foretold by Moses. In the above paragraph, however, he supplies this omission, and tells us that Christ, at the impeachment of the leading men, was condemned to the cross; and that notwithstanding he appeared to his followers after three days again alive; and that these, with other marvellous things concerning him, had been predicted by the divine prophets: and this is precisely the history of Christ and his religion, as far as we can gather them from the New Testament.

But it is said that this testimony of Josephus was not quoted by any Christian writer before the days of Eusebius in the third century. True: but the more early Greek and Latin fathers had sufficient reason for not quoting it. Josephus was an apostolic believer; he received and embraced the religion of Jesus in its purity. And he not only excludes the doctrines of his divinity and miraculous birth from the history which he gives of our Lord,—and by this exclusion he shows them to be foreign to his Gospel,—but in the context he brings to light the origin of those doctrines, and brands the base authors of them with infamy to the end of time. Justin Martyr, Origen, and others, knew this to be a fact, and they passed over the testimony of the Jewish historian in profound silence, lest in an age when the transactions were fresh in the memories of men, the secret should transpire, and the very foundations of the orthodox faith be blown up as with gunpowder by the illustrious historian of the Jews. Time however removed the events to which Josephus refers from the knowledge of men; and after three centuries ecclesiastical writers feel themselves safe to quote the authority of Josephus.

The objections made against this disputed passage would never have been made, had these things been known: they originated in misconception; and the real character and views of Josephus being at length brought to light, they fall like a dead weight to the ground; and there they will remain, a monument of the

temerity and mistaken views of those who urged them. Nor should I omit to mention that the style of the passage is in exact unison with the very peculiar style of Josephus; the same conciseness and comprehension, the same dry and unvarnished detail of facts, distinguish it, which distinguish all his other works. Nor can any suspicion arise against its genuineness, from the want of authentic evidence. The same historical testimony authenticates it which authenticates all the works of Josephus, no manuscript, no version, no copy being ever known to exist without this celebrated paragraph. When men talk of forging a passage in Josephus, they surely talk without due consideration. A spurious paragraph might have been inserted in those copies which the Christians possessed; but could they do the same with those in possession of the Jews? And what Jew ever possessed the works of Josephus which did not contain the testimony he bears to Jesus Christ?

This important passage unites in a remarkable manner the opposite qualities of brevity and fulness. In a few sentences Josephus has brought together the leading articles of faith contained in the four Gospels, and asserts them to be true. Beginning in substance with the third chapter, and ending with the twenty-eighth of Matthew, he states that "Jesus was a wise man, and the author of wonderful works. The same Jesus is the Christ the rulers condemned, and Pilate crucified him. Nevertheless his followers, who loved him from the beginning, still continued to love him to the end: for he appeared to them again alive the third day, the inspired penmen of Judea having foretold these and thousand other things respecting him. In the midst of his sufferings and his disgrace, he attached to himself many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles; to these he taught the truth; and the men who loved him, who saw his works, and who heard his words and recorded them in the memoirs of his public life, were such as took pleasure only

in the truth. These great facts, thus explicitly attested by the Jewish historian, are the chief points on which the Apostles insisted in preaching the Gospel; and they form the peculiar and distinguishing doctrines of Christianity *.

* The learned Daubuz has composed a whole volume to show that one egg is not more like to another than the style of this paragraph is to that of Josephus. I will here point out one coincidence, not only between the words but the ideas and sentiments of Josephus. He says of Jesus, that he attracted to himself many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. The verb is sanyɑyɛro. Now in speaking of the converts which the Apostles made at Antioch, he used the same verb ayw in the middle voice combined with #gos instead of 1. "They were continually attracting to their own worship a great multitude of the Greeks." When Josephus says that Jesus attracted many to himself, he explains the cause to be the wisdom, the love of truth, which he displayed, and the wonderful works which he performed. The miracles which had been done by our Lord, and those which at the time were done by the preachers, were also the real cause of the attraction at Antioch. Every thing also connected with them was repulsive in the extreme, as they were vilified and persecuted not only as heretics, but even as incendiaries. The writer of the Acts briefly says, that "the hand of the Lord was with them," yet Josephus is silent respecting the miraculous power that thus gave them success, though the notice of it was necessary to render his narrative intelligible and rational. The improper use which the Heathens, to whom Josephus addressed his writings, made of the miracles wrought by Christ and his Apostles, is the true cause of the reserve which the Jewish historian maintains respecting them; and this is well illustrated by a signal example in modern days. I allude to the celebrated convert to Unitarianism in India. The Hindoos were disqualified by their erroneous notions of God and the laws of nature, to draw the proper inference from the miracles of Christ. RAMMOHUN ROY, therefore, in order to bring his countrymen over to Christianity, addresses to them a work in which he passes over the miracles of Jesus, and dwells on his precepts as the guide to peace and happiness.

CHAPTER VII.

Antichrist taught at Rome by a Jew and certain Egyptian Priests.-The Emperor prevailed upon by these Men to propose to the Senate the Deification of Jesus.-The same stigmatized as Impostors by Josephus.-The Notice taken of them by Paul in his Epistle to the Romans.

MY object in this and the two succeeding chapters is to show, that the antichristian system described in the third was introduced into the several churches established by the apostle Paul. If this should appear to be the case, two consequences will obviously follow; namely, that the authors of that system at Jerusalem employed emissaries in disseminating it, with the view of counteracting the labours of the Apostles; and that the success which the impostors met with, was the principal means in the hands of providence in calling forth the letters which Paul addressed to the converts whose name they bear. This inquiry is an object of high importance, as it cannot fail to throw new light upon many obscure parts of these writings, settle the question respecting certain dogmas imputed to the author by the advocates of the orthodox faith, and enable us to meet and refute the allegation, that Paul taught a religion different from that of Christ and his other apostles.

I begin with the introduction of Gnosticism into the church at Rome: and here a celebrated passage of Tertullian already quoted, claims our attention. Therein he says that Tiberius, apprized of the works of Jesus, proposed his deification to the senate, with his own vote in his favour, but that the senate rejected the proposal, because the emperor had himself declined that honour. Eusebius and Orosius state the same fact. The words of the latter are to this effect, Oros. lib. 7. c. 4. "Tiberius

proposed to the senate that Christ should be made a God, with his own vote in his favour. The senate, moved with indignation that it had not been, as was usual, proposed to them to determine respecting the reception of his religion, rejected his deification, and decreed by an edict, that the Christians should be banished from the city, especially as Sejanus, præfect of Tiberius, most obstinately resisted the reception of their faith. Yet Tiberius threatened with death the accusers of the Christians by an edict."

The persons here called Christians were Jews who believed in Christ. Tertullian and Orosius, to answer their own purpose, have antedated the name: for the term was not yet in existence. Philo and Josephus notice the transaction, and of course they call the sufferers Jews. The narrative of Tertullian implies, and that of Orosius more distinctly asserts, that the emperor protected the followers of Jesus by an edict. Improbable as this may appear, Philo, who lived at the time, not only asserts the same thing, but has copied at least the substance of that edict. It is to this effect: "All nations, though prejudiced against the Jews, have been careful not to abolish the Jewish rites; and the same caution was taken in the reign of Tiberius; though indeed the Jews in Italy have been distressed by the machinations of Sejanus. For after his death the emperor became sensible that the accusations alleged against the Jews in Italy were lying calumnies, the mere inventions of Sejanus, who was eager to devour a nation that alone or chiefly would, he knew, be likely to oppose his impious designs and measures. And to the constituted authorities in every place, Tiberius sent orders not to molest, in their respective cities, the men of that nation, excepting the guilty only, who were few, and not to suppress any of their institutions, but to regard as a trust committed to their care, both the people themselves, and