o serve the creature more than the Creator....

"Images and pictures were first introduced into churches, not to be
worshiped, but either in the place of books to give instruction to those
who could not read, or to excite devotion in the minds of others. How far
they ever answered such a purpose is doubtful; but, even granting that
this was the case for a time, it soon ceased to be so, and it was found
that pictures and images brought into churches darkened rather than
enlightened the minds of the ignorant--degraded rather than exalted the
devotion of the worshiper. So that, however they might have been intended
to direct men's minds to God, they ended in turning them from Him to the
worship of created things."--_J. Mendham, __"__The Seventh General Council,
the Second of Nicaea,__"__ Introduction, pp. iii-vi._

For a record of the proceedings and decisions of the Second Council of
Nice, A.D. 787, called to establish the worship of images, see Baronius,
"Ecclesiastical Annals," Vol. IX, pp. 391-407 (1612 Antwerp ed.); J.
Mendham, "The Seventh General Council, the Second of Nicaea;" Ed.
Stillingfleet, "Defence of the Discourse Concerning the Idolatry Practiced
in the Church of Rome" (London, 1686); "A Select Library of Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers," second series, Vol. XIV, pp. 521-587 (N. Y., 1900);
C. J. Hefele, "History of the Councils of the Church, from the Original
Documents," bk. 18, ch. 1, sec. 332, 333; ch. 2, sec. 345-352 (T. & T.
Clark ed., 1896, Vol. V, pp. 260-304, 342-372).

Page 53. EDICT OF CONSTANTINE.--The law issued by Constantine on the
seventh of March, A.D. 321, regarding a day of rest, reads thus:

"Let all judges, and all city people, and all tradesmen, rest upon the
venerable day of the sun. But let those dwelling in the country freely and
with full liberty attend to the culture of their fields; since it
frequently happens, that no other day is so fit for the sowing of grain,
or the planting of vines; hence the favorable time should not be allowed
to pass, lest the provisions of heaven be lost."--_A. H. Lewis,
__"__History of the Sabbath and the Sunday,__"__ pp. 123, 124 (2d ed.,
rev., 1903)._

The original (in the "Codex of Justinian," lib. 3, tit. 12, leg. 3) is
quoted by Dr. J. A. Hessey in his Bampton Lectures on "Sunday," lecture 3,
par. 1, and by Dr. Philip Schaff in his "History of the Christian Church,"
Vol. III, sec. 75, par. 5, note 1. See also Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical
History," c