_The bloody sweat of Christ._
Saint Luke relates of Christ himself, that, "when he was in an agony
by the fervency of his prayers, his sweat was like drops of blood
falling down on the[139] ground."
[139] _Chap. xxii. v. 44._
This passage is generally understood, as if the Saviour of mankind had
sweated real blood. But the text does not say so much. The sweat was
only [Greek: hôsei thromboi haimatos], as it were, or like drops of
blood; that is, the drops of sweat were so large, thick and viscid,
that they trickled to the ground like drops of blood. Thus were the
words understood by Justin Martyr, Theophylactus and Euthymius. And
yet Galen has observed, that _it sometimes happens, that the pores are
so vastly dilated by a copious and fervid spirit; that even blood
issues thro' them, and constitutes a bloody sweat_.[140]
[140] _Lib. de utilitate respirationis._