Saint Andrew's Cross

“ Seeing is believing; nevertheless, the form is fixed by tradition and usage, and ought not to be departed from, though Michael Angelo has done so in the figure of St. Andrew in the Last Judgment, and there are several examples in the Italian masters. [207] The legend goes on to relate, that St. Andrew, on approaching the cross prepared for his execution, saluted and adored it on his knees, as being already consecrated by the sufferings of the Redeemer, and met his death triumphantly. Certain of his relics were brought from Patras to Scotland in the fourth century, and since that time St. ”

“ Unto those youths who in the ocean-stream
Had lost their life within the flood's embrace,
So that their souls, forsaken by the Lord,
Shorn of their glory, had been borne away
To death and torments in the power of fiends.
Saint Andrew's prayer was pleasing unto God, 1620
Almighty One, the Counselor of men;
He bade the youths, those whom the flood had slain,
Rise up unscathed in body from the ground.
Then straightway stood there up among the throng
Many an ungrown child, as I have heard ”

“ We have never so much cause for consolation, as when we find ourselves oppressed by sufferings and trials; for these make us like Christ our Lord, and this resemblance is the true mark of our predestination.----St. Vincent de Paul
No one has understood this great truth so well as St. Andrew the Apostle. At first sight of the cross on which he was to be crucified, he was filled with joy, and broke forth into this exclamation: "O cross so much desired, so much loved, and so much sought by me! behold how I come to thee full of security and joy! ”

“ Andrew's cross, and not the Cross was shadowed by them.
There is always something solemn, even to a healthy and strong person, in the narrow bed in which at last all must lie down! it seems to remind the living they too must die; it is an object on which few can gaze without feeling a sense of dread! ”

“ Then Saint Andrew made up his mind to go into other wild countries and preach the principles of the New Testament, but the widow and the nation implored him not to go away from them until he had successfully taught them all the laws of the faith. Every single day the nation gathered in tremendous crowds and the apostle carefully explained to them the rules and details of the religion and all the necessary church rules, consecrated for their service a bishop, many priests and deacons and again started for his great and dangerous mission. ”

“ But Andrew, already on the eve of a martyr’s triumph, would not bear to be snatched back from such glories so nearly attained; and in earnest remonstrance cried out, praying, “O Lord Jesus Christ! do not suffer thy servant, who for thy name’s sake hangs on the cross, to be thus freed,――nor let me, O merciful God! when now clinging to thy mysteries, be given up again to human conversations. But take thou me, my Master! whom I have loved,――whom I have known,――whom I hold,――whom I long to see,――in whom I am what I am. Let me die then, O Jesus, good and merciful.” ”

“ The Scots honour St. Andrew as principal patron of their country, and their historians tell us, that a certain abbot called Regulus, brought thither from Constantinople in 369, certain relics of this apostle, which he deposited in a church that he built in his honour, with a monastery called Abernethy, where now the city of St. Andrew stands. Many pilgrims resorted thither from foreign countries, and the Scottish monks of that place were the first who were culdees. The Muscovites say, he preached among them, and claim him as the principal titular saint of their empire. ”

“ Andrew has been venerated as the special protector of Scotland, and his feast, known as "Andrewmas," celebrated everywhere with great rejoicing. The legend of St. Regulus (see October 17) which attributes to that saint the bringing of {174} the apostle's relics to the country is rejected by modern historians. The origin of devotion to St. Andrew in Scotland is nevertheless due to the translation of the apostle's relics thither (probably from Hexham) during the eighth century. ”

“ Andrew, a subject most difficult to treat effectively, and retain at the same time the dignity of the suffering apostle, while avoiding all resemblance to a similar scene in the life of Christ. Here he is bound down on a sort of table; one man lifts a rod, another seems to taunt the prostrate saint; a lictor drives back the people. ”

“ And having made up his mind to the death upon the cross, he went away and had a banquet with his equals. But Maximilla, the Lord going before her in the form of Andrew, went with Iphidamia to the prison. And when a greater number of brethren had met, Andrew felt compelled to speak thus:
15. "I was sent, dear brethren, by the Lord as an apostle into these regions, of which the Lord deemed me worthy, not to teach but to exhort all men inwardly related to the words, that they live in transitory sufferings, if they rejoice in the noxious notions of their imagination. ”

“ Andrew's Cross is, as is well known, always represented in the shape of the letter X: but that this is an error, ecclesiastical historians prove by appealing to the Cross itself on which he suffered, which St. ”

“ Where in Achaia holy Andrew dwelt,
Guiding his people in the way of life, 170
A voice was heard from out the heavens above.
To him, that steadfast saint, the Lord of hosts,
Glory of kings, Creator of mankind,
Unlocked the treasure of His heart, and thus
In words He spake:—"Thou shalt go forth and bear
My peace, and journeying shalt fare where men,
Devourers of their kind, possess the land,
And hold their home secure by murderous might. ”

“ Andrew, and receiving the relics of the apostle brought there by one of its bishops; and, sixty years later, the Picts expelling the Columban monks, introducing the secular clergy, placing the kingdom under the patronage of St. Peter, and then receiving from some unknown quarter the relics of St. Andrew, and founding a church in honour of that apostle, who becomes the national patron saint. The second legend concludes with this statement:—‘These are the names of those holy men who brought the sacred relics of St. Andrew the apostle into Scotia—St. Regulus himself ”

“ And the priests of idols saw all these signs and wonders and did not believe, but they sought out Saint Andrew the apostle in all that country that they might kill him. Afterwards they gathered together and came and took the holy Apostle Andrew, and they beat him severely and dragged him round about the city naked, and they cast him into the prison house, so that they might kill him on the following day. Now the custom of these people was when they wanted to kill a man to take him and hang him up on a tree, and stone him until he died. ”

“ Then spake the Lord of hosts, Almighty God,
And said these words unto His valiant thane:—
"O Andrew, thou shalt do a deed of might;
Shrink not before this host, but thy brave heart
Strengthen against the strong! The hour is nigh 1210
When these blood-thirsty men shall weigh thee down
With torments and cold chains. Reveal thyself,
Make firm thy soul, and strengthen thy brave heart,
That they may recognize My power in thee!
They cannot and they may not, crime-stained men,
Deal death unto thy body 'gainst My will,
Though thou shalt suffer many evil blows
From murderers. ”

“ Saint Andrew, thanked the noble Counselor,
Upon the ocean, on the oar-swept sea:—
"For this repast may God, the righteous Lord,
Ruler of hosts, who sheds the light of life,
Grant thee reward, and give thee for thy food
The bread of heaven, e'en as thou hast shown
Good will and kindness to me on the deep. 390
My thanes, these warriors young, are sore afraid;
Loud roars the raging, overwhelming sea;
The ocean is all troubled, deeply moved ”

“ Then Andrew knew the purpose of the folk
Within his heart; he knew the warriors' might, 1570
The pride of valiant men, was humbled low.
The waters compassed them about, and fierce
The rushing torrent flowed, the flood rejoiced,
Until the welling sea o'ertopped their breasts,
And reached their shoulders. Then the noble saint
Bade the wild flood subside, the storms to cease
About the stony cliffs. Straight walked he out
And left his prison, valiant, firm of soul,
Wise-hearted, dear to God; for him forthwith
A way was opened through the spreading stream ”

“ Andrew's cross, which is the same with that of Burgundy, was in great veneration among the Cumas, in South America, and that they fortified themselves with the cross against the incursions of evil spirits, and were in use to put them upon new-born infants; which thing very justly deserves admiration. ”

“ I have said, too, that he was a devout churchman. Many of the noble hymns and prayers with which the poem abounds are largely original, expanded from a mere line or two in the Greek. Many and beautiful are the epithets or kennings which he applies to God, taken in part from the Bible, and in part from the imagery of the not wholly extinct heathen mythology.
Thoroughly English is his love of violent action, of war and bloodshed. Andrew is a "warrior brave in the battle"; the apostles are Thanes of the Lord, whose courage for the fight Failed never, e'en when helmets crashed in war. ”

“ He was shortly after appointed to preach in Florence; and his fervour and love for sinners produced very astonishing fruit, in moving many who had lived in sin to turn in sorrow to the cross, and renounce their evil ways. Andrew was next sent to Paris, there to prosecute his studies, and was there invested with the degree of doctor; and after he had completed his studies with Cardinal Corsini, his uncle, at {108} Avignon, he returned to Florence, where he was elected prior of his cloister. ”

“ Hast thou no store of bread
To comfort thee upon the ocean-road,
Or pure drink for thy thirst? The life is hard
For him who journeys far upon the flood."
In answer then did Andrew, wise in wit,
Unlock to him the treasure of his words:—
"It is not seemly that with arrogance
And words of taunting thou demand reply,
When God hath given thee abundant wealth
And worldly fortune; better for each man 320
That with humility he kindly greet
A traveler bound to other lands far off,
As Christ commanded, Lord most glorious.
We are His thanes, chosen as champions ”

“ Then the most Holy Virgin washed her face and having pressed it well against a platter, she left on it her reproduction with her predicted son in her arms. Having handed the image to Saint Andrew, she said: “Yes, may the mercifulness and the overwhelming help of Him who was born of me be with thee everywhere where thou choosest to go. I myself will invisibly help to increase the complete success of thy preaching tour and my province of future enlightenment will always remain [119] under my constant, nay, never ceasing care and protection.” ”

“ We see the conversion of England in the very process of its accomplishment. We see the beauties of Paganism and those of Christianity blending with each other, much as the Medieval and the Renaissance are blended in Spenser. In the one aspect Andrew is the valiant hero, like Beowulf, crossing the sea to accomplish a mighty deed of deliverance; in the other he is the saintly confessor, the patient sufferer, whose whole trust is in the Lord.
If we compare the poem with the other epics of its class, its most formidable competitors are the anonymous Judith and Cynewulf's Christ. ”

“ Brand adds, that “singed sheep’s heads are borne in the procession before the Scots in London, on St. Andrew’s day.”
There is a marvellous pleasant story in the “Golden Legend,” of a bishop that loved St. Andrew, and worshipped him above all other saints, and remembered him every day, and said prayers in honour of God and St. Andrew, insomuch that the devil spitefully determined to do him mischief. Wherefore, on a certain day, the devil transformed himself “in to the fourme of a ryght fayre woman,” and came to the bishop’s palace, and desired in that “fourme” to confess, as women do. ”

“ Now, from legends we learn that St Andrews is possessed of a prodigious number of supernatural appearances of different kinds, sizes, and shapes—most of them of an awe-inspiring and blood curdling type. In fact, so numerous are they—80 in number they seem to be—that there is really no room for any modern aspirants who may want a quiet place to appear and turn people’s hair white. It might be well to mention a few of them before telling the tale of “The Veiled Nun of St Leonards Church Avenue.” ”

“ Andrews, apprehended that blessed martyr of Christ Jesus, Walter Myln; a man of decrepit age, whom most cruelly and most unjustly he put to death by fire in St. Andrews, the twenty-eighth day of April, the year of God 1558. This did highly offend the hearts of all godly, and immediately after his death a new fervency arose amongst the whole people; yea, even in the town of St. Andrews, the people began plainly to damn such unjust cruelty. ”

“ She promised that all the days of life that remained to her should be dedicated to carrying out his will, and that she would stay in the country of his adoption and walk in his footsteps as far as her weakness allowed. Then brilliant lights and sweet odours announced the ascent of the soul of Andrew, and all the people came and venerated their dead saint. Brigid left the monastery and settled near the source of the Sieci, high up in the Val d’Arno, where she founded a church in honour of St. ”