piece of history, and in as concise a manner as I could, to obviate the objections which prejudice has raised against it. I hope that I have laboured to some good purpose.*

The very words of Origen, wherein he intimates, "That Josephus did not believe in Jesus as the Christ," shew clearly that the Historian did in some degree believe, and that he had afforded evidence of his belief. This is manifestly past all dispute. We may then be assured that Josephus had given an history of this divine person; and Origen had seen it, as is plain, for otherwise he never would have blamed the Historian for mentioning Christ, as the cause of these calamities, but for not mentioning him at all. The first was only a wrong inference, not so much of Josephus, as of his countrymen, and of little consequence; but the latter, had it been true, would have been a fatal omission, an unpardonable defect; for he who knew so much of the Disciple (James the Just), could not well be ignorant of the master; and should have taken proper notice of his character, all which in reality we find done. Origen therefore was acquainted with this passage, and as he tells us more than once that Josephus never admitted Jesus to have been the Saviour of the world, he shews plainly how he interpreted the words, 'O Xpicos duros nv (See Origen, Contr. Cels. Edit. Cantab. See Daubuz, p. 15.) We find there, that Origen seems to blame Josephus for not attributing the evils which the Jews experienced to Christ, rather than to James; for he was a person of more consequence, and their outrage to him more heinous. But how could he have expected any such thing from the Historian, if he had never shewn, that he was at all acquainted with Christ, but only had mentioned his name incidentally? Origen thinks the behaviour of Josephus upon this occasion still more strange, as Christ had been foretold by the Prophets. But the Historian must have shewn that he was acquainted with our Saviour's character, or how could he have known that it was conformable with the Prophecies ?

* Should the reader feel any interest to be acquainted with the different opinions given on "Josephus," we refer him to three chapters "On the Essenes," in the Nos. ccxci., ccxciv., and ccxcv., of Blackwood's Magazine. Vol. XLVII.-January to June, 1840.

APPENDIX II.

ON THE BOOKS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.

REV. SIR,

TO THE REV. CHARLES LE BLANC.

As for the Books of the New Testament, what use can Unitarians make of them? Yes, very great, saith the Socinian. If the Books of the New Testament were reformed, and those patches entirely taken from them which were never written by the Apostles, though under their names,—such as the Epistle to the Hebrews, which was brought in after the year 140 of Christ, and stuffed with doctrines of a Trinity and Christ's Divinity, contrary to the faith of Jesus Christ, and of his Apostles and the primitive Christians,-then we might hope to have success in the conversion of the Jews.

But in truth, they are not likely to succeed with their reformed Socinian Gospel so well as they would have us believe; for is it not reasonable to think, that every Jew of common sense would retort the book on themselves, and tell them frankly, This is not the Christian Gospel by which you propose to convince me; this is a book of no authority, but an imposture, of which you are the Father. We Jews, who are spread throughout all parts of the world, and intermingled among Christians of all persuasions, never yet met with these books, such as you now produce, to shew that Jesus is the Messiah. You tell us that they were corrupted by the Christians of the second age; produce copies more ancient as vouchers of this truth. The books which you assert were falsified, are of no authority. What other books have you besides these falsified books, to prove there ever was such a man as Jesus Christ, who died and suffered what you tell us of? Since you accuse these books of additions and defalcations, and all sorts of corruptions, you have no solid proof for the matters contained in them, which you say are true. They who thus falsified the Scriptures, by adding or subtracting what they pleased, or rather you

yourselves by advancing this position, have ruined the entire use which might be made of these books in points controverted between

us.

Thus much it is natural for a Jew of but ordinary capacity to say, and to quote his Tanchuma, and all the Rabbins who have disputed ever since there were Christians, against the Gospel, on the score of their attributing Divinity to Jesus Christ. Tanchuma is a famous book among the Jews, and has a passage in it-the Parascha va-elle Massahe-which the Italian Inquisitors expunged from all these books which the Jews printed by Bomberg at Venice; but this passage is still preserved, and is to this effect-that Jesus Christ, whom they call wicked Balaam, taught that he was God; and on the contrary, R. Tanchuma argues that he was a mere man. But should we call into the dispute a learned Jew, who understands the original and the meaning of his prayers, he would laugh in the face of a Socinian that should endeavour to persuade him, that Jesus Christ is not represented in the Gospels as God, or that the Christians were not of this belief till after the year of Christ 140. And he has every reason for it: the learned Jews know well, that the prayer which in the Christian countries is called the prayer against the Sadducees, and in other countries the prayer against Minnim, the Heretics and Apostates, was truly and originally written against the Christians, for being teachers of a Trinity and of Christ's Divinity, and so, as they judged, destroyers of the Unity of the Godhead. And this is R. Solomon's sense of that prayer in his notes on the Talmud. The Jews moreover knew that this prayer was composed under R. Gamaliel, who died Anno Domini 52, i. e. eighteen years before the destruction of the Temple. That this is no fable of the Talmud, which in more than one place (Talm. tr. Berac. ch. 5, and Bath. Isr. sect. 69) relates it, they may evidently prove from Justin Martyr's Dialogue (written A.D. 139), who mentions this prayer, or rather curse against the Christians, as already spread and received throughout all the synagogues of the world. A learned Jew deriding these Socinians, would represent to them that he knew not how they could refuse Jesus Christ that worship which the Christians ever since the first preaching of the Gospel throughout the world have paid him, on supposition of his being the true God. He reads how his ancestors saw him adored by the Christians in the first century, and he proves it to the Socinian from the Talmud, (Sanhedr, ch. 4, in Gem.) wherein are divers relations of R. Eliezer,

the great friend of R. Akiba, who lived in the end of the first and the beginning of the second century, concerning the Gospels, and the public worship rendered to Jesus Christ by the Christians. In a word, any Jew, who has sense enough to reflect on it, may see that the Gospel proposes Jesus Christ as the object of Christian worship. These considerations I shall leave now to the serious reflection of Socinians.

Of all the ancient heretics, I can perceive none but the Manicheans in the 4th century who dared to call in question the authenticity of the Gospels. Besides, this tardy accusation could be of no sort of avail to them against the constant and universal belief of the three preceding centuries. It suffices for any one to read the objections mentioned by St. Augustine in his work against Faustus the Manichean, to shew that they did not rest on any critical principles; that they did not quote any authentic testimony of antiquity; in fine, that the only proof they could produce was the opposition of their doetrine to that of the Gospels. So certain are we in our belief of the authenticity of them, that I may truly say with St. Irenæus, that it is confirmed by the testimony of heretics themselves; because each one of them, in separating from the communion of the Church of Rome, seeks to prove their own doctrine from it.* To the express testimony and to the unwilling avowal of the ancient heretics, we can add likewise the opinion of the Pagans, and as I have mentioned before, of the Jews, who have never expressed the least doubt regarding the history of Christ, notwithstanding the advantage they would gain by so doing in denying his Divinity. 1st. It is certain that the Jews have never contested the authenticity of the Gospels; as I have already shewn. 2nd. Silence in this case is an avowal of the truth of what I assert. 3rd. What positively shews that the New Testament was known to the Jews at the very commencement of the Christian religion, and before the destruction of the Temple, is, that the Ebionites, who belonged more to the Synagogue than to the Church, admitted the Gospel of St. Matthew. As to Pagans, we know that their Philosophers combatted with all their efforts the

* St. Irenæus's words are, "Tanta est circa Evangelium firmitas, ut et ipsi Hæretici testimonum reddant ei, et ex ipsis Egrediens unusquisque eorum conetur suam confirmare doctrinam.... Quando ergo hi qui contradicunt nobis testimonum perhibent, et utuntur his, firma et vera est nostra de illis ostensio."

doctrines of Christianity in their several works, and that the Emperors by their edicts every where prohibited them. I could produce several fragments from Celsus, from Hierocles, from Porphyrus, and from the Emperor Julian; we have likewise the works of Origen, of Eusebius of Cesarea, of St. Jerome, of St. Cyril of Alexandria, who have refuted them. The objections made by the Philosophers, and the answers of the Fathers, clearly shew us what the contested points were; but the authenticity of the Gospels was never called in question by them in this controversy; the Philosophers did not attack it, consequently the Fathers did not defend it. But do not let it be supposed for a moment, that the Philosophers had no knowledge of the existence of the Gospels, the reverse being the fact.Celsus, who wrote about one hundred years after Jesus Christ, mentions many particulars regarding them; but far from calling in question the authenticity of them, he accuses the Christians of having altered the original text, an accusation void of all proof, but by which at least he acknowledges that there was an original text of our Holy Scriptures. The testimony of the Emperor Julian is even yet more precise; he attributes formally the books of the New Testament to the authors whose names they bear, and he combats the Divinity of Jesus Christ by saying, that neither Paul, or Matthew, or Luke, or Mark, have spoken of it, and that John was the first who dared to teach it. In one of his edicts, he positively forbids the Christians to teach the Belles Lettres, and to read the parts in the public schools: he says, 'They may go into the conventicles of the Galileans, and they may explain there Luke and Matthew." Julian, consequently, did not doubt but that Luke and Matthew were the original historians of the Christians. If he had for a moment supposed them spurious, he would not have failed to have said so, in order to weaken their authority. If he had had the least room for considering them supposititious, they never would have escaped the researches and the malignity of that apostate Prince.

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Not only in the days of Julian, but also in the preceding age, the Pagans were perfectly of accord in regard to the authenticity of the Gospels. I require no other proof in corroboration of what I assert, than the decree of the Emperor Diocletian, who commanded all Christians, under pain of death, to deliver up their writings; they were forced to deliver up all the great muniments of Christianity, because it was impossible to refute them; consequently, they (the Pagans) had recourse to violence, because they