Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol 5 | Page 4

momentary devotion; but these Catholic images were faintly and flatly delineated by monkish artists in the last degeneracy of taste and genius. ^14
[Footnote 7: After removing some rubbish of miracle and inconsistency, it may be allowed, that as late as the year 300, Paneas in Palestine was decorated with a bronze statue, representing a grave personage wrapped in a cloak, with a grateful or suppliant female kneeling before him, and that an inscription was perhaps inscribed on the pedestal. By the Christians, this group was foolishly explained of their founder and the poor woman whom he had cured of the bloody flux, (Euseb. vii. 18, Philostorg. vii. 3, &c.) M. de Beausobre more reasonably conjectures the philosopher Apollonius, or the emperor Vespasian: in the latter supposition, the female is a city, a province, or perhaps the queen Berenice, (Bibliotheque Germanique, tom. xiii. p. 1 - 92.)]
[Footnote 8: Euseb. Hist. Eccles. l. i. c. 13. The learned Assemannus has brought up the collateral aid of three Syrians, St. Ephrem, Josua Stylites, and James bishop of Sarug; but I do not find any notice of the Syriac original or the archives of Edessa, (Bibliot. Orient. tom. i. p. 318, 420, 554;) their vague belief is probably derived from the Greeks.]
[Footnote 9: The evidence for these epistles is stated and rejected by the candid Lardner, (Heathen Testimonies, vol. i. p. 297 - 309.) Among the herd of bigots who are forcibly driven from this convenient, but untenable, post, I am ashamed, with the Grabes, Caves, Tillemonts, &c., to discover Mr. Addison, an English gentleman, (his Works, vol. i. p. 528, Baskerville's edition;) but his superficial tract on the Christian religion owes its credit to his name, his style, and the interested applause of our clergy.]
[Footnote 10: From the silence of James of Sarug, (Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. p. 289, 318,) and the testimony of Evagrius, (Hist. Eccles. l. iv. c. 27,) I conclude that this fable was invented between the years 521 and 594, most probably after the siege of Edessa in 540, (Asseman. tom. i. p. 416. Procopius, de Bell. Persic. l. ii.) It is the sword and buckler of, Gregory II., (in Epist. i. ad. Leon. Isaur. Concil. tom. viii. p. 656, 657,) of John Damascenus, (Opera, tom. i. p. 281, edit. Lequien,) and of the second Nicene Council, (Actio v. p. 1030.) The most perfect edition may be found in Cedrenus, (Compend. p. 175 - 178.)]
[Footnote 11: See Ducange, in Gloss. Graec. et Lat. The subject is treated with equal learning and bigotry by the Jesuit Gretser, (Syntagma de Imaginibus non Manu factis, ad calcem Codini de Officiis, p. 289 - 330,) the ass, or rather the fox, of Ingoldstadt, (see the Scaligerana;) with equal reason and wit by the Protestant Beausobre, in the ironical controversy which he has spread through many volumes of the Bibliotheque Germanique, (tom. xviii. p. 1 - 50, xx. p. 27 - 68, xxv. p. 1 - 36, xxvii. p. 85 - 118, xxviii. p. 1 - 33, xxxi. p. 111 - 148, xxxii. p. 75 - 107, xxxiv. p. 67 - 96.)]
[Footnote 12: Theophylact Simocatta (l. ii. c. 3, p. 34, l. iii. c. 1, p. 63) celebrates it; yet it was no more than a copy, since he adds (of Edessa). See Pagi, tom. ii. A.D. 588 No. 11.]
[Footnote 13: See, in the genuine or supposed works of John Damascenus, two passages on the Virgin and St. Luke, which have not been noticed by Gretser, nor consequently by Beausobre, (Opera Joh. Damascen. tom. i. p. 618, 631.)]
[Footnote 14: "Your scandalous figures stand quite out from the canvass: they are as bad as a group of statues!" It was thus that the ignorance and bigotry of a Greek priest applauded the pictures of Titian, which he had ordered, and refused to accept.]
The worship of images had stolen into the church by insensible degrees, and each petty step was pleasing to the superstitious mind, as productive of comfort, and innocent of sin. But in the beginning of the eighth century, in the full magnitude of the abuse, the more timorous Greeks were awakened by an apprehension, that under the mask of Christianity, they had restored the religion of their fathers: they heard, with grief and impatience, the name of idolaters; the incessant charge of the Jews and Mahometans, ^15 who derived from the Law and the Koran an immortal hatred to graven images and all relative worship. The servitude of the Jews might curb their zeal, and depreciate their authority; but the triumphant Mussulmans, who reigned at Damascus, and threatened Constantinople, cast into the scale of reproach the accumulated weight of truth and victory. The cities of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt had been fortified with the images of Christ, his mother, and his saints; and each