The cup in which Christ gave the sacrament of his blood to the apostles is shown at Notre Dame de l'Isle, near Lyons; and there is another in a convent of Augustine monks in the Albigéois;--which is the true one? Charles Sigonius, a celebrated historian of our times, says, in his fourth book on Italy, that Baldwin, second king of Jerusalem, captured in 1101, with the assistance of the Genoese, the town of Cesarea in Syria, and amongst the spoils taken by his allies was a vessel or cup of emerald, which was considered to have been made use of by Jesus Christ at his last supper. "Therefore,"--these are his own words,--"this cup is even now devoutly preserved in the town of Genoa."
According to this account, our Lord must have had a splendid service on that occasion; for there would be as little propriety in drinking from such a costly vessel without having the rest of the service of a similar description, as there is in some Popish pictures where the Virgin Mary is represented as a woman with her hair hanging over her shoulders, dressed in a gown of cloth of gold, and riding on a donkey which Joseph leads by the halter. We recommend our readers to consider well the Gospel texts relating to this subject.
The case of the dish upon which the paschal lamb was placed is still worse, for it is to be found at Rome, at Genoa, and at Arles. If these holy relics be genuine, the customs of that time must have been quite different from ours, because, instead of changing viands as we now do, the dishes were changed for the same food!
The same may be said of the towel with which Jesus Christ wiped the feet of the apostles, after having washed them; there is one at Rome at the Lateran, one at Aix-la-Chapelle, and one at St Corneille of Compiegne, with the print of the foot of Judas. Some of these must be false.
But we will leave the contending parties to fight out their own battles, until one of them shall establish the reality of his case. It appears to me, however, that trying to make people believe that a towel which Jesus Christ had left in the place where it was used, had in several hundred years afterwards found its way into Germany and Italy, is nothing better than a gross imposture.