The Fathers of the Church loved to find in every reference to wood or tree, staff, rod or ark in the Hebrew Scriptures a type of the cross of Christ. Cyril of Jerusalem declares, "Life ever comes from wood!" Paulinus of Nola chants to the cross, "You have become for us a ladder for us to mount to heaven." And in an anonymous Easter homily inspired by Hippolytus, the tree of the cross reverses the destruction wrought by the tree of Eden: “For me this tree is a plant of eternal health. I feed on it; by its roots I am rooted; by its branches I spread myself; I rejoice in its dew; the rustling of its leaves invigorates me...I freely enjoy its fruits which were destined for me from the beginning. It is my food when I am hungry, a fountain for me when I am thirsty; it is my clothing because its leaves are the spirit of life.” Pascha IV
The poetic intuition of the Fathers found beautiful expression in a splendid processional hymn of Venantius Fortunatus, the Pange Lingua in which we sing to the cross directly:
Faithful cross, O Tree all beauteous
Tree all peerless and divine!
Tree all peerless and divine!
Not a grove on earth can show us
Such a leaf and flower as thine.
