Note Back to Main Text — Chapter I

As years rolled on, and the Church at Rome became rich and allied itself with the secular power, it gradually departed more and more from its primitive condition,[92] until at length it was scarcely to be recognised from the Paganism which it had superseded. The heathen gods were replaced by canonised mortals; Venus and Cupid by the Virgin and Child; Lares and Penates by images and crucifixes; while incense, flowers, tapers, and showy dresses came to be regarded as essential parts of the ceremonial of the new religion as they had been of the old. Madonnas winked and bled again, as the statues of Juno and Pompey had done before; and stones and relics worked miracles as in the time of the Augurs.