personage whose history it contains should be himself a mere man? Do we find that he assumed the tone of an enthusiast or ambitious sectary? What sweetness, what purity in his manners! What an affecting gracefulness in his delivery! What sublimity in his, maxims! What profound wisdom in his discourses! What presence of mind in his replies! How great the command over his passions! Where is the man, where the philosopher, who could so live and so die, without weakness, and without ostentation? When Plato described his imaginary good man, with all the shame of guilt, yet meriting the highest rewards of virtue, he describes exactly the character of Jesus Christ. What prepossession, what blindness must it be to compare (Socrates) the son of Sophroniscus to (Jesus) the son of Mary! What an infinite disproportion is there between them! Socrates, dying without pain or ignominy, easily supported his character to the last; and if his death, however easy, had not crowned his life, it might have been doubted whether Socrates, with all his wisdom, was any thing more than a vain sophist. He invented, it is said, the theory of morals, others, however, had before put them in practice; he had only to say, therefore, what they had done, and to reduce their examples to precept. But where could Jesus learn among his competitors, that pure and sublime morality, of which he only has given us both precept and example? The death of Socrates, peaceably philosophising with his friends, appears the most agreeable that could be wished for; that of Jesus expiring in the midst of agonizing pains, abused, insulted, and accused by a whole nation, is the most horrible that could be feared.-Socrates, in receiving the cup of poison, blessed the weeping executioner who administered it; but Jesus, in the midst of excruciating tortures, prayed for his merciless tormentors! Yes! If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus were those of a God. Shall we suppose the evangelick history a mere fic

tion? Indeed, my friend, It bears no the mark of fiction; on the contrary, the history of Socrates, which nobody presumes to doubt, is not so well attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposition, in fact, only shifts the difficulty, without obviating it. It is more inconceivable that a number of persons should agree to write such a history, than that one only should furnish the subject of it. The Jewish authors were incapable of the diction and strangers to the morality contained in the gospel, the marks of whose truth are so striking and inimitable, that the inventor would be a more astonishing character than the hero."

Such is the testimony of the enemies of Christ! Yet the same splendid writer says, "I cannot believe the gospel.” How far above all praise-how resplendant and glorious must be that character, which extorts such testimonials from his enemies! Here then is the issue. We must believe, that such a person spent his whole life in a splendid career of deception, practicing the low arts of a juggler, and palming a tissue of falsehoods upon his countrymen, with no earthly object but to bring down the vengeance of an infuriated priesthood and cruel unthinking rabble, to take his life, and cover his memory with disgrace, or we must believe that Jesus is divine, and his religion is from heaven. But another difficulty will arise, if we still say so, pure a person was an impostor; we must then believe that he not only deceived the people in every attempt to perform his wonderful works; but that he possessed a power to deceive that no mortal man ever possessed before. That he did it before his enemies, so publickly that they acknowledged his superhuman power; and they could only account for it, by attributing it to demoniacal agency. And we must not only believe this, but we must believe he also succeeded in making the most indisputable evidence appear after he was dead, that he had risen again as he had foretold! For a mortal man to work miracles, or even to deceive mankind after he is dead, would be, we think, as

great a miracle as any ascribed to Jesus Christ. We have now proved from infidels themselves that Christ did exist at the time, and did appear at least to perform the miracles ascribed to him. We have also proved from them that he deceive. And finally to deceive as he

was too good to

must have done, if his miracles were not real, would have required all the power that christians have attributed to The conclusion is irresistable that "Jesus was the

him.

son of God."

VI. Proofs of christianity from the immediate disciples of Christ.-We have proved beyond all cavil, that christianity originated at the time alleged; and that Jesus did appear to work miracles. That he was too good to be an impostor; and that his miracles were generally such as could not admit of deceptive appearances. But however conclusive this reasoning may be, we will farther consider the argument in reference to the apostles.

1. Either the writers of the New Testament were themselves deceived: : or

2. They knowingly deceived others; or

3. They were true witnesses, and their testimony is true. 1. Were the writers of the Christian Scriptures themselves deceived? This was impossible. Most of them lived in the place where the events happened, and were contemporary with the events which they record. They profess to have seen Christ; to have heard his sayings, which they record, from his own mouth; to have seen his miracles, the healing of the sick, and raising of the dead; to have seen him after his resurrection from the dead at different times. Many of these events were of such a nature that they could not have been deceived about them. For instance, the feeding of the multitude of many thousands; the giving sight to those who had been born blind; the. raising of the dead, especially one that had been four days in the grave. All his miracles were done openly, not in presence of a few chosen persons, who might have been

coadjutors in deceiving the writers, but in day light, in prescuce of multitudes of believers and unbelievers, friends and enemies. Could they have been deceived? Could they have been imposed upon so much as to believe that all these things occurred before their own eyes and in their own ears, if they did not occur at all? Especially could they have thought, that there was an earthquake at the death of Christ, and darkness over the land for a number of hours! And that they saw and conversed with him frequently after his resurrection, if none of these things were done? In order to believe this, we must believe that the writers of the New Testament were perfectly destitute of common sense, and totally incapable of writing the books which they did write; which would prove that the Holy Ghost not only superintended, but actually dictated every word! And that Jesus was capable of using the most consummate deception after he was dead without a resurrection ! Will infidels believe in such miraculous things? No. It will not be contended that the writers were deceived; we will then inquire,

On this answer

2. Did they knowingly deceive others? must depend the whole question. 1. Were their characters such as deceivers and impostors usually sustain? No. For their good characters are susceptible of the most indubitable proof. Look at the moral principles contained in their writings. What other object can be discovered in them, but to recommend a high, a pure, and an exalted morality to men, and to persuade all men to practice holiness? They seem to forget themselves and their own interests; and thus every where plead with men to reform. They urge, they admonish, they appeal to reason, to humanity, to all that is lovely and good, to all the serious and solemn considerations that can move the human heart. Is it not reasonable to suppose that men, always endeavouring and labouring to do good, are in reality good men. Who can read the simple unadorned writings of the New

Testament, and not be made to feel that the writers were devoted heart and soul to all that is good? It is admitted by the most learned philosophers and opponents of christianity, that the gospel contains the most clear and indubitable marks of fervid and zealous devotion to pure morals of any book ever published. But

2. We have other testimony to their good character besides the internal evidence furnished in their writings. We might name a host of men who testified to the good character of the apostles, and who passed through "much tribulation" and death itself in defence of them in the early ages; but infidels will not confide in their testimony.— We, therefore, adduce the names of infidels themselves who wrote against christianity for four hundred years from its rise.

Tacitus was contemporary with Christ; and in his history of Rome, admits that multitudes of christians existed when Nero burned the city and alleged it to the christians as a pretext for the cruel and vindictive persecutions with which he pursued them, but he admits that "they were destroyed not out of regard to the publick welfare, but only to gratify the cruelty of one man." The accounts of the Neronian persecution and of the innocence of the christians are confirmed by Suetonius, Martial and Juvenal, who also describe their coat of pitch in which christians were burnt. They were fastened up to a stake, covered with a coat, upon the inside of which was a plaster of sulphurous pitch; and when burning the whole body would seem to send up a column of dense flame, and a stream of blood and melted sulphur would flow on the ground. Such were the cruelties inflicted by infidels on christians in the first ages of christianity; and such were the earthly motives to induce multitudes to embrace the cross of Christ. Pliny, an officer under the Roman emperor Trajan, wrote to his master on the cruelties he had inflicted on the christians (in the first century) and acknowledges that the whole of