minds in fermentation. In fine, we shall behold an artisan, a melancholy enthusiast, and unskilful juggler, bursting out of a carpenter's shop, in order to deceive men of his own cast; miscarrying in all his projects; himself punished as a public incendiary; dying on a cross; and yet after his death becoming the legislator and the god of many nations, and an ob ject of adoration to beings who pretend to common sense! There is every reason to believe, if the Holy Ghost had foreseen the transcendant fortune which the religion of Jesus was one day to attain; if he had foreseen that this religion would, in the course of time, be received by kings, civilized nations, scholars, and persons in the higher circles of life; if he had suspected that this religion would be examined, analysed, discussed, and criticised by logicians; there is, we say, rea son to believe, that the Holy Ghost would have left us. memoirs less shapeless, facts more circumstantial, proofs more authentic, and materials better digested, than those we possess on the life and doctrine of its founder. He would have chosen writers better qualified than those he has inspired, to transmit to nations the speeches and actions of the Saviour of the World; he would have made him to act and speak, on the most trifling point, in a manner more worthy of a god; he would have put in his mouth a language more noble, more perspicuous, and more persuasive; and he would have employed means more certain to convince rebellious reason, and abash incredulity. Nothing of all this has occurred the gospel is merely an eastern romance, disgusting to every man of common sense, and apparently addressed to the ignorant, the stupid, and the vulgar, the only persons whom it can mislead.* Criticism finds there no connection of facts, no agreement of circumstances, no train of principles, and no uniformity of relation. Four men, unpolished and devoid of letters, pass for the faithful authors of memoirs containing the life of Jesus Christ; and it is on their testimony, that Christians believe themselves bound to receive the religion they profess; and adopt, without examination, the most contradictory facts, the most incredible actions, the most amazing prodigies, the most unconnected system, the most unintelligible doctrine, and the most revolting mysteries! Supposing, however, that the gospels in our hands belong to the authors to whom they are attributed; that they were in reality written by apostles or disciples of apostles, should it not follow from this alone, that their testimony ought to be suspected? Could not men, who are described as ignorant, and destitute of parts, be themselves deceived? Could not enthusiasts and very credulous fanatics imagine, that they *Victor of Tunis informs us, that, in the sixth century, the Emperor Anastasius caused the gospels to be corrected, as works composed by fools. The Elements of Euclid are intelligible to all who endeavour to understand them; they excite no dispute among geometricians. Is it so with the Bible? and do its revealed truths occasion no disputes among divines? By what fatality have writings revealed by God himself still need of commentaries? and why do they demand additional lights from on high, before they can be believed or understood? Is it not astonishing, that what was intended as a guide to mankind, should be wholly above their compre, hension? Is it not cruel, that what is of most importance to them, should be least known? All is mystery, darkness, uncertainty, and matter of dispute, in a religion intended by the Most High to enlighten the human race. had seen many things which never existed, and thus become the dupes of deception?* Could not impostors, strongly attached to a sect whereby they subsisted, and which therefore they had an interest to support, attest miracles, and publish facts, with the falsehood of which they were well acquainted? and could not the first Christians, by a pious fraud, afterwards add or retrench things essential to the works ascribed to the apostles? We know that Origen, so early as the third century, complained loudly of the corruption of manuscripts. "What shall we say (exclaims he) of the errors of transcribers, and of the impious temerity with which they have corrected the text? What shall we say of the licence of those, who promiscuously interpolate or erase at their pleasure?" These questions form warrantable prejudices against the persons to whom the gospels have been ascribed, and against the purity of their text. It is also extremely difficult to ascertain, with any degree of certainty, whether those books belong to the authors whose names they bear. It is a well known fact, that in the first ages of Christianity there was a Whoever has perused the ancient historians, particularly Herodotus, Plutarch, Livy, and Josephus, must feel the force of this reasoning. These writers, with a pious credulity similar to that of Christians, relate prodigies pregnant with absurdities, which they themselves pretended to have witnessed, or were witnessed by others. Among the wonders that appeared at Rome, some time before the triumvirate, many statues of the Gods sweat blood and water; and there was an Ox which spoke. Under the empire of Caligula, the statue of Jupiter at Olympus burst forth into such loud fits of laughter, that those who were taking it down to carry to Rome, abandoned their work and fled in terror. A Crow prognosticated misfortune to Domitian, and an Owl paid the same compliment to Herod. very great number of gospels, different from one another, and composed for the use of different churches and different sects of Christians. The truth of this has been confessed by ecclesiastical historians of the greatest credit.* There is therefore reason to suspect, that the persons who composed these gospels might, with the view of giving them more weight, have attributed them to apostles, or disciples, who actually had no share in them. That idea, once adopted by ignorant and eredulous Christians, might be transmitted from age to age, and pass at last for unquestionable, in times when it was no longer possible to ascertain the authors or the facts related. It is well known, that among some fifty gospels, with which Christianity in its commencement was inun 34. * Vide Tillemont, tom. ii. p. 47, 257, 438. St. Epiphan. Homil. The celebrated Henry Dodwell affirms, that it was not till the reign of Trajan, or indeed of Hadrian (i. e. more than a century after Christ) that a collection, or canon, of the books of the New Testament was made. These writings had even till then been concealed in the archives of churches, and were only in the hands of priests, who could dispose of them at their pleasure. Dodwell's Dissertations on Irenæum, p. 66, &c. To this may be added, the profound work of Mr. Freret, published in 1766, under the title of Examen Critique des Apologistes de la Religions Chretienne. It is evident, that, among the first Christian doctors, there was a great number of pious forgers, who, to make their cause prevail, framed and forged gospels, legends, romances, oracles of Sybils, and other works, of which the imposture and folly were so striking, that the church itself has been forced to reject them. To be convinced of this, we have only to cast our eyes on the work entitled Codex Apocryphus Novi Testamenti, published by J. A. Fabricius, at Hamburgh, 1719. The practice of framing Evangelical Romances, was not even recently left off in the Romish Church. A Jesuit, called father Jerome Xavier, a dated, the church, assembled in council at Nice, chose four of them only, and rejected the rest as apocryphal, although the latter had nothing more ridiculous in them than those which were admitted. Thus, at the end of three centuries (i. e. in the three hundred and twenty-fifth year of the Christian era), some bishops decided, that these four gospels were the only ones which ought to be adopted, or which had been really inspired by the Holy Ghost. A miracle enabled them to discover this important truth, so difficult to be discerned, at a time even then not very remote from that of the apostles. They placed, it is said, promiscuously, books apocryphal and authentic under an altar :~ the Fathers of the Council betook themselves to prayers, in order to obtain of the Lord, that he would permit the false or doubtful books to remain under the altar, whilst those which were truly inspired by the Holy Ghost should place themselves above it-a circumstance which did not fail to occur. It is then on this miracle that our faith depends! It is to it that a Missionary, in Persia, composed a ridiculous history of Jesus, his mother, and St. Peter, in the Persian and Latin languages, which was published under the title Historica Christi Persica, in 4to. Lugd. Batav. 1639. L'Histoire du Peuple de Dieu, by the Rev. Father Berruyer, is well known. In the thirteenth century, the Cordeliers composed a book under the title L'Evangila Eternal. In all ages, Christians, whether Orthodox or Heretics, have been piously occupied in deceiving the simple. Some have gone so far as to palm works on Jesus, and we have a pretended letter of his to king Agbarus. It ought to be remarked, that authors approved by the Church, such as St. Clemens Romanus, St. Ignatius Martyr, St. Justin, and St. Clement of Alexandria, have quoted passages which are not to be found in the four gospels admitted at present. |