himself surrounded by’ demons, whose appearance fills him with terror.
By a gesture of thoughtless fear, he makes the Sign of the Cross, and the demons disappear. The
sorcerer complains, and repeats his incantations. The demons reappear. Julian forgets himself again
and, at the Sign of the Cross, the spirits of darkness again take flight.3
This fact, related by St. Gregory Nazianzen, Theodoret, and other Fathers of the Church, caused
great excitement in the East.
The second is better known in the West. We have it from Pope Saint Gregory. The illustrious
pontiff commences his relation by the following words.
The fact which I am about to relate is not doubtful, for it had almost as many witnesses as the town
of Fondi numbered inhabitants.4
A Jew, journeying from Campania to Rome by the Appian Way, arrived at the small town of
Fondi. It being very late, he could find no lodging, and went to pass the night in an old temple of
Apollo. He felt afraid of that ancient dwelling of the demons, and although not a Christian, took
care to arm himself with the Sign of the Cross.
Frightened at his solitude, he remained awake until midnight. Suddenly he saw a troop of demons,
who seemed to be coming to pay homage to their chief; who was seated at the head of the temple.
As they presented themselves, he interrogated each in particular as to what he had done to lead men
into sin. All revealed to him their artifices. In the midst of the discourse one advanced, who related
that he had succeeded in making the venerable bishop of the city feel the sting of a terrible
temptation.
“Until now,” said he, “my labor was in vain, but last evening I succeeded in making him give a
slight tap on the shoulder of the holy woman employed in his house.”
“Continue,” answered the ancient enemy of mankind, “continue and finish what you have begun,
and so great a victory shall bring you an extraordinary reward.”
Meanwhile, the Jew, the witness of the spectacle, could scarcely breathe. In order to make him die
of fear, the president of the infernal assembly, knowing of his presence, ordered them to inform
him who was that rash man who had dared to take shelter in the temple. The evil spirits
2 Gretzer, lib. iv. c. 62, p. 703. Gregorius de Valentia, Suarez, Bellarminus, Pyræus, et al.
3 Orat. I., contr. Julian.
4 Dial., lib. iii. c. 7.
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approached, but seeing him marked with the Sign of the Cross, cried out: ‘Woe! woe! an empty
vessel, sealed! Væ, væ! vas vacuum el signaturn!’ At those words, the infernal troop disappeared.
The Jew, on his side, hastened to depart. He hurried to the church, where he found the venerable
bishop. Calling him aside, he related all that had happened to him, and how he had learned of the
slight tap given to his servant, and what was the project of the demon. Surprised beyond measure,
the bishop immediately dismissed her, and from that time forbade all persons of the other sex to
enter his house. He consecrated the old temple of Apollo in honor of St Andrew, and the Jew was
converted.5
Let us relate another fact. We read, in the Ecclesiastical History of Nicephorus, that under the
emperor Mauritius, Chosroes II, king of Persia, sent an embassy to Constantinople, and that all the
Persians who composed it had the Sign of the Cross marked on their foreheads.
The emperor asked them why it was that they bore a sign in which they did not believe. Said they:
What you see on our foreheads is the testimony of a signal favor which we received some time ago.
A pestilence was ravaging our country, and some Christians advised us to mark the Sign of the
Cross on our foreheads, as a preservative against it. We believed them, and have been saved,
although nearly all our families were cut off by the scourge.6
After these facts naturally follows the reflection of the great Bishop of Hippo, which seems
decisive in favor of the teachings of theologians. Say he:
We must not be surprised at the power of the Sign of the Cross when it is made by good Christians,
since it has so much strength when employed by strangers, who do not believe in it, and this
happens for the glory of the great King.7
That we may remain within the limits of orthodoxy, we must, however, add that the Sign of the
Cross does not operate of itself, purely and simply, but in as much as is useful for our salvation and
that of others. It is the same with it as with certain other practices, such as, for example, exorcisms, to
which no divine promise attaches effects infallible and unconditional.
I add, that the piety of him who makes the Sign of the Cross contributes to its efficacy. This sign is
a silent invocation of Jesus Crucified; consequently, it is so much the more efficacious as it is made
with greater fervor. Again, the invocation with the heart or the mouth is so much the more likely to
obtain its effect, as the Christian who makes it is more virtuous and more agreeable to the Lord.8
It is a universal prayer. In one sense the Sign of the Cross may say, like our Savior Himself: “All
power has been given to me in Heaven and on Earth.” Here, more than anywhere else, we must, my
dear Frederic, reason with facts. They are so numerous that the only difficulty is to choose among
them. All, and each in its manner, proclaim on one side the faith of our ancestors, and on the other, the
empire of the Sign of the Cross over the visible and invisible worlds. It provides for all the wants of
both soul and body.
For his soul, man has need of lights; the Sign of the Cross obtains them. St. Porphyius, Bishop of
Gaza, is obliged to dispute with a Manichean woman. In order to dispel, by the clearness of his
reasoning, the darkness with which the unfortunate woman is surrounded, he makes the Sign of the
Cross, and light shines on that darkened intellect.
5 Dial., lib. iii. c. 7.
6 Hist., lib. xviii. c. 20.
7 Hist., lib. xviii. c. 20.
8 Gretzer, ubi supra.
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Julian, the crowned sophist, provokes a controversy with Cæsarius, brother of St. Gregory
Nazianzen. The generous athlete enters the lists armed with the Sign of the Cross. To an enemy perfect
in that art of warfare, and skilful in his manner of reasoning, he opposes the standard of the Word, and
the spirit of lies is caught in his own snares.9
St. Cyril of Jerusalem, so powerful in words and deeds, orders recourse to be had to the Sign of
the Cross every time that he is to engage in combat with the pagans, and he assures them that they shall
be reduced to silence.10 In the temporal order, no less than in the spiritual, divine lights are necessary to
man; they also are obtained by the Sign of the Cross. The emperors of the East, the successors of
Constantine, when they had to speak before the Senate, always began by the Sign of the Cross.11
As we have already seen, St. Louis, before discussing in council the affairs of his kingdom, always
conformed himself to this most ancient and religious practice.
If, after the example of the greatest princes who have governed the world, the emperors and kings
of the nineteenth century should have recourse to the Sign of the Cross, do you think that affairs should
be in a worse state than they are? As for me, I am as convinced as I am of my own existence, that they
would be much better.
Are not those who govern now as much in need of light as those who governed in former times?
Do they pretend to find it elsewhere than in Him who is its source? Do they know of a means more
certain to invoke Him with success? Do not all ages bear witness to its efficacy? Does not the Church,
which ought to be their oracle, continue to proclaim it? Is there a council, a conclave, or a religious
assembly that is not begun with the Sign of the Cross? Do the Catholic priests, faithful inheritors of
tradition, ever speak from the pulpit without being armed with this sign of strength and light? In this
they observe the precept of the ancient Fathers.
“Make the Sign of the Cross,” says St. Cyril of Jerusalem, “and you shall speak; Fac hoc signum
et loqueris.”12
What I have said of kings, my dear friend, must be said of all those who are charged with teaching
others.
Is not the Incarnate Word the God of science and of all sciences, the Professor of professors, the
Master of masters?
If the Sign of the Cross presided over all the lessons that are now given, over all the books that are
now printed, do you think we would be inundated, as we are, with errors, sophistry, false ideas, and
incoherent systems, whose incontestable result is to cause the modern world to sink again into that
intellectual darkness from which Christianity has drawn it?
For his soul, man needs strength: the Sign of the Cross is the fruitful source of it. Look at your
illustrious ancestors, the martyrs. From what did they seek the courage to triumph in their heroic
combats? From the Sign of the Cross. Generals of armies, centurions, soldiers, magistrates, senators,
patricians, and plebeians, children and aged men, matrons and .young virgins, all were careful, when
descending into the arena, to cover themselves with this invincible armor: insuperabili christianorurn
armatura.
9 S. Greg. Nazian. In laud. Cæsar.
10 Catech., xiii.
11 Coripp. Deland. Justin. jun.
12 Catech. illuminat., iv.
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Come with me; I will name a few to you. In Cæsarea, see that generous martyr, who walks to the
place of execution surrounded by an immense concourse of people. It is the centurion Gordius. See
him, calm and collected, arming his forehead with the Sign of the Cross.13
What is that town in Armenia, situated in the midst of snows, and on the borders of a frozen lake?
It is Sebaste. Behold, coming here in the evening, forty men, bound with cords, and stripped of their
garments, who are being dragged to the midst of the lake, condemned to pass the night there. Who are
they? Forty veterans of the army of Licinius. A superhuman force of resistance is so much the more
necessary, because on the shore, warm baths are prepared for those who will apostatize. They make the
Sign of the Cross, and an heroic death comes to crown their courage.14
We have seen the young Agnes as a living Sign of the Cross amidst the flames. Behold other
Christian virgins, born like her in the Golden Age of the martyrs. The first is St. Thecla, illustrious by
her birth, more illustrious by her faith. The executioners have seized upon her; they conduct her to the
funeral pile; she mounts it with a firm step, makes the Sign of the Cross, and remains calm and tranquil
in the midst of the flames. At the same moment, the rain descends in torrents, the flames are
extinguished; and, like the children of Babylon, the young heroine comes forth from the fire without
one hair of her head being injured.15
The second is St. Euphemia, no less celebrated than the first. Upon the orders of the judge, the
instruments of torture are made ready in an instant. The young virgin is about to be stretched on the
wheel: she makes the Sign of the Cross, and advances towards the frightful engine, bristling with iron
spikes; she gazes on it without any terror, and by that glance, causes it to fly into fragments.16
Look again. We stand in one of the Roman prætoriums, so often crimsoned with the blood of our
fathers, so often the witnesses of their sublime answers and their heroic constancy. It is during the
persecutions of Decius; you know that sanguinary emperor, that execrable animal, as Lactantius calls
him: execrabile animal Decius. Before the judge stands a band of Christians. The accuser comes,
according to custom, to charge them with all sorts of crimes. They are already condemned; they know
it. What do they do? Raising their eyes to Heaven they make the Sign of the Cross, and say to the
proconsul, “You shall see that we are neither cowardly nor faint-hearted.”17 Were I to continue this list,
I should have to cause the innumerable army of martyrs to pass before you in review.
There is not one of those valorous soldiers of the Crucified who, in going to combat, did not bear
the standard of his King. Let it suffice to name a few. St. Julian and St. Pontian, St. Constant and St.
Crescent, St. Isidore, St. Nazarius and St. Celsus, St. Maximinus, St. Alexander, St. Sophia and her
three daughters, St. Paul and St. Juliana, St. Cyprian and St. Justina.18
Taken from all countries and all conditions, they bear witness that it was a universal custom
among the martyrs to arm themselves with that sign of strength, before entering the lists with men,
with beasts, or with the elements.
But better still; fearing that the weight of the chains would prevent them from forming the Sign of
the Cross, they ask the Christians, their brethren, or the priests, their fathers, to arm them with the
victorious sign. Corribonus, converted to the faith by the martyr St. Eleutherius, goes himself into the
amphitheatre to seek the crown of martyrdom.
13 S. Basil, Orat. in S. Gord.
14 Encom. in 40 SS. Martyr.
15 Ado, in Martyrol., Sept. 23.
16 Apud. Sur. t. v. at Baron. Martyrol., Sept. 16.
17 Apud. sur. Apr. 13.
18 See their Acts
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“Pray for me,” says he to his father in Jesus Christ, “and arm me with the Sign of the Cross, the
same with which you have armed Felix the general.”19
Glyceria, the noble daughter of a father thrice consul, is seized and cast into a narrow prison. The
first act she performs, on seeing herself in the hands of her enemies, is to beg the holy priest,
Philocratus, to make the Sign of the Cross on her forehead. The priest grants her desire, saying, “May
this sign of the Crucified fulfill all your desires.”20 They are all accomplished.
The young heroine descends into the amphitheatre. At the moment she is about to gather the palm
of victory, she turns towards the Christians, who mingle with the crowd, and says with all the spirit of
a warrior about to die for his flag:
Brethren, sisters, children, fathers, and all you who hold to me the place of a mother, beware;
watch over yourselves, and consider well who is the Emperor whose mark and sign is engraved on
our foreheads.21
You have heard it; in the Sign of the Cross all the martyrs sought for strength. And would they
have looked for strength from a nonentity? Would the great Emperor, for whom they died, have
allowed them to remain in an incurable illusion? If any one believes this, let him give his proofs.
I shall write soon again.
________________
19 Apud. sur., Apr. 18.
20 Apud. sur., Apr. 18, t. iii. et Baron. t. ii.
21 Ibid.
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TWELFTH LETTER.
Perpetual necessity of the Sign of the Cross to obtain strength — Its
recommendation and practice by the chiefs of the spiritual combat — The Sign of
the Cross in temptations — The Sign of the Cross at death — Examples of the
martyrs — Examples of true Christians dying a natural death — The dying caused
the Sign of the Cross to be made on them by their brethren
December 7th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
The Sign of the Cross has lost nothing of its power or necessity. It is true that the tryants are dead,
and the amphitheatres in ruins. The Sign of the Cross has vanquished the one and overthrown the
other. If the second are not rebuilt, the first, from time to time, arise from their graves. The race of
Neros shall never be extinct; the most formidable is yet to come. With ancient fury, those who have
appeared since the Cæsars have decimated the Christians; that other race equally immortal, that race
devoted to death, as Tertullian says, expeditum morti genus. What they did yesterday in the West, they
do today in the East; they will do again tomorrow wherever they shall reign.
Advice to combatants: — let no one forget where is the source of strength.
Until that time, remember, dear friend, that peace has also her martyrs, habet et pax martyres suos.
Who is the man who does not carry within himself one or more Neros? Is there one day of his rational
life, or even hour, in which he has not to watch and to fight? What do I say? Twenty times a day,
seducing objects present themselves before him, evil thoughts importune his mind, rebellious senses
solicit his heart to commit the basest treasons. O! how greatly is he in need of strength!
Where shall he find it? In the Sign of the Cross. The testimony of ages, the experience of both
veterans and young soldiers, attest to-day, as they did yesterday, the sovereign power of the Sign of the
Cross to dissipate seductive charms, expel evil thoughts, and repress the motions of concupiscence.
Listen to Prudentius, the poet of the martyrs, who knew both the details of their triumphs and the
secret of their victories.
When, at the call of sleep, you go to your chaste bed, make the Sign of the Cross on your forehead
and heart.
The Cross shall preserve you from all sin; before it shall fly the powers of darkness; the soul,
sanctified by this sign, cannot waver.1
Hear also those generals of the eternal combat, those great geniuses and great saints, consummate
in the art of spiritual warfare, which is called asceticism; they all, with one voice, recommend
Christian soldiers to make use of the Sign of the Cross.
“Do you feel your heart inflamed?” says St. Chrysostom. “Make the Sign of the Cross on your
breast, and your anger shall be dissipated like smoke.”2
1 Fac cum vocante somno
Castum petis cubile,
Frontem locumque cordis
Crucis figura signet:
Crux pellet omne crimen,
Fugiunt crucem tenebræ.
Tali dicata signo
Mens fluctuare nescit.
Apud S. Greg.Turon., lib. I. Miraculi., c. 106.
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And St. Augustine: — “Does Amalec, your enemy, try to bar the way and hinder you from
advancing? Make the Sign of the Cross, and he shall be vanquished.”3
And Mark, the great servant of God, who foretold to the emperor Leo the hour of his death: —
I have learned, by my own experience, that the Sign of the Cross appeases interior troubles, and
procures the health of the soul. As soon as the Sign of the Cross is made, grace operates; all is
appeased, the flesh as well as the heart.4
St. Maximus of Turin: —
It is from the Sign of the Cross we must expect the cure of all our wounds. If the venom of avarice
be diffused through our veins, let us make the Sign of the Cross, and the venom shall be expelled.
If the scorpion of voluptuousness sting us, let us have recourse to the same means, and we shall be
healed.
If grossly terrestrial thoughts seek to defile us, let us again have recourse to the Sign of the Cross,
and we shall live the divine life.5
St. Bernard: —
Who is the man so completely master of his thoughts as never to have impure ones? But it is
necessary to repress their attacks immediately, that we may vanquish the enemy there where he
hoped to triumph. The infallible means of success is to make the Sign of the Cross.6
St. Peter Damian: —
If you feel a bad thought arise in your mind, immediately make the Sign of the Cross with your
thumb, and be assured that it shall be dissipated.7
The pious Ecberth: —
Nothing is more efficacious than the Sign of the Cross to dissipate temptations, even the most
shameful.8
To sum up all those testimonies: — “Whatever may be the temptations that oppress us,” concludes
St. Gregory of Tours, “we must repulse them. For this end, we should make, not carelessly, but
courageously, the Sign of the Cross, either on our forehead or our breast.”9
If it were necessary, one thousand facts could be given to confirm what you have just heard. One
will suffice. It is a revelation with which a fervent religious, named Patroclus, was favored, and by
which God showed him the sovereign power of the Sign of the Cross against temptation.
One day, the Demon, transforming himself into an angel of light, appeared to the venerable abbot.
He tried to persuade him, with artful words, to abandon his solitude and return to the world. But the
man of God, feeling a pestilential fire coursing through his veins, prostrated himself in prayer, and
begged God to make him accomplish His holy will. His prayer was heard. An angel appeared to him
and said: “If you desire to know the world, ascend this column, and see what it is.”
2 In. Math. Hom. 88.
3 Lib. 50. Homil., Homil. 20.
4 Biblioth. pp. t. v.
5 Apud. S. Ambr. serm. 55.
6 De passion. Dom. c. xix. n. 65.
7 Instit. Monast.
8 Lib. viar. Domin., c. xxi.
9 Ubi supra.
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Being ravished into an ecstasy, the pious solitary believed he saw before him a column of
prodigious height. He ascended it, and beheld homicides, thefts, massacres, fornications, and all the
enormous crimes of the universe. “Alas!” exclaimed he, as he descended, “alas, my Lord, do not
permit that I should ever return to the midst of so many abominations.”
The angel answered:
Cease then to regret the world, lest you perish with it.
Go, rather, into your oratory, to pray the Lord that you may find support in the midst of the trials of
your pilgrimage.
He obeyed, and there found the Sign of the Cross engraved on a brick. He understood the gift of
God, and knew that that sign was an impregnable fortress against temptation.10
A martyr of war, or a martyr of peace; such is man during his life. What is he in death? Look at
that sick man, a prey to pain, abandoned by everybody, or surrounded by parents and friends who are
utterly powerless. Behind him, time, which flies; before him, eternity, which advances, and into which
he finds himself passing, without any human power being able to retard the moment of his departure,
or mitigate the anguish of the journey. That sick man is you, my dear friend; it is I, it is every man, rich
or poor, subject or monarch. If, during the warfare of life, we stand in need of light, strength,
consolation, and hope; tell me, is not our need a thousand times greater in the decisive struggle of
death? Well! the Sign of the Cross supplies all. Under this new point of view, how dear was it to our
ancestors, and how dear ought it to be to us!
As the martyrs, when going to their last combat, failed not to fortify themselves with the Sign of
the Cross, so the true Christians of every age have had incessant recourse to the same sign, to alleviate
their sufferings and sanctify their deaths. I will cite a few examples.
Speaking of his beloved sister, St. Macrina, whom he himself assisted in her last moments, St.
Gregory of Nyssa, writes as follows:
“Lord,” said she, “in order to put the enemy to flight, and to protect the lives of those who fear
thee, Thou hast given them the Sign of the Cross.” In pronouncing these words, she formed the
adorable sign on her eyes, her lips, and her heart.11
His illustrious brother, St. Gregory Nazianzen, defying the Demon, said to him: “If you dare to
attack me at the moment of my death, beware: for I shall put you shamefully to flight by the Sign of
the Cross.”12
Instead of making it with the hand, the early Christians very frequently, when dying, extended
their arms. This is what they called “The evening sacrifice, sacrificium vespertinum.” To this manner
of making the Sign of the Cross, Arnobius applies the words of the Psalmist, “The lifting up of my
hands is my evening sacrifice,” and says:
May such be our evening sacrifice, I mean that of the evening of our lives, when we are really
about to offer the evening sacrifice; and may our attention be directed to raise our hands in the
form of a Cross, that we may rejoice in the Savior Jesus, at the moment that we go to Him.13
It was in the like attitude that St. Paul, the patriarch of the desert, died, and in which he was found
by St. Anthony.14
10 Greg. Turon., Vit. Part., c. 9.
11 Vit. S. Macr.
12 Carm. 22.
13 In Ps. 140.
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The same spectacle was presented by St. Pachomius. “Being at the point of death,” says the author
of his life, “he armed himself with the Sign of the Cross; beheld with great joy the angel of the Lord
approaching him, and gave up his holy soul to God.”15
In the same manner died St. Ambrose.
“On the last day of his life,” writes the priest Paulinus, “from about the eleventh hour until he gave
up his holy soul to God, he prayed with his arms extended in the form of a Cross.”16
From Milan let us proceed to Constantinople. Behold another bishop at the point of death. “St.
Eutychius,” says his historian, “was seized with a violent fever towards the middle of the night. He
remained in that state for seven days, never ceasing to pray and to fortify himself with the Sign of the
Cross.”17
Let us end our journey by passing through France; let us assist at the deaths of some of her kings.
Let us stop for a moment at Aix-la-chapelle, and behold the last moments of the great emperor. “The
next day being come,” says a bishop, an eye-witness, “Charlemagne, knowing what he ought to do,
extended his right hand, and as well as he could made the Sign of the Cross on his forehead, his breast,
and every part of his body.”18 Thus did that great man before his death.
Look at his son, Louis the Pious.
Having arranged all his affairs, and made his last requests, he ordered that the evening office
should be recited near him, and a relic of the true Cross be placed upon his breast. During that time
he himself, as much as his strength allowed, made the Sign of the Cross on his forehead and his
heart. When he became too weak, he begged his brother to continue to do it for him.19
Let us come to one of his successors, the most worthy of the throne, the good King Robert. During
the last days of his life, he never ceased, both by voice and gesture, to call the saints of Heaven to his
aid, and continually fortified himself by making the Sign of the Cross on his forehead, eyes, nostrils,
lips, throat, and ears, in memory of the Incarnation of Our Lord, of His Nativity, Passion, Resurrection
and Ascension, and of the Holy Ghost. Such had been, during his life, the custom of this prince, who
was never wilfully without having holy water with him.20
Let us cite another, Louis le Gros. Seeing himself near death, he caused a carpet to be laid on the
ground, and ashes to be spread over it in the form of a Cross. Being laid by his officers upon that bed,
which reminded him of that of the King of Calvary, the virtuous monarch continued to make the Sign
of the Cross even to his last breath.21
For a king to die like a God; is there anything degrading in this? What degrades a man is to die
without understanding death, to die with the insensibility of a beast.
You have seen that the martyrs, fearing that when dying they should not be able to make the Sign
of the Cross themselves, begged their Christian brethren to make it for them. The same was done by
our ancestors who died a natural death. Besides the example of Louis le Débonnaire, of whom you
14 S. Hier., De Vit. S. Paul.
15 Life of St. Pachomius, c. 53.
16 Paulin. in Vit. S. Ambr.
17 Apud. sur. Jul. 2.
18 Thegan. De gestis Ludov. Imper.
19 Apud. Gretzer.
20 Helgald., in Epitom. Vit. Robert.
21 Gretzer, p. 617.
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have just read, I will remind you of a few others. Taken from the first ages, they will show the
perpetuity of the tradition.
St. Zenobius, the intimate friend of St. Ambrose, being on the point of terminating his beautiful
life by a precious death, raised his hand and made the Sign of the Cross on every person around him.
Then he begged the bishops to make on him, with their consecrated hands, the sign of strength, hope,
and salvation.22
From the deathbed of a priest, let us pass to that of one of the faithful. Behold here a devoted
daughter, who assists her tender, her illustrious mother.
In our day the greater number content themselves with bestowing on their dearest friends only
material cares. They would reproach themselves, were they to omit the least prescription of the
physician. But what of Christian assistance? What of the prescription of the Divine Physician, and of
our Mother, the Church? With what care do they attend to those? To the most devoted bodily care, our
ancestors, far wiser and better than we, added the remedies of the soul.
Then in Bethlehem, the illustrious daughter of Fabius, St. Paula, lies at the point of death. By her
bedside is Eustochium, worthy daughter of her mother.
How is that angel of tenderness occupied?
“She never ceased,” says St. Jerome, “to form the Sign of the Cross on the lips and breast of her
mother, endeavoring to alleviate her sufferings by the impression of that consoling sign.”23
You see, then, that both in life and death, the Sign of the Cross was constantly employed by our
ancestors to obtain for themselves, and others, light, strength, resignation, courage, and hope. “What a
great thing, then, is the Sign of the Cross !“ cries out, with good reason, one who was witness to its
admirable effects. Magna res signum crucis.24 Tomorrow we shall see its efficacy in a new order of
things.
________________
22 Apud. sur. May 25.
23 In Epitaph Pau1æ.
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THIRTEENTH LETTER.
Effects of the Sign of the Cross in the temporal order — It cures all diseases,
and removes whatever can harm us — It gives sight to the blind, hearing to the
deaf, speech to the dumb, the use of their limbs to the lame and paralyzed; cures
other maladies, and restores life to the dead December 8th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Poor and indigent in the spiritual order, man is not less so in the temporal; his body and soul
subsist only by alms.
Among the good things necessary for the body, there are two in particular, my dear friend, which I
will point out to you; health and security. The Sign of the Cross is efficacious to procure both one and
the other.
Health. The Incarnate Word is the living and vivifying life. Speaking of Him when he dwelt
among men, the Gospel tells us, in words as simple as sublime, “a virtue came forth from Him which
healed all diseases; virtus de illo exibat et sanabat omnes.”
History teaches us that these words may be applied in their full extent to the Sign of the Cross.
Nothing is more fully established than that this sign was used by the first Christians to heal the sick.
Saint Cyril, and St. John Chrysostom, the one patriarch of Jerusalem, the other of Constantinople,
assure us positively that the Sign of the Cross continued in their time, as well as in that of their
ancestors, to cure the sick, and heal the bites of ferocious beasts.1
Let us come to proofs. All man’s senses are subject to disease; let us begin with the most noble,
the sight. If, instead of continually poring over pagan authors, our young students had sometimes read
the acts of the martyrs, they would have seen in those of St. Laurence the striking miracle of which the
Church sings even to this day, qui per signum crucis cæcos illuminavit.
The illustrious archdeacon of Rome had entered the house of a Christian, in which was a blind
man named Crescentius, who, melting into tears, threw himself at the feet of the saint, saying: “Place
your hand over my eyes, that I may see you.” The blessed Laurence, deeply affected, said: “May our
Lord JesusChrist, who opened the eyes of the man born blind, give you light.” At the same time he
made the Sign of the Cross on the eyes of Crescentius, who saw the light and the blessed Laurence, as
he had desired.”2
The learned Theodoret relates of his own mother what follows:
My mother had a sore eye, which baffled all the resources of medicine. We had turned over the
leaves of every volume, and examined all the old authors, but none gave the remedy applicable to
the present evil. We were all there, when a friend of my mother’s called to see her. She told her of
a man of God, named Peter, and related a miracle which had been operated by him. “The wife of
the Governor of the East,” said she, “had the same disease as you. She addressed herself to Peter,
who is from Pergamus, and he cured her by praying for her and making on her the Sign of the
Cross.”
My mother lost not one instant. She went to find the man of God, threw herself at his feet, and
conjured him to heal her. He answered, “I am but a poor sinner, and am far from possessing that
power with God which you suppose me to have.” My mother redoubled her entreaties and tears,
protesting that she would not leave him until he had cured her.
1 Catech., xiii; S. Chrys. In Math., hom. 54.
2 Apud sur., Aug. 10.
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“God,” said he to her, “is the Physician for those evils.3 He always hears the prayers of those that
believe. He will hear you, not in view of my merits, but because of your faith. If, then, yours is
sincere, true, pure, and without doubt, laying aside medicine and physicians, accept the remedy that
God gives you.” At these words he stretched his hand over her eye, made the Sign of the Cross, and
the disease was healed.4
Facts nearer our time will show you that, in traversing centuries, the Sign of the Cross has never
ceased to be the best oculist. St. Eligius, Bishop of Noyon, in crossing one of the bridges in Paris,
cured a blind man, who, instead of asking for alms, begged him to make the Sign of the Cross on his
eyes.5
A miracle very like this is seen in the life of St. Frobert, abbot of a monastery near Troyes in
Champagne. He was yet only a child, when his mother, who had been blind for many years, took him
on her knee; then embracing and caressing him, she asked him to make the Sign of the Cross on her
eyes. The young saint at first refused, but at length, overcome by her maternal entreaties, he invoked
the name of the Lord, made the Sign of the Cross as required, and at that instant his mother recovered
her sight.6
In the life of St. Bernard, Mabillon cites more than thirty blind persons of every age and condition,
in France, Germany, and Italy, cured in the presence of kings and great nobles, by means of the Sign of
the Cross, made over them by the Thaumaturgus of Clairvaux.7
From the sight, let us pass to the hearing. Like our Lord Himself, the Sign of the Cross makes the
deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak.
Behold us in the midst of the great city of Rome, in the palace of the Prefect. Before us stands a
young and brilliant officer; he is called Sebastian. This name, illustrious among all others, is never
heard in our colleges. You must know, then, that St. Sebastian was commandant of the first prætorian
cohort, under Diocletian. In our modern language, we would say, colonel of a regiment of the Imperial
Guard.
Endowed with eloquence equal to his intrepidity, he employed the gifts of God to encourage the
martyrs who were brought daily to the prætorium. One day Zoë, the wife of the Prefect of Rome, who
had been dumb for six years, had the happiness of assisting at his discourse. Although a pagan, she was
so much moved that she cast herself at the feet of the saint, and tried to make him understand by
gestures that she desired to be cured.
She was understood. The Sign of the Cross made on her mouth instantly restored her speech, and
the first use she made of it was to ask for baptism.8
Tell them, also, that by the same sign the immortal Abbot of Clairvaux, St.Bernard cured a
number of deaf and dumb persons. At Cologne, a girl deaf for many years; at Bourlémont, a child deaf
and dumb from her birth; at Bale, a deaf man; at Metz, a deaf person in the presence of an immense
concourse of people; at Constance, at Spire, at Maastricht, persons both deaf and dumb; at Troyes, a
3 The saint reasoned like Ambrose Paré, the father of French surgery: “I dress it, and God Cures it.”
4 Hist. S. S. Pater. in Petro.
5 Life of the Saint, by S. Owen, Bp. of Rouen, c. xxix.
6 His Life, Dec. 31st.
7 T. II.
8 Act. de S. Sebast.
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lame and dumb girl in the presence of the bishops, Geoffrey of Langres and Henry of Troyes. In fine,
at Clairvaux, a deaf and dumb child, who had been awaiting his arrival for fifteen days.9
While the saint was at Spire, where he wrought many miraculous cures, Anselm, bishop of
Havelsperg, arrived there. He had a very sore throat, and was scarcely able either to speak or swallow.
“You ought to cure me also,” said he to St. Bernard.
“If you had as much faith as these good women,” answered the Abbot of Clairvaux, pleasantly, “I
could, perhaps, render you the same service.”
“If my faith is not sufficient,” answered the bishop, “let yours cure me.
The saint touched him, making the Sign of the Cross, and the pain and swelling disappeared at the
same instant.10
Diffused throughout the whole body, the sense of touch is that which presents a greater surface to
the attacks of disease. How can we detail the evils, more or less painful, to which it is exposed?
But numerous as they are, it is consoling to know that none can elude the salutary power of the
Sign of the Cross. By its virtue we recognize Him who healed all kinds of maladies among the people;
omnem languorem in populo.
St. Germanus, one of the most holy and amiable bishops that have governed the diocese of Paris,
was one day going to visit St. Hilary of Poitiers, his worthy colleague. As he was on his way, two men
brought to him with great difficulty a poor woman both lame and dumb. The saint had no sooner made
the Sign of the Cross on her, than she recovered her speech and the use of her limbs. Three days
afterwards, she went to return thanks to her benefactor.11
A like miracle was wrought by St. Euthymius, the great archimandrite of Palestine. Terebon, son
of the governor of the Saracens, in Arabia, had been from his early youth paralyzed in one half of his
body. Having heard the holy abbot spoken of, he begged to be conducted to him; his request was
granted, and his father and a great number of the barbarians accompanied him. The saint made the Sign
of the Cross on Terebon, who was immediately cured. This cure was followed by the conversion, not
only of the father and son, but also of the Saracens, the companions of their journey and witnesses of
the miracle.
Long afterwards, St. Vincent Ferrer operated in France the same prodigy as that which had
rejoiced the East. As he was at Nantes, they brought him a man who had been paralyzed for eighteen
years, and asked him to give him his blessing. “I have neither gold nor silver,” said the saint to the sick
man, “but I pray our Lord to give you health of body and soul.” Then he made the Sign of the Cross
over his limbs. At the same moment the paralytic, entirely cured, rose up and gave thanks to God and
the saint; then he returned home, and never again felt his former disease.12
Such is, sometimes, the violence of pain, that it occasions delirium, and thus deprives the
unfortunate son of Adam of the health both of body and soul. The Sign of the Cross forces the malady
from this new entrenchment.
9 Mabillon, ubi supra.
10 Vit. lib. vi. c. 5. n. 19.
11 Vita, c. xlvi.
12 Fleury. Hist. eccl. lib. xxiv, n. 28.
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Edmer, the historian of St. Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, relates that the holy man, in going
to Cluny, cured, by means of the Sign of the Cross, a woman who had lost her mind, and become
furious.13
St. Bernard did the same at Sechingen and Cologne. In the latter city, they presented to him a
woman who had become a maniac, on account of the death of her husband and child. The unfortunate
woman employed all her strength against herself, so that they were obliged to keep her in chains. The
saint, moved with compassion, made the Sign of the Cross over her, by which she was immediately
restored to her reason and full possession of her faculties.14
The Word, the Redeemer, whom the Gospel so often shows to us curing the most obstinate fevers,
has communicated to the Sign of the Cross the virtue of operating the like prodigies.
St. Prixus, bishop of Clermont in Auvergne, having arrived at the monastery of Darouge in the
Vosges, found the abbot Amarinus ill with so malignant a fever that he was unable to walk or to
swallow anything, except a few drops of water. The holy bishop had recourse to his ordinary weapons,
and paid for his welcome by a miracle. He made the Sign of the Cross on the sick man, who rose up,
perfectly cured.15
It has the same power with regard to epilepsy, a malady much more difficult to be healed. In the
life of St. Malachy, archbishop of Armagh, who died at Clairvaux, St. Bernard says: “Before starting
for Rome, whither he was going to receive the pallium from the hands of Pope Eugenius III., the holy
archbishop restored health to an epileptic by making the Sign of the Cross on the breast of the
unfortunate man, who used to fall down many times in a day.
St. Bernard himself wrought a similar miracle in favor of a girl from Troyes, in Champagne. Such
had been the malignity of the disease, that she had lost the power of speech. The holy abbot imposed
hands and made the Sign of the Cross over her; at the same moment, being restored to complete health,
she spoke to those present.16
Our Lord has said, “After my example, heal the lepers.” His disciples have received this
command, and its divine virtue has passed into the Sign of the Cross. St. Francis Xavier filled the East
with the renown of his name. His fame reached the ears of a leper who, during many years, had sought
in vain for his cure. Not daring to appear in public, he conjured the saint to visit him.
Xavier, being much occupied, could not yield to the desires of the poor man, but sent one of his
companions to ask him if he would believe in the Gospel, in case he should be healed. If he promised
to embrace the faith, the deputy was to make the Sign of the Cross over him three times. All was done
as Xavier had ordered. Scarcely had the leper given the promise, when his body became as clean as if
he had never been infected with the leprosy.17
Before going further, dear friend, I believe I ought to insert here a remark of St. Chrysostom,
which may be applied to the healing of diseases, or the prevention of accidents and scourges by the
Sign of the Cross. If, notwithstanding its power, the Sign of the Cross, even when made with good
13 Vit. S. Anselm, lib. ii.
14 Mabillon, ubi supra, lib. iv. c. 6. n. 33.
15 Life of SS., Jan. 26th.
16 Mabillon, ubi supra, c. xiv. n. 47.
17 Life, lib. v. p. 349.
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dispositions, does not always cure the one, and ward off the other, it is not because its virtue is
wanting, but because it is useful for us to be tried.18
There is a disease no less painful than leprosy, and much more common; it is the cancer. It cannot
resist the power of the Sign of the Cross any more than other infirmities. Hear the following fact,
related by St. Augustine, an eyewitness.
At Carthage lived a pious lady named Innocentia, who belonged to the most illustrious family in
the city. She had on her breast a cancer, a horrible malady, which the physicians regard as
incurable. It must be extracted to the very roots, or, in order to procure some slight relief for the
patient, liniments must be continually employed. Then, according to Hippocrates, when the malady
is evidently mortal, it is useless to make the patient suffer more.
Her physician, who was an intimate friend of the family, had concealed nothing from her.
Innocentia turned to God by prayer, confiding in Him alone to work her cure. One night near
Easter, she was warned in a dream to go to the baptismal font, on the women’s side, where the
catechumens were waiting, and to cause the Sign of the Cross to be made on the diseased part by
the first catechumen that should present herself before her. She obeyed, and was instantly healed.
The physician, who had announced to her that the disease was incurable, finding her perfectly
restored, hastened to inquire what remedy she had employed. She related what had taken place.
Then, with an air of indifference, which made the pious lady fear that the words were not very
respectful to our Lord, the physician replied: “I expected to hear something extraordinary from
you!” But seeing her become very uneasy, he hastened to add: “Is it extraordinary that the cancer
has been cured by Jesus Christ, by Him who raised to life a man who was four days dead?”19
Never was miracle better attested; the whole city was witness to it.
To natural maladies are often added, to the injury of man’s health, the attacks of ferocious or
venomous beasts. The remedy to those wounds is again the Sign of the Cross.
Writes Theodoret:
The holy anchoret Thalassius, traveling by night, trod accidentally upon a sleeping viper. The
reptile awoke, and in its fury plunged its fangs into the sole of his foot. The saint stooped and
placed his right hand on the wound. The viper bit it also, and did not spare the left, which hastened
to the assistance of the right. Having satiated its rage, and given more than ten bites, the reptile
glided into its hole, and left its victim a prey to intolerable pain. In this circumstance, no more than
in any other, the servant of God had not recourse to human remedies. To cure his wounds he
employed the remedies of faith, the Sign of the Cross, prayer, and the invocation of the name of the
Lord.20
Master of life, our Lord is also Master of death. This sovereign empire is found in the Sign of the
Cross. See what we read in the life of St. Dominic. Being in Rome, he preached one day in the ancient
church of St. Mark.Among his auditors was a Roman lady called Guttadona, who was much devoted to
the servant of God. In order to hear the sermon, she had left one of her children, who was sick; at her
return, she found it dead. Without making any useless show of grief, she took her servants with her and
carried the child to St. Dominic. She met him at the gate of St. Sixtus’s convent, placed the child
before him, fell at his feet, and with many tears begged him to give her back her son. The saint, moved
with compassion, cast himself on his knees, and after a short prayer made the Sign of the Cross on the
child, took him by the hand, raised him full of life, and gave him to his mother, recommending her to
18 Ad. Coloss. ii. Homil. ix.
19 De Civ. Dei, lib. xxii. c. 8.
20 In Tha1ass.
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preserve absolute silence. But in the excess of her joy, the lady published the miracle, and the whole
city of Rome was soon informed of it.
Two centuries earlier we find St. John Gualbert. This noble and saintly warrior had pardoned the
murderer of his brother. God rewarded him by giving him a religious vocation, and the power of
working miracles. The Sign of the Cross became his sword against the Demon. Furious at his
numerous defeats, the great homicide armed his agents who, during the night, attacked the monastery,
burned the church, demolished the buildings, and mortally wounded all the religious. The saint
hastened to the rescue, and with the Sign of the Cross restored them to life and health.21
You understand, my dear Frederic, that I have given only one or two cases of each malady.
Immense volumes would not suffice to contain them all. St. Augustine, St.Chrysostom, St. Cyril,
St. Ephraim, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Paulinus, and a hundred other witnesses from the East and the
West, in every age, prove by thousands of facts that the adorable Sign of Him who came to cure all our
maladies has not ceased to restore sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, health to
the sick, and life to the dead.
Look at history. We must either accept it, such as it is, or tear out all its pages and fall into
skepticism, or write another more learned and more worthy of credit. Ask your comrades if they feel
competent to undertake it; then when it is finished we shall see.
Adieu until tomorrow.
________________
21 See his Life.
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FOURTEENTH LETTER
The Sign of the Cross a preservative against all that could injure life or health
— It appeases tempests — Extinguishes fire — Protects us against accidents —
Opposes a barrier to floods — Causes the waters to return to their bounds —
Keeps ferocious beasts at a distance — Preserves from poison, from thunderbolts
— Makes creatures the instruments of prodigies
December 9th
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
Powerful as is the Sign of the Cross to give health and life, my dear friend, it is not less so to keep
at a distance whatever might be injurious to them. Here again we find abundant facts, but the limits of
a letter will allow me to cite only a few. Since the original revolt, all the elements, submitted to the
influence of the demons, are conjured up against man. Air, fire, water, and what not, wage against him
a war, continual and often deadly. A universal weapon has been given us to defend ourselves; it is the
Sign of the Cross.
The God, whose voice commanded the winds and the tempests, commands them again by the sign
of our redemption. We read in the life of St. Nicetus, bishop of Treves, that when going to his diocese,
he fell asleep on board the vessel in which he had taken passage. In the midst of the voyage, a violent
wind agitated the waves, the sails were torn, the masts broken, and the vessel seemed ready to sink.
The terrified passengers aroused the saint, who tranquilly made the Sign of the Cross over the angry
waves, and a calm immediately succeeded the storm.1
According to the belief of the Church, so clearly expressed in the Roman Pontifical, the Demon is
a great gatherer of clouds. Over the air, his region and that of his innumerable legions, he exercises a
particular influence. How many times does he use it to desolate the country, and above all, to throw
obstacles in the way of those who work for the destruction of his empire!
Because of the immense crowds that hastened to hear the sermons of St.Vincent Ferrer, one of his
most powerful opponents, he was almost always obliged to preach in the open air. In order to hinder
the preaching, the Demon rarely failed to raise storms, which the saint was obliged to dissipate. One of
the most fearful was that which he dissipated by the Sign of the Cross and holy water. It happened in a
town of Catalonia, on the feast of the holy apostles, Peter and Paul, after he had celebrated Mass, and
before he had taken off the sacerdotal vestments.2
Like air, fire obeys the Sign of the Cross. St. Tiburtius, son of the Prefect of Rome, was sentenced
either to offer incense to idols, or to walk on a bed of fire. The young martyr made the Sign of the
Cross, and without the least hesitation advanced into the middle of the burning coals. Standing
barefoot on them, he said to the judge:
Now renounce your errors, and acknowledge that there is no other God than ours. Place, if you
dare, your hand in boiling water in the name of Jupiter. Let that Jupiter, whom you call your God,
prevent you from feeling the burning heat. As for me, I feel as if I were on a bed of roses.3
Sulpicius Severus relates as having heard it from St. Martin himself that one night the chamber, in
which the Thaumaturgus of the Gauls was reposing, caught fire. Awakening in a fright, the Saint tried
to extinguish the flames, which were already consuming his clothing. His efforts were useless. All at
once he returned to himself; and no longer thought of extinguishing the fire, or saving himself, but, full
1 S. Greg. Puron, De gloria confess., c.. xvii.
2 Vit. lib. iii.
3 Act. S. Sebast.
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of confidence, he made the Sign of the Cross. The flames immediately separated, and forming an arch
over his head, permitted him to continue tranquilly his prayer.4
Let me relate another fact concerning this great bishop.
Martin, the indefatigable enemy of idolatry, had demolished a very famous and ancient pagan
temple. He wished also to cut down a pine tree that stood near it, because it was an object of
superstition. The chief priest and other pagans opposed him. At length they said to the courageous
bishop: “Since you have so much confidence in your God, we will cut down the tree ourselves, on
condition that you stand under it when it falls.” The condition was accepted.
In the presence of an innumerable crowd, the saint allowed himself to be tied to that side of the
tree on which it leaned. His companions were in mortal terror. Meanwhile the tree, half-cut, seemed
ready to fall; in another moment, the venerable bishop would have been crushed. What did the man of
God do? He calmly raised his hand and made the Sign of the Cross. At the same instant the tree
became straight, and as if blown by a violent wind, fell on the contrary side.
A cry of admiration arose from the assembled multitude, nearly all of whom demanded baptism.5
What took place among the Gauls was renewed also in Italy. The venerable abbot, Honoratus,
founder of the monastery of Fundi, one day saw that holy asylum, in which dwelt two hundred
religious, threatened with total ruin. From the summit of the mountain, at the foot of which the
monastery was built, a large rock had been detached, and threatened to crush everything with its
weight. The saint hastened to invoke the name of the Lord and, extending his right hand, opposed to
the rock the sign of salvation. The enormous mass suddenly stopped in its course, and remained
immovable on the side of the mountain; a position which it retains even to this day.6
From the West let us pass to the East. We shall see that the sovereign power of the Sign of the
Cross is not limited by difference of climate, nor degrees of latitude or longitude. Let us listen to St.
Jerome. “The universal earthquake, which followed the death of Julian the Apostate, caused the seas to
overflow their bounds. As if God threatened the world with a second deluge, in which all things should
return to their ancient chaos, vessels were left on the tops of mountains, whither the furious billows
had carried them. The inhabitants of Epidaurus, seeing the frightful pools of water on the hills, and
dreading lest their town should be submerged, as had happened before, went to find the holy old man,
St. Hilarion. They placed him at their head, as if they had been going out to combat. Being arrived at
the shore, the saint made the Sign of the Cross three times on the sand, and extended his hand towards
the raging waters, which were advancing. It is incredible to what a height the sea rose at that sign, and
remained so before him. But after having raged for a long time, as if angry at the obstacle opposed to it
by Hilarion, its waves subsided and retired, not daring to cross the sacred limits. Epidaurus and the
whole country still relate the miracle; mothers tell it to their children, that the memory of it may
descend to posterity.”7
The following is a similar, but more recent fact.
Our French historian, Mézeray, relates that in 1196 heavy rains caused the rivers and ponds to
overflow, and produced an inundation like a veritable deluge. They knew no other means to stay the
4 Epist. I. ad Euseb. presbyt., et vit. S. Martini, lib. x.
5 Id ubi supra.
6 S. Greg. Dial., lib. i. c. 1.
7 Vit. S. Hilarion, vers. fin.
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flood than prayer, public processions, and supplications. They were employed. No sooner was the Sign
of the Cross made upon the waters, than they retired within their limits.8
If Moses’ rod, which was only the figure of the Sign of the Cross, could divide the waters of the
Red Sea and hold them suspended like mountains, why should not that sign itself cause floods to return
to their bounds?
Let us return to the immortal Thebaide, and allow me to relate a few other marvels of which its
angelic inhabitants were the actors, and the Sign of the Cross the instrument. One of them, Julian,
surnamed Sabas, or the whitehaired old man, is traversing the barren solitude. On his way he meets an
enormous dragon, which casts on him a ravenous look, and opens its horrid jaws to devour him.
Without the least emotion, the venerable anchoret slackens his pace, invokes the name of the Lord,
makes the Sign of the Cross, and the dragon dies.9
A little later, behold Marcian, a solitary of Syria, who renews the same miracle. While he is
praying at the door of the cell, Eusebius, his disciple, who is at a little distance from him, sees a
monstrous reptile on the wall at the east side, ready to spring on the saint to devour him. Eusebius,
horrified, cries out with all his strength, conjuring his master to fly. Marcian reproves him for his fear,
makes the Sign of the Cross, blowing it towards the fearful monster. Behold the effects of the primitive
words: “I will put enmity between her seed and thine.” The breath which comes from the mouth of the
saint is like a flame, which burns the dragon so much, that it falls in pieces like a reed burned by fire.10
It would be easy to multiply instances of facts accomplished in those ever celebrated places. But
that we may group together wonders of the same nature, let us come to Italy, even if we be compelled
to return to the East.
St. Gregory the Great relates that St. Amantius, a priest of Citta di Castello, in Umbria, had such
power over the most venomous and terrible serpents that they could not live before him. With one Sign
of the Cross he caused all those around him to perish. When they went into their holes, he sealed them
in with the Sign of the Cross, and afterwards they were taken out dead, killed by an invisible power.
Thus has been accomplished the words of the Master, “They shall kill serpents: serpentes tollent.”11
You know that our Lord immediately adds: “And if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not
hurt them: et si mortiferum quid biberint non eis nocebit.” I will give a few proofs from among
thousands. Saint Julian was bishop of the city of Bosra in Idumea. Out of hatred of his religion, some
of the principal inhabitants formed a plot to poison him. They bribed the bishop’s servant, procured
poison and charged him to put it in his master’s cup.The unhappy man obeyed.
Being divinely instructed as to all that had passed, the saint took the up, placed it before him and,
without touching its contents, said to his servant: “Go, in my name, and invite the principal inhabitants
of the city to dine with me.” He knew that among them should be found the guilty ones. All accepted
the invitation. Then the holy man, being unwilling to expose any one, said with angelic sweetness: “As
it is your wish to poison the humble Julian, here is the poison, I am going to drink it.” He made the
Sign of the Cross three times over the cup, saying, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of
8 Hist. of France, t. ii. p. 135.
9 Theodoret, Re1ig. Hist. c. 2.
10 Ibid. 3.
11 Dialog., lib. iii., c. 35.
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the Holy Ghost, I drink this cup.” He drained it to the last drop and received no injury. At this sight, his
enemies fell at his feet and begged his pardon.12
One must be a Bachelor of the nineteenth century to be ignorant of the following fact.
If there is a man whose life should be known in its minutest details, it is St.Benedict, the patriarch
of the Western monks. Like another Moses, is it not by him and his children that Europe has been
drawn from barbarism? Show us a piece of waste land, either moral or material, that the Benedictine
has not cultivated; a civilizing principle that he has not matured, taught, practiced, at the price of
efforts which God alone knows.
What we do know is that Satan, the old Pharaoh, left no means untried to hinder the benevolent
work. No sooner had Benedict retired into his solitude than he beheld coming to him a few monks
unworthy of the name; they asked to be taken under his care. The saint gave them a rule, and by word
as well as example, endeavored to bring them under the yoke of regular discipline.
Vain effort! Example wounded their pride, words provoked their anger, and aroused their hatred.
They took a resolution to poison their venerable superior. They mixed poison in the wine, and filled a
glass with it, which they presented to him, that he might bless it, according to the custom of the
monastery. Benedict stretched forth his hand, made the Sign of the Cross, and by this sacred sign, as by
the blow of a stone, the poisoned glass was shivered into fragments. The saint understood that they had
presented him with the cup of death, from which he had been preserved by the Sign of the Cross.13
From these examples, and a thousand others, you may see, dear friend, what a powerful prayer is
the Sign of the Cross, with how many graces it enriches us, and from .how many dangers it preserves
our frail existence.
Let us come now to another application of the protecting sign.
In France, Spain, Italy and, I believe, in your own country, Catholics are accustomed to make the
Sign of the Cross when it thunders and lightens. Those who doubt nothing take this for weakness, as if
the true Catholics of the eighteen centuries which have preceded us were all weak-minded persons and
superstitious women.
Now, in the circumstance indicated above, and in all unforeseen dangers, we find the Sign of the
Cross in use among the Christians of the East and the West, from the first ages of the Church. Saint
Ephrem, St. Augustine, St.Gregory of Tours, and a thousand other witnesses, have seen it in our stead,
and affirm it.
“If, on a sudden,” says the deacon of Edessa, “the lightning flashes from the clouds, and the
thunder bursts with a crash, man is terror-stricken and, all in fear, we bow ourselves to the Earth.”14
Speaking of those who frequent worldly assemblies, St. Augustin adds: “If, by chance, anything
affright them, they immediately make the Sign of the Cross.”15
St. Gregory relates, as a thing of public notoriety, that under the impression of fear, or at the
approach of any danger whatsoever, the Christians had recourse to this sign, their protector. And not in
vain; among thousands we choose the following proof.
12 Sophron., in Prat. spir.
13 S. Greg., lib. ii, c. 3.
14 Ser. de cruce. The saint speaks of the Sign of the Cross, and though he does not name it, it is c1ear that it was made in
this circumstance, since they never failed to make it in even the most ordinary actions.
15 Lib. .50 Homil., homil. 21.
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Two men were journeying from Geneva to Lausanne. They were soon overtaken by a violent
storm, accompanied with vivid lightning and repeated claps of thunder. According to the traditional
custom of Christians, one of the travelers made the Sign of the Cross on himself. The other scoffed at
him, and said: “Are you chasing the flies? Leave those superstitions to old women. Such mummeries
are a disgrace to religion, and unworthy of an intelligent man.”16
He had scarcely finished speaking, when a thunderbolt stretched him dead at the feet of his
companion.
Then the first, more than ever, continued to protect himself by the Sign of the Cross. His journey
was happily terminated, and he related everywhere what had happened to him.17
A warning to the strong-minded, who are secured against thunderbolts.
The Sign of the Cross protects not only the life of man, but is also a pledge of security for all that
belongs to him. Thence comes the universal use of this liberating sign over houses, fields, fruits and
animals.
Says the grave Stuckius:
Catholics have prayers, accompanied by the Sign of the Cross, for every creature in particular;
water, leaves, flowers, the Paschal lamb, milk, honey, cheese, bread, vegetables, eggs, wine, oil,
and the vessels that contain them. In each formula they ask expressly for the removal of the
malicious power of the demon, and health for body and soul.
On the day of the Resurrection, they bless milk, honey, meat, eggs, loaves of bread, everything that
they keep or give, as being salutary for the soul. On the day of the Assumption, herbs, plants, roots
and the fruit of trees, to communicate to them a divine virtue.
On St. John’s day, wine, which without this blessing they regard as impure and the principle of
evil. On St. Stephen’s, the pastures, on St. Mark’s, the grain. In this they follow the precept of St.
Paul, who bids the faithful bless all that is used for the support of life, and return thanks for them:
— mysterious usages for which theologians give excellent reasons.18
In their turn, those creatures, delivered from the influence of the demon, become, thanks to the
Sign of the Cross, instruments of the powerful goodness of the Creator.
We read, in St. Gregory of Tours, that a pestilential malady made such ravages among animals
that people began to ask themselves if the species would not become wholly extinct. In their
desolation, some country people came to the basilica of St. Martin and took from thence holy water
and the oil from the lamps. Having carried it to their homes, they made the Sign of the Cross with it on
the heads of the cattle who had not as yet been attacked, and gave it as a drink to those who were at the
point of expiring; all were instantly cured.19
Let us cite a last example of the protecting power of the Sign of the Cross. Saint Germanus, bishop
of Paris, was on his way to meet the relics of St.Symphorian, Martyr. As he was passing by a village,
the inhabitants came and begged him to take pity on a poor woman named Panitia, whose little field of
wheat was ravaged by bears. “Come,” said they to him, “come, and look at that poor field, so that the
malicious beasts may fly from your presence.”
16 Lib. ii., Miracul. S. Martin, c. 45.
17 Tilman, Collect. of the Holy Fathers, Book vii. c. 58.
18 Antiq. convivial., lib. ii. c. 36. p. 430.
19 Lib. iii., Mirac. S. Mart. c xviii.
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Notwithstanding the opposition of those that accompanied him, the saint went to the place and
made the Sign of the Cross over the little heritage. Very soon, two bears came to the spot; transported
with fury, they fell upon each other; one was left dead upon the field, the other, being mortally
wounded, was dispatched with a spear, and the poor widow had never again occasion to deplore the
loss of her harvest.20
History abounds in similar facts, but let this suffice for today.
________________
20 Fortunat. In Vita S. Germ.
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FIFTEENTH LETTER.
Answer to a question — The Sign of the Cross is a weapon which repulses the enemy
— Life is a warfare — Against whom? — Necessity of a weapon within the reach of
every one — What is that weapon? — Proofs that the Sign of the Cross is the
special weapon, the most forcible weapon against the evil spirits
December 10th.
MY DEAR FREDERIC:
If you communicate my last letter to your companions, it is probable, my dear friend, that they
will say to you: “If the Sign of the Cross is as powerful as he writes to you, why does it no longer do
what it has done?”
To this question there are many answers.
The first is given by St. Augustine. In speaking of miracles, the great doctor makes a very just
observation:
The miracles recorded in the holy books have a great publicity. As everybody reads or hears them
read, no one is ignorant of them. This is as it should be, because they are the proofs of faith.
Today, also, miracles are operated in the name of the Lord, by the sacraments, by prayers, and at
the tombs of the saints, but they are far from having the same notoriety as the first. They are known
in the places where they are wrought, but if it be in a considerable city, they will scarcely be known
to all; nay, it often happens that but very few are informed of them. When they relate them to
others or in other places, the authority of their testimony is not such as to be admitted without
difficulty or hesitation; although they be related by Christians to other Christians.1
In proof of what he advances, the saint relates many miracles operated under his eyes, some of
them by the Sign of the Cross. Therefore, because your companions or other persons know not the
miracles accomplished in our day by the Sign of the Cross, there is no reason to conclude that it
operates them no longer.
To this first answer, a second naturally links itself. It is from another great doctor, Pope St.
Gregory. Distinguishing former times from the present, he says: “At the beginning of the Church,
miracles were necessary. It was by them that the faith of the people was confirmed. When we plant a
tree, we water it until it takes root. As soon as we are assured that it will grow, the watering is stopped.
This is what the apostle says: ‘The gift of tongues is a sign, not for the faithful, but for infidels.’ ”2
It is the same with moral improvement as with material. Now that Christianity has taken root even
in the bowels of the Earth, miracles are not as necessary as at the time of the divine planting. Already
fifteen hundred years have rolled away since St. Augustine said: “He who in our days asks prodigies in
order to believe, is himself the greatest of prodigies.”3
For a moment, replace the world in the same circumstances as it was at the birth of the Church,
and you shall see the Sign of the Cross renewing all its primitive miracles. Listen to contemporary
history.
One of our missionary bishops writes:
1 De civ. Dei, lib. xvii.
2 Homil. xxix. in Evang.
3 Ubi supra.
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Would you believe it? Ten villages are converted! The Demon is furious, and strikes a hundred
blows. During the fifteen days that I have been preaching, there have been five or six possessions.
With holy water and the Sign of the Cross, our catechumens expel the devils, and cure the sick. I
have seen some marvelous things. The Devil helps me very much to convert the pagans. As in the
time of our Lord, although the father of lies, he cannot prevent himself from telling the truth.
Behold this poor man, possessed with an evil spirit, making a thousand contortions, and crying out:
“Why do you preach the true religion? I cannot endure that you should take away all my disciples.”
“What is your name?” asks the catechist. After some refusals, he answers: “I am the envoy of
Lucifer.” “How many are you?” “Twenty-two.” Holy water and the Sign of the Cross delivered the
possessed.4
But, even admitting, which I do not, that the Sign of the Cross no longer works miracles among
Christian people, by how many superhuman effects does it not reveal its power at each hour of the day
and night, throughout Christendom? If we suppose one hundred million temptations in the day, we
may hold it for a certainty that more than three-fourths of them are dissipated by the Sign of the Cross.
Who has not had experience of this in himself? Judge from this; and remember that what you do,
others do also; you may, by this, estimate the universal and permanent power of the Sign of the Cross,
the liberator.
I will go further, and admit that the Sign of the Cross does not always succeed in chasing away
importunate thoughts, in dispelling seductive charms, or in withdrawing the soul from the verge of the
abyss; but with whom lies the fault? Is it not on account of the little faith of the Christians of our day?
Must we not say, with regard to the inefficacy of the Sign of the Cross, what we, with good reason, say
of the fruitlessness of Holy Communion in a great number — that the fault is not in the food, but in the
disposition of him that eats: Defectus non in cibo est, sed in edentis dispositione?
It is with a view to cure this want of faith, which impoverishes and ruins Christians, that I have
undertaken this correspondence. I shall continue it by developing another title which the Sign of the
Cross possesses, to the confidence of the Catholics of the nineteenth century.
THEY ARE SOLDIERS, THE SIGN OF THE CROSS IS A WEAPON WHICH REPULSES
THE ENEMY.
More than three thousand years have elapsed since Job defined the life of man to be a continual
warfare: militia est vita hominis super terram. Ages have rolled away, generations have succeeded
generations, empires have given place to other empires; twenty times has the face of the world been
renewed, yet Job’s definition has always remained true. Life is a warfare; a warfare for you as well as
for me, as for your companions, for the rich as well as the poor. It is a warfare begun at the cradle, to
end only at the tomb; a warfare for every moment of the night and day, in sickness and in health. It is a
decisive warfare; on the victory depends not fortune, health, nor the temporal advantages we esteem so
highly, but infinitely more than all those — an eternity of happiness, or an eternity of woe.
Such, my dear friend, is man’s condition here below; we can change nothing of it. Who are his
enemies, yours, mine? Ah! who is there that does not know them, not only by name, but by their
attacks? The Devil, the world, and the flesh; three formidable enemies, bent on our ruin. As I have not
the slightest idea of giving you a complete course of asceticism, I shall occupy myself only with the
first.
4 Letter of Mgr. Anouilh, Bishop of Abydos, missionary in China. Tching-Ting-Fou, province of Pekin, March 12th, 1862.
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As sure as there is a God, so sure also there are demons. “No Satan, no God,” said Voltaire, and he
was right. If there is no Satan, there was no fall, no redemption, no Christianity; no Christianity, all is
false; the human race is foolish, and there is no God.
Now, the demons are fallen angels. By their intelligence, strength and agility, they are far superior
to man. Their number is incalculable. Until the day of the last judgment, they have for their abode the
atmosphere which surrounds us. Jealous of the sons of Adam for being called to enjoy the happiness
they have lost, their occupation both day and night is to lay snares for us; to excite our passions, to
cause us to be placed in dangerous positions, to obscure in us our esteem for the faith, to stifle remorse,
and to blunt our moral sense, in order to make us the accomplices of their revolt, the companions of
their torments. All these truths are, I repeat, as certain as the existence of God.
Tyrants over man by sin, the demons are also such over creatures subject to man; the king being
vanquished, all his subjects belong to the victor. Distributed throughout all parts of the creation, and in
each creature in particular, they penetrate them with their malignant influence. Within the limits of the
power that has been given them, they make it the instrument of their hatred against man, against his
soul and body. This is also a dogma of universal belief.
What does he know, who is ignorant of this? Nothing. And he who doubts it? Less than nothing.
He who denies it deserves no longer to be numbered among intelligent beings.
Now, the struggle and man, being given such as they are, can you conceive it possible that Divine
Wisdom would have left mankind without defense? Must you not, on the contrary, understand as
clearly as that two and two make four, that in order to equalize the struggle, God has given to man a
powerful, a universal weapon, always at hand and within the reach of every one? What is this weapon?
Let us ask all ages, particularly Christian ages. With unanimous voice, they answer that it is the
Sign of the Cross. The constant use which they have made of it gives the answer. This point of view
illuminates all the history of the Sign of the Cross. It highly justifies the conduct of the primitive
Christians, and no less highly condemns our own. There is nothing more certain than that this sign is
the especial weapon, the powerful weapon against Satan and his angels. Tell me — when we want to
know the value of a cannon, a carbine, or any other arm of new invention, in what way do we proceed?
We do not blindly trust to the inventor. The authorities name a committee; the weapon is tried in
presence of competent judges. The judgment which they form decides the value of the engine of war
submitted to their examination.
Let it be the same with the Sign of the Cross; only remember that the divine sign is not a weapon
of new invention. It is old, very old, but it is neither rusty, nor weak, nor worn out.
As to the committee of examination, it has been long formed, and leaves nothing to be desired. It
is composed of the ablest men of the East and the West; chosen men, who, from ancient times, have
known the weapon in question, and the details of the warfare, not only in theory but in practice. Behold
the tribunal; let us hear its judgment.
Does that judge believe in the power of the Sign of the Cross, and the fitness of that divine
weapon to combat with the demons, who expresses his decision in the following terms:
Never leave your house without making the Sign of the Cross. It will be to you a staff, a weapon,
an impregnable fortress. Neither man nor demon will dare to attack you, seeing you covered with
such powerful armor. Let this sign teach you yourself that you are a soldier, ready to combat
against the demons, and ready to fight for the crown of justice. Are you ignorant of what the Cross
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has done? It has vanquished death, destroyed sin, emptied Hell, dethroned Satan, and resuscitated
the universe; would you then doubt its power?5
Does that second judge believe in it, who says:
The Sign of the Cross is the invincible armor of the Christian. Soldier of Christ, let this armor
never leave you, either day or night, at any moment, or in any place. Without it, undertake nothing.
Whether you be asleep or awake, watching or working, eating or drinking, sailing on sea or
crossing rivers, have this breast-plate ever on you.Adorn and protect each of your members with
this victorious sign, and nothing can injure you. There is no buckler so powerful against the darts of
the enemy. At the sight of this sign, the infernal powers, affrighted and trembling, take to flight.6
Does that third judge believe in it, who addresses to himself and to all Christians the following
recommendation:
Let us make the Sign of the Cross boldly and courageously. When the demons see it, they are
reminded of the Crucified; they take to flight; they hide themselves and leave us.7
And the fourth, who says:
Let us bear on our foreheads the immortal standard. The sight of it makes the demons tremble.
They who fear not the gilded capitols, tremble at the sight of the Cross.8
Thus has the East decided, by the voice of her greatest men, St.Chrysostom, St. Ephrem, St. Cyril
of Jerusalem, and Origen, to which it would be easy to add other names equally respectable.
Let us hearken to the West.
Saint Augustine says to the catechumens:
It is with the symbol and the Sign of the Cross that we must march to meet the enemy. Clothed
with this armor, the Christian shall easily triumph over his proud and ancient tyrant. The Cross is
sufficient to cause all the machinations of the spirits of darkness to vanish.9
His illustrious contemporary, St. Jerome, says: “The Sign of the Cross is a buckler which shields
us from the burning arrows of the Demon.”10
And elsewhere “Frequently make the Sign of the Cross on your forehead, that you may not yield
to the destroyer of Egypt.”11
And Lactantius says:
Whoever wishes to know the power of the Sign of the Cross has only to consider how formidable it
is to the demons. When adjured in the name of Jesus Christ, it forces them to leave the bodies of
the possessed. What is there in this to wonder at? When the Son of God was on Earth, with one
word He put the demons to flight, and restored peace and health to their unfortunate victims.
Today, His disciples expel those same unclean spirits in the name of their Master, and by the sign
of His passion.12
5 S. Chrys., Homil. xxii. ad popul. Antioch.
6 S. Eph., De Panoplia et de Poenitent., apud Gretzer., pp. 580, 581, 642.
7 S. Cyril., Catech. xiii.
8 Orig., Homil. vii. in divers Evang. locis.
9 Lib. de Symb. c. i.
10 Ep. xviii. ad Eutoch.
11 Epist. 97 ad Demetriad
12 Lib. iv. c. 27.
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The East and the West have spoken. The most able judges proclaim the Sign of the Cross to be an
excellent weapon, a special weapon against the demons. An incalculable number of facts form the
basis of their judgment. In the first ages of the Church, they were repeated every day in the presence of
Christians and pagans, in all places of the universe.
They were so conclusive that St. Athanasius, an eye-witness, said without fear of any
contradiction:
By the Sign of the Cross all the arts of magic are rendered powerless, all enchantments
inefficacious; and all idols deserted. By it the passions of the sensual voluptuaries are moderated,
checked and appeased; and the soul, groveling on the Earth, is raised towards Heaven.
Formerly the demons deceived men by assuming divers forms, and standing near a fountain or a
river; in the woods or upon rocks, and by their enchantments and delusions surprised unwary
mortals. But since the advent of the Divine Word, their artifices are powerless; the Sign of the
Cross is able to unmask all their impostures.
Does any one wish to prove it? He needs only to come into the midst of the enchantments of the
demons, the impostures of the oracles, and the miracles of magic; then let him make the Sign of the
Cross and invoke the name of the Lord, and he shall see how, through fear of the sacred sign, the
demons will fly, the oracles become dumb, the charms and incantations be struck powerless.13
I will relate a few of those experiences. Lactantius, the preceptor of Constantine’s son, who knew
better than anyone the secrets of the imperial court, relates the following.
While in the East, the Emperor Maximian, a very curious searcher into the future, one day
immolated some victims, and sought to read in their entrails the secrets of the future. Some of his
guards, who were Christians, made on their foreheads the immortal sign: immortale signurn. At the
same moment the demons fled away, and the sacrifice became dumb.14
If, at the sight of the Sign of the Cross, the demon was obliged to fly away from his temples, how
could he remain in other places? Let us hear one of the most grave doctors of the East, St. Gregory of
Nyssa. In the life of St. Gregory Thaumaturgus, the Moses of Armenia, the illustrious historian relates
what follows.
Troades, his deacon, arrived one evening at Neocæsarea. Being fatigued with his, journey, he
wished to take a bath, in order to refresh himself, and for this purpose went to the public baths.
That place was haunted by a murderous demon, who killed all those who dared to enter there after
nightfall, therefore the doors were closed at sunset. The deacon presented himself and requested to
have them opened. The keeper of the bath told him all that had happened. “You may believe me,”
said he, “whoever dares to enter here, at this hour, never comes forth alive. At night the demon is
master of the place, and many unfortunate persons have paid for their temerity by cries of agony
and by death.” Troades was not moved by what he heard, but insisted on the doors being opened.
Overcome by his solicitations, the keeper of the bath bethought himself of an expedient by which
he might save his own life and, at the same time, satisfy the desire of the petitioner. He gave him
the keys, not daring to open the door himself, and ran away. The deacon entered alone. Arrived in
the first room, he began to remove his clothes. All at once, and on every side, objects of horror and
dread, specters of various forms, half flame, half smoke, figures of men and beasts, presented
themselves to his sight, howled in his ears, infected him with their loathsome breath, and
surrounded him as with a circle that could not be broken. Without the least emotion, the deacon
made the Sign of the Cross, invoked the name of the Lord, and left the first room in safety. Having
entered the bath-room, he found himself in the midst of a more horrible spectacle. The demon
13 Lib. de Incarnat. Verb.
14 Lactant., De mortib persecut., c. x.
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appeared to him under a form calculated to cause the death of anyone by terror. The earth shook,
the walls were rent asunder, the floor opened and the deacon saw beneath him a furnace, from
which the sparks flew into his face. He had recourse to his former weapon, the Sign of the Cross,
and the invocation of the name of the Lord, and all disappeared. After having taken his bath he
hastened to depart, but the demon barred his passage and kept the doors closed. But by the Sign of
the Cross, Satan’s opposition was again overcome, and the door flew open of itself. As the
courageous deacon went forth, the demon said to him, in a human voice, Humana vox: “Do not
imagine it owing to your virtue that you have escaped death. You owe it to Him whose name you
invoked.” Having thus been saved, Troades became a subject of admiration to the keeper of the
bath, and to all those who knew of the occurrence.15
The fact you have just read, dear friend, is not an isolated one. It is but a part of a vast whole of
similar facts, attested by thousands of witnesses in past ages, which are reproduced in our days
amongst idolaters. Rome often witnessed them. Allow Lactantius to speak.
When the pagans sacrifice to their gods, if any of the assistants marks his forehead with the Sign of
the Cross, the sacrifice cannot take place, and the oracle consulted gives no answer. Such has often
been the cause why wicked emperors have persecuted the Christians. Some of us, accompanying
them to the sacrifices, have made the Sign of the Cross; then the demons, being put to flight, could
not mark in the entrails of the victims the signs indicative of the future. When the haruspices
perceived this, they failed not, being incited thereto by the demons to whom they sacrificed, to
complain of the presence of the profane. The princes became furious, and persecuted Christianity
to the extreme, that it might defile itself with sacrileges of which they so cruelly bore the pain.16
My next shall contain some other facts.
________________
15 Vit. B. Greg. Inter oper, Nyssa.
16 Lact. lib. iv. c. 27.
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