INTRODUCTION. Both Ir is an old and familiar observation, that Chronology and Geo graphy are the two eyes of History. Without a knowledge of both, no historian can write accurately, and no lover of history can read with complete satisfaction or profit. Yet it must be obvious to every one who has at all attended to sacred or profane history, that in both the above-named sciences many disputable points still exist. Among those of chronology are the precise dates of the birth and death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not surely that any one who takes a Christian view of history can suppose for a moment that either of those events was in itself obscure. were predicted, even from the fall; and a succession of prophecies, brighter and clearer as they advanced, prepared the minds of men for the coming of the Saviour. At the very time of our Lord's birth an intense expectation prevailed. Many were waiting for redemption in Jerusalem. It was revealed to the aged Simeon that he should not die till he had seen the Lord's Christ. Even among the heathen, as we learn from Virgil, Suetonius, Tacitus, and the Magi, rumours of this expected and extraordinary event had gone forth. The heavenly host announced the day and place to the shepherds; and the providence of God so ordered, that a census was taken in Bethlehem, by command of the Roman emperor, at the very moment in which the Virgin brought forth, and both she and her infant son were then and there enrolled. In like manner the death of our Lord took place under the cognizance and by the express permission of the Roman government. Any one who adverts to the jealous scrutiny of that government, and especially to the gloomy and suspicious character of Tiberius, must be convinced à priori that such an event would be noticed in the annual returns of administration sent to Rome. In a word, the birth and death of our Lord Jesus Christ are the centre around which all history moves. These events alone can unfold the operations of the Divine government from the beginning to the end of time; and therefore they furnish the key to the civil as well as ecclesiastical history of man. No two events in history being then more certain, how comes it to pass that the generality of ecclesiastical historians have left almost unnoticed the chronology of our Saviour's life?-have abandoned the subject in despair, and pronounced it to be utterly impossible to ascertain the day of his birth, or the year of his crucifixion? It may well be asked, whether this general abandonment does not proceed, either from an exaggerated estimate of former labours, or from a reluctance to engage anew in dry and laborious investigation. At the revival of learning, many illustrious men engaged with ardour and untiring effort in the attempt to reconcile the ancient with the modern computations of time; and it may safely be said that no one applied himself to it without clearing up some difficulty, and adding something to the stock of general knowledge. But their labours were progressive. Errors were rectified. New discoveries took place. Inscriptions, coins and medals, were continually found, which ascertained dates, and narrowed the grounds of controversy. Lost works were from time to time recovered, either in their original languages or in ancient translations. Even now the researches of the learned are often rewarded with valuable fruit, and the stores of antiquity are found to be yet unexhausted. The progress of astronomical science has shed light upon the dates of ancient history, by the more accurate calculation of eclipses; and from time to time there have been some, though few, who have ventured, in opposition to the tendencies of the age, to investigate anew and with success the vexed questions of remote antiquity. Where an object, therefore, is of importance, there is no reason to despond, because men of great names have failed, or because much or all of the ground which they have trodden is to be gone over again, and the way is beset with thorns, and is difficult and tedious. If it be asked why the author feels himself called upon to undertake this task anew, the only answer is that he thinks it his duty. By the terms of his appointment he is required to prepare "from the most original sources now extant, a faithful Ecclesiastical History." He could not meet this requisition fully without a new examination of the original evidence concerning the true time of our Saviour's birth and death. If he fails, he will only share the fate of far abler and riper scholars than himself. If he succeeds, he will be fairly entitled to the thanks of the Christian world. It is no presumption in him to say that the obscurity of the dates now to be made the subject of renewed inquiry, has arisen in great measure from the faulty methods of modern investigation. Some writers have had pre-existing theories to support, by which their judgments have evidently been biassed. Others have taken up the inquiry at wrong points. They have built on the foundation of ancient dates and epochs supposed to have been established by preceding writers. Where those writers are at variance, they have often, from various motives, decided in favour of one, without duly weighing the contradictory evidence advanced by others. In this way they have been led into untenable hypotheses; and instead of untangling the mazes of controversy, have rendered the whole subject still more perplexed and intricate. Mistakes of this nature may be looked upon as floating lights in a passage of difficult navigation, warning the cautious mariner to avoid the shoals and rocks which have occasioned former shipwrecks. There is another defect in the character of all former treatises on this subject, which it is important to avoid. They have been written only for the learned, and have referred to, but not produced their authorities. The author, on the contrary, writes for the unlearned as well as the learned; and his object will be in every case to make his readers acquainted as fully as himself with the testimony on which the decision of every question must be founded. For this purpose the following work will be divided into two parts,—the first appertaining to ancient history in general,—the second, to the history of our Lord in particular. The first part, concerning ancient history in general, will be occupied in giving the evidence from original sources of the ancient methods of computing time, and exhibiting the certain laws by which they are to be connected with modern computations now in use. This has been neglected or erroneously stated by most of the writers who have attempted to determine the true dates of our Lord's birth and death. Yet the establishment of the one is absolutely essential to the due computation of the other. The first is the foundation, -the second, the superstructure. Unless the foundation be strongly and firmly laid, the superstructure will be weak, and liable to be overturned. But if both are of solid materials, the whole building will be fitly framed together, being compacted by that which every joint supplieth. In the prosecution of this plan, the rules which the writer lays down for his own guidance are the following: 1. To take nothing for granted. Every necessary question, from beginning to end, must be examined on its own merits, and decided by acknowledged authorities from history, verified, wherever the case allows it, by astronomical observations, and. arithmetical computation. 2. With regard to all such questions, conjecture is never to be allowed. In the adjustment of a series of events, where the truth is to be arrived at by approximation, and in the absence of positive testimony, probabilities are to be weighed. But in all cases they are carefully to be distinguished as probabilities only. The reader must be enabled to see where certainty ends, and where probability begins: so that even if the reasoning of the author be found inconclusive on any point of this nature, the certainty of established facts will not thereby be weakened. The ordeal of criticism may consume the perishable, but cannot demolish the solid parts of the building. 3. No theory before examination is to be assumed. Testimony is to be followed, whithersoever it may lead. The two great objects to be constantly kept in view must be the investigation of truth for its own sake, and the lucid communication of that truth to others. 4. In the examination of testimony, the original author is, if possible, to be consulted. This rule is as necessary, in order to arrive at the truth of history, as it is in a court of justice to reject hearsay evidence. A fruitful source of error is the copying authorities from the works of modern writers on chronology. Each generally brings forward such testimony as he thinks adapted to sustain the point he wishes to prove. They are special pleaders arguing a case. Undoubtedly they are entitled, from their learning and ability, to great respect, and all they say is to be duly weighed; but the judge notes down the authorities they offer, and then examines them for himself. 5. The testimony of the original witnesses is, as far as possible, to be laid before the reader in the very language of each witness. It has been usual, in writing for the learned, to give only a summary of the ancient testimony, in the modern writer's own words, because it is presumed that the learned will examine the authors referred to for themselves. But with the best intentions, the modern writer may make mistakes; and even if he quote correctly, the passage, separated from its context, may convey wrong impressions to the reader. Nor to the reader can there be the same |