\ 
 
 V 
 
 
 University of California. 
 
 OF 
 
 ^&: 
 
INTERNAL EVIDENCE! 
 
 ' AMERICAN 
 UNITARIAN 
 ASSOCIATION 
 
 ^os TON 
 
 OP THE 
 
 GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 REMAKES ON CHRISTIANITY AND THE GOSPELS. 
 
 WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO 
 
 STRAUSS'S "LIFE OF JESUS." 
 
 PART II. 
 
 PORTIONS OF AN UNFINISHED WORK. 
 
 BY ANDREWS NORTON. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 
 1856. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1855, by 
 
 CHARLES ELIOT NORTON, 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE: 
 BTEKEOTTPED AND FEINTED BY METCALF AND COMPANY. 
 
EDITORIAL NOTE. 
 
 THE work which forms the First Part of this 
 volume was mostly written in the years 1847 and 
 1848, and, after its completion, was laid aside for 
 future revision. In 1849 a severe attack of illness 
 left the strength of its author so diminished, that, 
 for a considerable period, his pursuits were inter- 
 rupted, and when he again became able to work 
 he devoted himself, in the near prospect of the 
 end of life, to more important labors than that of 
 revising what he had written. At the time of 
 his death, in 1853, the work was in the state in 
 which it now appears; but the manuscript bore 
 many notes in pencil upon passages which it had 
 been in the mind of the author to alter or enlarge. 
 It was his wish, however, that the work should 
 be published; for whatever changes or additions 
 he might have made would have been only for 
 the purpose of enforcing, with still greater dis- 
 
j v EDITORIAL NOTE. 
 
 tinctness and earnestness, the sentiments and the 
 convictions already expressed. 
 
 The Second Part of the volume consists of what, 
 at the time of its composition, many years ago, was 
 intended to form a portion of a general treatise on 
 the internal evidences of the genuineness of the 
 Gospels. This work was never finished. 
 
 The Appendix consists of one of the Lectures 
 delivered by the author as Dexter Lecturer in 
 Harvard University. It has been printed here as 
 having a close relation to the subject of the 
 volume. 
 
 It may be remarked, that many of the internal 
 proofs of the genuineness of the Gospels are 
 pointed out and illustrated in the Notes accom- 
 panying the author's Translation of the Gospels. 
 
 The few editorial notes are inclosed in brack- 
 ets. Whatever is so inclosed is editorial, except 
 where the brackets are used in the course of 
 quotations. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, February, 1855. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 REMARKS ON CHRISTIANITY AND THE GOSPELS, WITH 
 PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO STRAUSS'S "LIFE OF JE- 
 SUS" 1 
 
 INTRODUCTION 3 
 
 Mode of pursuing the inquiry concerning the internal evi- 
 dence of the genuineness of the Gospels, pp. 3-5. Par- 
 ticular notice to be taken of the late attacks of the infidel 
 theologians of Germany on the credibility of the Gospels, 
 pp. 5-7. Strauss's " Life of Jesus," pp. 8, 9. Impractica- 
 bility of separating the internal evidences of the genuineness 
 of the Gospels from those of their authenticity, pp. 10, 11, 
 A main design of the present work is to remove errors 
 which obscure these evidences, p. 12. An essential error 
 of this kind is the doctrine that the Gospels are infallible 
 books, written by divine inspiration, p. 13. Remarks on 
 this doctrine, pp. 13-17. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL REMARKS ON STRAUSS'S THEORY OF THE ORIGIN 
 
 OF CHRISTIANITY 18 
 
 Essentially coincident with speculations advanced by Volney, 
 pp. 18-20. General view of his theory, pp. 20-31. It 
 supposes, that some among the Jews converted their imagi- 
 nations of an expected Messiah into fictions concerning 
 Jesus, which were afterwards embodied in the Gospels, pp. 
 20, 21 ; that these fictions or mytlii were not generally 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 intentional falsehoods, the Apostles and their associates not 
 being responsible for them, pp. 21-27 ; and that most of 
 them became current before the destruction of Jerusalem, 
 p. 27. Explanation of their rapid growth and recep- 
 tion among the Jews, pp. 28-31. Remarks on this 
 theory, pp. 31-45. The innocent impostors who prop- 
 agated these mythi concerning Jesus must have been 
 everywhere contradicted by those acquainted with his 
 history, pp. 31-33. Impossible that they should have 
 succeeded in imposing them on the whole Christian world 
 as the original accounts of the Apostles and their asso- 
 ciates, pp. 34, 35. Another part of their task con- 
 sisted in identifying the history of Jesus with the Jewish 
 anticipations concerning the Messiah, p. 36. No attempt 
 could be more hopeless or more foolish, pp. 37-39. The 
 communication of Christianity to the Gentile world not ex- 
 plained by Strauss, p. 39. Necessary inferences from his 
 theory on this point contrary to indisputable facts, pp. 40, 
 41. Character and facilities of those by whom, according 
 to his theory, Christianity must be supposed to have been 
 established in the heathen world, pp. 42-44. Impossible 
 that such agents should have succeeded under such circum- 
 stances, pp. 44, 45. Concluding remarks, p. 46. 
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 
 REMAKES ON OTHER THEORIES 47 
 
 General remarks, pp. 47, 48. Account of the infidel theory 
 prevalent in Germany previously to that of Strauss, p. 49. 
 Concerning these theories some preliminary considera- 
 tions to be attended to, p. 49. Extraordinary phenomena 
 to be accounted for by him who reasons against the divine 
 origin of our religion, whatever period he may assign for 
 the commencement of its authentic history, pp. 50-62. 
 The existence of Christianity and its results in the last 
 quarter of the second century, pp. 50 - 52. (The character 
 of our religion such as to compel the reverence of those who 
 deny its divine origin, pp. 52-54.) The conception of 
 Jesus presented in the Gospels, and the view given in them 
 
CONTENTS. Vll 
 
 of his character and his ministry, pp. 54-62. How are 
 these phenomena to be accounted for by unbelievers? 
 The theories of modern infidel writers may be resolved into 
 one, pp. 62-64. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EXAMINATION OF STRAUSS'S Two FUNDAMENTAL PRINCI- 
 PLES OF CRITICISM 65 
 
 Strauss's work mainly occupied by an attack on the credibility 
 and genuineness of the Gospels, p. 65. Statement of two 
 principles of criticism laid down by him as tests to determine 
 that an account is not to be believed, p. 66. Remarks on 
 the first of these principles, the impossibility of a miracle, 
 pp. 66, 67. Remarks on the second of these principles, 
 that an account which lays claim to historical value must not 
 contradict other accounts, pp. 67-70. Illustration of the 
 character of Strauss's criticism on the Gospels by applying 
 his process to the accounts of the assassination of Caesar, pp. 
 70-82. Such criticism inapplicable to human testimony, 
 p. 82. Want of complete agreement between narratives of 
 the same event not inconsistent with their essential truth, 
 pp. 82, 83. The discrepances among the Gospels of such a 
 character as to confirm their authenticity, but disprove their 
 inspiration, pp. 84, 85. Used by Strauss, however, in the 
 attempt to disprove their authenticity and genuineness con- 
 sidered as the proper works of human authors, p. 85. This 
 use not new, p. 85. Example from Paine's " Age of Rea- 
 son," pp. 85, 86. First part of Strauss's work occupied with 
 a prolix discussion of the difficulties in the first two chapters 
 of Matthew and the first two chapters of Luke, p. 87. Re- 
 marks on his argument, pp. 87-93. Neither the supposed 
 errors of the Evangelists in these chapters, nor the incon- 
 sistencies between the two narratives, discredit the fact -of 
 the miraculous birth of our Lord, pp. 93 - 95. But the only 
 question to be settled is,. Do, or do not, the Gospels present 
 such appearances as to make it evident, or to create a pre- 
 sumption, that their writers were not well informed and 
 trustworthy witnesses respecting the events of the public 
 
VUl CONTENTS. 
 
 ministry of Jesus ? p. 95. Not to be confounded with the 
 question, whether the narratives in the Gospels are free 
 from error, p. 96. The conclusion arrived at by Strauss 
 that the Gospels are not genuine invalidates his arguments 
 against the truth of Christianity, pp. 96, 97. Supposing 
 the truth of our religion, if the Gospels were not written till 
 the second century, it would be altogether unreasonable to 
 expect that they would be exposed to fewer objections than 
 he has urged against them, pp. 97, 98. To prove the gen- 
 uineness of the Gospels is to prove the truth of Christianity, 
 but to disprove their genuineness is no step toward dis- 
 proving its truth, pp. 98-100. Influence of the work of 
 Strauss, pp. 100, 101. Its characteristic tone, p. 102. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ON SOME IMPORTANT CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPELS 103 
 
 The Gospels as literary compositions, pp. 103-115. They are 
 among the most imperfect of histories, pp. 103 - 105. They 
 imply that the great outlines of the ministry of Jesus, and 
 many circumstances connected with his history, were already 
 known to their readers, pp. 105, 106. Their accounts of 
 our Lord's appearances after his resurrection an example of 
 the manner in which they assume the existence of knowl- 
 edge on the part of their readers beyond what they furnish, 
 pp. 106-108. True character of the Gospels, and purpose 
 for which they were written, pp. 109, 110. Want of skill 
 in the Evangelists as literary artists, pp. 110, 111. The 
 Gospels in construction and style correspond to the charac- 
 ter and circumstances of their authors, p. 111. The char- 
 acter of the Gospels exposes them to the attacks of minute 
 criticism, p. 111. Difficulties disappear in proportion to 
 the justness of our conceptions and the extent of our knowl- 
 edge of the circumstances of their composition, p. 112. 
 Two classes of difficulties, pp. 112, 113. The defects of 
 the Gospels as literary compositions afford striking evidence 
 of their authenticity, pp. 113 115. General ignorance 
 concerning the true character of the Gospels, and conse- 
 quent incorrect conceptions of Christianity, pp. 115-120. 
 
CONTENTS. x 
 
 Neglected state in which the Gospels have been left for 
 popular use, p. 115. Faults of the Common Version, p. 
 116. Other obstacles to obtaining correct notions of their 
 character, p. 117. Want of information concerning the 
 Gospels has involved the whole subject of our religion in 
 obscurity, pp. 118, 119. Ground for encouragement in the 
 gradual advance in religious knowledge, pp. 119, 120. Re- 
 marks on the outburst of the revolutions of 1848, pp. 121 - 
 123. Such changes in themselves afford no certainty of 
 improvement, p. 123. To Christianity better understood 
 we must look for all essential improvement in the character 
 and condition of men, pp. 123 - 125. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ON WHAT ESSENTIALLY CONSTITUTES THE VALUE OF CHRIS- 
 TIANITY AND OF THE GOSPELS 126 
 
 The essential value of Christianity consists in its being a mirac- 
 ulous revelation of God, p. 126. If such a revelation has 
 been made, the truths of religion rest on the witness of God 
 himself, p. 127. And it is only through such a revelation 
 that these truths can be known, p. 127. Illustration of the 
 latter proposition, pp. 127-143. What can human reason 
 alone effect toward establishing the facts on which religion 
 is founded? It may assure us that there is an infinite 
 cause of all finite things, p. 128 ; that the Infinite Being 
 is intelligent and benevolent, pp. 128, 129 ; and that this 
 Being is unchangeable, p. 129. But before this conception 
 of God Reason stands confounded, p. 130. In contemplat- 
 ing the relations of God to finite beings, difficulties present 
 themselves which she cannot solve, pp. 130-134. These 
 difficulties resolve themselves into the question, What are 
 the relations of the Infinite Spirit to each one of us individ- 
 ually ? pp. 134-136. The answer to this question given 
 by the supernatural manifestation of God through Christ, 
 p. 136. Objections brought against the idea of such a rev- 
 elation, pp. 136, 137. These objections founded on erro- 
 neous conceptions, p. 137. Astonishing as the fact of such 
 a revelation is, there is nothing in the belief of it to offend 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 our reason, pp. 137-139. Our misapprehensions arise from 
 the narrowness of our conceptions, pp. 139, 140. Truths 
 made known to us by Christianity, p. 140. Its inestimable 
 value as a miraculous revelation, pp. 141, 142. Plainness 
 of its evidences, p. 142. It still leaves us in great igno- 
 rance, p. 143. But it has taught us all that is necessary to 
 know as the foundation of the highest virtue and the most 
 glorious hopes, p. 143. The Gospels are the history and 
 permanent evidences of this miraculous revelation, pp. 143, 
 144. Their character, pp. 144, 145. The union of hu- 
 man error and imperfection with their great essential char- 
 acteristics renders them a standing miracle in evidence of 
 the truth of Christianity, p. 146. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 STRAUSS'S PROPOSED SUBSTITUTE FOR CHRISTIANITY. 
 KEMARKS ON MODERN GERMAN PHILOSOPHY . . .147 
 
 The Concluding Dissertation of Strauss's book full of instruc- 
 tion, p. 147. Extract from it concerning the results of his 
 inquiry, pp. 147, 148. He proposes "to re-establish dog- 
 matically that which has been destroyed critically," p. 148. 
 Obscurity of this language, and absurdity of the meaning 
 which appears to be intended, pp. 148, 149. Further ex- 
 tracts from Strauss, relating to his proffered substitute for 
 Christianity, pp. 149-151. He " perceives the substance 
 of the Christian religion to be identical with the deepest 
 philosophical truth"; that is, with the atheistic philosophy 
 of Hegel, pp. 151, 152. Extracts from Strauss relating to 
 this philosophy, pp. 153, 154. "The key of the whole 
 Christology," pp. 155-157. The Concluding Dissertation 
 of Strauss's work affords materials for forming an estimate of 
 the speculations of modern German philosophers (so called) 
 in theology and metaphysics, p. 157. Character of these 
 speculations, pp. 158, 159. The school of writers to which 
 Strauss belongs not distinguished by its peculiar doctrines, 
 but by its mysticism and abuse of language, pp. 160, 161. 
 Its antiquity and extensive prevalence, pp. 161-163. 
 Its high pretensions, pp. 163-165. Its mischievous influ- 
 ence, pp. 165-168. 
 
CONTENTS. Xi 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 CONCLUDING REMARKS .169 
 
 Efficiency of such works as that of Strauss in the production 
 of evil, liable to be underrated, p. 169. Importance of cor- 
 rect opinions, p. 170. The improvement of our race de- 
 pends on the prevalence of truth, p. 170. How those 
 truths upon which our characters should be formed are to 
 be established, pp. 171, 172. Remarks on the position of 
 America in regard to the attainment and promulgation of 
 truth, pp. 172 188. Peculiar advantages in this country, 
 p. 172. Discouraging circumstances, p. 173. Neglect of 
 the higher departments of thought and learning, p. 173. 
 For example, of the sciences of political government and 
 political economy, p. 1 74. Evils of ignorance in these 
 departments of knowledge exhibited in the condition of 
 France and Germany, pp. 175-17 7. Neglect of the studies 
 which discipline the intellect so that it may be correctly ex- 
 ercised, p. 177. Neglect of the sciences of religion and 
 morals, pp. 178, 179. The study of theology essentially 
 connected with almost all the other important branches of 
 knowledge, pp. 179, 180. Tendency of our times to dis- 
 connect the truths of religion from the discussion of those 
 subjects which concern the present well-being of men, p. 
 181. Much to be learned and taught in the sciences of 
 religion and morals, pp. 182 184. No proper provision in 
 our literary institutions for the prosecution of the most im- 
 portant studies, pp. 184, 185. The great want in our 
 country is that of a body of men qualified to give instruc- 
 tion on these subjects, p. 186. The influence of the great 
 truths of religion and morals determines the fate of society, 
 p. 187. Responsibility of Americans as the advanced 
 guard of the civilized world, pp. 187, 188. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 ON THE INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE GENUINENESS OF 
 THE GOSPELS ; BEING PORTIONS OF AN UNFINISHED 
 WORK . 189 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CONSISTENCY OF THE NARRATIVE IN THE GOSPELS 
 WITH ITSELF, AND WITH ALL OUR KNOWLEDGE BEARING 
 ON THE SUBJECT 191 
 
 The internal evidences of the genuineness of the Gospels not 
 to be separated from those of their authenticity, pp. 191, 
 192. Among the most important proofs of both is the con- 
 sistency of the narrative in the Gospels with itself, and with 
 all other known facts having a bearing upon it. State- 
 ment of this argument, pp. 192-196. This consistency 
 discovers itself throughout the Gospels, p. 193. Is not the 
 work of study or artifice, pp. 193, 194. Appears more 
 clearly, in proportion to the extent and accuracy of our 
 knowledge, pp. 194-1915. The same argument presented 
 under another form, pp. 196-201. The Gospels contain 
 much that requires explanation, p. 196. This explanation 
 to be sought from a great variety of sources, p. 197. The 
 narratives in the Gospels accord with all that we can learn 
 or reasonably infer respecting the subjects to which they re- 
 late, p. 197. If the Gospels were not true, such agreement 
 could not exist, pp. 198, 199. Consideration of what is 
 implied in the hypothesis that they are narratives of fic- 
 titious events, p. 200. The character of the Gospels, then, 
 establishes the truth of the testimony to their genuineness, 
 p. 201. The preceding argument a cumulative one, p. 201. 
 Examples of its application, pp. 202-218. Explana- 
 tion of a portion of the eighteenth chapter of the Gospel 
 of Matthew, for the purpose of pointing out its intrinsic 
 marks of truth, pp. 202 - 212. Similar explanation of the 
 narrative concerning the young man who came to Christ 
 
CONTENTS. Xlll 
 
 addressing him, " Good teacher, what good thing shall I do 
 to have eternal life ? " pp. 212 - 218. Conclusion, p. 218. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE CONSISTENCY OP THE NARRA- 
 TIVE CONSIDERED 219 
 
 It may be said that the effect produced by the ministry of 
 Christ upon the Jewish nation was inconsistent with what 
 we might reasonably expect, supposing his history to be 
 true ; that such miracles as are ascribed to him must have 
 produced conviction, pp. 219, 220. Consideration of this 
 objection, pp. 220-230. An error to suppose that men 
 will always believe and act as it is in the highest degree 
 reasonable that they should believe and act, pp. 220, 221. 
 Circumstances to be considered which produced in the 
 minds of the Jews a false estimate of the weight of the evi- 
 dence for the divinity of our Saviour's mission, p. 221. 
 They regarded his miracles as performed through the agen- 
 cy of evil spirits, pp. 221 - 223. The holiness of his char- 
 acter and of his teachings did not deter them from this 
 opinion, but was in itself a cause of their hatred against him, 
 p. 224. The religious pride of the Jews, and their expec- 
 tations concerning a Messiah, p. 224. Christ appeared to 
 humble their pride and prostrate their hopes, pp. 225, 226. 
 Feelings of bitter hostility with which they naturally re- 
 garded him, as a moral and religious reformer, opposing 
 their strongest prejudices, pp. 226 229. An ignorant 
 and superstitious people not likely to be particularly af- 
 fected by miracles, pp. 229, 230. From the preceding 
 considerations it appears that the result of Christ's ministry 
 was such as we might reasonably expect, p. 230. These 
 statements may be viewed under a different aspect, 
 p. 230. Striking correspondence in the Gospels with the 
 representations that have been given, p. 231. The reality 
 of Christ's miracles appears to have been unquestioned, 
 pp. 231-233. This is not the case, however, concerning 
 the miracle of his resurrection, p. 233. This exception 
 such as to confirm the argument derived from the fact 
 b 
 
XIV CONTENTS. 
 
 just mentioned, pp. 233, 234. This fact corresponds to 
 the supposition of the truth of the Gospels, but does not 
 correspond to any other supposition that can be made, 
 pp. 234 - 238. Summary of the argument on this point, 
 p. 238. The history contained in the Gospels may be 
 divided into two parts : one, containing narratives of mirac- 
 ulous events ; the other, accounts of the discourses of our 
 Saviour, of his actions not miraculous, and of the dis- 
 positions, words, and actions of others, p. 238. Between 
 these two portions there is a perfect correspondence, pp. 
 239, 240. Such is the consistency of these different por- 
 tions, that the whole narrative must be true, or the whole 
 must be false, p. 241. No one will contend that it is 
 merely fictitious, p. 241. Supposition of those who deny 
 the truth of the Gospel history, p. 241. But to any suppo- 
 sition which denies the truth of the miracles, the consistency 
 of the history presents a conclusive objection, pp. 242 - 244. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST AS IT APPEARS IN THE GOS- 
 PELS 245 
 
 SECTION I. 
 His Teaching . . .245 
 
 The perfect exhibition of moral excellence in the teachings 
 and actions of Christ a proof of the genuineness of the writ- 
 ings in which it appears, p. 245. Statement of the argu- 
 ment, pp. 245 - 248. The Gospels contain just conceptions 
 of a perfect system of religion as taught by a divine teacher, 
 pp. 245, 246. Their writers derived these conceptions 
 either from reality or from their own imaginations, p. 246. 
 They could not have derived them from imagination, p. 
 247. Circumstances under which Christ appeared, pp. 248, 
 249. The great characteristics of his preaching, pp. 249- 
 258. His teachings concerning God, pp. 249 - 252. Con- 
 cerning immortality, pp. 252 255. Concerning the moral 
 responsibility of men as immortal beings, pp. 255-257. 
 These doctrines constitute his religion, p. 257. To have a 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 just conception of the force of the argument to be derived 
 from them, they should be compared with those which phi- 
 losophy had attained before, p. 258. No heathen teacher 
 of a higher rank than Socrates, p. 258. His imperfect 
 conception of the great truths of religion, pp. 258 - 260. 
 Comparison of the Memorabilia of Xenophon with the Gos- 
 pels, pp. 261, 262. Characteristics of the moral principles 
 inculcated by Christ, pp. 262 - 266. The morality which 
 he taught the most pure and comprehensive, p. 262. As 
 yet but imperfectly comprehended, p. 263. Nature and 
 extent of its requirements, pp. 263 - 266. How is it to be 
 explained that such a system is found in the Gospels ? p. 266. 
 
 SECTION II. 
 His Personal Character 267 
 
 The personal character which in the Gospels is ascribed to 
 Jesus Christ is most striking and original, p. 267. How he 
 is there represented, pp. 267-269. Truth of the concep- 
 tion contained in the Gospels of the character which the 
 miracles of a messenger from God ought to have, p. 269. 
 Character of Christ's discourses in reference to the gaining 
 of followers and disciples, pp. 270-272. The representa- 
 tion of these discourses such that it must have been drawn 
 from reality, pp. 273, 274. But little in the Gospels con- 
 cerning the private character of Christ till the closing scenes 
 of his life, p. 274. In relation to this subject there are 
 some passages which require explanation, p. 275. The 
 reply of Jesus to his mother at the marriage feast at 
 Cana, pp. 275-279. His treatment of the Syro-Phoe- 
 nician woman who besought him to cure her daughter, pp. 
 279 - 281. The miraculous cure of the Gadarene dsemom- 
 acs, pp. 281-283. These passages are among the striking 
 proofs which the Gospels everywhere furnish, of the fact that 
 their writers had no purpose of deceiving by the display of an 
 imaginary character, pp. 283, 284. The Evangelists seem 
 never to have formed an abstract conception of what the 
 character of Christ really was, p. 284. Defective style and 
 inartificial construction of their histories, and evident ab- 
 
XVI CONTENTS. 
 
 sence in them of all aim at effect, pp. 284, 285. When 
 we find, therefore, that from their entire narratives there 
 results a most wonderful, original, and consistent exhibition 
 of character, it is impossible to ascribe this to any other 
 cause than that they drew from reality, p. 285. The rec- 
 ords of our religion show that their writers had no ability 
 to deceive, and thus carry with them independent evidence 
 of their own authenticity, pp. 286, 287. One other pas- 
 sage besides those already noticed presents a difficulty, 
 that relating to the cry of our Saviour on the cross, p. 287. 
 Explanation of this passage, pp. 287-292. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 ON THE ADAPTATION OF THE DISCOURSES OF CHRIST TO 
 THE CHARACTER AND CONDITION OF THE JEWS, AND 
 TO THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH HE WAS PLACED . 295 
 
 General remarks, pp. 295, 296. In the tune of our Saviour 
 the notions of the Jews concerning religion were very im- 
 perfect and erroneous, p. 296. Their conceptions of God, 
 pp. 296, 297. Of the future life, pp. 297, 298. Of 
 moral and religious excellence, p. 298. Their political con- 
 dition at the time of our Saviour's ministry, pp. 298, 299. 
 Their expectations concerning the Messiah, pp. 299, 300. 
 Preaching of John the Baptist, pp. 301, 302. Conception 
 that may be formed of the appearance of Christ, pp. 302, 
 303. Commencement of his ministry in Galilee, p. 303. 
 The Sermon on the Mount, pp. 304-308. Spirit of the 
 Beatitudes contrasted with the feelings and expectations of 
 the Jews, pp. 305-308. Character of the remainder of 
 this discourse, when viewed in connection with the moral 
 and intellectual state of those to whom it was addressed, pp. 
 308, 309. The whole affords decisive evidence that Jesus 
 Christ was what he claimed to be, a teacher commissioned 
 and instructed by God, p. 309. 
 
PART I. 
 
 REMARKS 
 
 ON 
 
 CHRISTIANITY AND THE GOSPELS, 
 
 WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO 
 
 STRAUSS'S "LIFE OF JESUS.' 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IT has been my intention, after completing what 
 I had to say respecting the historical evidence of 
 the genuineness of the Gospels, to present a view 
 of the collateral, or of what, by giving an allow- 
 able, though somewhat extended, meaning to the 
 term, may be called the internal evidence of their 
 genuineness. It may seem at first thought as if 
 this might be sufficiently done by a direct state- 
 ment of the topics which compose that evidence, 
 without adverting to the objections, founded on 
 the contents of the Gospels, and originating, as I 
 conceive, in erroneous conceptions of their charac- 
 ter, with which their genuineness and authenticity 
 have been assailed. But such is not the fact. 
 
 It may be true, I believe it to be true, that, 
 without bringing into notice the false conceptions 
 of believers, or the objections of unbelievers, an 
 argument may be framed for the authenticity of 
 
4 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 the Gospels, derived from the internal evidence 
 afforded by them, which to an intelligent man may 
 appear conclusive, as admitting of no direct reply. 
 Yet to an intelligent man it may be far from being 
 satisfactory. In all cases of moral reasoning where 
 any doubt may exist, in all cases where there is a 
 division of opinion, and men who have professedly 
 examined the question at issue have arrived at op- 
 posite conclusions, we desire to view the subject 
 in all its aspects, and are unwilling definitely to 
 settle our judgment till we have heard both sides. 
 Even the very circumstance that an argument ap- 
 pears to us decisive may increase our desire to 
 know how it has been evaded, or what other rea- 
 soning has been opposed to it. Respecting any 
 important subject, we wish not merely to attain a 
 conviction of the truth, but also to comprehend 
 the bearing of the truth on the whole system of 
 opinions having relation to it, either as directly 
 contradicting it, on the one hand, or, on the other, 
 as disguising it and keeping it out of sight by 
 misrepresentations and false substitutes. We do 
 not care to have the sun admitted to us through 
 an opening into a darkened room. We desire to 
 see the objects exhibited by it in broad daylight. 
 In treating of the historical evidence for the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 5 
 
 genuineness of the Gospels, I have endeavored to 
 bring distinctly into view what has been asserted 
 or suggested in opposition to it. This it was easy 
 to do in the course of the discussion, without any 
 preliminary argument. But in regard to the sub- 
 ject before us the case is different. In treating 
 the historical evidence there can be no essential 
 disagreement, among men capable of discussing 
 the subject, concerning the principles of reasoning 
 to be applied to it. The only controversy must 
 be about facts. But he who opposes the credit of 
 the Gospels on the ground of their intrinsic char- 
 acter may proceed throughout on false principles 
 and untenable theories. He is then not to be met 
 in the course of the discussion by particular con- 
 futations of particular objections, but by a previ- 
 ous general confutation of the whole tenor of his 
 reasoning. And this becomes necessary in order 
 to attain a clear and satisfactory comprehension of 
 the subject. 
 
 THESE considerations have led me to take par- 
 ticular notice of the late attacks of the infidel the- 
 ologians of Germany on the credibility of the 
 Gospels. Such a mode of pursuing the inquiry is 
 particularly demanded at the present day, for the 
 i* 
 
6 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 writings of those theologians have obtained a wide 
 notoriety, and have affected the minds of numbers 
 by whom they are read, and of numbers by whom 
 they are not read. Through the operation of this 
 cause, and of others of a more general nature, whose 
 working lies deeper, Christianity has with very 
 many ceased to be regarded as a subject of rational 
 and manly investigation. The truth is a sad one, 
 but it is the truth, that a very great portion even 
 of intelligent men pass it by, perhaps with a cer- 
 tain air of respect, but as if it were a matter about 
 which they have no particular concern ; as if it 
 were not their business to determine for themselves 
 what is true and what is false concerning it. They 
 appear to look on the whole subject as one to be 
 left to divines and priests and the Church. Gross 
 ignorance and gross misconceptions of Christianity 
 consequently prevail. Objections, cavils, and sup- 
 posed difficulties, which would at once vanish in 
 clear day, assume a portentous appearance amid 
 the darkness, or the perplexity of false lights. 
 Explanation, thorough explanation, a readiness to 
 view the subject on every side and in all its impor- 
 tant relations, a total indisposition to fall back for 
 support on authority or traditionary opinions or 
 vulgar prejudices, and a freedom from all those 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 7 
 
 motives of fear or interest which may bias the mind 
 to countenance the errors of any party, are espe- 
 cial requisites at the present day in a defender and 
 expositor of Christianity. He should be 
 
 " veritatem quserere pertinax, 
 
 sollicitus parum 
 
 Utcunque stet commune vulgi 
 Arbitrium et popularis error." 
 
 The character of our age is such that we are 
 particularly called upon to consider the opinions 
 of those by whom Christianity is rejected, and 
 by whom, as we shall hereafter see, all religion is 
 rejected, and to examine the foundations of their 
 system of unbelief. 
 
 The number of modern German theologians who 
 have more or less formally attacked the credibility 
 of the Gospels is great. But it may not be very 
 difficult to give a general view sufficiently com- 
 prehensive and satisfactory of the modes of reason- 
 ing which they have pursued, and of the objections 
 which they have brought forward. The theolo- 
 gians of Germany are much in the habit of writ- 
 ing in chorus, if I may so express myself, and of 
 repeating each other with inconsiderable varia- 
 tions. No other among those who have contro- 
 verted the truth of our religion has become by 
 
8 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 many degrees so conspicuous as Strauss, of whose 
 principal work, " The Life of Jesus," it is my in- 
 tention to take particular notice. He may fairly 
 be regarded as a representative of the class. The 
 pre-eminence in notoriety which that work has at- 
 tained above the similar productions of his coun- 
 trymen, its wide circulation in the original and in 
 translations, and the number of those who have 
 viewed it, either with fear or with favor, as a for- 
 midable attack on Christianity, give it a clear title 
 to particular attention. But besides this, it con- 
 tains a copious collection from various modern 
 authors, the countrymen of Strauss, of what has 
 been regarded as most forcible in their objections 
 to the credibility of the Gospels ; and the collec- 
 tion is connected throughout with a theory con- 
 cerning the origin of Christianity, not, indeed, 
 original with the author, but which is more fully 
 developed by him than by any one of his prede- 
 cessors. 
 
 But, though I thus profess my intention of tak- 
 ing especial notice of the work of Strauss, yet no 
 reader needs to apprehend that his attention will 
 be diverted from the great topics before us to the 
 consideration of the errors, misapprehensions, and 
 incapacity of a particular writer. A reasoner with 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 9 
 
 the sole purpose of establishing the truth will not 
 take advantage of any want of ability in his oppo- 
 nent. He may incidentally point it out as illus- 
 trating the character and qualifications of those by 
 whom what he believes to be the truth is assailed ; 
 but he will not dwell on the mistakes or folly of 
 any writer whom he may think it worth while to 
 controvert, as if these aiforded evidence that the 
 propositions maintained by that writer must be 
 false. One advantage, however, and it is some- 
 times a great advantage, he who is maintaining the 
 truth may derive from the work of an opponent. 
 To arguments the most decisive, other representa- 
 tions may be opposed. A writer may be fully 
 aware that, however conclusive his reasoning may 
 be to his own mind, there are other minds differ- 
 ently constituted and informed that entertain, dif- 
 ferent views. These views, it is true, he may pre- 
 sent in his own language. He may put words 
 into the mouth of a supposed objector. But in 
 doing so there is danger that he may seem to be 
 trifling with his readers, to be making another 
 say what no intelligent man would say. But if 
 he produce what has actually been said, and what 
 many have thought to be forcibly said, he is re- 
 lieved at once from the suspicion of contending 
 with a man of straw fabricated by himself. 
 
10 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 IN treating of the evidence which the Gospels 
 themselves afford of their genuineness and of their 
 authenticity, it is not worth while to attempt to 
 make an artificial separation between those argu- 
 ments which bear more directly on the one sub- 
 ject, and those which relate more particularly to 
 the other. They run into each other and are inti 
 mately blended together ; and the ultimate pur- 
 pose of both is the same. 
 
 If the Gospels be authentic, that is, if their 
 contents be true, they are genuine works of their 
 supposed authors ; for, if true, they were written by 
 early and well-informed disciples of Christ ; and 
 it would be idle to ascribe them to any other dis- 
 ciples of Christ than those to whom the Christian 
 world has assigned them from the beginning. On 
 the other hand, if their genuineness be proved, 
 their truth is established ; for it would be folly to 
 suppose that disciples of Jesus, in the midst of un- 
 believers and enemies, whom it was evidently their 
 purpose to impress with the noblest truths and 
 sentiments of religion and morality, put forth pre- 
 tended histories of their master full of marvellous 
 fables, and obtained reception for these fables, 
 though they and their contemporaries knew them 
 to be false. In dealing with the historical evi- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 11 
 
 dence for the genuineness of the Gospels, we may 
 prove that they were written by those to whom 
 they have been ascribed, without, at the same time, 
 bringing any direct proof of their credibility, though 
 the step from one conclusion to the other is, as we 
 have just seen, unavoidable. But, in arguing from 
 their contents to prove their genuineness, it is not 
 practicable, and if it were practicable it would 
 not be desirable, to separate the arguments for 
 their genuineness from those which establish the 
 great truth that they contain the authentic history 
 of a miraculous revelation of God. 
 
 The evidence for this truth, as we might expect 
 in regard to a fact so momentous, presents itself 
 on every side. It is constantly opening before us 
 as we pursue new paths of investigation. It may 
 be hidden from view by the interposition of false 
 notions of Christianity and of the Gospels. Con- 
 ceptions so erroneous may exist concerning our re- 
 ligion and the books containing its history, that 
 the internal evidences of its truth may not apply 
 to the false representations given of the one or the 
 other. There may be no coherence between them. 
 But God, in manifesting himself to the world 
 through Christ, has not left us without abundant 
 witness that he has so manifested himself. The 
 
12 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 evidences which Christianity affords of its mirac- 
 ulous origin, the proofs which the "new creation," 
 as it is called by St. Paul, gives of its author, are 
 in number and variety like those which the natu- 
 ral creation affords of the power, wisdom, and 
 goodness of God. Both may be clouded over by 
 human errors. Both require the exercise of our 
 reason, that we may discern them in their extent 
 and clearness. Both may be disregarded. But 
 they exist. 
 
 WHAT may properly be called the internal evi- 
 dences of the truth of our religion, or, in other 
 words, of the truth of the history contained in the 
 Gospels, are so numerous, so diverse in their char- 
 acter, and appear from so many different points of 
 view, that the subject is not to be exhausted by 
 any one writer or in any one treatise. In explain- 
 ing the historical evidence for the genuineness of 
 the Gospels, I have been naturally led to point 
 out some of the more important internal proofs of 
 their authenticity. In the present work I shall 
 bring forward others. But a main design of this 
 work is to remove the errors and objections which 
 may counteract the proper influence of these proofs, 
 and tHus to leave the mind open to their reception, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 13 
 
 from whatever source they may be derived, or in 
 whatever form they may present themselves. 
 
 IN pursuing this design, we must begin with 
 entirely setting aside one essential misapprehen- 
 sion concerning the intrinsic character of the Gos- 
 pels. The traditionary doctrine has been, that they 
 are not, properly speaking, the works of their re- 
 puted authors, but works written by the inspira- 
 tion of God, or under his immediate suggestion 
 and superintendence. On the one hand, this doc- 
 trine is an insuperable obstacle to all just appre- 
 ciation of that vast amount of evidence for their 
 truth which the Gospels carry with them when 
 properly regarded and understood; and, on the 
 other, it is from this doctrine that the objections 
 with which their genuineness and authenticity 
 have been assailed derive their chief strength. 
 
 It having been assumed that they are infallible 
 books, free from the imperfections and mistakes 
 that belong to the works of merely human narra- 
 tors, and especially to those of writers so uned- 
 ucated as the Evangelists, when such imperfec- 
 tions and mistakes have been discovered in them, 
 the unbeliever has thought himself to have found 
 an argument against the reality of God's revela- 
 
14 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 tion by Christ, while in fact he had found only an 
 argument against a false doctrine. 
 
 * It is true, that in a book not expressly intended 
 for the confutation of merely popular errors, in 
 a work of reasoning addressed to intelligent men, 
 who may be supposed to be so far interested in its 
 subjects as to have exercised some serious thought 
 upon them, and to have made themselves in some 
 degree acquainted with the facts necessary to be 
 attended to in order to form a correct judgment 
 concerning them, it may seem incongruous and 
 out of place to enter into a confutation of this 
 doctrine as applied to the Gospels. But the as- 
 sumption that it is necessary for a defender of their 
 trustworthiness to defend their infallibility has 
 afforded the main opportunity for the most plausi- 
 ble attacks which have been made on their credit ; 
 while, at the same time, many Christians have 
 
 * [The preceding "Introduction" was left unfinished by the author. 
 The following fragment found among his papers, relating to the topic 
 with which it breaks off, was apparently to have been used as a por- 
 tion of the intended conclusion. It is therefore here printed, but it 
 should be understood that it did not receive the author's final re- 
 vision.] 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 15 
 
 joined with the adversaries of our religion in in- 
 sisting on the truth of this assumption, and in re- 
 garding the doctrine that the Gospels are properly 
 to be referred to God as their author, and are con- 
 sequently free from error, as essential to Christian- 
 ity, and the main point to be defended in a con- 
 troversy concerning its truth. The objections to 
 it all which it is worth while to urge, since, if 
 these are not considered as decisive, all others 
 must be unavailing may be stated in a few 
 words. It supposes a miracle of which no proof 
 can be afforded through the evidence of ocular 
 witnesses. It is a miracle the first step in the 
 proof of which is wanting; for the first step in 
 proving . such a miracle is to show that the sup- 
 posed subject of it claims to write by the author- 
 ity and under the guidance of God; and the Evan- 
 gelists put forward no such pretension. There 
 can, it would seem, be no rational ground for as- 
 cribing inspiration to a writer who himself does 
 not claim to be inspired. But though the Evan- 
 gelists do not claim it for themselves, it may be 
 said that they are affirmed to have been inspired 
 by an authority that cannot be questioned; for 
 St. Paul says, " All Scripture is given by inspira- 
 tion of God." (2 Timothy iii. 16.) This passage 
 
16 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 is the main argument for the supposition ; and it 
 affords a very striking example of the manner in 
 which a few misunderstood but easily remembered 
 words are often detached from the Bible and em- 
 ployed in support of irrational doctrines, in oppo- 
 sition to all else that may be learned from it, and 
 to the plainest dictates of common sense. In re- 
 gard to those words, it is unnecessary to urge the 
 considerations, that, before an argument in proof 
 of a miracle can be founded upon them, it must 
 be proved that St. Paul was inspired to write 
 them ; and that it must be further proved that the 
 Gospels were in existence when he wrote them, 
 which is very doubtful ; or even the consideration, 
 that, were they in existence, he could not have 
 had them in mind, since it is clear from the con- 
 text that he referred only to the books of the Old 
 Testament. The words have their whole force, 
 great as it has been upon the minds of English 
 readers, only from the improper use of the word 
 "inspiration" in our common English version, and 
 the consequent false meaning which has been put 
 upon them. Their true meaning may be thus 
 expressed : " The spirit of God is breathed into 
 every book " ; that is, of the Old Testament ; and 
 the only purpose of the Apostle was to assert gen- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 17 
 
 erally, what no Christian will deny, that a relig- 
 ious spirit pervades the books of the Old Testa- 
 ment. Hence they are, and were especially to the 
 early converts to our faith, " profitable," &c. I 
 say especially to the early converts, because at the 
 time when St. Paul wrote there was no collection 
 of the books of the New Testament, there was no 
 Christian literature, and certainly nothing in 
 heathen literature, supposing them to have had 
 any familiarity with it, which could supply the 
 place of the books of the Old Testament as a 
 source of religious instruction and religious feel- 
 ings. 
 
 But the Gospels themselves afford evidence the 
 most decisive of the question whether they bear 
 the stamp of God's infallibility, or the impress of 
 human minds. 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
18 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENEEAL EEMAEKS ON STEAUSS'S THEOEY OF ' THE OEIGIN 
 OF CHEISTIANITY. 
 
 SINCE the first edition of my work on the Gen- 
 uineness : of > the Gospels , appeared, an English 
 translation of Strauss's ". Life of Jesus " has been 
 published. It i is: remarkable, Considering the gen- 
 eral coincidence between the subject of his work 
 and my own, that, with the exception of a few in- 
 cidental observations, I have hitherto found no 
 occasion, nor : even '- any suitable opportunity, to 
 take notice of -it. ' It contains nothing which in- 
 validates the statement of facts' from which I have 
 reasoned, or touches upon the arguments which I 
 have drawn from those facts. 
 
 The theory of Strauss respecting the origin of 
 Christianity, which I have formerly very briefly 
 explained,* is essentially coincident with specula- 
 tions advanced by Volney in a once famous book, 
 
 * Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, 2d Ed., Vol. IH. 
 p. lix. Compare Vol. I. pp. 118 - 120. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 19 
 
 " The Ruins." He says : " Conformably to the 
 calculations received by the Jews, nearly six thou- 
 sand years had passed since the imagined creation 
 of the world." That time had been fixed for a 
 renovation of the world by a great deliverer of 
 whom there was a general expectation throughout 
 Asia. " This coincidence produced a fermentation 
 in men's minds. Nothing was thought of but an 
 approaching end. Men interrogated the hiero- 
 phants and their mystic books, which assigned 
 various periods for it. They expected the Re- 
 storer. In consequence of talking about him, 
 some one said that he had seen him ; or we may 
 suppose that some enthusiast believed himself 
 to be that personage, and collected partisans. 
 These partisans, deprived of their chief by an inci- 
 dent, true without doubt, but which passed in ob- 
 scurity, gave occasion, by the stories which they 
 told, to a rumor which was gradually organized 
 into history. On this foundation, all the circum- 
 stances of the mythological traditions were very 
 soon arranged, and the result was an authentic 
 and complete system, which it was not permitted 
 to doubt."* 
 
 * " Or, dans les calculs admis par les Juifs, on commen9ait a comp- 
 
20 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Conformably to what has been before said, 
 Strauss supposes that there was among the Jews 
 
 ter prs de six mille ans depuis la creation (fictive) du monde. Cette 
 coincidence produisit de la fermentation dans les esprits. On ne 
 s'occupa plus que d'une fin prochaine ; on interrogea les hierophantes 
 et leur livres mystiques, qui en assignment divers termes ; on attendit 
 le riparateur ; a force d'en parler, quelqu'un dit 1'avoir vu, ou menu; 
 un individu exalte crut 1'etre et se fit des partisans, lesquels, prives 
 de leur chef par un incident vrai sans doute, mais passe* obscurement, 
 donnerent lieu, par leurs recits, a une rumeur graduellement orga 
 nisee en histoire : sur ce premier canevas etabli, toutes les circonstances 
 des traditions mythologiques vinrent bientot se placer, et il en re"sulta 
 un systeme authentique et complet, dont il ne fut plus permis de dou- 
 ter." Les Euines, (Bruxelles, 1830,) p. 224. 
 
 This theory of Volney is immediately followed in his work by 
 another irreconcilable with it, borrowed from his contemporary, Du- 
 puis, the author of the " Origine de tous les Cultes." According to the 
 latter theory, Christ is an allegorical personage, and Christianity is an 
 allegory representing certain celestial phenomena. In this allegory 
 Christ is the sun. Yolney (pp. 227, 290) derives the name Christ 
 from the Hebrew word D1TJ, Jieres or cheres, which signifies the sun, 
 and the name Jesus from Yes, "which is formed by the union of three 
 letters, the numerical value of which is 608, one of the solar periods." 
 It would be hard to find in the book of Volney himself anything 
 more astonishing than the marvellous absurdity of these etymologies. 
 Certainly it would be very difficult to find anything like them in the 
 works of a writer having a reputation for common learning and com- 
 mon honesty. It deserves notice, that when their absurdity was com- 
 mented on by Dr. Priestley, though Volney replied to his work, he 
 did not undertake to make any defence on this topic. See Priestley's 
 " Observations on the Increase of Infidelity," (1797,) p. 118, seqq. ; 
 and his " Letters to Mr. Volney," (1797,) p. 23. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 21 
 
 an eager expectation of their Messiah. Jesus, at 
 least during a part of his ministry, regarded him- 
 self as the Messiah, as " the greatest and last of 
 the prophetic race." He was consequently so re- 
 garded by his followers. The expectation which 
 the Jews entertained of their Messiah was definite, 
 and " characterized by many important particu- 
 lars." They had formed many imaginations con- 
 cerning him connected with allegorical and typical 
 misinterpretations of the Old Testament; and, after 
 the appearance of Jesus, there were some among 
 the Jews who converted their imaginations of what 
 the Messiah was to be into fictions of what Jesus 
 had been, and embodied those fictions in a history 
 of his ministry. 
 
 I have said, " some among the Jews." This 
 mode of expression is not adopted by Strauss him- 
 self, but it is necessarily implied ; for the follow- 
 ers of Jesus were a small minority of the Jewish 
 nation. The Jewish people generally rejected 
 him, as not their Messiah, and their leaders perse- 
 cuted and crucified him as a religious impostor 
 and blasphemer. Nor, according to Strauss, were 
 the supposed fictions concerning him propagated 
 by his immediate disciples, who had witnessed his 
 deeds .and listened to his words, his Apostles and 
 
22 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 their associates ; nor, consequently, by those who 
 knew and held the truth concerning him as taught 
 by them. To affirm that they were propagated by 
 the Apostles and their associates would be to 
 maintain what the most reckless infidelity has 
 shrunk from directly asserting, namely, that the 
 received history of Jesus is a collection of 'enor- 
 mous falsehoods, fabricated by his immediate dis- 
 ciples, and preached by them with ineffable effron- 
 tery in - the very face of those who' knew them' to 
 be false. From this simple solution of the origin 
 of our religion, the " mythical ',' theory of Strauss 
 essentially differs; for, though: he does not define 
 the sense in which he, uses the term " my thus" it is 
 fundamental in his theory that my thi, and partic- 
 ularly the mythi or fables concerning Jesus, are 
 not generally intentional falsehoods. It is 'this 
 characteristic alone which distinguishes it ' from 
 the more : obvious and bald solution of the origin 
 of Christianity which has been adverted to. 
 
 Thus -he quotes, as , essentially expressing his 
 own opinions concerning- the origin and nature of 
 the mythi in .- the - history of Christ, what is said 
 by Otfried Miiller concerning the origin and na- 
 ture of the- mythi or mythological fables of the 
 ancient Heathens. The words in parentheses in 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 23 
 
 the following extract are inserted by Strauss to 
 accommodate the language of Miiller to his pur- 
 pose. 
 
 Mtiller contends that the mythological fables of 
 the ancients were not the fictions of one individual 
 or of many, for the purpose of deception. "It is 
 impossible," he says, "to prove that such a caste of 
 deceivers existed in ancient Greece (or Palestine) ; 
 on the contrary, this skilful system of deception, 
 be it gross or refined, selfish or philanthropic, if 
 we are not misled by the impression we have re- 
 ceived from the earliest productions of the Gre- 
 cian (or Christian) mind, is little suited to the 
 noble simplicity of those times. Hence an inven- 
 tor of the mythus, in the proper sense of the word, 
 is inconceivable. This reasoning brings us to the 
 conclusion, that the idea of a deliberate and in- 
 tentional fabrication, in which the author clothes 
 that which he knows to be false in the appearance 
 of truth, must be entirely set aside as insufficient 
 to account for the origin of the mythus." * 
 
 The following passage may further illustrate 
 the fundamental idea of Strauss, that the mythi 
 or fables contained in the Gospels were not fic- 
 
 * Strauss's Life of Jesus, (English Translation,) Vol. I. p. 76. 
 
24 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 tions invented by adherents of Jesus for the pur- 
 pose of deception. 
 
 " Perhaps it may be admitted that there is a 
 possibility of unconscious fiction, even when an 
 individual author is assigned to it, provided that 
 the mythical consists only in the filling up and 
 adorning some historical event with imaginary 
 circumstances ; but that where the whole story is 
 invented, and not any historical nucleus is to 
 be found, this unconscious fiction is impossible. 
 Whatever view may be taken of the heathen my- 
 thology, it is easy to show, with regard to the New 
 Testament, that there was the greatest antecedent 
 probability of this very kind of fiction having 
 arisen respecting Jesus, without any fraudulent in- 
 tention." * 
 
 But if the Gospels were composed by the au- 
 thors to whom they are ascribed, by Apostles and 
 by those who knew the truth respecting the his- 
 tory of Jesus from the communications of the 
 Apostles, that is, if the positions maintained in 
 " The Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gos- 
 pels " be correct, the " mythical " theory falls 
 at once to the ground. We are compelled to 
 
 * Strauss, I. 80. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 25 
 
 recur to the supposition of intentional falsehood 
 on the broadest scale, if those who knew the truth 
 respecting Jesus were the authors of the fables 
 concerning him. Accordingly, Strauss says: "The 
 most ancient testimonies tell us, firstly, that an 
 Apostle, or some other person who had been ac- 
 quainted with an Apostle, wrote a Gospel history ; 
 but not whether it was identical with that which 
 afterwards came to be circulated in the Church 
 under his name ; secondly, that writings similar to 
 our Gospels were in existence ; but not that they 
 were ascribed with certainty to any one individual 
 Apostle or companion of an Apostle. Such is the 
 uncertainty of these accounts, which after all do 
 not reach further back than the third or fourth 
 decade of the second century. According to all 
 the rules of probability, the Apostles were all dead 
 before the close of the first century ; not except- 
 ing John, who is said to have lived till A. D. 100; 
 concerning whose age and death, however, many 
 fables were early invented. What an ample scope 
 for attributing to the Apostles manuscripts they 
 never wrote ! " * 
 
 Thus, according to Strauss, " the external testi- 
 
 * Strauss, I. 62. 
 3 
 
26 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 mony respecting the composition of our Gospels 
 is far from forcing upon us the conclusion, that 
 they proceeded from eyewitnesses or well-informed 
 contemporaries'" ; * and the internal grounds of 
 evidence determine that such was not their origin. 
 
 The following passage may throw further light 
 on the conceptions of Strauss respecting the essen- 
 tial position of his theory, namely, that the Apos- 
 tles and their associates, the first followers of our 
 Lord and the witnesses of his ministry, are not re- 
 sponsible for the fables contained in the Gospels. 
 
 "In the first place," he says, "the fact that 
 many such compilations" (as the Gospels) "of nar- 
 ratives concerning the life of Jesus were already 
 in general circulation during the lifetime of the 
 Apostles, and more especially that any one of our 
 Gospels was known to an Apostle and acknowl- 
 edged by him, can never be proved. With respect 
 to isolated anecdotes, it is only necessary to form 
 an accurate conception of Palestine, and of the 
 real position of the eyewitnesses referred to, in 
 order to understand that the origination of legends, 
 even at so early a period, is by no means incom- 
 prehensible. Who informs us that they must ne- 
 
 * Strauss, I. 65. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 27 
 
 cessarily have taken root in that particular district 
 of Palestine where Jesus tarried longest, and where 
 his actual history was well known 1 And with 
 respect to eyewitnesses, if by these we are to un- 
 derstand the Apostles, it is to ascribe to them ab- 
 solute ubiquity, to represent them as present here 
 and there, weeding out all the unhistorical legends 
 concerning Jesus, in whatever places they had 
 chanced to spring up and flourish." * 
 
 According to Strauss, however, the greater part 
 of those fictions concerning Jesus which are em- 
 bodied in the Gospels, became connected with his 
 history during the period of about thirty years 
 which intervened between his death and the de- 
 struction of Jerusalem,t that is, during the period 
 throughout which many of his Apostles and their 
 associates, the first preachers of our religion, 
 and the great body of those instructed by them, 
 were living. These fictions did not proceed from, 
 nor were they countenanced by them, nor were 
 they received as true by those who relied on their 
 authority. How, notwithstanding, they obtained 
 such currency as almost immediately to obscure 
 and obliterate his true history, is to be thus ex- 
 plained. 
 
 * Strauss, I. 63, 64. f Ibid., I 84. 
 
I 
 
 28 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 The age, it is true, was "an historical age " 
 (by which term Strauss, I suppose, must be un- 
 derstood as meaning an age in which facts would 
 be recorded, and mythological fables would not 
 find ready currency) ; but " the pure historic idea 
 was never developed among the Hebrews." " In- 
 deed, no just notion of the true nature of history 
 is possible, without a perception of the inviolabil- 
 ity of the chain of finite causes, and of the impos- 
 sibility of miracles. This perception, which is 
 wanting to so many minds of our own day, was 
 still more deficient in Palestine, and indeed through- 
 out the Roman empire. And to a mind still open 
 to the reception of the marvellous, if it be once 
 carried away by the tide of religious enthusiasm, 
 all things will appear credible; and should this en- 
 thusiasm lay hold of a yet wider circle, it will 
 awaken a new creative vigor, even in a decayed 
 people. To account for such an enthusiasm, it is 
 by no means necessary to presuppose the Gospel 
 miracles as the existing cause. This may be found 
 in the known religious dearth of that period, a 
 dearth so great that the cravings of the mind after 
 some religious belief excited a relish for the most 
 extravagant forms of worship ; secondly, in the 
 deep religious satisfaction which was afforded by 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 29 
 
 the belief in the resurrection of the deceased Mes- 
 siah, and by the essential principles of the doctrine 
 of Jesus." * 
 
 The theory of Strauss necessarily supposes, that 
 Jesus was a very conspicuous individual, who acted 
 strongly on the minds of men. Before this theory 
 can be received, it becomes requisite to explain 
 the very rapid growth of those most extraordinary 
 fictions concerning him, which sprung up and 
 flourished while very many of his contemporaries 
 were still living ; especially as by a great majority 
 of those contemporaries, his enemies, they would 
 be at once indignantly spurned and trampled 
 under foot, as being what they were, monstrous 
 falsehoods ; while by another portion, the first ad- 
 herents of Jesus, and the original witnesses of his 
 ministry, their growth, to say the least, was not 
 fostered, they did not rest on their testimony. 
 Strauss has shown himself sensible that an expla- 
 nation of this phenomenon is requisite ; and the 
 solution which he gives of the sudden develop- 
 ment of such an array of fables concerning Jesus 
 may be found in the following passage. It may 
 be readily understood, if we bear in mind what has 
 
 * Strauss, I. 64, 65. 
 3* 
 
30 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 been before stated, that according to his theory 
 the Jews had entertained many imaginations con- 
 cerning their expected Messiah ; and that the pro- 
 cess in forming the history of Jesus which has 
 come down to us consisted in converting these 
 imaginations of what was to be into fables con- 
 cerning Jesus. 
 
 He says : "A frequently raised objection re- 
 mains, the objection, namely, that the space 
 
 of about thirty years, from the death of Jesus to 
 the destruction of Jerusalem, during which the 
 greater part of the narratives must have been 
 formed, or even the interval extending to the 
 beginning of the second century, the most distant 
 period which can be allowed for the origin of even 
 the latest of these Gospel narratives, and for the 
 written composition of our Gospels, is much too 
 short to admit of the rise of so rich a collection of 
 mythi. But, as we have shown, the greater part 
 of these mythi did not arise during that period, 
 for their first foundation was laid in the legends 
 of the Old Testament, before and after the Baby- 
 lonish exile; and the transference of these legends, 
 with suitable modifications, to the expected Mes- 
 siah, was made in the course of the centuries which 
 elapsed between that exile and the time of Jesus. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 31 
 
 So that, for the period between the formation of 
 the first Christian community and the writing of 
 the Gospels, there remains to be effected only the 
 transference of Messianic legends, almost all ready 
 formed, to Jesus, with some alterations to adapt 
 them to Christian opinions, and to the individual 
 character and circumstances of Jesus : only a very 
 small proportion of mythi having to be formed 
 entirely new." 
 
 This is the only explanation he affords. 
 
 IT appears, then, according to Strauss, that some 
 time during the thirty or forty years after the death 
 of our Lord, the small body of his followers among 
 the Jews was divided into two parties of very dif- 
 ferent characters. One was composed of his per- 
 sonal friends and followers, the Apostles and their 
 associates, who knew his true history and doc- 
 trines, and who did not propagate those falsehoods 
 concerning him on which the religion of Chris- 
 tians is founded. The other was composed of per- 
 sons who did propagate those falsehoods. These 
 had their origin, as Strauss suggests, in districts 
 of Palestine where Jesus did not tarry long, and- 
 
 * Strauss, I. 84, 85. 
 
32 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 where his actual history was not well known ; 
 and it would, he says, be ascribing absolute ubiqui- 
 ty to the Apostles to suppose them to have been 
 capable of being present here and there to weed 
 out all the unhistorical legends concerning him in 
 whatever places they had chanced to spring up 
 and flourish.* Those who propagated these fic- 
 tions concerning him had no intention of deceiv- 
 ing. They were unconscious of falsehood ; they 
 believed that what they related had actually taken 
 place.t They had had so little acquaintance with 
 Jesus, or with the eyewitnesses of his ministry, 
 that they did not know that all which they affirmed 
 concerning him was untrue. On the contrary, 
 they were persuaded that it was true. 
 
 But though, as Strauss suggests, their fictions 
 may not originally " have taken root in that par- 
 ticular district of Palestine where Jesus tarried 
 longest," t yet, in order to make converts to the 
 belief of them, it was necessary that they should 
 be preached in parts of Palestine where our Lord 
 had been well known, and where there could be 
 no ignorance respecting the essential facts in his 
 ministry. Here, on the one hand, they would be 
 
 * See the quotation from Strauss given before, p. 27. 
 
 f See before, p. 22, seqq. J See before, p. 27. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 33 
 
 indignantly and vehemently contradicted by the 
 great body of the unbelieving Jews, and, on the 
 other, they would be denied and discountenanced 
 by the true followers of Christ. The innocent im- 
 postors, who, in their ignorance, propagated uncon- 
 sciously such enormous falsehoods concerning him, 
 must have been surprised to find all those ac- 
 quainted with the facts in his history, whether 
 friends or enemies, utterly confounded, to say the 
 least, by their marvellous stories. One might 
 think that their own confidence would have been 
 shaken by the direct and authoritative evidence 
 which they must have encountered, on every side, 
 of the falsehood of their narrations. It might 
 seem, moreover, that it would be impossible under 
 such circumstances to procure converts to the be- 
 lief of them. But such was not the case. Their 
 own confidence was not shaken ; they persisted in 
 promulgating their stories, and they triumphed 
 signally. They are the true authors of Christian- 
 ity. It is to them that we are indebted for the 
 Gospels. Their fictions have supplanted the real 
 history of Christ, the original testimony of eye- 
 witnesses, and have become the foundation of 
 Christian faith. Nor is this all. Keeping them- 
 selves out of view, they have had complete sue- 
 
34 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 cess in putting their stories before the world as 
 resting on the authority of the Apostles and their 
 associates, in making them responsible for the 
 marvellous tales. The whole Christian world has 
 believed that these stories proceeded from Apos- 
 tles and their associates. But it was not so. They 
 proceeded from another party among the followers 
 of Christ, a party that does not appear in history, 
 the existence of which is irreconcilable with all 
 remaining records and memorials of the times 
 when it is supposed to have nourished, utterly 
 irreconcilable with all probability, and which, 
 therefore, was unknown to the world before its 
 discovery by Strauss. 
 
 It is to be borne in mind that the distinguish- 
 ing characteristic of the theory of Strauss, the 
 " mythical " theory of the origin of Christianity, 
 consists in the supposition that the mythi or fic- 
 tions in the history of Jesus were not intentional 
 fabrications for the purpose of deception, but that 
 they sprung up, as it were, spontaneously ; those 
 among whom they originated and by whom they 
 were propagated being unconscious of falsehood. 
 If intentional fictions, it is conceded that they are 
 not mythi. This, at least, is the general view to 
 be taken of them. The history of Jesus now ex- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 35 
 
 tant, which is little more than a mass of fictions, 
 attributing to him throughout a supernatural char- 
 acter and divine authority, could not have pro- 
 ceeded from those who were personally conversant 
 with him, and knew the real events of his life. 
 This fact is fully recognized by Strauss, though 
 not clearly apprehended by him in its necessary 
 relations. His reader should keep it in mind. 
 We must not suffer ourselves to vacillate between 
 two theories wholly inconsistent with each other. 
 The Apostles and their associates were, or were 
 not, the most shameless of impostors. According 
 to Strauss, they were not impostors. It follows that 
 the history of our Lord which the Christian world 
 has received was not derived from them, though it 
 grew to its present form principally while the 
 most, or many, of them were living. It proceeded, 
 therefore, from other individuals, the true origina- 
 tors of Christianity, anonymous individuals, of 
 whom history has preserved no record, and who 
 must have taught under the circumstances which 
 have been described.* 
 
 * "Narrationes in Evangeliis traditas, quas rerum vere gestarum 
 esse persuadere nrihi non potueram, mythorum in modum, qui inter 
 antiquas gentes inveniuntur, aut in ore populi a minutis initiis coa- 
 luisse et eundo crevisse, aut a singulis, sed qui vere ita evenisse super- 
 
36 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 WE may next observe, that, however difficult 
 was the task of these teachers of our present re- 
 ligion in persuading the contemporaries and coun 
 trymen of an 'individual so conspicuous as our 
 Lord must have been to give credit to a history 
 of him full of marvels that were utterly devoid of 
 truth, yet this was not the sole, nor the greatest, 
 difficulty which they are supposed to have over- 
 come. 
 
 Their teaching consisted, as we are informed by 
 Strauss, in identifying the history of Jesus with 
 the anticipations of the Jews concerning their ex- 
 pected Messiah. The mythi respecting this imagi- 
 nary personage were ready made for their use, 
 and they had only to turn them into historical fic- 
 tions and accommodate them to Jesus. 
 
 stitiose in animum induxerant, fictas esse existlmaveram. Quod ut 
 sufficit explicandis plerisque eorum, quae dubitationem moventia tribus 
 prioribus Evangeliis continentur : ita quart! Evangelii auctorem ad 
 tuendas et illustrandas sententias suas baud raro meras fabulas scien- 
 tem confinxisse, a Baurio, theologo Tubingensi doctisslmo, nuper ita 
 demonstratum est, ut critici me judicii rigori religiosius quam verius 
 temperasse intelligam. Dumque prima a Christo secula accuratius 
 perscrutantur, partes partiumque certamina, quibus nova ecclesia 
 commovebatur, in apricum proferunt, narrationum baud paucarum, 
 quas fabulas esse ego bene quidem perspexeram, sed unde ortsB essent 
 demonstrare non valueram, veram in illis primsB ecclesise motibus 
 originem detegere theologis Tubingensibus contigit." Strauss, Vol. 
 I. p. vii. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 37 
 
 But every one knows what were the popular 
 expectations of the Jews respecting their coming 
 Messiah. Of him, David, the greatest of their 
 kings, the founder of their monarchy, was in their 
 view the especial type ; though in all by which 
 the favor of God had distinguished David, the 
 Messiah was to be far more highly distinguished. 
 He, too, was to be a monarch, the restorer of the 
 kingdom of Israel, a warrior, a conqueror, the de- 
 liverer and exalter of his people. Establishing 
 the seat of his empire at Jerusalem, he was 'to 
 found a kingdom extending over the world and 
 enduring to the consummation of all things, over 
 which he was to rule without a successor. This 
 was the outline of their expectations, which, doubt- 
 less, before the coming of our Lord, was filled up, 
 as it has been since, with many particular imagi- 
 nations, corresponding to its general character. 
 
 But, according to Strauss, it was the purpose of 
 those who propagated the fabulous history of Je- 
 sus to evince that he was the Messiah through the 
 correspondence of its fictions with the previous 
 expectations of the Jews concerning the Messiah. 
 This history actually shows one striking point of 
 resemblance, in representing Jesus as the last great 
 messenger of God to the Jewish nation, endued 
 
38 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 with miraculous powers. But the whole repre- 
 sentation of the purpose and effects of his mission, 
 of his personal character, of his humble condition 
 in this world, of his determined repression of all 
 hope of worldly aggrandizement for himself, his 
 followers, or his countrymen, of his annunciation 
 to his immediate disciples, that they must submit 
 to poverty and suffering, and prepare themselves 
 for the last outrage of persecution, together with 
 the account of the apparent triumph of his ene- 
 mies and of his cruel death, this representa- 
 tion, if it were a fiction, might seem to have been 
 devised in direct opposition to the expectations of 
 the Jews respecting their Messiah. 
 
 But it may be said, that the facts to which I 
 have referred were so notorious, that no other ac- 
 count could be given by the honest impostors, 
 who, unconscious of falsehood, propagated the 
 stories of his miracles. Certainly these facts were 
 so notorious, that no other account could be given 
 but that which we have received. But such being 
 the case, it follows, that no attempt could be more 
 hopeless or more foolish, than an attempt to per- 
 suade the Jews that the life and the death, the 
 character, acts, and teachings of Jesus, correspond- 
 ed to their previous expectations of the Messiah. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 39 
 
 So far, indeed, from their finding any such corre- 
 spondence, we know that, during his ministry and 
 after his death, he was rejected by a very great 
 majority of the nation, as disappointing all their 
 hopes from a Messiah, and exasperating their 
 strongest prejudices. 
 
 I have elsewhere spoken of the theory of Strauss 
 as an outrage upon common sense. If the pre- 
 ceding account of it be correct, and no one, I trust, 
 will pretend that it is not, the language which I 
 have used cannot be objected to. But, as may 
 abundantly appear from the evidence afforded by 
 Strauss's work alone, he has many speculatists 
 among his own countrymen to keep him in coun- 
 tenance. 
 
 BUT we have as yet viewed this theory only un- 
 der one aspect; namely, in its relation to the Jew- 
 ish nation. We will consider it in some other 
 very important relations, in which the author has 
 not presented it, and in regard to which he has, 
 of course, given no explanations. 
 
 Christianity had its origin among the Jews, but 
 it is not through them that it has been transmitted 
 to us. From them it was communicated to the 
 Gentiles, the Heathens, our predecessors, from 
 
40 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 whom we have received it. ' But between the 
 Heathen world and the Jewish people there had 
 been previously a wide separation. This separa- 
 tion continued between the Jewish Christians gen- 
 erally and the Gentile Christians. With the ex- 
 ception of the Gospel of Matthew, the former did 
 not use the Gospels received by the latter, Gos- 
 pels which attained universal authority among the 
 Gentile Christians. These books were received by 
 them, I do not here say, as authentic histories of 
 Jesus, but as authentic histories of a miraculous 
 revelation from the true God, a God before un- 
 known to the generality among them, the God 
 whom St. Paul announced as such even at Athens. 
 From whom, then, did the Heathens receive 
 their knowledge of Christianity and of the Gos- 
 pels ] The theory of Strauss admits but of one 
 answer. According to this theory, they must have 
 received it, not from the main body of the Jewish 
 Christians, but from those few mistaken men among 
 them who, having little or no acquaintance with 
 Jesus, propagated, unconscious of falsehood, those 
 mythi concerning him with which the Gospels are 
 filled, and who thus established in the world not 
 merely a fabulous history of him, the professed 
 Messiah, of whom they knew nothing correctly, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 41 
 
 but likewise a new religion, embracing the no- 
 blest principles of action, founded upon faith in one 
 whose real history they had obliterated or ren- 
 dered doubtful, and whose character they had es- 
 sentially misrepresented. This is the only answer 
 which the theory of Strauss admits. But the only 
 answer admitted by authentic history and indis- 
 putable facts is, that the Heathens were instructed 
 in Christianity by the immediate followers and 
 companions of our Lord and by their associates, 
 by those who were perfectly aware -whether their 
 teaching was or was not true ; that they received 
 our religion from Barnabas and Paul and Luke, 
 from Peter and Mark, from the Apostle John, who 
 resided so long among them, and from others asso- 
 ciated with these early teachers. Above all, no 
 degree of folly, I think, certainly none to which a 
 rational person can be required to give heed, will 
 lead any one to pretend expressly that there is any 
 evidence, or any ground whatever for imagining, 
 
 that the Gospel was preached to the Heathen 
 
 
 
 world in two different forms ; in one form by half- 
 crazy fanatics, who filled the history of our Lord 
 with stories of fictitious miracles, and in another 
 by his immediate followers and friends, who told 
 the truth concerning him, whatever that was. 
 
42 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 But turning from unquestionable truths, we will 
 enter the region of mere hypothesis. We will 
 clear the ground, as far as possible, of those facts 
 that stand in our way. The Epistles of St. Paul 
 we will regard as forgeries, and the whole history 
 of the propagation of Christianity which may be 
 gathered from the New Testament as a fabrica- 
 tion. We may thus find room for those conclu- 
 sions that necessarily result from the theory of 
 Strauss concerning the establishment of Christian- 
 ity in the heathen world. 
 
 Though it is implied by him, that we have no 
 evidence of the reception of our present Gospels 
 before the last half of the second century, yet it 
 is acknowledged, or rather maintained, by him, as 
 well as by the other infidel theologians of Ger- 
 many, that histories of the same essential charac- 
 ter existed at a much earlier period. It is not 
 pretended that any history of our Lord essen- 
 tially at variance with the Gospels, any history in 
 which he was not represented as a teacher from 
 God, whose mission was attested by miraculous 
 displays of God's power, was ever known to the 
 Gentile Christians. 
 
 These Christians, therefore, received their in- 
 struction in Christianity from the fanatical and 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 43 
 
 ignorant portion of Christ's disciples. Every one 
 knows what these teachers effected. Let us con- 
 sider their means and the obstacles which they 
 had to encounter. 
 
 They were men very deficient in good sense. 
 They had taken 110 pains to inform themselves 
 correctly concerning the character, acts, and teach- 
 ing of him whose disciples they professed to be, 
 and whom they were so zealous in exhorting oth- 
 ers to obey. They had, on the contrary, fallen 
 into the grossest mistakes concerning them. God 
 did not " bear them witness with signs and won- 
 ders and divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy 
 Spirit." The pretence that he did so is merely 
 one of the fables which are put forward through- 
 out the New Testament. It was not only mor- 
 ally, but physically, impossible that they should 
 produce any miraculous evidence of the truth of 
 their fictions. Nor were they distinguished for 
 eloquence or ability of any sort, since, though 
 they effected such an astonishing work, history 
 has not even preserved their names, but has falsely 
 substituted for them those of other individuals, 
 Apostles of Christ and the associates of Apos- 
 tles. 
 
 Such were the character and the facilities for 
 
44 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 accomplishing their purpose, possessed by these 
 zealous missionaries of falsehood. What obsta- 
 cles, then, had they to encounter 1 
 
 According to Strauss, their main purpose in 
 their mythical history of Christ, which we now 
 find in the Gospels, was to evince that a Messiah 
 (named Jesus) had appeared among the Jews. 
 This was the story which they propagated in the 
 heathen world. 
 
 But the heathen world would have regarded 
 only with indifference or ridicule such a story 
 from such preachers, a story, that a Messiah 
 had appeared among the Jews, a people towards 
 whom the prevalent feelings of the Heathens had 
 been those of dislike and contempt ; and in whose 
 supposed good or ill fortune in the advent of their 
 Messiah, it must have been very hard to persuade 
 them that they had any concern. Admitting, 
 however, that it were possible to excite their at- 
 tention to the subject, with what ineffable scorn 
 must they have regarded the sort of evidence laid 
 before them ! How would they have listened to 
 proofs founded on a pretended correspondence be- 
 tween a body of incredible fictions and certain 
 passages of a book called the Old Testament, 
 a book for which they had no respect, which very 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 45 
 
 many of them probably had never heard of, and 
 which it may be safely presumed no one of them 
 had read, which passages were represented to 
 them as expressing typically or mystically what 
 the Jews had expected concerning the Messiah ? 
 With how much patience would they have lis- 
 tened to these Jewish proselyting missionaries 
 who had come among them, when these missiona- 
 ries themselves told them, that the person whom 
 they called on them to receive as the Jewish Mes- 
 siah had been rejected by his own nation as an 
 impostor and blasphemer, and had, in consequence 
 of his pretensions, suffered a public execution as 
 ignominious as it was cruel 1 What must they 
 have thought of this Jewish Messiah, the deliv- 
 erer of his people, when he was preached to them 
 after the destruction of Jerusalem, and the dis- 
 persion and ruin of the Jewish nation I Is it pos- 
 sible, an intelligent reader may ask, that any one 
 can have been so bewildered and confounded by 
 irreligion and mysticism, as to imagine that the 
 most astonishing moral revolution in the history 
 of mankind, the establishment of Christianity in 
 the heathen world, was effected by such agents 
 under such circumstances ? 
 
46 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 IT is not my intention to proceed at length 
 in such an examination of the theory of Strauss. 
 Were it worth while to exhaust the subject, it is 
 one which could not easily be exhausted. As truth 
 finds continual confirmation flowing in upon every 
 side, in proportion as the views of those who ex- 
 amine it are more comprehensive and correct, so 
 error is continually encountered by new objec- 
 tions, in proportion as it is distinctly contem- 
 plated, and its necessary relations clearly un- 
 derstood. I shall therefore confine myself to a 
 very few of the more important aspects of that 
 theory. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 47 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 REMAKES ON OTHER THEORIES. 
 
 IF the Gospels be genuine, if the essential facts 
 which I have stated in " The Evidences of the 
 Genuineness of the Gospels " be not erroneously 
 stated, which no one, I believe, will pretend, and 
 if the reasoning upon them be not fallacious, of 
 which every one may judge for himself, the theory 
 of Strauss is wholly excluded ; there is no ground 
 on which it can stand. It becomes evident that 
 it is only one of those many theories which hang 
 in the cloudy region of German speculation, 
 oijT6 yfjs ovre ovpavov aTTTo/jieva, unconnected with 
 anything on earth or in heaven. If the Gospels 
 were written by Apostles and by those who re- 
 ceived their accounts immediately from Apostles, 
 the mythical theory of their having proceeded 
 from men who innocently and unconsciously origi- 
 nated and propagated marvellous stories respect- 
 ing our Lord must vanish at once into air. Noth- 
 ing remains for the disbeliever in the historical 
 
48 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 facts concerning the origin of our religion, but to 
 fall back on the forlorn hypothesis, that the his- 
 tory of Jesus is throughout fictitious, and that, 
 of all intentional falsifiers, the Apostles were the 
 most shameless and the most successful, shame- 
 less and successful in so marvellous a manner, 
 that no account whatever can be given of it. 
 
 If, then, the views which have been taken of 
 the theory of Strauss be correct, nothing can be 
 added, which will exhibit more clearly its inco- 
 herent and dreamlike character, or its utter insuffi- 
 ciency to explain either the origin of Christianity, 
 or any one essential fact connected with the origin 
 of Christianity. I pass over, therefore, many 
 other considerations respecting it, which to my 
 own mind seem equally decisive as to its charac- 
 ter, and will only make a few remarks on this in 
 common with other theories to account for the 
 establishment of Christianity which have been ad- 
 vanced by such as refuse to admit its miraculous 
 origin. Those theories are very few. To object, 
 not to explain, has been the common work of un- 
 believers. 
 
 PREVIOUSLY to the theory of Strauss, that which 
 was prevalent in Germany supposed, that the facts 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 49 
 
 recorded in the Gospels, with the exception of 
 those of a miraculous character, were in the main 
 historically true, and that, in regard to the ac- 
 counts of miracles which they contain, those like- 
 wise were founded on certain facts which actually 
 took place, but facts in the common course of 
 nature, to which a miraculous character was given 
 only through the misapprehension of those by 
 whom they were witnessed. But it did not at- 
 tempt to explain how Christianity was established 
 in the world through this misapprehension of some 
 ignorant Jews, whose folly was regarded with 
 contempt and indignation by a very great majority 
 of their countrymen. This theory has passed, or 
 is rapidly passing, into a matter of history, and 
 there it will stand, as a melancholy proof of the 
 intellectual and religious state of men in a large 
 portion of civilized Europe during the latter part 
 of the last and the beginning of the present 
 century. 
 
 In regard to these two theories, and the spec- 
 ulations, generally, of infidel writers respecting 
 the origin of Christianity, there are some prelim- 
 inary considerations which are essential to form- 
 ing a correct judgment on the subject, but which 
 have been greatly neglected or kept out of view. 
 
50 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Let him who is reasoning against the divine origin 
 of our religion fix any period he may choose for 
 the commencement of its authentic history, still 
 at this period phenomena present themselves of a 
 character altogether wonderful and unparalleled. 
 
 We may take, for example, the last quarter of 
 the second century, and regard as fabulous all the 
 previous history of Christianity. What, then, is 
 to be found at this period I 
 
 We find the miraculous history of Jesus, the 
 history of a Jew who was represented to have 
 been commissioned by the God of the Jews to 
 instruct and command all men in his name, we 
 find this history, as it is recorded in the four Gos- 
 pels, received with an immovable conviction of 
 its truth, by a great number of heathen converts. 
 They were steady in affirming that this history, 
 and the books in which it is contained, had been 
 received by them from those who had made known 
 to them the new religion, from Apostles of 
 Christ and their associates. From whom, indeed, 
 could they have received the history of Christ's min- 
 istry, the truth of which they believed so firmly, 
 except from those by whom Christ had been made 
 known to them, and on whose teaching their faith 
 in him rested ? Of the strength of their belief 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 51 
 
 they gave sure proof by the marvellous change 
 which it wrought in their hearts and lives, by the 
 wide separation which it produced between them 
 and the heathen world, by their readiness to 
 submit to all the deprivations and evils which 
 it brought upon them; and even when they 
 shrunk from torture and death, it was not that 
 their belief was shaken, but that their courage 
 failed. Here is one group of remarkable phe- 
 nomena to be accounted for. Let us look at 
 another. 
 
 In an age which has afforded pictures of the 
 darkest and most revolting depravity prevailing 
 throughout the heathen world, in the midst of 
 such men as had furnished materials for the his- 
 tories of Tacitus and Suetonius, histories from 
 which so much more may be inferred by a Chris- 
 tian reader than is told by the heathen writers, 
 at a period when pagan ignorance and superstition 
 had become inflamed into persecuting bigotry, we 
 find Christianity in existence and extending its 
 power, in opposition to the strong antipathy and 
 resistance of the evil by which it was surrounded. 
 To use the words of a Christian then living, Ter- 
 tullian, it was " converting men to the worship of 
 the true God, causing them to reject error, and 
 
52 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 forming them to righteousness, chastity, patience, 
 mercy, innocence." If there be any truth in any 
 religion, if there be a God who cares for men, if 
 men are immortal beings, if there be any respon- 
 sibility for our actions beyond this life, if that 
 doctrine be not false which teaches us to regard 
 ourselves as spiritual beings, and not as perishing 
 animals, if there be anything ennobling or con- 
 solatory beyond what atheism may afford, what- 
 ever can give value to religion is found in Chris- 
 tianity. And Christianity was existing in the 
 second century. How is this fact to be account- 
 ed for? 
 
 Such is the character of our religion, that those 
 who have denied its divine origin have generally, 
 in modern times, been disposed to pay it a show 
 of reverence, and, while rejecting its history and 
 its authority, to belie its name and assume it for 
 their infidel theories. Even Strauss gives us to 
 understand, that "he is filled with veneration for 
 every religion, and especially for the substance of 
 the sublimest of all religions, the Christian, which 
 he perceives to be identical with the deepest phil- 
 osophical truth " ; * that is, with the atheistic phi- 
 
 * Vol. m. p. 397. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 53 
 
 losophy of Hegel. Whatever inconsistency or 
 folly there may be in this assertion, I do not sup- 
 pose that it is to he regarded as ironical mockery. 
 His fellow-laborer, Baur, as I have formerly re- 
 marked, insists on the intimate connection be- 
 tween the atheistic philosophy of Hegel and 
 Christianity, so that the former transfers to itself 
 the entire substance of the latter.* No one will 
 so misunderstand me as to suppose that I quote 
 these passages as deserving consideration, regarded 
 as the testimonies of the individual writers to the 
 value of Christianity; for the Hegelian philosophy 
 of these writers has not even any false semblance 
 of Christianity, though it might ally itself with 
 the religion of the Tartars, which teaches the in- 
 carnation of the divinities in human bodies, that 
 is, in the Lamas ; I only quote them to show 
 that Christianity, however grossly it may have 
 been misunderstood and perverted, however the 
 study of its character and its evidences may have 
 been and is neglected, has yet, with the progress 
 of morals and intelligence, taken so strong a hold 
 on all which is excellent in the minds and hearts 
 of men, that its enemies, while assailing it, are 
 
 * See Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, II. 45, 46. 
 
54 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 obliged, in order to secure followers, to inscribe 
 its name on their banners. 
 
 BUT not only was Christianity in existence in 
 the second century ; there is another astonishing 
 phenomenon to be accounted for. It is the con- 
 ception of its Founder presented in the Gospels, 
 the view given in them of his character and his 
 ministry. It is a conception to which human his- 
 tory or human experience offers no parallel or 
 resemblance, one apparently surpassing the 
 power of any human genius to have formed 
 from such materials as the heathen world could 
 furnish him, from any comprehension of relig- 
 ious truth he might derive from it, or from any 
 knowledge or imagination it might afford or sug- 
 gest of the moral nature and capacities of man. 
 Yet this portraiture of an individual in all its 
 supernatural grandeur is found in works which, 
 considered merely as literary compositions, are 
 rude, imperfect, fragmentary, in the works of 
 men whom it would be folly to speak of as in- 
 spired by human genius, and to whom, if we re- 
 gard them as fanatical or false or foolish, we 
 can ascribe no comprehensive and correct no- 
 tions of moral truth, and no sustained elevation 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 55 
 
 of moral sentiment. It is found in the produc- 
 tions of Jews who evidently had no superiority 
 over many of their countrymen through their 
 natural gifts, or through the advantages of such 
 an education as Galilee or Judaea could furnish ; 
 but whose writings, on the contrary, make it ap- 
 parent that they had no command of appropriate 
 expression in any language, and especially in the 
 foreign language of the Greeks. What is to be 
 said respecting this wonderful combination of in- 
 congruous facts 1 
 
 The character of Jesus, as it appears in the 
 Gospels, is not that of a truly wise and good 
 man, placed in such circumstances as may occur 
 in the course of God's ordinary providence, ex- 
 posed to severe trials in an irreligious age, yet 
 unbroken and unshaken by evil, thoroughly pen- 
 etrated and supported by a sense of his own im- 
 mortality and of his relation to God, and devoting 
 all the powers which nature has given him to the 
 service of his fellow-men. No human genius has 
 ever exhibited, by a series of actions and words, 
 an imaginary delineation of such an individual. 
 Nor is this the character which is presented to us 
 with so much distinctness in the Gospels ; but 
 one which it must have been far more difficult 
 
56 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 to portray before its actual appearance on earth. 
 Even should we connect with the conception just 
 presented the further trait, that the individual 
 supposed is, from the impulse of his own mind, a 
 great moral and religious reformer, strenuously 
 laboring to raise others to the same elevation with 
 himself, we should not embrace in it the distinc- 
 tive characteristics by which Jesus Christ was 
 separated from all other men. How, then, is he 
 represented in the Gospels ? 
 
 In the Gospels, in these rude works of unlet- 
 tered Jews, we find an account of the actions and 
 words of one who is represented as having been 
 the immediate minister of God, associated with 
 him as no other finite being within our knowl- 
 edge ever was, speaking to mankind in his name, 
 and certified to men as his representative by ex- 
 traordinary manifestations of God's power, alto- 
 gether different from that divine energy on which 
 the regular course of the physical universe de- 
 pends. To this fundamental conception the ac- 
 count given of him fully corresponds. He satis- 
 fies the highest imaginations that we can form of 
 such a teacher. He lives only for God and for 
 man. All selfish purposes and passions and fears 
 are put aside by him. He does not falter in his 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 57 
 
 course, through any human weakness. The boldest 
 assumptions of authority and of the most intimate 
 connection with God, are so accordant with the 
 whole representation of him, that we read them 
 without a thought of their utter and shocking 
 incongruity supposing him not to be the delegate 
 and representative of God. " No one knows the 
 Father but the Son, and he to whom it is the will 
 of the Son to reveal him." " He who has seen 
 me has seen the Father." " The words which I 
 speak are not mine, but the Father's who sent me." 
 "I and my Father are one," or, as we might 
 express it, " are the same." "I am the resurrec- 
 tion and eternal life." " It is the will of Him 
 who sent me, that every one who puts his trust 
 in the Son should have eternal life." "Who- 
 ever obeys my teaching will never see death." 
 " All power is given me in heaven and on earth." 
 The power of the Omnipotent will support that 
 cause for which he has sent me, the cause of truth 
 and righteousness. 
 
 These declarations are uttered with the perfect 
 calmness of un doubting superiority. Whether the 
 conception set before us be real or fictitious, there 
 can be no doubt about the truth of the words, 
 " Never did man speak like this man." 
 
58 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 This, then, is the presentation of a character of 
 inappreciable grandeur. But there is another 
 aspect under which Jesus appears in the Gospels, 
 wholly contrary to all vulgar notions of grandeur. 
 In this aspect there is nothing answering to any 
 previous imaginations which most of us, probahly 
 all of us, might form concerning the appearance 
 in this world of a messenger from God. He 
 who claimed to speak in the name of God was a 
 poor Jew of Galilee. His connections were all in 
 the humbler classes of society. He was uneducat- 
 ed. " Whence," asked the Jews, " has this man 
 his learning, having never been instructed ? " He 
 was regarded with scorn as well as with fear by 
 the powerful and rich among his countrymen. He 
 was scourged by the order of a Roman governor. 
 He was exposed to the insults of Roman soldiers. 
 He suffered, by a public execution, that terrible 
 death of agony and infamy, which was ordinarily 
 inflicted only on the most odious criminals, or 
 the most despised captives and unpitied slaves. 
 
 Thus is the delegate of God, he who was entitled 
 to be called the Son of God, brought before our 
 eyes in the Gospels. Were we to form a previous 
 conception of the coming of a messenger from God 
 to men, we might imagine him an angel descend- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 59 
 
 ing in glory from the visible heavens, or a Messiah 
 coming no one knew whence, a monarch, perhaps, 
 ruling with unresisted wisdom and benevolence, 
 and establishing throughout his kingdom the laws 
 of God, or a prophet, impressing all around him 
 with supernatural awe, and listened to only to be 
 obeyed. Certainly we should free our conception 
 from all that might seem degrading in the eyes of 
 men, and embody in it all that we might think 
 likely to command admiration and homage. 
 
 But when we turn from our imaginations to the 
 realities presented in the Gospels, we perceive that 
 in their exhibition of the office, character, and life 
 of Jesus, the parts which separately viewed may 
 seem so discordant blend themselves into one har- 
 monious whole. The dark cloud is a part of the 
 magnificent spectacle as essential as the flood of 
 glory which pours over it. The Saviour of men 
 came to teach us that all worldly distinctions are as 
 nothing, compared with those which concern our 
 spiritual nature and our immortal being ; and 
 how could he have taught this, if he had not him- 
 self trodden them under foot I He came to teach 
 that men are estimated by God very differently from 
 the manner in which they had estimated and do 
 still ordinarily estimate each other ; that, in the 
 
60 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 burning light of eternal truth and justice, all that 
 is accidental to character, all that imposes on hu- 
 man weakness, disappears ; and nothing remains as 
 an object of Gtod's approbation but essential, inde- 
 structible virtue. He came to teach us the vanity 
 of all merely human glory, and this lesson he 
 could not have given, if he had been invested with 
 the splendors of earth, or with more magnificent 
 splendors from heaven, that he might overpower 
 the imaginations of men. He came to teach us 
 not by words alone, but by embodying his teach- 
 ing in his life, that no sufferings should cause us 
 to turn aside from duty. He came to form men by 
 the most effectual, the only effectual means, by 
 his own example, to the practice of the hardest 
 and the highest virtues, those virtues which can 
 be called into action only by severe trials. How 
 could this have been done by such a messenger 
 from God as we might, in our folly, imagine as 
 suitable to the grandeur of the mission'? He 
 could, indeed, have proclaimed to us, that, when 
 duty requires it, we must submit to any depriva- 
 tion, to pain and death, and even be ready to bear 
 our cross to the place of our execution. But what 
 would have been the effect of such a declaration 
 compared with that of the words of Jesus : " Let 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 61 
 
 him who would be my follower renounce himself, 
 and come after me, bearing his cross " ? He came 
 to bring hope to a world full of suffering, in which 
 he heard all around him the wailing of wretched- 
 ness, as it may everywhere be heard at the present 
 day by him whose ears the spirit of the religion 
 of Jesus has opened to its cry. He came to men, 
 as they were and as they are, sinning, sorrow- 
 ing, insecure in all that they love on earth, often 
 oppressed with gloom, often tried by severe afflic- 
 tions, worn perhaps by disease and pain, seeing 
 others perishing by the last extremities of misery 
 and famine, and all fellow-travellers to death ; 
 he came to us whose real life, at its best, is often 
 so different from its show to the world ; and he 
 came to bring strength and consolation. Not be- 
 fore the throne of a monarch, nor in the presence 
 of an angel, could we look for sympathy. It is 
 when standing before the cross, while contem- 
 plating the death of the chosen of God, that we 
 recognize one bound to us by a common nature, 
 by community of suffering and by mutual sym- 
 pathies, Jesus the strengthener, and Jesus the 
 fellow-sufferer. 
 
 Looking back from the cross of Jesus on his 
 preceding ministry, what is the image of him which 
 
62 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 we receive from the Gospels'? If it have been 
 truly impressed on our hearts, we turn away un- 
 satisfied from the highest efforts of painting to 
 embody in his' lineaments the expression of his 
 character. Poetry can add nothing to our concep- 
 tions. It may render them more distinct and 
 vivid, but it will affect us only in proportion as we 
 believe it conformed to reality. It is to the per- 
 ception of essential reality that we owe the thrilling 
 sense of moral interest and grandeur produced by 
 the image it has called up of 
 
 "that calm, sorrowful, prophetic eye 
 With its dark depths of grief, love, majesty ; 
 And the pale glory of the brow, a shrine 
 Where Power sat veiled, yet shedding softly round 
 What told that He could be but for a time uncrowned." 
 
 SUCH as we have seen is the representation of 
 the office, life, and character of Jesus contained in 
 the Gospels. We have been reasoning, it will be 
 remembered, on the supposition that all the early 
 history of our religion before its establishment 
 among the Gentiles is essentially fabulous. But 
 the existence of this conception of Jesus in the 
 midst of the pagan world remains to be accounted 
 for. A solution, likewise, is to be given of the 
 other phenomena of which we have taken so rapid 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 63 
 
 a view. What explanation does infidelity afford 1 ? 
 The subject early exercised the minds of unbe- 
 lievers. During the last two or three centuries 
 strong efforts have been made to disprove the 
 miraculous origin of Christianity ; and of late the 
 work has been laboriously carried on by many 
 writers, some calling themselves Christians, and 
 others not assuming that name. What, then, are 
 the last results ? What is the theory now most 
 approved by such writers concerning the origin 
 and establishment of Christianity 1 
 
 The theories which have been advanced may be 
 resolved into one. It is this, that the origin 
 and establishment of our religion, with all the 
 phenomena to which our attention has just been 
 directed, are the result of the efforts of certain 
 Jews, who, if not fraudulent fanatics, grossly mis- 
 conceived, in some way or other, the character of 
 him whose history and office they pretended to 
 make known ; that, by means which are not ex- 
 plained, they imposed their fabulous stories, not 
 only on some of their own countrymen, but also 
 on the Heathens, while at the same time they pre- 
 sented to them the highest conceptions ever formed 
 of religion and duty ; and that these stories, after 
 having been somewhat changed by tradition, finally 
 
64 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 coalesced into the four Gospels. Whatever may 
 be the first thoughts that such a solution suggests 
 to a philosopher, one of his last reflections may 
 probably be on the vast difference which it has 
 pleased God to ordain among men in their intel- 
 lectual capacity and their moral perceptions and 
 feelings. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 65 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EXAMINATION OF STRAUSS' S TWO FUNDAMENTAL PRINCI- 
 PLES OF CRITICISM. 
 
 FROM these general considerations we return 
 to our immediate task, a notice of the work of 
 Strauss. His general theory concerning the origin 
 and establishment of Christianity is such as we 
 have seen. The main body of his work is occu- 
 pied in supporting this theory by an attack on the 
 credibility and genuineness of the Gospels. 
 
 " The sole purpose of the whole work that fol- 
 lows," he says, in his Introduction, " is to examine 
 the Gospels in detail in order to determine on inter- 
 nal grounds the credibility of their relations, and in 
 connection with this the probability or improba- 
 bility that the Gospels are the work of eye- 
 witnesses, or, generally, of well-informed writers." * 
 
 In this examination the two principles which he 
 lays down as tests, either of which is sufficient to 
 
 * Leben Jesu, I. 64 ; Engl. Translation, I. 57. 
 
66 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 determine that " an account is not historical," that 
 is, that it is not to be believed, are these : 
 
 First. " An account is not historical, when it is 
 irreconcilable with the known and universal laws 
 which govern the course of events." * 
 
 Second. " An account which lays claim to any 
 historical value must not be inconsistent with 
 itself, nor contradict other accounts." t 
 
 With respect to the first of these principles, 
 "the impossibility of a miracle," a conclusion 
 which, according to Strauss, has been established 
 " by a series of the most laborious researches, con- 
 tinued for centuries," it must rest on the truth of 
 one of two assertions. 
 
 He who affirms it must either maintain that 
 there is no power capable of producing other effects 
 than those which men witness in the regular course 
 of nature ; or he must maintain that, if any being 
 possesses such power, we may be fully assured that 
 he will never exercise it. 
 
 But if there is a being who may properly be 
 
 * Leben Jesu, 1. 100 ; Engl. Translation, I. 87. 
 
 f As this is so extraordinary a proposition, it seems right to give 
 the original : " Mit sich selbst und mit anderen Berichten darf eine 
 Relation nicht in Widerspruch stehen, wenn sie geschichtliche Geltung 
 ansprechen will." Leben Jesu, 1. 101 ; Engl. Translation, I. 89. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 67 
 
 called God, the presumption and folly of either 
 proposition preclude any argument respecting it 
 such as might be addressed to an intelligent man. 
 If the existence of such a being as men have 
 conceived of under the name of God be denied, 
 the question respecting the historical evidences of 
 Christianity is shut out, and the only question re- 
 maining a question to be first settled is about 
 the truth of atheism. 
 
 If the proposition be fully established, that a 
 miracle is impossible, it is a futile labor to fill 
 many pages with criticisms intended to show that 
 the narratives of the pretended miracles found in 
 the Gospels are incoherent and contradictory to 
 one another. But it is the application of Strauss's 
 second principle to the criticism of the Gospels 
 which alone will interest an English reader, except 
 so far as he may be curious to know the last prod- 
 ucts of German speculation concerning religion, 
 and the last accepted theory of infidelity. 
 
 This fundamental principle is enunciated by him 
 with his customary indefiniteness and incorrectness, 
 and the consequent absence of any tenable mean- 
 ing. 
 
 "An account," he says, "which lays claim to 
 any historical value, must not contradict other 
 
68 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 accounts." It is only after two or three pages, 
 that he incidentally recognizes the truth, that, 
 " when two narratives mutually exclude each other, 
 one only is thereby proved to be unhistorical." * 
 
 But this is not the only great oversight in the 
 position taken by Strauss. He speaks of one nar- 
 rative as contradicting another, in a sense wholly 
 indefinite. In what respects must two narratives 
 contradict each other, that the credit of one or both 
 may be invalidated'? Certainly in the essential 
 points of the narration. If they agree in these, no 
 further agreement is ordinarily to be expected. 
 Absolute freedom from error is not a common 
 attribute of the most credible history, and it would 
 be a marvel if it were found in four different rela- 
 tions of the same series of transactions. Two 
 professedly independent histories of the same events 
 would present, I do not say a very suspicious 
 character, but a character wholly unexampled, if 
 they agreed together throughout, if no real or 
 apparent discrepances were to be found between 
 them. And in proportion as any important fact 
 is confirmed by a greater number of witnesses, so 
 may we expect to find more discrepances and 
 
 * Vol. I. p. 92, Engl. Translation. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 69 
 
 contradictions in the accounts of particular cir- 
 cumstances attending it. But, conformably to the 
 vagueness of his general proposition, Strauss, 
 throughout his criticism on the Gospels, neglects 
 the distinction between essential contradictions and 
 unimportant differences, and deals with the latter 
 as if they were of the same class with the former. 
 
 Thus, after laying down his rule, he proceeds 
 immediately to illustrate it in the following man- 
 ner: 
 
 " The most decided case falling under this rule, 
 amounting to a positive contradiction, is when one 
 account affirms what another denies. Thus, one 
 Gospel [that of Matthew] represents the first ap- 
 pearance of Jesus in Galilee as subsequent to the 
 imprisonment of John the Baptist, whilst another 
 Gospel [that of John] remarks, long after Jesus 
 had preached both in Galilee and in Judaea, that 
 ' John was not yet cast into prison.' " * 
 
 I believe that this statement of Strauss is erro- 
 neous. But it is not here necessary to discuss this 
 subject. Supposing it not to be erroneous, what 
 will follow ] It will follow that one or the other 
 Evangelist had been misinformed as to the time of 
 
 * Vol. I. p. 89. 
 
70 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 John's imprisonment, or that, writing after an 
 interval of probably more than thirty years, his 
 recollection of it was incorrect. It would not fol- 
 low that John' was not imprisoned ; nor would 
 any doubt be cast on the essential facts which the 
 two Evangelists relate concerning him. Nor would 
 it follow that either of them was disqualified, by 
 his mistake about the precise time of John's im- 
 prisonment, from being a trustworthy witness of 
 what he had seen and heard as a companion of 
 Jesus during his ministry. 
 
 THE character of Strauss's criticism on the Gos- 
 pels, and of his reasoning upon them generally, 
 admits of being illustrated by applying it to the 
 accounts given by different heathen authors of 
 almost any remarkable event which they have re- 
 lated in common. But it is difficult to give such 
 an illustration ; because, on any subject of profane 
 history, there is danger that even a subdued copy 
 of his manner may have an air of burlesque un- 
 suitable to a grave discussion. Where the subject 
 offers nothing to pervert the action of common 
 sense, the absurdity of the conclusion to be arrived 
 at by his mode of reasoning presents itself too 
 glaringly at the very commencement of the argu- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 71 
 
 ment. Nor would it be tolerable to give at length 
 an imitation of his prolixity, and his discussion 
 of immaterial and irrelevant topics. But, not- 
 withstanding these hindrances, we may, with the 
 omission of many particular circumstances and in a 
 simple and imperfect form, apply his process, tak- 
 ing for a subject the assassination of Caesar. The 
 purpose, it is to be conceived, is to show that the 
 narratives of this event are entitled to no historical 
 credit, but, on the contrary, are to be regarded as 
 different forms of a " mythus." The account of it 
 occupies less than twenty lines in the copy of 
 Suetonius lying before me. 
 
 Suetonius relates, that when Caesar had seated 
 himself in the theatre of Pompey where the Sen- 
 ate was assembled, the conspirators stood round 
 him. Cimber Tullius, as he says, had agreed to 
 take the lead. Accordingly, he immediately ap- 
 proached Caesar, as if to make some request. Thus 
 the story appears to have originally stood ; but in 
 the process of tradition men were not content with 
 so simple a statement. An imaginary subject was 
 invented for this request, which in fact was never 
 purposed, namely, the recall of his brother from 
 exile. Appian represents the request to have been 
 actually made ; and Plutarch, proceeding still fur- 
 
72 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ther, says that the other conspirators actually 
 joined in it. But no reason -can be supposed why 
 they should have thought it necessary to go through 
 this preliminary to their bloody act. In contradic- 
 tion to all these accounts, Dion Cassius says that 
 " one of the conspirators," (this indefinite expres- 
 sion, as we shall see, deserves to be remarked,) 
 " when it was time, came to him as if to acknowl- 
 edge a favor." The account of Dion, taken alone, 
 is unobjectionable, except on one ground ; namely, 
 that it does not appear how any one could signify 
 by his looks alone that he had the purpose of 
 acknowledging a favor ; especially how this could 
 be done by a conspirator agitated by such feelings 
 as must naturally have accompanied the intention 
 to perpetrate the murder of a person like Csesar, 
 whose presence struck awe into all around him. 
 
 If these contradictions and improbabilities cast 
 suspicion on the story, this suspicion is heightened 
 by the want of agreement among its different 
 relators as to the name of the person who is said 
 to have come near to Csesar. Dion, as we have 
 seen, does not venture to give any name. Sueto- 
 nius calls him Cimber Tullius, a strange appella- 
 tion, as no other example has been produced of 
 Cimber used as a preenomen. Seneca, writing 
 
v EE3: 
 
 GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 73 
 
 about half a century before Suetonius, calls him 
 Tillius, or perhaps Tullius, Cimber; thus chan- 
 ging Cimber into an agnomen. Plutarch, in his 
 Life of Caesar, calls him Metillius Cimber ; but in 
 his Life of Brutus, Tullius Cimber. And, finally, 
 Appian gives him the name of Atilius Cimber. It 
 is easy to understand that the name of an individ- 
 ual so conspicuous that the conspirators, men of 
 noble rank, had assigned to him the lead in the 
 attack on Caesar, would not have been so con- 
 founded and lost. 
 
 In respect to the question whether the story is 
 to be regarded as of any historical validity or not, 
 the passage of Seneca, in his eighty-seventh Epis- 
 tle, which has been already alluded to, is of great 
 importance. He is discussing the question whether 
 a secret may be intrusted to a man intemperate in 
 the use of wine. He says : " That assassination 
 of C. Caesar, I mean him who, after subduing 
 Pompey, ruled the Commonwealth, was intrusted 
 to Tillius Cimber as well as to C. Cassius. Cassius 
 through his whole life drank only water. Tillius 
 Cimber was excessive in the use of wine, and a 
 brawler." We have no means of ascertaining the 
 precise date of this Epistle. But Seneca died 
 A. D. 65, and Caesar was assassinated, according 
 
74 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 to the common account, B. C. 45. Seneca was a 
 philosopher, and wrote for intelligent readers. 
 But we find, that within a century, or perhaps a 
 little more, after the supposed assassination of 
 Csesar, Seneca, in speaking of it, was obliged to 
 explain whom he meant by C. Csesar. " I mean 
 him," he says, " who, after subduing Pompey, ruled 
 the Commonwealth." When so little was known 
 in the time of Seneca of the history of the Ceesar 
 who was reported to have been assassinated in the 
 midst of the assembled Senate, that intelligent 
 readers could need such a specification of his per- 
 son, it is clear that little or no reliance can be 
 placed on the accounts of later writers than Seneca, 
 (as are all the historians who tell the story,) con- 
 cerning the manner of his death. 
 
 There is, moreover, a striking inconsistency be- 
 tween this passage of Seneca and what is asserted 
 by the subsequent narrators of the event. Accord- 
 ing to them, Cassius, and Brutus incited by Cassius, 
 were leaders in the conspiracy. Their accounts 
 are fairly represented in the famous play of Shake- 
 speare on this subject. Cassius, more than any 
 one else, appears as the author of the plot. But 
 Seneca, putting him on a level with Tillius Cimber, 
 whom he represents as a drunkard and a brawler, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 75 
 
 says that the secret of the conspiracy was intrusted 
 to him, tarn creditum est Tillio Cimbro quam C. 
 Cassio. No one can think that, if he had regarded 
 Cassius as the author of the conspiracy, or even 
 as a principal conspirator, he would have spoken 
 of the secret of the conspiracy as having been 
 intrusted to him. 
 
 But it is time to return to the detail of the sup 
 posed assassination. Suetonius says, that Cimber 
 Tullius, upon Caesar's repulsing him by a gesture, 
 laid hold of Caesar's robe on both shoulders. He 
 indicates no purpose in his doing so; but this 
 purpose was supplied by tradition in two opposite 
 forms, as I shall now proceed to show. 
 
 Suetonius does not represent Tullius as pulling 
 off Caesar's toga, or robe. This circumstance is 
 added by Plutarch, who says, that he pulled it off 
 from his neck, aVo rov rpaxfaov, or, as he ex- 
 presses it in another place, " he pulled it off with 
 both hands from his shoulders." The account of 
 Dion agrees essentially with that of Plutarch. But 
 Appian says, that, dragging his (Caesar's) garment, 
 he drew it upon his neck, TO el^a Trepio-Traa-as eTrl 
 TOV rpa^r]\ov el\Ke* Was the idea in Appian's 
 
 * I do not understand (I here speak in my own person, not that of 
 Strauss) how Schweighaeuser, in his edition of Appian (III 776), 
 
76 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 mind, that by dragging Caesar's garment round him 
 the free use of his arms would be prevented 1 ? 
 And did Plutarch and Dion, on the other hand, 
 conceive that by pulling it off he would be more 
 exposed to the blows of the conspirators, their 
 weapons being less likely to be impeded by its 
 folds'? 
 
 Whatever may be imagined respecting this action 
 of Tullius Cimber, as we may call him, there is 
 another account common to Suetonius, Plutarch, 
 Appian, and Dion, which cannot be reconciled with 
 historical probability. According to them all, 
 Caesar, when dying, covered his face and the lower 
 part of his body with his robe, that he might fall 
 in a decent manner. The same robe which had 
 either been pulled away from him, or dragged 
 round him, so as to confine his arms ! Suetonius 
 thus describes this circumstance: "toga caput 
 obvolvit : simul sinistra manu sinum ad ima crura 
 deduxit, quo honestius caderet, etiam inferiore cor- 
 poris parte velata." But how could Caesar, when 
 dying under twenty-three wounds, (for there is a 
 suspicious agreement among Suetonius, Plutarch, 
 and Appian in mentioning this precise number,) 
 
 could suppose that these words were to be rendered, Cimbrum togam 
 Ccesaris prehensam deorsum traxisse, ut collum nudaretur. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 77 
 
 have retained strength enough to recover his robe 
 from the conspirators, or, (if we receive the account 
 of Appian,) to have unwound it from his body, 
 so that he might dispose it in a more becoming 
 manner? If he had had the strength remain- 
 ing to do so, what probability is there, that the 
 conspirators would have stood quietly round while 
 he was performing the acts reported I Their fero- 
 cious attack on him, as we shall see by and by, was 
 continued till life was extinct, so as to leave him 
 no possibility of thus attending to decorum. 
 
 The discrepances among the different accounts 
 of the transaction are so great, as to compel us, 
 even while noticing only the most important, to 
 retrace our steps, and to resume the narrative at a 
 period preceding the supposed death of Caesar. 
 Suetonius says, that the signal having been given 
 by Cimber's laying hold of the robe of Caesar, Cas- 
 sius wounded him in front a little below the throat. 
 But Plutarch agrees with Suetonius neither as to 
 the name of the person who gave the first wound, 
 nor the position in which he was standing, nor the 
 nature of the wound. The wound, he says, was 
 given by Casca, who was standing behind Caesar, 
 and who wounded him, he in one place says, 
 " in the neck," and in another, " in the shoulder " ; 
 
 7* 
 
78 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 while Appian, differing from both, says, that Casca 
 reached over Caesar's head, and, aiming at his throat, 
 missed, and wounded him in the breast. All cer- 
 tain history disappears in the confusion of these 
 contradictory accounts. 
 
 We will now pass in review the different words 
 reported to have been uttered during the attack on 
 Csesar, by him and by others. Suetonius relates, 
 that, when Cimber laid hold of his robe, he ex- 
 claimed, " That is violence," Ista quidem vis est 
 Plutarch, Appian, and Dion say nothing of this 
 exclamation. Appian relates, that Cimber called 
 out, in Greek, to the other conspirators, " Friends ! 
 why do you delay] " Tl ppaSvvere, w $i\oi ; But, 
 again, nothing is said of this by the other narra- 
 tors. The account of Plutarch is also peculiar to 
 himself. He says that Caesar, when struck by 
 Casca, turned round upon him and laid hold of 
 his sword, crying out in Latin, " Villain ! what do 
 you mean 1 " and that Casca at the same instant 
 called to his brother in Greek, saying, " Brother, 
 help ! " Each historian has his own separate story ; 
 and how is this to be accounted for except by sup- 
 posing that they are all equally destitute of any 
 historical basis, and are the products of an ever- 
 varying tradition 1 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 79 
 
 The story of Plutarch is expressly contradicted 
 by Suetonius, who says, that Csesar, after receiving 
 the first blow, " uttered only a single groan, but did 
 not speak " ; he died uno modo ad primum ictum 
 gemitu sine wee edito. Tradition, however, had 
 burdened itself with another story of words uttered 
 by Caesar, which, though it is expressly rejected by 
 Suetonius and Dion, and not mentioned by Plu- 
 tarch and Appian, has yet become classical in 
 modern times. " He did not speak," says Sueto- 
 nius, " though some have related that, when M. 
 Brutus assaulted him, he said to him, ' And are 
 you one of them 1 you, my son I ' : The question 
 has even been discussed by modern critics, for what 
 reason Caesar called Brutus his son. But though 
 the story has become classical, we perceive in it, as 
 it is now commonly told or alluded to, a new in- 
 fluence of tradition in changing its form since it 
 was first reported. The supposititious words as- 
 cribed to Caesar are given by Suetonius in Greek, 
 to the effect of the rendering above. But the 
 words now put into Caesar's mouth are commonly 
 in Latin : Et tu Brute ! mi fill ! " And you too, 
 Brutus ! my son ! " 
 
 No accounts can be more contradictory to each 
 other than those of Suetonius and Appian concern- 
 
80 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ing the behavior of Caesar during the attack on him. 
 The essential trait of that of Suetonius, namely, 
 the silence of Caesar, has already been brought to 
 notice. Suetonius says, that, when he received his 
 first wound from Cassius (not Casca, it is to be 
 remembered), "he seized his arm and pierced it 
 with his writing-style, and endeavored to spring 
 forward, but was hindered by another wound. 
 Then, perceiving that he was aimed at on every 
 side with drawn daggers, he covered his head with 
 his robe, and with his left hand drew it down to 
 his feet, that he might fall in a more decorous 
 manner, even the lower part of his body being 
 covered. And thus he was pierced with three-and- 
 twenty wounds, uttering only a single groan at 
 the first blow, but no words." With this compare 
 the account of Appian, who relates, that, on receiv- 
 ing the first wound from Casca (not Cassius), he 
 seized his arm, and, springing down from his seat, 
 dragged Casca with much violence ; and that, while 
 struggling with him, he was wounded by four 
 others of the conspirators, and turned upon each of 
 them, " raging and roaring like a wild beast," o-vv 
 OPJTJ Kai jSorj) KaOdirep Bripiov, till at last he fell by 
 the statue of Pompey. What narrative entitled to 
 any historical credit could be constructed out of 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 81 
 
 these two accounts'? Plutarch's relation rather 
 corresponds with that of Appian in the more im- 
 portant parts of the detail. Dion's agrees essen- 
 tially with that of Suetonius. 
 
 Caesar fell, says Appian, by the statue of Pom- 
 pey. Of this Suetonius and Dion knew nothing. 
 It is plainly a traditional embellishment of the 
 story, which was greedily received by the romance 
 of after times. The purpose of it was to represent 
 Pompey, though dead, as triumphing over his once 
 victorious rival. His statue was probably con- 
 ceived of as informed by his spirit, for Plutarch 
 relates that Cassius, though inclined to the doc- 
 trines of Epicurus, was said, before the commence- 
 ment of the attack on Caesar, to have turned his 
 eyes to the statue of Pompey, and silently invoked 
 his aid ; and, though it is hard to understand how 
 any one could become acquainted with the silent 
 prayer of Cassius, yet the supposed indwelling of 
 the spirit of Pompey in his statue agrees with the 
 superstition of the age. The feeling which gave 
 rise to this embellishment is fully discovered in the 
 narrative of Plutarch. He says, Caesar, " either 
 by chance, or being pushed thither by the con- 
 spirators, fell at the pedestal of Pompey's statue, 
 which was covered with his blood ; so that Pompey 
 
82 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 seemed to preside over the vengeance inflicted on 
 his enemy, who was lying at his feet in his last 
 agonies, pierced with many wounds." 
 
 HERE we will stop in our illustration, not of 
 Strauss's manner of writing, for no illustration 
 of this could be given in any reasonable number of 
 pages, but of the intrinsic character of his crit- 
 icism. My purpose has been to make it evident 
 that this sort of criticism is inapplicable to human 
 testimony, to profane history equally as to the 
 Gospels ; and that its results have no tendency to 
 invalidate the essential truth of any narratives 
 subjected to it. I speak of that spurious criticism, 
 which, setting aside all the knowledge respecting 
 the fallibility and inaccuracy of human testimony 
 that experience is continually teaching us, repre- 
 sents it as an objection to the essential truth of an 
 account found in the narratives of different writers, 
 that these narratives do not agree with each other 
 in all their parts, that "they are more or less in- 
 crusted with errors of various kinds, and that none 
 of them is without flaws. Truth is not dug from 
 the mine of history as one entire and perfect chry- 
 solite, any more than it is so found in the every-day 
 relations of common life. Different original ac- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 83 
 
 counts of the same series of events, when they agree 
 in the main facts, but are inconsistent in minor 
 particulars, confirm each other; since they show 
 that the narrators give independent testimony, and 
 had each separate sources of information, while, 
 on the contrary, were it possible to find different 
 accounts professedly original, perfectly agreeing 
 in all their details, this would be a phenomenon 
 hitherto so unknown, as either to justify the sus- 
 picion of collusion in the writers, or to lead at 
 once to the inference, that we had, in fact, but the 
 testimony of one witness, whom the others had 
 copied 
 
 Were there a prepossession against the truth of 
 the history of Caesar, did this subject concern the 
 religious character and moral responsibility of 
 men, a work composed after the manner of Strauss, 
 with the design of proving that history to be fabu- 
 lous, would, I doubt not, find as many admirers as 
 there have been of Strauss's own work on the 
 Gospels, who would look upon it, with equal 
 justice, as a learned and elaborate piece of reason- 
 ing. Certainly one speaks very far within bounds 
 in saying, that the accounts of the ministry, death, 
 and resurrection of Christ, given in the four Gos- 
 pels, which Strauss has subjected to his microscopic 
 
84 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 criticism,* present no such, contradictions and im- 
 probabilities as exist, not merely in the accounts 
 of the assassination of Csesar, as given by the four 
 historians whom I have quoted, but throughout 
 the ancient narratives and notices of his life. 
 
 In the first volume of " The Evidences of the 
 Genuineness of the Gospels," in an Additional 
 Note " On the Origin of the Correspondences 
 among the First Three Gospels," I have pointed 
 out discrepances and inconsistencies among the 
 Gospels, the number of which bears a large pro- 
 portion to the number of all those which Strauss 
 has remarked upon in his three volumes. But it 
 did not enter my mind, nor, I will venture to 
 assert, has it entered the mind of any one of my 
 readers, that I could be considered as undermining 
 the authenticity of the Gospels. On the contrary, 
 I believed that I was establishing their authen- 
 ticity by showing that the discrepances among 
 
 * In remarking on the criticism of Strauss, one is reminded of the 
 lines of Pope : 
 
 " The critic eye, that microscope of wit, 
 Sees hairs and pores, examines bit by bit : 
 How parts relate to parts, or they to whole, 
 The body's harmony, the beaming soul, 
 Are things which Kuster, Burman, Wasse, shall see 
 When man's whole frame is obvious to a flea." 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 85 
 
 them were of such a character, that, when con- 
 sidered in connection with their essential agree- 
 ment, it was evident that the writers of those books 
 must either have been Apostles, or have derived 
 their information from Apostles. The discrepances 
 among the Gospels have, from the time of Origen, 
 been familiar to Christians, and made subjects of 
 discussion by them. They have been urged, and 
 correctly urged, to disprove the theological doc- 
 trine of the divine authorship of the Gospels, or, 
 in other words, the doctrine of their inspiration. 
 The novelty of Strauss's work consists in the use 
 which he has made of them to disprove the gen- 
 uineness and authenticity of the Gospels, consid- 
 ered as the proper works of human authors ; 
 not, indeed, in the assumption of the principle on 
 which he has proceeded, but in his indefatigable 
 prolixity in the application of it. Neither the 
 principle nor the application of it is in itself new. 
 For example, one of the most notorious, and not 
 of the least able, of infidel writers thus reasons : 
 " Not any two of these writers [the Evangelists] 
 agree in reciting exactly in the same words [the 
 italics are his own] the written inscription, short 
 as it is, which they tell us was put over Christ 
 when he was crucified; and, besides this, Mark 
 
 8 
 
86 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 says he was crucified at the third hour (nine in 
 the morning), and John says it was at the sixth 
 hour (twelve at noon). 
 
 " The inscription is thus stated in those books : 
 
 Matthew, ' This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.' 
 
 Mark, ' The King of the Jews.' 
 
 Luke, ' This is the King of the Jews.' 
 
 John, ' Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.' 
 
 " We may infer from these circumstances, trivial 
 as they are, that those writers, whoever they were, 
 and in whatever time they lived, were not present 
 at the scene." * 
 
 The inference obviously intended, because it is 
 the only inference that may even seem to be to the 
 purpose, is, that the Evangelists are not credible 
 writers. It has never been maintained that any 
 one of them, except John, was present at the scene. 
 But the inference actually required to invalidate 
 the authenticity of the Gospels is one which no 
 man of sense could think of drawing ; namely, that 
 Jesus was not crucified either at the third, or the 
 sixth, or any other hour, and consequently that no 
 inscription whatever was put upon his cross, this 
 fact being further evinced by the contradictory 
 accounts given of that pretended writing. 
 
 * Paine's Age of Reason, Part II. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 87 
 
 IN a few pages of an Additional Note to the 
 first volume of " The Evidences of the Genuineness 
 of the Gospels," * I have endeavored to show that 
 the first two chapters of our present Gospel of 
 Matthew were not the work of that Evangelist. 
 It is with a discussion of the difficulties in these 
 two chapters and in the first two chapters of Luke, 
 that Strauss commences his critical examination 
 of the Gospels. This discussion fills about two 
 hundred pages. He assumes, without argument, 
 that the first two chapters ascribed to Matthew 
 were originally a part of the Gospel which bears 
 his name. Through these pages, and through a 
 hundred more of like character, as relating to 
 events of which the Apostles had not personal 
 knowledge,! he prepares his readers for the ex- 
 amination of those narratives concerning the public 
 ministry of Jesus, in which alone, as we believe, is 
 preserved the original testimony of the Apostles, 
 affirming on their own authority the truth of what 
 they related. 
 
 The whole argument of Strauss in the first two 
 hundred pages to which I have referred, admits 
 
 * Additional Note A, Section V. i. 
 
 f Namely, the " Relations between Jesus and John the Baptist,'* 
 and the " Baptism and Temptation of Jesus." 
 
88 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of being placed in a proper light in a few sen- 
 tences. 
 
 We will admit that the reasoning is fallacious 
 which I have formerly used to prove that the first 
 two chapters of Matthew's Gospel are not gen- 
 uine. We will assume that the narrative con- 
 tained in them proceeded from the original author 
 of the Gospel, whoever he was. I have formerly 
 not conceded, but maintained, that this narrative 
 contradicts that of Luke ; and that circumstances 
 are related in it which are in themselves incredi- 
 ble. Nothing further can be asked by one who 
 denies the authenticity of the Gospels, unless, with 
 Strauss, he deny also the possibility of a miracle, 
 a denial by which all discussion about the truth 
 of any particular account of a miracle is fore- 
 closed. 
 
 Yet this denial is, as we have seen, very early 
 put forward by Strauss as a fundamental position 
 of his work, and is continually reappearing 
 throughout the course of it as a main element of 
 his criticism on the Gospels. If, however, the 
 principle be settled, that a miracle is impossible, 
 there can be no greater waste of time than to argue 
 at length from other considerations against the 
 truth of the narratives of the Evangelists. Some 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 89 
 
 general solution of the existence and reception of 
 such a mass of fables as they have related is rea- 
 sonably to be expected, but prolix discussions of 
 these fables, considered individually, may well be 
 dispensed with. One might as profitably spend 
 his time in a minute critical examination of the 
 mythological stories concerning the birth, labors, 
 and death of Hercules, with the purpose of prov- 
 ing the narratives concerning him to be false, by 
 an exhibition of their inconsistencies and improb- 
 abilities. These remarks are applicable not merely 
 to the portion of Strauss's work immediately be- 
 fore us, but to his whole attack on the authenticity 
 of the Gospels. As a groundwork for any argu- 
 ment or explanation on this subject, we must 
 assume the possibility of their authenticity, that 
 is, the possibility of a miracle, or, in other words, 
 the possibility that we do not know that God can- 
 not act except conformably to what we call the 
 laws of nature, and the possibility that we are not 
 so acquainted with the counsels of t his infinite 
 wisdom and goodness, as to be assured of all which 
 it has been his will to effect. 
 
 Having, therefore, as regards the narrative in 
 the first two chapters ascribed to Matthew, con- 
 ceded everything except the prejudged conclu- 
 
 8* 
 
90 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 sion, that all the narratives of miraculous events 
 contained in the Gospels are necessarily false, a 
 conclusion which Strauss assumes before entering 
 into his particular arguments against their truth, 
 and constantly interweaves with his reasoning, 
 we will now consider what follows from our ad- 
 missions. 
 
 I have formerly maintained it to be highly 
 probable, that Matthew, as an Apostle, must have 
 been aware of the errors of the narrative contained 
 in these first two chapters.* If, as I have sup- 
 posed, the historical evidence concerning these 
 chapters leads us to doubt their genuineness, then 
 the argument that their contents are not such as 
 we might expect from an Apostle, may be of de- 
 cisive weight. But we now assume that these 
 chapters were originally a part of the Gospel as- 
 cribed to Matthew, and this argument alone is, as 
 I am about to show, of no weight to invalidate the 
 historical evidence that has been adduced to prove 
 that this Gospel was his work. 
 
 In the supposed case that the two chapters are 
 genuine, the following considerations at once pre- 
 sent themselves. We know nothing of the per- 
 
 * Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. I. p. Iviii, seqq. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 91 
 
 sonal history of Matthew after the death of our 
 Lord. We do not know how long he remained in 
 the society of the other Apostles, or how much he 
 was separated from them. If he remained in their 
 society, we have no reason to think that the facts 
 respecting the birth of our Lord were a common 
 topic of conversation among them. However im- 
 probable, therefore, it may be, that as an Apostle 
 he would be very incorrectly informed respecting 
 these facts, yet this is an improbability which 
 cannot be opposed to the proof that the Gospel 
 ascribed to him was his work ; and we are now 
 arguing on the supposition that the two chapters 
 were originally a part of it. 
 
 It appears, then, on this supposition, that 
 Matthew adopted and embodied in his Gospel a 
 false narration of circumstances connected with the 
 birth and infancy of our Lord. What follows from 
 this I We had no reason before to suppose that he 
 was well qualified as an historical critic to decide 
 on the truth or falsehood of a narrative. He was 
 originally of a class looked upon by his country- 
 men as degraded, a Jewish tax-gatherer in the ser- 
 vice of the Roman government. With his Gospel 
 before us, we cannot suppose him to have had any 
 literary culture; and we have no authentic account 
 
92 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of his having in any way distinguished himself, 
 except by its composition, after becoming an Apos- 
 tle. He had no personal knowledge concerning 
 the supposed events narrated in the first two 
 chapters, and was writing about sixty years after 
 their occurrence. Under these circumstances, he 
 adopted an erroneous narrative of those events. 
 He adopted, I say, this narrative ; for no one can 
 believe that, sixty years after the birth of Jesus, 
 the Evangelist wrote from his own imagination a 
 fabulous account of circumstances attending and 
 following that event, an account which, having 
 never before been heard of, would be regarded by 
 his readers with equal astonishment and incredu- 
 lity. The narrative must have been reported and 
 believed previously to his incorporating it in his 
 Gospel. 
 
 But if it was believed by others, what is there 
 in the fact that it was believed by Matthew which 
 may change, in any considerable degree, our opin- 
 ion of him as a writer 1 Or, rather, to state the 
 only question really at issue, What is there in 
 this fact to invalidate in any degree his testimony 
 to what he relates as of his own knowledge, the 
 miracles and the teaching of our Lord I Nothing 
 whatever. On the contrary, the striking difference 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 93 
 
 between the first two chapters and that portion of 
 the Gospel which relates to the public ministry 
 of Jesus is alone sufficient to create a strong 
 presumption, that, in the one case, we have an 
 erroneous tradition, and, in the other, authentic 
 testimony. It is not necessary to our argument, 
 but it should be remembered, that the events to 
 which the Evangelist testifies in his own person 
 are confirmed by the irresistible evidence of phe- 
 nomena which could not have existed without 
 those events as their cause. 
 
 Reasoning of a similar kind may be applied to 
 the case of Luke ; and every reader can make for 
 himself the necessary modifications in so applying 
 it. The main point to be attended to is, that the 
 errors of either Evangelist (on the supposition that 
 the errors of the first two chapters are to be as- 
 cribed to Matthew) do not disqualify him from 
 being a reliable witness to the truth of the mira- 
 cles of Jesus. 
 
 Nor do either those errors, or the inconsisten- 
 cies between the two narratives, discredit the main 
 fact which lies at the foundation of both, the 
 miraculous birth of our Lord. So far from this, 
 the only plausible solution of the existence of two 
 such discordant narratives, at so early a period, is, 
 
94 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 that the main fact is true. Supposing the whole 
 story of the miraculous birth of our Lord to be 
 a fiction, this fiction must have had a primitive 
 form. The principal fact must have been related 
 with some detail of circumstances represented as 
 having been connected with it. The primitive fic- 
 tion, if it obtained currency, may have been added 
 to or altered in the process of tradition. But, 
 if we assume that the original story respecting 
 the birth of our Lord was a fable, derived, as it 
 must have been, from the invention of some indi- 
 vidual, and put into circulation by him, it is hardly 
 credible that another individual, equally without 
 any basis of truth on which to rest, should have de- 
 vised another fable irreconcilable with the former. 
 On the other hand, it might be expected before- 
 hand, that such an event as the miraculous birth 
 of our Lord, the facts concerning which were 
 known to so few individuals, should, in the lapse 
 of time, be enveloped in many fabulous circum- 
 stances. The narratives of no events are so likely 
 to be altered, in passing through the mouths of 
 different reporters, as those of miraculous events ; 
 and the fact that the accounts of the miracles of 
 Jesus, as related in the Gospels, are so free from 
 any traces of having been adulterated by tradition, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 95 
 
 is one of the strongest internal proofs of the gen- 
 uineness and authenticity of those books. 
 
 IN examining the Gospels, after the manner of 
 Strauss, for the purpose of discovering whether 
 they afford internal evidence destructive of their 
 credibility, we must keep distinctly in mind the 
 only question to be settled. Putting out of view 
 the notion of the impossibility of a miracle, (which, 
 as I have said, precludes all argument on the sub- 
 ject,) the only question to be settled is this : Do, 
 or do not, the Gospels present such appearances as 
 to make it evident, or to create a presumption, 
 that their writers were not well-informed and 
 trustworthy witnesses respecting the events of the 
 public ministry of Jesus ? 
 
 When this question is distinctly apprehended, 
 the discussion is greatly contracted. It will re- 
 late only to their genuineness, not to their essen- 
 tial authenticity. It appears that, without further 
 examination, a very large portion of such criti- 
 cisms as are found in works like that of Strauss 
 may at once be laid out of consideration, as having 
 no bearing upon it. But this question has been 
 confounded with another altogether different, 
 whether the narratives contained in the Gospels 
 
96 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 are free from error. The affirmative of this ques- 
 tion is not to be maintained. But no intelligent 
 and well-informed man will suppose that the ex- 
 istence of such errors and inconsistencies as may 
 be found in those narratives tends to invalidate 
 the essential authenticity of the Gospels, their 
 authenticity in the only sense in which we use the 
 term concerning any history, the general truth of 
 which is undoubted. 
 
 WE pass to another consideration. If the 
 Gospels are the works of eyewitnesses or of well- 
 informed contemporaries, the mythical theory of 
 Strauss, as he himself recognizes, is wholly ex- 
 cluded ; and so, likewise, is every other theory 
 which denies the miraculous origin of our religion, 
 excepting that theory, if such a theory may be 
 considered as existing, which refers its origin to 
 what may be called the pseudo-miracle of the suc- 
 cess of pure falsehood. It is, therefore, the main 
 immediate object of Strauss's work to prove that 
 the Gospels are not genuine, by showing that they 
 contain accounts which could not have proceeded 
 from well-informed narrators. 
 
 But in respect to the ultimate purpose of Strauss, 
 namely, to disprove the truth of our religion, the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 97 
 
 conclusion arrived at by him, that the Gospels are 
 not genuine, at once deprives his criticisms on 
 those books of any weight, and invalidates all his 
 arguments against Christianity, except, indeed, that 
 argument which consists in the denial of the pos- 
 sibility of a miracle. His reasoning is self-destruc- 
 tive. 
 
 Let us admit that the Gospels are not genuine, 
 that they are productions of the second century, 
 founded on previous imperfect, written narratives, 
 or on oral traditions, or on both. This, I think, it 
 has been formerly shown, could not have been the 
 fact ; * but we will now reason on the supposition 
 that it was so. Upon this supposition, then, that 
 they are productions of the second century, what 
 character might we expect them to have consist- 
 ently with the truth of Christianity, that is, con- 
 sistently with the truth of the essential facts 
 concerning the miraculous office, the character, 
 acts, teaching, death, and resurrection of Christ? 
 Let an objector, who does not assume that a mira- 
 cle is impossible, magnify at his will the discre- 
 pances among them, or what he regards as the 
 intrinsic improbabilities in their accounts of par- 
 
 * See Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, I. 168, seqq. 
 
98 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ticular events, yet no one, acquainted with the 
 nature of human testimony, especially with what 
 must be its nature in relation to facts so marvel- 
 lous and unparalleled, when passing through a se- 
 ries of reporters, will imagine that there could 
 be fewer discrepances and improbabilities than 
 exist in the narratives of the life of Jesus, if these 
 narratives were written in the second century, on 
 however firm a basis they might rest of essential 
 truth. Establish the position that the Gospels 
 were not written by those to whom they have been 
 ascribed, and the whole body of criticisms upon 
 them, such as are brought forward by writers like 
 Strauss, becomes utterly irrelevant and futile as 
 regards the truth of Christianity. Supposing the 
 truth of our religion, if the histories of Jesus which 
 we now possess were not written till the second 
 century, it would be altogether unreasonable to 
 expect that they would be exposed to fewer objec- 
 tions than Strauss has urged against them. 
 
 If we prove the genuineness of the Gospels, we 
 prove the truth of Christianity ; but, on the other 
 hand, to disprove the genuineness of the Gospels, 
 were that possible, would not be to advance a step 
 toward disproving its truth. It is evident, how- 
 ever, that the mistake has commonly been com- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 99 
 
 mitted by unbelievers of supposing that such 
 would be the case, and that this error has been 
 acquiesced in by many believers. But in order to 
 disprove the truth, or, in other words, the miracu- 
 lous origin, of our religion, it is necessary to show 
 that all those facts in the history of the world 
 which imply its miraculous origin as their cause 
 never existed, or that some other sufficient solu- 
 tion may be given of their existence. 
 
 The case may be thus stated. If the Gospels 
 are, as we believe, the works of Apostles and of 
 companions of Apostles, the question of the essen- 
 tial truth of their narratives is decided. If they 
 are, as Strauss and many other German theologians 
 have contended, the compilations of anonymous in- 
 dividuals in the second century, full of errors, as, 
 in that case, we might reasonably expect, then 
 neither their late compilation nor the existence of 
 those errors can invalidate the decisive evidences 
 of the miraculous origin of our religion still to be 
 derived from them, and to be derived from other 
 sources beside that particular one which we now 
 believe to exist, namely, the testimony of trust- 
 worthy witnesses of the ministry of our Lord, given 
 either by themselves or by those to whpm they had 
 directly communicated their knowledge, under cir- 
 
100 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 cumstances which preclude the notion of essential 
 error or of intentional deception as an incredible 
 absurdity. And it is to be observed, that among 
 the phenomena which, on this supposition, would 
 evince the miraculous origin of Christianity, would 
 be the compilation of such histories of Christ in 
 the second century. If the Gospels had not ap- 
 peared till this time, they would undoubtedly be 
 far less correct narratives than they are ; they 
 would have been full of traditionary fables. But it 
 may well be doubted, whether the evidence of the 
 truth of our religion would be weakened. The 
 existence of such a representation of the character 
 and ministry of Christ in the Gentile world, found 
 in the second century, in certain books, to be as- 
 cribed to anonymous Jewish writers, would be, to 
 say the least, as difficult to account for, on any 
 other supposition than that of its essential truth, 
 as the existence of such a representation in the 
 Gospels considered as genuine. 
 
 THE work of Strauss has obtained celebrity, and 
 produced an effect, probably much disproportioned 
 to the number of its readers ; for, in the present 
 state of theological literature and inquiry, it cannot 
 be supposed that the readers of so long a work of 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 101 
 
 such a character have been numerous, at least out 
 of Germany. But it has furnished a pretence for 
 infidelity, by being a very long, and what has been 
 reputed an elaborate and learned, work in its de- 
 fence ; and the very circumstance that its actual 
 contents were little known has undoubtedly mag- 
 nified the notion of their importance. The direct 
 effect which it may have produced on some minds 
 by the views which it presents, is to be ascribed to 
 various causes. The fact that there are errors in 
 the Gospels is confounded throughout with the, 
 conclusion that the writers are not credible wit- 
 nesses. The doctrine of the impossibility of a 
 miracle is constantly kept in view, to determine all 
 questions against the truth of the Gospels. The 
 opinions of the Rationalists (so called) of the 
 school of Paulus, who resolve all miracles into 
 erroneous accounts of natural events, are produced 
 in detail by the author in his criticisms on many 
 passages, and are triumphantly confuted ; and so, 
 too, are opinions which he ascribes to some de- 
 fenders of Christianity among his countrymen: 
 and this may give an impression of his power of 
 reasoning that will unduly affect th.e judgment of 
 certain readers. His untiring prolixity may weary 
 others into a belief that there is some force in what 
 
102 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 he says. But perhaps the main direct effect pro- 
 duced by his work has resulted from its treating 
 all those facts in which our happiness and virtue 
 are most interested, those facts which address 
 themselves to our noblest sympathies and senti- 
 ments, which, even if they were divested of reality, 
 would remain the most glorious of imaginations, 
 from its treating those facts in the driest manner, 
 on the narrowest basis of thought, and with a heart- 
 less disregard of the associations connected with 
 them in the mind of a religious man, and of the 
 bearing of the discussion on the essential interests 
 of humanity. This is the characteristic tone of 
 his book ; and it may be difficult for one who 
 undertakes the task of reading it through to 
 escape the infection of it. There is danger that 
 his feelings may be so degraded, his views so con- 
 tracted, and, I may add, his reasoning powers so 
 confused, as to leave his mind in a proper state 
 for the reception of German mysticism and infi- 
 delity. If one were to submit to hear the char- 
 acter and conduct of his most intimate friend 
 canvassed and questioned at great length, in the 
 manner in which Strauss discusses the history of 
 our Lord, he might find it difficult to feel for him 
 the same confidence and respect as before. 
 
GENUINENESS OE THE GOSPELS. 103 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ON SOME IMPOETANT CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPELS. 
 
 BEFORE leaving the subject of the criticism of 
 the Gospels, we will advert to some general facts 
 concerning them, which should be kept in mind 
 by him who would read them intelligently. 
 
 I have repeatedly had occasion to speak of, or 
 to refer to, their character. As literary composi- 
 tions they are among the most imperfect of his- 
 tories. Either individually or collectively, they 
 present only a brief narrative of some of the 
 most striking events in our Lord's ministry, and 
 these told by the writers, with the exception of 
 John, for the most part nakedly and in few words. 
 John's narratives of particular events form an ex- 
 ception to this remark ; but the incompleteness of 
 his history, taken as" a whole, is even more remark- 
 able than that of the other Gospels. No skill is 
 shown by anyone of the Evangelists in connecting 
 his relations together, so as to form a proper con- 
 
104 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 tinuous history, however brief. No explanations 
 are given, except a few which are parenthetical 
 and unimportant. With the exception of some 
 passages in John's Gospel, there is no comment 
 on anything told which discovers the writer's feel- 
 ings or state of mind. It is with astonishment 
 that we recognize the fact, when our attention is 
 directed to it, that a writer wholly uninterested in 
 the events related could not have recorded them 
 more dryly than do the first three Evangelists ; 
 that the whole effect on our minds of what is told 
 is due to its intrinsic character. I may turn aside 
 for a moment to observe, that, among the over- 
 whelming evidences of the genuineness and authen- 
 ticity of the Gospels, this is one among the many 
 of those which we may speak of as the most deci- 
 sive. Such works could not have been written 
 with the purpose of deception ; but the notion 
 of intentional deception in their writers is now, I 
 suppose, universally regarded as foolish and obso- 
 lete. It is equally clear that they could not have 
 been written by weak-minded and fanatical indi- 
 viduals, whose imaginations** had been strongly 
 excited by some extraordinary delusion. No writ- 
 ings can present a stronger contrast than do the 
 Gospels to what might be expected from fanatics. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 105 
 
 As I have said, the Gospels are not proper his- 
 tories. They are very far from being such works 
 as might furnish an intelligible and satisfactory 
 account of the ministry of Jesus, of its character 
 and purpose, to one previously unacquainted with 
 the essential facts concerning it. 
 
 Let us imagine them to be put without explana- 
 tion into the hands of a very intelligent heathen 
 contemporary of their authors, but one as imper- 
 fectly informed as were the generality of Heathens 
 of the condition and history of the Jewish nation, 
 and having only those imperfect notions and that 
 hesitating belief of the great truths of religion 
 which appear even in the writings of Cicero. Sup- 
 posing him to read them through with attention, 
 what ideas of their meaning and bearing would he 
 have been able to form, corresponding to those of 
 an enlightened Christian 1 The conceptions of the 
 character and purpose of the ministry of Christ, 
 entertained by different Christians of the present 
 day, are very unlike one another ; and if our own 
 be correct, they must be the result of much thought 
 and reasoning, and derived in part directly and in 
 part by clear inference from many other sources of 
 information beside the Gospels, especially from 
 the history of the Apostles given by Luke, and the 
 
106 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Epistles of St. Paul. I do not say that every 
 
 intelligent and rational Christian must for himself 
 
 
 
 have gone through the process requisite to acquire 
 the knowledge necessary in order to understand 
 the Gospels'; but if he have not done so, he must 
 be indebted for it to the labors of others. 
 
 The Gospels imply throughout, that the great 
 outlines of the ministry of Jesus, together with the 
 condition and character of the Jews among whom 
 he appeared, and the more striking immediate 
 results of what he did and taught, were already 
 known to their readers. They suppose, in like man- 
 ner, their readers to be already acquainted with 
 many circumstances attending particular events 
 and discourses of our Lord, which circumstances 
 are not brought into view in their narratives. A 
 knowledge of circumstances which the Evangelists 
 do not directly state is, as I have said, the main 
 key to the understanding of the character and 
 bearing of what they relate, the great source of 
 illustration for the Gospels. 
 
 I will give a single example of the manner in 
 which the Evangelists relied on the previous 
 knowledge of their readers, or rather, as one may 
 sayj of their unconscious assumption of the exist- 
 ence of such knowledge. The example is, perhaps, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 107 
 
 the more striking, because there is no process, such 
 as exists in so many other cases, by which we can 
 now recover the information not given by them, 
 and apply it to the completion or illustration of 
 their narratives. 
 
 There are at least seven different appearances 
 of our Lord after his resurrection related in the 
 Gospels. Two others, occurring before his ascen- 
 sion, are mentioned by St. Paul. And Luke, in 
 the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, says that, 
 " after he suffered, he gave many certain proofs to 
 his Apostles that he was living, being seen by them 
 during the course of forty days, and teaching the 
 things concerning the kingdom of God." 
 
 Yet, in relation to this subject, the Gospels 
 afford no answer to questions which at once arise 
 in our minds. What was our Lord's mode of life 
 during the interval between his resurrection and 
 his ascension ] Whither did he retire when he sep- 
 arated from his disciples I These, indeed, are ques- 
 tions which the Evangelists might not have been 
 able to answer. But there are others, in respect 
 to which, had they anticipated the curiosity of 
 readers of after-times, they would have been able 
 to satisfy it. After his several appearances to his 
 disciples, in what manner did he leave them 1 ? 
 
108 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Why did none of them attempt to follow him ] 
 At least, in regard to the circumstances attending 
 his departure after his various interviews with 
 them, they co,uld have given us satisfactory infor- 
 mation. But, with the exception of the fact, that 
 at his last interview he was separated from them 
 by his ascension, there is nothing in their nar- 
 ratives which throws any light on the subject. 
 
 What follows from all this] It follows, that, 
 in the narratives of the Evangelists concerning the 
 appearances of our Lord, we have not all that was 
 originally told. The circumstances which the 
 Apostles and other immediate disciples of our 
 Lord could not but know, but which are not re- 
 lated in the Gospels, must have been matters of 
 curiosity and interest to their early converts ; and 
 it would be idle to suppose that they withheld 
 that information concerning them which they were 
 able to give. 
 
 It may here be observed, that the supposition 
 that the accounts of the appearances given by the 
 Evangelists are not true, is altogether set a'side by 
 the unfinished form in which they appear. No 
 fabricated stories, whether the product of inten- 
 tional deception, or qf a self-deluding imagination 
 working on traditional stories, would have been 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 109 
 
 left in such a state of unsatisfactory incomplete- 
 ness. 
 
 But if the Gospels are not regular histories, 
 if the Evangelists assumed that their readers 
 already possessed a knowledge of the main facts 
 respecting our Lord's ministry, and even of partic- 
 ular circumstances in his history, what, then, is 
 their character] For what purpose were they 
 written 1 The answer I conceive to be this. Such 
 a series of events as constituted and accompanied 
 the ministry of Jesus could not have taken place 
 without giving rise to a great number of re- 
 ports, false as well as true. Its true history was 
 given by the Apostles and their associates, but 
 their converts had heard, or were exposed to hear, 
 much that was not true, falsehoods proceeding 
 from the enemies of Jesus, and misstatements and 
 fables having their origin among his ill-informed 
 followers. In this state of things it became neces- 
 sary from these numerous relations to separate, to 
 collect together, and to authenticate by the highest 
 authority, a portion at least of those more impor- 
 tant facts which determined that his ministry was 
 from God, and afforded the most striking illustra- 
 tions of its character. This was done by the 
 
 Evangelists. Every one of them, I believe, might 
 10 
 
110 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 have explained his purpose in language corre- 
 sponding to that used by Luke (i. 4) : "I have writ- 
 ten, .... that you may know the truth concerning 
 the relations > which you have heard " ; * or might 
 have adopted the words of John (xx. 30, 31): 
 " Many other miracles, indeed, did Jesus perform 
 before his disciples, which have not been written 
 in this book; but these have been written, that 
 you may believe Jesus to be the Messiah, the Son 
 of God ; and that, believing, you may have life 
 through him." 
 
 THUS, as I conceive, it is to the circumstances 
 under which the Gospels were written, and which 
 led to their composition, that they owe, in part, 
 their imperfect and fragmentary character; but 
 this is due in great part, also, to the want of skill 
 in the Evangelists as literary artists. 
 
 In regard to the criticism of the Gospels, it is 
 constantly to be kept in mind, that this want of 
 literary skill in their authors appears not merely 
 in the construction of their histories, but equally 
 in their use of language. Their vocabulary was 
 
 * Such I conceive to be the meaning of the original. See Evi- 
 dences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. I. pp. clxxi, clxxii, 
 note. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. Ill 
 
 very limited, and hence the action of their minds 
 was constrained. They had no command and 
 choice of expression, and, at the same time, were 
 called upon to communicate ideas, sentiments, and 
 modes of thought, with which the generality of their 
 contemporaries had been wholly unacquainted. 
 The difficulty they found in writing caused them 
 to narrate briefly and imperfectly, omitting con- 
 necting thoughts and explanatory circumstances ; 
 and their want of familiarity with the use of lan- 
 guage not unfrequently led them to employ forms 
 of speech which are evidently not the precise logi- 
 cal expression of the meaning intended. 
 
 THE Gospels, then, in their construction and in 
 their style, correspond throughout to the character 
 and circumstances of the writers to whom they are 
 ascribed. They bear with them indelible proofs 
 of their genuineness. 
 
 BUT it is obvious that books of the character 
 described must be very open to the attacks of 
 minute criticism, and exposed to many cavils in 
 which there is no weight. A story when told by 
 one imperfectly skilled in the art of narration often 
 suggests objections, and presents seeming improb- 
 
112 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 abilities, which may be easily removed by expla- 
 nation. Every one must have observed how, in 
 such a case, what at first appeared obscure or 
 doubtful is at once cleared up by the answers to a 
 few questions ; or how even the statement of a 
 single circumstance, with which we were before 
 unacquainted, may throw light on all that per- 
 plexed us. But as we cannot interrogate the 
 Evangelists, we must, as regards them, answer 
 our questions ourselves ; and our answers are to 
 be derived, as I have before explained, from a 
 wide range of knowledge and of thought. 
 
 In proportion as we have more just concep- 
 tions of the character and condition of the Evan- 
 gelists, and are better acquainted with the state of 
 things under which they wrote, so will difficulties 
 and obscurities disappear, and their writings become 
 clear to us. In proportion as one is deficient in 
 this requisite knowledge, or in the comprehension 
 and judgment necessary to make use of it, or in 
 the disposition to apply it, so will he be able to 
 raise cavils and objections. 
 
 If the Gospels be of such a character as I have 
 described, they must present many difficulties. 1 
 do not here mean by that word passages affording 
 any well-founded objection to their authenticity, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 113 
 
 but passages requiring to be explained for the gen- 
 erality of readers. In all ancient classical histories, 
 and in the other writings which have come down 
 to us from Greece and Rome, there are many such 
 difficulties. The explanation of them has given 
 occasion to that vast body of direct and indirect 
 commentaries on these writings, which includes all 
 those books which treat of the Greek and Roman 
 antiquities, language, literature, and philosophy. 
 
 But beside the difficulties in the Gospels, of the 
 nature just represented, there are, as in all other 
 histories, errors, misapprehensions of the meaning 
 of language, and mistakes in regard to facts. But 
 as difficulties of the former class are, from the char- 
 acter of the Gospels, more likely to occur in them 
 than in most ancient histories, so, on the other hand, 
 we believe that important difficulties of the latter 
 class, or, in other words, important errors concern- 
 ing the history of our Lord's public ministry, are 
 less likely to- occur, because, in relation to the facts 
 of this history, we believe the Evangelists to have 
 been well-informed and thoroughly honest relators. 
 
 THE character of the Gospels, such as it has 
 been represented, is one mode in which it has 
 
 pleased God to preserve to us, in the very books 
 10* 
 
114 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 themselves, evidence of their authenticity. It ap- 
 pears, that, in order to understand them, we must 
 be acquainted with many facts which they do not 
 state; that we must bring to bear on their ex- 
 planation many considerations which they do not 
 expressly present. Parallel with what the Evan- 
 gelists relate, there existed a state of things which 
 they do not bring into view. Results not narrated 
 by them must have been consequent on what they 
 do narrate. Circumstances which they have not 
 placed before us must have given occasion to much 
 that was said and done by our Lord, and must have 
 affected, throughout, the course of his ministry. 
 Of the histories which they have written, there is 
 an unwritten counterpart. Between the two there 
 is such correspondence, that, in order to understand 
 what is written, we must make a study of the 
 unwritten. This correspondence becomes more 
 striking in proportion to the correctness and clear- 
 ness of our apprehension of that state of things 
 which was coexistent with the events recorded in 
 the Gospels. The relations between what is told 
 and what is not told become more apparent. All 
 the knowledge which we can bring to bear on the 
 history of Jesus as given by the Evangelists, goes 
 to confirm its essential truth. The case would be 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 115 
 
 the very reverse, if this history were false. Then, 
 in prosecuting our inquiries, instead of continually 
 discovering new proofs of its authenticity, we 
 should continually discover new proofs of its false- 
 hood. Nothing but truth could bear the test 
 which we have it in our power to apply. Such is 
 the character of the Gospels, such is their defi- 
 ciency of information, their imperfection and in- 
 completeness, that they are necessarily complicated 
 with a great body of circumstantial evidence of 
 the most unsuspicious kind. Thus, what we might 
 consider as their defects, what are their defects 
 when regarded merely as literary compositions, 
 contribute greatly to enhance their value. 
 
 BUT this, one may say, is not the view of the 
 Gospels commonly given. It is not. It is incon- 
 sistent with the view of their character presented 
 by any established church, or by any writer hold- 
 ing the traditionary opinions concerning them, 
 whether more or less distinctly. It is altogether 
 inconsistent with the neglected state in which the 
 Gospels have been left for popular use, for 
 the use of all who are not theological scholars. 
 Through this neglect, we who speak the English 
 language now read them in a translation in which 
 
116 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 their meaning is often mistaken, and often, when not 
 absolutely misunderstood, improperly expressed, 
 in which the great simplicity of the Evan- 
 gelists (one of the most decisive marks of their 
 truth) is disguised by a stiff and solemn style, as 
 much as the Evangelists themselves would have 
 been disguised, if, putting off the dress of their 
 times, they had clothed themselves in the vest- 
 ments of a modern priest ; in a translation of 
 which the phraseology is in part antiquated, and 
 in part such as w r as equally improper in former 
 days as at present, and which, in aiming at a 
 verbal rendering, retains what are mere idioms 
 of the original language, without force or propri- 
 ety in our own. Even the mechanical aid to a 
 right understanding of the Gospels to be derived 
 from a proper division of their contents in print- 
 ing, so as to separate from one another those 
 portions which relate to different topics or different 
 occasions, is not afforded in the copies published 
 by authority. On the contrary, the divisions made 
 are such as not to guide, but to mislead, the un- 
 learned and inattentive reader. Were all this 
 reformed, a veil would be removed which now 
 obscures and distorts their meaning. 
 
 The same causes whatever they are which 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 117 
 
 have operated to deprive the great majority of the 
 Christian community in every country of that 
 means of understanding the Gospels which would 
 be afforded by a translation corresponding to the 
 original as nearly as the difference of languages 
 permits, have presented an equal obstacle to com- 
 municating to the generality of readers correct 
 notions of their character, and of the manner in 
 which they ought to be regarded. The action of 
 these causes has kept back from popular use a 
 knowledge of the true character of the Gospels, 
 and of that great variety of facts and considerations 
 by which they are illustrated and their truth con- 
 firmed. It is true, that, from the vast number of 
 works which directly or indirectly relate to the 
 Gospels, a great amount of important information, 
 and very many explanations and suggestions, are 
 to be derived by the theological student. But the 
 most important of these works require so much 
 preparatory knowledge in order that they may be 
 used at all, or used with advantage, many of them 
 have so repulsive a character, and most of them 
 are founded on such false conceptions of Christian- 
 ity and of the Gospels, that, as regards the gen- 
 erality of Christians, all inquiry is discouraged, or, 
 if pursued, there is danger of its becoming un- 
 profitable, if not worse than unprofitable. 
 
118 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 The general want of that information concern- 
 ing the Gospels which ought to be the common 
 property of Christians, has caused the whole sub- 
 ject of our religion to be involved in obscurity, 
 perplexity, and error. This ignorance has not 
 been confined to the laity, who have commonly 
 been regarded as excused from any study of the 
 character or the evidences of their professed or 
 nominal faith, but has likewise extended over 
 a very large portion of those who have assumed 
 to be teachers of Christianity. The faith of the 
 generality of men has rested on traditionary au- 
 thority. Beside the influence of this authority, 
 the weight of the external evidences of Christian- 
 ity, the essential principles of its morality, based 
 on the immortal nature of man, and the intrinsic 
 character of the Gospels, which cannot be wholly 
 obscured, have undoubtedly made many men Chris- 
 tians, but often with a wavering faith, and with 
 very imperfect or very erroneous conceptions of 
 Christianity. But, on the other hand, the neglect, 
 or the inability, or the unwillingness, to communi- 
 cate that knowledge to the great body of Christians 
 which would place the history of our religion in 
 clear day, but would at the same time place in as 
 broad a light the superstitions and false doctrines 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 119 
 
 that have been represented as essential to Chris- 
 tianity, has left the misunderstood Gospels exposed 
 defenceless to the attacks of unbelievers. If those 
 truths concerning them which may be clearly es- 
 tablished were generally known and recognized, 
 works like that of Strauss could hardly be pro- 
 duced. If produced, they w r ould fall at once to 
 their proper level. They would be classed with 
 such writings as those of one of his countrymen 
 (Professor Samuel Simon Witte), who, in the last 
 quarter of the eighteenth century, maintained that 
 the Pyramids and the rums of Persepolis, Palmyra, 
 and Baalbec were natural productions, the result 
 of volcanic agency. 
 
 It is by the prevailing ignorance of which I have 
 spoken, and by the inveterate errors which have 
 come down to us from ages more ignorant than 
 our own, and the consequent outbreak of modern 
 extravagances occasioned by the free action of 
 men's minds having been so long constrained, that 
 he who would explain the character, and make 
 evident the divine origin of Christianity, is prin- 
 cipally embarrassed. Undoubtedly, among those, 
 throughout the small body of theological scholars, 
 who have given their thoughts to the study of our 
 faith, there has been a great advance in religious 
 
120 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 knowledge, and consequently in correct concep- 
 tions of Christianity, since the beginning of the last 
 century. In going back from century to century, 
 to an era preceding the Protestant Reformation, we 
 find the same gradual change for the better. This 
 is ground for encouragement, and for the hope of a 
 brighter period. Were it not for this retrospect of 
 the past, the view before us and around us would 
 be gloomy. When we see the vast power of prej- 
 udice opposed to the truth, the sacred authority 
 with which antiquated errors are invested, the 
 obstinacy with which the dead formulae of barbar- 
 ous creeds, the leavings of mortality and decay, 
 are still set forth, like the relics of a Catholic saint, 
 as having power to give health and life, and the 
 strong influence acting on the love of wealth and 
 rank which determines or affects the professed 
 belief of a great number of men, even of the pub- 
 lic teachers of religion, in the Christian world ; 
 when we look at the state of things existing in 
 the established church of one of the most enlight- 
 ened Christian nations, a nation so intimately 
 connected with our own, we might well feel dis- 
 couraged, were it not for 
 
 " the deep voice from the past, 
 Which tells us these things cannot last." 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 121 
 
 I LEAVE the preceding paragraph as it was 
 originally written. But since it was written, the 
 news has burst upon us of that almost simultane- 
 ous development of moral force that has been for 
 a long time accumulating, which is now rapidly 
 and irrevocably changing the aspect of Europe. 
 It has become evident, that, throughout the more 
 enlightened portion of the Old World, traditionary 
 institutions and obsolete creeds, unsuited to the 
 present age, must fall. The prejudices on which 
 they have rested are decayed, and have grown too 
 weak for their support. They must fall, if not 
 before the reason, yet before the passions and the 
 altered feelings, of those on whom they have been 
 imposed ; and the same abuses and errors cannot 
 be restored. The struggle which has commenced, 
 sudden as may seem its first outbreak, has been 
 preparing through many years by the progress of 
 men's thoughts and convictions. It may be obsti- 
 nate and long, many mistakes may be committed, 
 much folly, much wickedness, and much suffering 
 may accompany it; but, whatever doubts there 
 may be of its final result as regards the happiness 
 of our race, there is no doubt that it will sweep 
 away many evils by which civilized Europe has 
 
 been afflicted, and into which a new vitality can- 
 11 
 
122 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 not hereafter be infused. This struggle is not the 
 commencement of a series of events corresponding 
 to those which the last sixty years have witnessed. 
 Men are starting anew from a more advanced state 
 of intellectual and moral culture. Their physical 
 condition has also been improved. The wants and 
 sufferings of the less favored portion of our race 
 have been gaining more and more attention from 
 those to whom the power to alleviate them has 
 been afforded by the providence of God manifest- 
 ed in the necessary order of things which he has 
 established in this world and by which men are 
 bound together. The ferocious passions of the 
 many have not been maddened as they had been 
 sixty years ago by direct and open oppression, 
 habitual injury and contempt ; nor has the intel- 
 lect of the more enlightened been insulted and 
 exasperated through the imposition of absurd 
 creeds, and the maintenance of intolerable abuses, 
 under the name of religion. We cannot doubt 
 that the aged survivors of the next half-century 
 will have witnessed changes as great and as start- 
 ling as those which have stamped their character 
 on the period through which we have just passed, 
 but changes of another kind. Men will not again 
 run the same cycle. There seems to be no ground 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 123 
 
 for fear or for hope, should any be disposed to en- 
 tertain such hope, that a new reaction will take 
 place strong enough to carry men back to the 
 same causes of evil from which they are now 
 struggling to free themselves. 
 
 But this anticipation of coming changes affords 
 in itself alone no augury of good. The restlessness 
 and the convulsions of nations are in themselves 
 no more favorable indications of improvement than 
 the tossings and spasmodic motions of a man in a 
 fever are symptoms of returning health. It is 
 with nations as with the individuals of whom they 
 are composed. It is only through means which 
 may raise the moral and intellectual character of 
 men, that their permanent good may be effected. 
 It can be effected only through the influence of 
 those principles of action which control our self- 
 ishness, and call forth our social affections ; 
 only through a better knowledge and a deeper 
 feeling of the truths which concern our relations 
 to our fellow-men as founded on our relations to 
 God and to immortality, and which lead us by 
 the highest motives to the performance of our 
 duties. 
 
 When, accordingly, we reflect, I do not say on 
 the passions, but on the motives to action, which 
 
124 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 govern the majority of men ; on the virtual irre- 
 ligion which is prevalent even under the profession 
 of religion ; on the merely outward and ceremoni- 
 ous respect for some established form of national 
 worship; on the wild speculations which appear 
 in the writings of so many, who, from their po- 
 litical station or their great intellectual powers, 
 control directly or indirectly the minds of their 
 fellow-men; on the infidelity and atheism, made 
 only the more offensive by pretending to use the 
 language of religion, which have found favor in 
 our age as the highest philosophy ; on the general 
 absence of a recognition of the influence of men's 
 opinions and religious belief in determining their 
 character and conduct, and, in consequence of this, 
 the general insensibility to the value of truth and 
 to the mischief of error on the most important 
 topics of thought, or, in other words, the common 
 indifference as to what is essentially true or essen- 
 tially false concerning Christianity ; when we 
 consider these things, we may perceive that other 
 influences, very unlike those which are now agitat- 
 ing the surface of society, influences working far 
 deeper in the nature of man, are required to pro- 
 duce any great and permanent good for our race. 
 We may hope, we may believe, that the pres- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 125 
 
 ent state of things is preparing the way for the 
 more unobstructed action of these influences at 
 some distant period. Christianity, though mis- 
 understood and misrepresented, neglected and ca- 
 lumniated, has been the great civilizer of the 
 world ; and it is to Christianity better understood 
 than it has been, that we must continue to look 
 for all essential improvement in the character and 
 condition of individuals, and consequently of na- 
 tions. 
 
 11* 
 
126 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ON WHAT ESSENTIALLY CONSTITUTES THE VALUE OF CHRIS- 
 TIANITY AND OF THE GOSPELS. 
 
 I HAVE spoken in the last Chapter of some of 
 the characteristics of the Gospels. One requisite 
 necessary to complete our view of their character 
 one requisite the most important remains to be 
 mentioned. We must have a correct apprehension 
 of what essentially constitutes their value ; and to 
 this end we must have a correct apprehension of 
 what essentially constitutes the value of Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 The Gospels are the history of a miraculous 
 communication from God to men. If this history 
 be true, it relates to an event of inconceivable in- 
 terest and importance. The Infinite Being has 
 suspended the ordinary operations of his power to 
 manifest himself more immediately to the dwellers 
 on earth. The essential value of Christianity con- 
 sists in its being such a revelation of Him. When 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 127 
 
 we inquire respecting the truth of Christianity, the 
 only question at issue is, whether it be a fact, that 
 God, through Christ, miraculously revealed him- 
 self to men. Let us consider why this fact is so 
 important. 
 
 One answer is obvious. If God has thus re- 
 vealed his existence and his purposes towards us, 
 the truths of religion rest on an immovable basis, 
 the witness of God himself. This needs no 
 illustration. But there is another answer, which 
 has been less considered. It is only through such 
 a supernatural manifestation of God that these 
 truths can be known. This admits of explana- 
 tion. 
 
 In proof of the proposition just stated, we need 
 not appeal to the ignorance, the errors, the uncer- 
 tainty, and the very limited conceptions of the 
 wisest of heathen philosophers. We will put 
 aside the whole of that decisive evidence to be de- 
 rived from our knowledge of the condition of men 
 unenlightened by Christianity. We may consider 
 the proposition in the abstract, not referring to 
 what experience has determined concerning it, but 
 regarding directly the actual powers of the human 
 mind, and what in the nature of things must be 
 true. 
 
128 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 What can human reason alone, when strongest 
 and most unembarrassed in its action, effect toward 
 establishing the facts on which religion is founded 1 
 Our reason may assure us of the truth that there 
 is an infinite cause of all finite things. All expe- 
 rience teaches us that every thing finite, all motion, 
 all organized life, all changes, must have a cause 
 for their existence. We have no experience, and 
 therefore we have no belief, that a body of what 
 we call matter can come into existence uncreated. 
 The weight of this universal experience is so deci- 
 sive, that the conviction derived from it has been 
 commonly regarded as an innate law of the mind. 
 But the truth that finite things cannot exist with- 
 out a cause, leads us directly to the conclusion 
 that there is an Infinite Being, who is the cause of 
 all finite things, the Creator of the Universe. 
 
 What indications, then, do our very brief expe- 
 rience, and our most imperfect knowledge of the 
 objects around us, and of the state of things in 
 which we are existing, afford us of the character 
 of the Cause of all things ] The phenomena we 
 are able to observe, the series of what we call 
 causes and effects, may satisfy our reason of his 
 intelligence and benevolence. Our conclusion in 
 regard to the moral character of God is confirmed 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 129 
 
 by the fact, that we neither know, nor can conceive 
 of, any cause of moral evil except the selfish desires 
 of finite beings. These indeed have been ascribed 
 to the Deity in those false systems of theology 
 which represent him as having created the uni- 
 verse for his own glory. But we are not speaking 
 of what superstition has taught, but of what our 
 reason, unassisted by revelation, may be conceived 
 of as capable of teaching. 
 
 The Infinite Being, then, is intelligent and be- 
 nevolent. But we can imagine no limitation to 
 the essential attributes of such a being. We 
 conceive, therefore, that his intelligence and be- 
 nevolence are infinite, in the whole extent of the 
 meaning of that term which we are able to com- 
 prehend. 
 
 Furthermore. This Being we can conceive of 
 only as unchangeable. The Source of all power 
 can be affected by no power from without. No 
 new motive of action derived from temporal and 
 finite things can influence Him who is the Author 
 of all things temporal and finite, and to whose in- 
 finite intelligence they have ever been present. 
 
 Thus we have arrived at a conception, of the 
 truth of which I believe that it is possible for our 
 reason alone to give us assurance. But I here 
 
130 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 use the word " possible " to denote merely that 
 which may be supposed without supposing what 
 in the nature of things is an absurdity. There is 
 no evidence > that such a conception of God has 
 been entertained by the wisest of men unenlight- 
 ened by Christianity, though it is not to be 
 questioned that a few such men have made some 
 approach towards it. 
 
 To this conclusion, then, our reason may have 
 attained. But before this conclusion she stands 
 utterly confounded. She has arrived at a concep- 
 tion which she cannot comprehend. Putting aside 
 all our imperfect and contradictory notions of in- 
 finity and eternity,* and of an Unchangeable Being 
 whose successive volitions cause all changes, no- 
 tions which she has no power to reconcile, other 
 questions at once present themselves which she 
 cannot answer, difficulties which she cannot 
 solve. She has risen into an immeasurable ex- 
 panse of light, in which all sensible things melt 
 away into mere manifestations of the Infinite 
 Spirit ; but it is an expanse of light by which she 
 is overwhelmed and bewildered. No power of 
 
 * See Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. n. p. 
 cxcvii, seq. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 131 
 
 distinct vision remains. No countenance mani- 
 fests itself to her from the unfathomable glory. 
 No articulate voice issues forth. The light is 
 mute. 
 
 In contemplating the relations of God to finite 
 beings, our reason, when untaught and unguided 
 by God himself, utterly fails us. In attempt- 
 ing to explore this subject, she proceeds stum- 
 bling, uncertain, disheartened, meeting on every 
 side with barriers which she cannot pass. God 
 is infinitely benevolent. Why, then, one may 
 ask, am I a suffering being in a world full of 
 suffering, where moral and physical evils often 
 present themselves in forms so appalling 1 God 
 is infinitely benevolent. Of this we are assured. 
 But numberless beings are but just beginning to 
 exist. Numberless inferior animals around us 
 have been formed with but very limited capacities 
 of happiness, if happiness it may be called. There 
 are to our perceptions immeasurable voids in the 
 universe, containing no created life. Why have 
 not all time and space been filled with happy 
 beings ] God is an agent. This is certain. His 
 power is in continual action, forming, sustaining, 
 and moving all things. But we can conceive of 
 no action of any conscious being without a motive. 
 
132 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 And we can conceive of no motive which does 
 not consist in the purpose of improving one's 
 condition through the gratification of some unsat- 
 isfied desire. ' And no such motive can be ascribed 
 to the Infinite Being. God is the source of all 
 power ; he has formed our natures ; he has formed 
 and disposed all things that act upon them. How 
 is it, that I am not merely a passive instrument in 
 his hands ? How is it, that there is inseparably 
 connected with my nature a conviction that I can 
 act for myself, that I can choose good and avoid 
 evil, and that the consequent sense of responsibil- 
 ity becomes a source of unhappiness and misery, 
 when I feel that I have chosen ill ? In what re- 
 spect does the uncontrollable power of God differ 
 from an inexorable Fate, consigning, if not myself, 
 yet many of my fellow-creatures, to sin and misery 1 
 Certainly the difference is not to be established 
 through such expedients as are resorted to by those 
 who maintain that this uncontrollable power, the 
 ultimate cause of all finite things, is indeed incon- 
 sistent with the moral power of man to choose 
 between good and evil. But how are these things 
 to be explained and reconciled ? 
 
 These difficulties, more or less clearly perceived, 
 have in all times, and more particularly in our 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 133 
 
 own, spread the darkness of atheism over what has 
 been called philosophy ; for, at the present day, 
 the belief that no such doctrine as atheism exists 
 can be held only by a very ill-informed and very 
 innocent person. I have stated these difficulties 
 that the subject may be fully apprehended; so 
 that he who thus apprehends it may not be taken 
 unawares, when he finds them put forth by others, 
 or when they rise spontaneously before his own 
 mind. I have stated them for another purpose, 
 that we may fully recognize what ought to be recog- 
 nized as a fundamental principle by all who under- 
 take to speculate on the highest truths, the truths 
 of religion, that man's reason is very limited. 
 All that by its unassisted exercise we know or can 
 know concerning the condition of God's creatures 
 in this world, or his relations to his creatures gen- 
 erally or to the universe, bears a far less propor- 
 tion to what, in our present state, we cannot thus 
 know, than do the objects which we may discern 
 by the light of a taper in a narrow room to what 
 we may behold when the midnight sky opens 
 above us, with its numberless worlds of light 
 spreading through the immeasurable and unimag- 
 inable distance. With this just, and consequently 
 
 most humble, view of our native powers, we shall 
 12 
 
134 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 form a proper estimate of those pretended systems 
 of the highest philosophy, which, rejecting all that 
 God has revealed to us, and renouncing even the 
 clearest deductions of our own reason concerning 
 his being and perfections, have been in reality in- 
 coherent and unintelligible dreams of human folly. 
 But all the difficulties and questions which I 
 have spoken of, or to which I have alluded, resolve 
 themselves into one great question of the deepest 
 interest to us all. What are the relations of the 
 Infinite Spirit to each one of us individually 1 ? Is 
 it possible that they can be of such a character, 
 that, in the imperfect language to the use of which 
 we are compelled, in speaking of God, by our in- 
 adequate conceptions, we may call them personal 
 relations I Happiness flows forth from Him ; nor 
 can we reasonably ascribe any other purpose than 
 the production of happiness to the Author of all 
 things. But is my happiness as an individual his 
 care, the care of that Being on whom I am wholly 
 dependent 1 I have been but just introduced by 
 him among his works. If God regards me with 
 benevolence, and his benevolence is infinite, why 
 was not my being commensurate with his own ] 
 And why am I, in this my short life here, exposed 
 to so much suffering'? 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 135 
 
 We speak of the love of God for his creatures. 
 But I have no experience of love except that of 
 one finite being for another. My natural powers 
 enable me to form no conception of any other. I 
 love because there exist in the objects of my love 
 qualities with which I can sympathize and the 
 contemplation of which gives me pleasure, or from 
 the gratification afforded by the exercise of the 
 amiable and benevolent affections, by the perform- 
 ance of those acts to which they lead, and by the 
 reciprocal love which they produce. I love be- 
 cause I find my happiness in the happiness of 
 others, and in their feelings of kindness towards 
 me. But I can attribute no such motives to the 
 Infinite Being. The affections which bind men 
 together cannot be ascribed to him. 
 
 I am suffering in a world full of suffering. My 
 imagination, or, if one will, my reason, may put be- 
 fore me the conception of another world in which 
 suffering does not exist. I may not object, that 
 for me to attain to it I must pass through a fear- 
 ful change ; but what assurance can reason alone 
 give me, that I am to exist in that better world ? 
 She may teach me that God regards the sum of 
 happiness in the universe ; but it is my individ- 
 ual happiness about which I inquire. If another 
 
136 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 being is to take my place in that world ; or if, ac- 
 cording to a doctrine received by many, utterly 
 unintelligible in itself, but which they suppose 
 themselves to understand, my spirit, distinct from 
 my consciousness, is to animate another being, 
 this will not lessen the sum of happiness in the 
 universe ; but what does that doctrine concern 
 me ] Where am I to learn that God cares for me 
 as an individual 1 
 
 From one source only, from the testimony of 
 God himself. The answer to that question is 
 given by his supernatural manifestation of himself 
 through Christ. Through him he has addressed 
 men, individual men, as his creatures, as his care, 
 as acting and suffering here under his continual 
 providence, in preparation for an immortal exist- 
 ence. 
 
 But in supposing such a revelation, you present, 
 an unbeliever may say, ideas which I cannot com- 
 prehend. You bring together in a supposed con- 
 nection, which is impossible, the infinite and the 
 finite. You blend with the history of human 
 events, of the deeds of men, what you would have 
 regarded as immediate acts of God. You teach 
 that infinite perfection and power were in union 
 with human imperfection and weakness, for the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 137 
 
 purpose of accomplishing what you call a divine 
 work. You represent God as dissatisfied with 
 what he had ordained, and interrupting the estab- 
 lished course of things in order to amend it. You 
 would have us believe that the Unchangeable Be- 
 ing did so change as to interpose at a particular 
 time in this world of ours, and operate in a man- 
 ner altogether different from his usual laws of 
 action. My imagination is confounded, and my 
 reason revolts. 
 
 I have in what precedes, and elsewhere,* taken 
 notice of the erroneous conceptions on which such 
 language may be founded. But there is a most 
 important truth involved in it. God's miraculous 
 revelation of himself through Christ of which 
 it has been a fashion with many in our times to 
 speak so foolishly and so flippantly, not professing 
 absolutely to disbelieve it, but only to regard it 
 as a matter of indifference whether God has so 
 revealed himself or not is in truth the most 
 astonishing fact of which we can conceive, and 
 one of incomparably greater interest to us than 
 any other of which we may assure ourselves. Our 
 imagination may well be overwhelmed by it, but 
 
 * See Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. II. p. 
 cxcviii, note. 
 
 12* 
 
138 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 there is nothing in the belief of it to offend our 
 reason. 
 
 Our reason does not hesitate to admit the belief 
 of the all-controlling, unintermitted agency of God 
 throughout the universe, in all that surrounds us 
 and in ourselves. It assents at once to the truth, 
 that the Infinite Being is everywhere in the most 
 intimate connection with finite things ; all finite 
 things being but manifestations of His power, and 
 preserved in existence by Him. Reason embraces, 
 as if it were a deduction of her own, the truth 
 taught by Christianity, that the perfect, all-pervad- 
 ing Spirit of God is continually working in the 
 midst of human imperfection, and (to use the only 
 language which our most limited apprehensions 
 afford) in union with it, for the production of 
 good. To one who acknowledges the existence 
 and agency of God, the fact is evident and admits 
 of no dispute, however impossible we may find it 
 to reconcile the conceptions which it brings to- 
 gether, that the Unchangeable is at every moment 
 operating to produce changes in his works, im- 
 measurably exceeding in number and variety any 
 limit to which our imagination can extend. As 
 regards the supernatural manifestation of God to 
 bring about a new state of things, to accomplish 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 139 
 
 one of those innumerable changes, reason finds no 
 difficulty in believing that Infinite Power may act 
 without the intervention of those phenomena which 
 we call natural causes. She perceives that the 
 existence of these causes is from him, and that 
 precedent to their existence he must have so 
 acted, that the work of creation is a miracle. 
 The fact does not seem to have been generally 
 recognized, but the only difficulty which presents 
 itself to our reason in relation to this subject is 
 of an opposite kind. It is in answering the ques- 
 tion, why the Ultimate Cause of all things has 
 ordinarily interposed a chain of finite causes, so 
 called, between his power and will, and the effects 
 which it is his purpose to produce. 
 
 Our misapprehensions, and incredulity and im- 
 perfect belief, concerning God's manifestation of 
 himself through Jesus Christ, arise from our nar- 
 row conceptions. We are of the earth, earthy. 
 We find it hard to raise our apprehensions above 
 it. We are in continual danger of thinking and 
 feeling as if we had been here always, and were to 
 remain here for ever. We affect to be philosophers, 
 and to speculate on the constitution of a universe 
 into which we have but just been introduced ; but 
 our unaided speculations are drawn downwards 
 
140 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 toward the earth, and, for the most part, only carry 
 us into the region of its smoke and exhalations. 
 The objects immediately about us, of which we 
 have known nothing but for a few years, and from 
 which we are so soon to be separated, may press 
 upon us, and engross us, and close round us, and 
 shut out from our view all the marvels and glories 
 of the infinite unknown. We are' surrounded 
 by an immeasurable expanse of created things, 
 throughout which the power of God is ever oper- 
 ating ; but in our littleness we find it hard to com- 
 prehend that God may have manifested himself to 
 men in a mode different from any of which we had 
 had experience. 
 
 THE revelation of God has broken through the 
 barrier of clouds that environs us, and has opened 
 to us the light of day beyond. It makes known 
 to us that we have far more important relations 
 than those which belong only to our present exist- 
 enc e 5 imperishable relations with God, and his 
 yet unknown works. It raises us into another 
 sphere of being. It blends earth with heaven, 
 connects the finite, powerless sufferer with the 
 all-powerful Source of infinite good, our lives that 
 have but just commenced with eternity, and our 
 world with the universe. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 141 
 
 The fact alone that the Infinite Spirit has mi- 
 raculously revealed himself to men answers that 
 question in which we have so deep an interest, 
 What are our individual relations to God I It is 
 in its being a miraculous revelation, that the essen- 
 tial, the inestimable value of Christianity consists. 
 An articulate voice has been uttered from the 
 ineffable glory that fills all space. God, in thus 
 speaking, has made known to us that he cares 
 (we can use no other word) for men as individual 
 beings, and the whole purpose of his communi- 
 cation concerns us as immortal beings. He has 
 taught us, that he does sustain relations to us, the 
 nature of which we may inadequately express by 
 calling them personal relations. He has through 
 Christ spoken to us, to borrow the language of 
 Scripture, as man to man. For our sakes his ordi- 
 nary operations in producing the phenomena of 
 nature have been suspended, and his power has 
 been manifested in new modes of action; thus 
 giving us assurance that the communication we 
 have received is from the Source of all power. It 
 is through this manifestation of God by Christ, and 
 through this alone, that we are able to rest in the 
 conviction, that He who supports all things in be- 
 ing may be contemplated by us as our individual 
 Friend and Father, that all our concerns are his 
 
142 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 care, and that our relations of entire dependence 
 on his infinite goodness are to continue for ever. 
 
 If we may trust the decisions of our reason 
 grounded on -proofs which she can clearly compre- 
 hend, concerning subjects which lie within her 
 sphere, such a supernatural manifestation has 
 been made. The fact, I think, has not been suffi- 
 ciently attended to, that our faith in the essential 
 truths of religion, if derived from Christianity, rests 
 on a very different basis from what it could do if 
 derived from any other source. It requires for 
 its support no experience, no knowledge, and no 
 capacities, above the ordinary faculties and at- 
 tainments of human nature. Christianity has so 
 taught us, that all the reasoning necessary to a 
 conviction of the truths which it has revealed lies, 
 as I have elsewhere observed, entirely within the 
 compass of our powers, and belongs to our familiar 
 methods of investigation. The proofs which estab- 
 lish the fact that the Gospels were written by those 
 to whom they are ascribed, the proofs that attest 
 the reality of all those other facts which necessa- 
 rily imply a divine interposition, are of the same 
 nature as the proofs on which we rely as to any 
 other historical fact, or any natural phenomenon 
 about which we have no distrust, They are equal- 
 ly level to our comprehension. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 143 
 
 The manifestation through Christ of the Infinite 
 Being, and of his purposes toward us, still leaves 
 us, without doubt, in great ignorance. We are still 
 surrounded by difficulties which we cannot solve, 
 and questions press upon us which we cannot 
 answer. But it has taught us all that it is neces- 
 sary for us to know as the foundation of the 
 highest virtue and the most glorious hopes. All 
 correct conceptions of religion, of the moral nature, 
 the relations, and the duties of man, all which 
 constitutes the highest philosophy, that philosophy 
 which concerns the noblest objects of thought and 
 the most important interests of man, must rest 
 on those realities which the revelation of God has 
 discovered to us, and of which we can in no other 
 way have assurance. All speculations concerning 
 religion in which God's miraculous revelation of 
 himself through Christ is not recognized, may be 
 compared to the speculations of one who should 
 form a theory concerning the probable motions of 
 the heavenly bodies, without adverting to the fact, 
 that the laws to which those motions are conformed 
 have been demonstrated. 
 
 THE Gospels are the history of this miraculous 
 revelation of God to man. But they are not its 
 history alone. They are permanent evidences of 
 
H4 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 the fact, that such a revelation has been made. 
 This evidence appears in the very constitution of 
 those books, in their actually possessing the 
 characteristics which have been insisted upon by 
 unbelievers (like Strauss) as a main ground for 
 disputing their credibility, and which many be- 
 lievers have most unwisely been disposed to dis- 
 guise or deny. It appears in what to human 
 apprehension may, at first view, seem their mar- 
 vellous incongruities. 
 
 The Gospels are rude works of certain Jews, 
 men belonging to a despised race, themselves very 
 unskilled in writing, having no literary or philo- 
 sophical culture, and not distinguished by any 
 uncommon natural powers of mind. They are 
 stamped with the character of the nation and the 
 age in which they were written. But whatever 
 they may discover of human incapacity or imper- 
 fection appears in intimate union with conceptions, 
 which I do not say that the minds of their unin- 
 structed writers could not have attained, but which 
 no human mind could have attained without being 
 supernaturally enlightened by God, conceptions, 
 of religion and duty, of all that is most sublime in 
 character, views of God and man, of life and im- 
 mortality, far transcending all which mere human 
 philosophy has reached. Considered only as liter- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 145 
 
 ary compositions, the Gospels are precisely such 
 works as we might expect from their authors, a 
 fisherman of Galilee, a tax-gatherer of Galilee, and 
 two other Jews, their associates. Yet in these 
 works, when we pass through their outward form 
 to their contents, and contemplate the accounts 
 which their authors give of their Master, we find 
 the exhibition of a character to which there is 
 elsewhere no parallel and no approach in history 
 or fiction; for these accounts form a consistent 
 representation of one singled out from the rest of 
 men to sustain peculiar relations to God and to 
 the world, and thoroughly fulfilling these relations. 
 It is impossible that this character should have 
 been an invention of those in whose narratives it 
 appears. 
 
 " God," says St. Paul, " has chosen the foolish 
 things of the world to put wise men to shame." 
 "My discourses and my preaching," he tells the 
 Corinthians, "were not in persuasive words of 
 wisdom, but were accompanied by the manifestation 
 of God's spirit and power." The first preachers 
 of Christ were intrusted with that treasure of truth 
 which he revealed. " But we have this treasure," 
 says the Apostle, " in earthen vessels ; so that our 
 exceeding strength is from God, and not of our- 
 selves." In these passages, and often elsewhere, 
 
 13 
 
146 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 he refers to the inability of the first preachers of 
 Christ to have originated his religion, or to estab- 
 lish it in the world through any natural powers or 
 human wisdom which they possessed. Weak in- 
 struments indeed they were. To the apprehensions 
 of many, it may seem incongruous that God should 
 employ such ministers ; but this wonderful con- 
 trast between their human insufficiency and what 
 they taught and what they accomplished, estab- 
 lishes the truth of the Apostle's declaration, that 
 their sufficiency was from God. "We are not able 
 of ourselves," he says, " to make account of any- 
 thing as our own work, but our ability is from 
 God." 
 
 Conformably to this, the union of human error 
 and imperfection in the Gospels with their great 
 essential characteristics, renders those books a 
 standing miracle in evidence of the truth of Chris- 
 tianity. I use these words not loosely, not in the 
 way of declamation, nor in any metaphorical sense, 
 but in their literal meaning. The Gospels bear 
 with them a supernatural character ; for they pre- 
 sent most striking and apparently contradictory 
 phenomena, which cannot be accounted for by what 
 we call natural causes ; and thus they are in them- 
 selves a permanent miracle, an evidence to men of 
 all ages. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 147 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 STRAUSS'S PROPOSED SUBSTITUTE FOR CHRISTIANITY. RE- 
 MARKS ON MODERN GERMAN PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 THOUGH it is something like passing from clear 
 air and bright sunshine into a chilling and pesti- 
 lential congregation of vapors, yet we will return 
 once more to the speculations of Strauss. The 
 purpose in view is sufficiently important to justify 
 our doing so. The " Concluding Dissertation " of 
 his book is full of instruction, but instruction of a 
 wholly different kind from what the writer pro- 
 posed to impart. 
 
 In this Dissertation he gives his readers to un- 
 derstand, that, in his own opinion, he has accom- 
 plished a great work. He begins by saying: 
 
 " The results of the inquiry which we have now 
 brought to a close, have apparently annihilated 
 the greatest and most valuable part of that which 
 the Christian has been wont to believe concerning 
 his Saviour Jesus, have uprooted all the animating 
 motives which he has gathered from his faith, and 
 withered all his consolations. The boundless store 
 
148 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of truth and life which for eighteen centuries has 
 been the aliment of humanity, seems irretrievably 
 dissipated; the most sublime levelled with the 
 dust, God divested of his grace, man of his dignity, 
 and the tie between heaven and earth broken. 
 Piety turns away with horror from so fearful an 
 act of desecration, and strong in the impregnable 
 self-evidence of its faith, pronounces that, let an 
 audacious criticism attempt what it will, all which 
 the scriptures declare, and the church believes of 
 Christ, will still subsist as eternal truth, nor needs 
 one iota of it to be renounced. Thus at the con- 
 clusion of the criticism of the history of Jesus, 
 there presents itself this problem : to re-establish 
 dogmatically that which has been destroyed criti- 
 ically."* 
 
 The larger part of the paragraph which I have 
 quoted is plain in its meaning; and no comment 
 can be required on this cold-blooded bravado of 
 infidelity. The greater part of the paragraph is, 
 as I have said, intelligible ; but this is not true of 
 the last sentence : " Thus, at the conclusion of 
 the criticism of the history of Jesus, there presents 
 itself this problem: to re-establish dogmatically 
 that which has been destroyed critically." 
 
 * Vol. HI. p. 396. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 149 
 
 It is with these words as with other similar 
 aggregates of words which form the staple of what 
 passes for original thought in the works of many 
 German speculatists. No intelligible purpose can 
 be assigned to them, except by considering what 
 meaning, or rather what pretence of meaning, the 
 connection requires in order to keep up a seeming 
 continuity of thought. Proceeding by this rule, 
 we must understand Strauss as saying, that by a 
 critical examination the history of Jesus has been 
 shown to be false, and that the problem remains 
 to re-establish this history as true under the form 
 of a system of doctrines ; or, in other words, to 
 convert the historical fictions concerning Jesus 
 into propositions which, as doctrines of religion, 
 may be received as true. The problem proposed 
 is, to discover some method by which essential 
 falsehood may be changed into essential truth, 
 which truth, it is implied, may form a satisfactory 
 substitute for the falsehood. 
 
 But the darkness becomes more gross as we 
 proceed ; and we grope in vain for any tangible 
 meaning. A little after the passage just quoted, 
 the following occurs : 
 
 " Hitherto our criticism [has] had for its object 
 what Christianity is, as it appears in the history 
 
 13* 
 
150 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of Jesus given in the evangelical records. Now 
 this history having been called in question by our 
 doubts, it reflects itself upon itself [throws itself 
 back upon itself], and seeks an asylum in the soul 
 of the believer, where, however, it exists not as 
 simple history, but as a history reflected upon 
 itself, that is, as a creed and dogma." * 
 
 From such passages nothing can be gathered, 
 but that Strauss had a notion that some substitute 
 was to be provided for the belief of a Christian, 
 which might replace all that he had destroyed, 
 
 * " Bisher war Gegenstand der Kritik der christliche Inhalt, wie er 
 in den evangelischen Urkunden als Geschichte Jesu vorliegt : nun 
 dieser durch den Zweifel in Anspruch genommen ist, reflectirt er 
 sich in sich, sucht eine Freistatte im Innern der Glaubigen, wo er aber 
 nicht als blosse Geschichte, sondern als in sich reflectirte Geschichte, 
 d. h. als Bekenntniss und Dogma, vorhanden ist." Leben Jesu, 
 ( 144,) H. 665. 
 
 I give my own rendering above, because Strauss's English trans- 
 lator appears to me to have failed, here as elsewhere, I do not say in 
 giving the sense of the original, for it would be hard to bring it as a 
 charge against him, that he has not done what was impossible, but in 
 giving English words which fairly represent the German. He renders 
 thus : " Hitherto our criticism had for its object the data of Chris- 
 tianity, as historically presented in the evangelical records ; now these 
 data having been called in question in their historical form, assume 
 that of a mental product, and find a refuge in the soul of the believer; 
 where they exist, not as a simple history, but a reflected history, that 
 is, a confession of faith, a received dogma." Vol. HI. p. 398. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 151 
 
 and that this substitute was in some way to be 
 connected with the history of Christ, " reflected 
 upon itself." 
 
 In regard, however, to the work of re-establish- 
 ing what he had destroyed, Strauss says : 
 
 " The critic seems to require no such re-estab- 
 lishment, since he is able to endure the annihila- 
 tion resulting from his own labors. Hence it 
 might be supposed that the critic, when he seeks 
 to rescue the dogma from the flames which his 
 criticism has kindled, acts falsely in relation to his 
 own point of view, since, to satisfy the believer, he 
 treats what is valueless for himself as if he esteemed 
 it to be a jewel." 
 
 " But," he adds, " in proportion as he is distin- 
 guished from the naturalistic theologian and the 
 free-thinker, in proportion as his criticism is 
 conceived in the spirit of the nineteenth century, 
 he is filled with veneration for every religion, and 
 especially for the substance of the sublimest of all 
 religions, the Christian, which he perceives to be 
 identical with the deepest philosophical truth; 
 and hence, after having in the course of his criti- 
 cism exhibited only the differences between his 
 conviction and the historical belief of the Chris- 
 tian, he will feel urged to place that identity in a 
 
152 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 just light " ; * that is, as appears from what fol- 
 lows, the identity of the substance of Christianity 
 with the atheistic philosophy of Hegel. 
 
 In what follows the introductory matter from 
 which I have quoted, Strauss goes over various 
 schemes of religion, apparently with the purpose 
 of finding some substitute for the common belief 
 of Christians in the truth of the history of Christ. 
 He first treats at length of what he calls " the 
 Christology of the Orthodox System." But there 
 was no reason for introducing this scheme, nor any 
 propriety in doing so, since, whatever may be its 
 character in other respects, it supposes for its 
 foundation the belief of the history of Christ as 
 given in the Gospels, and cannot, therefore, -be 
 proffered as a substitute for belief. He then passes 
 to what is properly to his purpose, the exposition 
 of various schemes of infidelity which havje pre- 
 vailed among his countrymen, that of the earlier 
 Rationalists, and then those of Schleiermacher, 
 Kant, De Wette, and others, all of which he rejects 
 as unsatisfactory, and finally comes down to the 
 latest product of German philosophy, the He- 
 gelian theory, as modified by himself. This may 
 be explained as follows*. 
 
 * Vol. HI. p. 397. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 153 
 
 Schelling laid down the proposition, that " the 
 incarnation of God is an incarnation from eter- 
 nity." " By the incarnate Son of God," says 
 Strauss, " he understood the finite itself as it 
 attains consciousness in man, and, in its distinc- 
 tion from the infinite, with which it is yet one, 
 appears as a suffering God, subjected to the rela- 
 tions of time."* 
 
 " In the latest philosophy," says Strauss, " this 
 idea is thus further developed. If God be pro- 
 nounced tp be spirit, then, since man also is spirit, 
 it follows at once that they are not in themselves 
 [essentially] different. Furthermore, since it is 
 essential to spirit in its distinction from itself to 
 remain identical with itself, to possess itself in an- 
 other than itself, it is implied in our recognition of 
 God as spirit, that he does not remain fixed as a 
 barren infinite without and above finite things, 
 but enters into them, producing the finite, nature 
 and the human spirit, only as a renunciation of 
 
 * Vol. HE. pp. 432, 433. I give my own rendering. The original 
 of the last sentence is as follows : " Verstand der letztere [Schelling] 
 unter dem menschgewordenen Sohn Gottes das Endliche selbst, wie 
 es im Menschen zum Bewusstsein kommt, und in seinem Unterschiede 
 von dem Unendlichen, mit dem es doch Eins ist, als ein leidender, 
 und den Verhaltnissen der Zeit unterworfener Gott erscheint." 
 Leben Jesu, ( 150,) H 704. 
 
154 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 himself, from which, on the other hand, he is ever 
 returning into unity with himself. Simply as finite 
 spirit confined to its finiteness, man has not truth 
 [has no true,' real existence]; and as little has God 
 reality simply as infinite spirit, secluding itself in 
 its infinity. The infinite is real spirit only when 
 it develops itself into finite spirits ; as the finite 
 spirit is true only when it merges itself in the in- 
 finite. Thus the true and real being of spirit is 
 neither God by himself, nor man by himself, but 
 the God-man [the union of God and man] ; neither 
 its infinity alone, nor its finiteness alone, but the 
 motion of influx and reflux between both, which 
 on the divine side is revelation ; on the human, 
 religion." * 
 
 The next paragraph begins with supposing the 
 truth of the proposition, that " God and man are 
 in themselves one'' (" Sind Gott und Mensch an 
 sich Ems," u. s. w.) 
 
 As some key to what it was the purpose of the 
 writer to have regarded as the meaning of the 
 
 * Here again the rendering is my own. Strauss's English transla- 
 tor, Vol. HI. p. 433, seems either not to have fully comprehended the 
 philosophy and reasoning of his author, or not to have been disposed 
 to present it unveiled to English readers. The original passage 
 stands in Strauss, 150, Vol. H. pp. 704, 705. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 155 
 
 words I have quoted, it is to be understood that, 
 according to the philosophy of Hegel, the sub- 
 stratum of all things is infinite, unconscious spirit, 
 which assumes consciousness of its own existence 
 in finite, human spirits, into which it develops 
 itself. On these doctrines of Schelling and Hegel 
 is founded Strauss's proposed substitute for Chris- 
 tianity. It is an allegory, in which he represents 
 the true doctrines of philosophy, of the highest 
 German philosophy, as shadowed forth symbol- 
 ically in what he regards as the orthodox system of 
 the Church concerning the character and office of 
 Christ. He thus exhibits it. 
 
 " The key of the whole Christology is this, that 
 the subject of those predicates which the Church 
 ascribes to Christ is not to be regarded as an indi- 
 vidual, but as an Idea ; as a real Idea, however, 
 not as, according to Kant, an imaginary one. 
 Considered as existing in an individual, in a God- 
 man, the attributes and offices which the doctrine 
 of the Church ascribes to Christ are inconsistent 
 with each other ; in the Idea of the species, they 
 agree together. Humanity is the union of the 
 two natures; it is God become man; the infinite 
 spirit renouncing its infinity and becoming finite, 
 and the finite spirit becoming conscious of its in- 
 
156 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 finity. It is the child of the visible mother and 
 the invisible father ; of spirit and of nature. It is 
 the worker of miracles ; inasmuch as, in the prog- 
 ress of man's history, the spirit is continually 
 obtaining more full mastery over nature, both in 
 man and around him; nature becoming subjected 
 to its activity as a powerless material. Humanity 
 is the sinless ; inasmuch as the process of its de- 
 velopment is blameless ; pollution cleaves only to 
 the individual, but in the species, and in its his- 
 tory, is thrown off. It is Humanity that dies, and 
 rises from the dead, and ascends to heaven ; inas- 
 much as, through the negation of its naturality 
 [what in its composition belongs to nature], it 
 is continually attaining a higher spiritual life, 
 and by throwing off its finiteness, as a personal, 
 national spirit, a spirit of this world, its unity 
 with the infinite spirit of heaven is brought out. 
 Through faith in this Christ, particularly in his 
 death and x resurrection, is man justified before 
 God ; that is, through the quickening of the Idea 
 of Humanity within him the individual becomes a 
 partaker of the divinely human life of the spe- 
 cies ; conformably to the fact, that the negation 
 of naturality and sensuality (SinnlichJceit) which 
 is but the negation of a negation, seeing that they 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 157 
 
 are but the negation of the spiritual is the only 
 way for men to attain the true spiritual life. 
 
 "This alone is the absolute purport of the 
 Christology. That this appears connected with 
 the person and history of an individual, belongs 
 merely to its historical form." * 
 
 I HAVE said that the Concluding Dissertation of 
 Strauss is full of instruction. It is rare to meet 
 with an equal number of pages from which so 
 much may be learned, or which afford information 
 of so thorough a character. Every one whose 
 attention has been drawn to the strange and mul- 
 tifarious doctrines that have obtained currency in 
 our day, has heard of the speculations of German 
 philosophers (so called) in theology and meta- 
 physics, and knows something of their pretensions 
 and of the boasts of their admirers. The Conclud- 
 ing Dissertation of Strauss affords abundant mate- 
 rials for forming a judgment of the character and 
 results of those speculations, which all our further 
 knowledge of them may serve to confirm. In this 
 case, if in any, the old proverb holds true, that it 
 
 * Leben Jesu, ( 151,) II. 709-711 ; English Translation, HI. 437, 
 438. I have formerly had occasion to quote and remark on this pas- 
 sage. See " Tracts concerning Christianity," p. 360, seqq. 
 14 
 
158 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 is not necessary to drain the ocean to learn that its 
 waters are salt. The materials for forming a judg- 
 ment of this philosophy are not furnished by an 
 opposer of it, by an adherent of common sense, 
 nor by a neophyte giving his crude, mistaken im- 
 aginations of what he has imperfectly learned, but 
 by one initiated in its mysteries, who is liable to 
 no suspicion of intending to expose them to re- 
 proach or derision. 
 
 How then must such passages as I have quoted 
 be regarded, I do not say by a religious man, or by 
 an enlightened philosopher, but by a man of com- 
 mon clearness of intellect, accustomed to expect 
 some meaning in language, and some coherence of 
 ideas ? How would such writers as Strauss, and 
 the other speculatists among his countrymen to 
 whom he is allied, have been looked upon by the 
 English thinkers of former times (from whom it 
 must be confessed that in the general tone of our 
 literature we have somewhat degenerated), by 
 such men as Locke, and those who followed him, 
 by Berkeley and Butler ] What scope might these 
 theorists, " all-seeing in their mists," have afforded 
 for the penetrating and destructive satire of Pope ! 
 With what zest would Swift have given them a 
 place among his philosophers of Laputa! How 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 159 
 
 would Burke (who taught that " where there is no 
 sound reason, there is no real virtue ") have poured 
 out upon them the tempest of his scorn with its 
 vivid lightnings ! if we may suppose the atten- 
 tion of men like Pope and Swift and Burke to 
 have been fixed on such a class of writers. They 
 dwell in a chaos of ideas which has no analogy 
 to the world in which men think and reason 
 and endue their purposes with intelligible words. 
 There is no community between the two regions. 
 The inhabitants of one have no sentiments or lan- 
 guage in common with those of the other. The 
 opposition between them is like that which the 
 ancient Persians imagined between the empire of 
 light and the empire of darkness. 
 
 Such being the character of these speculations, 
 it is natural that they should be put forward with 
 great pretension, and that those who receive them 
 should congratulate each other on their intellectual 
 superiority. For there is but an alternative. The 
 case admits of no qualified judgment. These spec- 
 ulations are either, as their admirers contend, 
 revelations of transcendent wisdom, or they are 
 something of a wholly different character. 
 
 THE school of writers to which such speculatists 
 
160 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 as Strauss belong is not, in its modern devel- 
 opment among his countrymen, to be character- 
 ized by its peculiar doctrines; for, so far as its 
 doctrines haVe assumed a determinate shape, there 
 has been little accordance among those of different 
 parties into which it has been divided, except in 
 their common irreligious and debasing tendency. 
 But it is characterized by a use of language, which, 
 considered either in itself, or in its connection with 
 what is elsewhere propounded, or in its relations 
 to unquestionable truths and to the common con- 
 ceptions of men, presents no intelligible ideas. It 
 is a school which existed long before its recent 
 appearance in Germany. It is of great antiquity, 
 it has spread very widely, and occupied vast re- 
 gions in the domain of opinion, always presenting 
 the same essential characteristics. It may be called 
 " the School of the Mystics," in the widest sense of 
 that term, or " the School of the Incomprehensi- 
 ble"; or perhaps no other name can be found for 
 it more appropriate than one which has already 
 become attached to the modern branch of it, and 
 which may be extended to the whole, " the Tran- 
 scendental School." Quintilian has preserved the 
 story of a teacher of composition who inculcated 
 on his pupils the excellence of obscurity. He con 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 161 
 
 densed his instructions to them into one Greek 
 word, SKOTUTOV, Darken. Quintilian, being a Latin, 
 and the Latins in general, not affecting that style, 
 evidently regarded the direction as something ridic- 
 ulous. He does not advert to the fact, that it had 
 been a fundamental rule of writing with many of 
 the Greek philosophers, which probably originated 
 in an incapacity not to darken. I have elsewhere 
 had occasion to show that obscurity was regarded 
 from an early period as a distinguishing excellence 
 of style, and the appropriate badge of the profound- 
 est philosophy.* 
 
 The spirit of this school, the disposition to ob- 
 scure and distort what is false, or trivial, or un- 
 meaning, so that it may appear some revelation of 
 wisdom before unknown, to make doctrines out of 
 unformed imaginations, and to throw all knowledge 
 into confusion by the abuse of language, appears 
 in much that remains or is known of the ancient 
 philosophers before the time of Cicero. After his 
 time this widely-spread school embraced the whole 
 body of the later Platonists, and the allied sects of 
 the Gnostics and the Jewish Cabbalists. It has 
 not been confined to Europe, but has enveloped in 
 
 * See Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. TTT. pp. 
 86-91. 
 
 14* 
 
162 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 its darkness the philosophy and theology of India 
 and Persia. Its spirit has possessed that long 
 series of Christian writers on dogmatic theology 
 (so called) who have been zealous in maintaining 
 as essential to our religion doctrines before which 
 they summon reason to humble herself in sacred 
 horror. It was the spirit of the schoolmen of the 
 Middle Ages, to whom and to their successors 
 Locke, in treating of the nature of language and 
 the characteristics of this style of writing, had par- 
 ticular reference. It showed itself equally in their 
 contemporaries, the alchemists and the astrologers, 
 whose pretensions were as monstrous, and whose 
 language was as barbarous, as any of the present 
 day. Before its recent great outbreak in Germany, 
 it had manifested itself often in modern times by 
 smaller exhibitions which had prepared for its 
 fuller display. It had characterized the specula- 
 tions of Spinoza and the pantheists ; for no doc- 
 trine can involve absurdities more monstrous than 
 pantheism, or consequently bring together more un- 
 intelligible combinations of words. It is through 
 fellowship in the same great school, that the doc- 
 trine of Spinoza has had so marked an influence 
 on German literature, and that such admiration 
 has been expressed for him by modern transcen- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 163 
 
 dental philosophers, for his penetration, his 
 cogent reasoning, and even, as if in mockery of 
 common sense, for his highly devotional spirit.* 
 
 To a philosopher of this school it may appear a 
 strange doctrine, that so humble a matter as the 
 right use of words can have anything to do with 
 his speculations. In his view, these speculations 
 penetrate the uttermost regions of thought; and 
 the language in which they are put forth is not to 
 
 * I speak only of the larger and more distinguished bodies of which 
 this school has been composed ; but perhaps, even in such an enumer- 
 ation, Jacob Boehme and his followers ought not to be passed over 
 without notice ; for he was one of the most famous of mystics, and was 
 called in his day "the Teutonic philosopher," a name the appro- 
 priateness of which has been confirmed by the recent phenomena 
 of German philosophy, and by his having been recognized by some of 
 its most famous teachers as one of its forerunners and progenitors. 
 His works were translated into English by William Law (better 
 known as the author of " A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life "). 
 But those to whom the English language is their mother tongue are 
 in general but poor recipients of mysticism, and in this department of 
 thought English literature has produced of late but one conspicuous 
 name ; I say but one conspicuous name, for the great work of Cole- 
 ridge, which was to reconcile and supersede all other philosophy, had 
 never, I conceive, what logicians call a potential being. The idea of 
 it, in the semi-Platonic sense of the word idea, never existed in his 
 own mind. But Coleridge was a man whose natural powers, had he 
 been true to himself, might have enabled him to become something 
 very different from a mystagogue of German metaphysics. 
 
164 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 be understood through an acquaintance with the 
 ordinary signification of terms. Its meaning is to 
 be perceived by a peculiar sense, by a power of 
 inward vision which derives no aid from extraneous 
 knowledge. He promulgates great truths, which 
 are not to be understood, but to be felt. His con- 
 ceptions are debased by being brought down to 
 what is intelligible. He announces propositions, 
 which to common men seem mere absurdities, as 
 when, to take one among ten thousand, Hegel 
 announces that " mere being and mere nothing are 
 the same."* It is amid the darkness of language 
 which has no vulgar meaning, that the higher 
 subjects of thought are to be shown surrounded 
 by a phosphoric glimmer. But the unintelligible 
 words that are used are words of magic by which 
 
 * " Das reine Seyn und das reine Nichts 1st dasselbe." 
 
 " Peut-etre," says Madame de Stael in her eulogy of Kant, " Peut- 
 etre toutefois n'auroit-il creuse si profondement dans la science de 
 1'entendement humain, s'il avoit mis plus d'importance aux expressions 
 dont il se servoit pour 1'expliquer." 
 
 This is the same sort of language as if one were to say of a math- 
 ematician, that perhaps his investigations would not have been so pro- 
 found, if he had attended more to the significance of the symbols 
 used by him. 
 
 She adds : " Dans ses trait6s de metaphysique, il prend des mots 
 comme des chiffres, et leur donne la valeur qu'il veut sans s'embar- 
 rasser de celle qu'ils tiennent de 1'usage." 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 165 
 
 the sun is darkened at mid-day ; and through the 
 obscurity which envelops all things, shapes pre- 
 sent themselves like those which ^fEneas saw 
 
 " Vestibulum ante ipsum, primisque in faucibus Orel," 
 
 before the vestibule, and where opened the jaws of 
 Hell, horrible phantoms which he was about 
 to assail with human arms, if his guide had not 
 admonished him that they were but shadows. 
 
 " Et, ni docta comes tenues sine corpore vitas 
 Admoneat volitare cava sub imagine formse, 
 Irruat, et frustra ferro diverberet umbras." 
 
 If all this were mere folly, it would be compar- 
 atively a matter of little concern. But we have 
 seen that it is not mere folly. It is rare that 
 folly is not mischievous. Its effects are very often 
 disastrous. Speculative folly and practical folly 
 commonly go together. The preachers of false 
 doctrines, the opposers of truth, the utterers of 
 what wise men regard as nonsense, have wrought, 
 directly or indirectly, most of the moral evil that 
 exists in the civilized world. Men with the ex- 
 ception of those whose conduct is determined by cir- 
 cumstances and by impulses obeyed without reflec- 
 tion, and of those whose reason is violently borne 
 down by their passions pretend to be governed 
 
166 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 
 
 by their opinions, on the ground that their opinions 
 are conformed to the truth. There is no greater 
 evil-doer than he who, in the restlessness and 
 recklessness of his vanity, furnishes them with 
 pretences for any belief or disbelief that may either 
 loosen their sense of the obligations of religion 
 and morality, or may pervert and misguide it. 
 False speculations, and the practical theories which 
 have resulted from them, I refer to speculations 
 old as well as new, are among the chief sources 
 of those awful calamities with which Europe is 
 now afflicted. The wild doctrines of Communism 
 and Socialism, the dreams and the absurdities of 
 such men as St. Simon, Robert Owen, and Fourier, 
 have caused the streets of Paris to run with blood. 
 It is the conflict, not between right and wrong, 
 not between truth and falsehood, but between new 
 errors and old prejudices, the one tending to evil 
 not less than the other, which is now unsettling 
 the foundations of Christian and civilized society 
 throughout a great portion of Europe. All the 
 party watchwords by which the ferocious passions 
 and the viler propensities of men are excited, or by 
 which their ignorance and folly are imposed upon, 
 acquire their power for evil from the abuse of lan- 
 guage. They are general terms, such as liberty, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 167 
 
 fraternity, equality, capable of being understood 
 in very different senses and applications, and 
 therefore of being easily perverted, which are cast 
 abroad among the multitude, to be interpreted ac- 
 cording to the passions, the folly, the caprice, or 
 the madness of those who may adopt them as 
 their cry. 
 
 It is by its debasing and destroying the moral 
 and religious sentiments of men, that we discern 
 the worst effect of that school of pretended phi- 
 losophy which deals with imaginations instead 
 of truths, with unformed thought, assumptions 
 equally arbitrary and absurd, and a vague, barbar- 
 ous, false vocabulary. It has wrought this effect, 
 not only by the doctrines it has directly taught, but 
 also by spreading confusion through men's ideas 
 and language, and thus confounding their reason, 
 so that the supremacy of truth in their minds and 
 hearts cannot be established. It has infected the 
 whole body of literature connected with it, deprav- 
 ing the taste of its writers and its admirers ; for 
 taste is not a distinct faculty of the mind ; it is in 
 each individual an expression of his whole charac- 
 ter, of his likings and dislikings, of the quickness 
 or obtuseness of his intellectual perceptions, and of 
 the purity or depravation of his moral sentiments. 
 
168 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Thus it appears in the corrupt forms which so 
 much of the literature of Continental Europe has 
 assumed, with its bold lessons of vice and irreligion. 
 Its effects in deadening the love of truth and dis- 
 ordering the powers of reasoning have been made 
 apparent in the departments of philology, antiqui- 
 ties, and history. Nay, its influence has been felt 
 where it might least be expected, for it has carried 
 its reckless assertions and its unintelligible jargon 
 even into the physical sciences. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 169 
 
 NIVERSITY 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 CONCLUDING EEMAEKS. 
 
 WE have thus taken a view of the work of 
 Strauss, and of that philosophy, falsely so called, 
 with which this and many similar works have been 
 connected. The importance of such works, and of 
 the speculations on which they are grounded, 
 their efficiency in the production of evil, is liable 
 to be greatly underrated. Putting aside the brute 
 influence of the passions, the other causes which 
 affect the condition of society and the character of 
 individuals are often but little attended to; and 
 their character and workings may not be readily 
 discerned and appreciated. The moral atmosphere 
 may be filled with pestilential miasmata, the pres- 
 ence of which may not be obvious to our grosser 
 senses. Religion, morals, the love of truth, the 
 principles on which rests the well-being of man, 
 may be gradually undermined ; the evil may be 
 
 15 
 
170 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 working on, from day to day, in secret, almost un- 
 marked, or other props wholly ineffectual may be 
 resorted to for temporary security ; but the ruin 
 must follow. 
 
 So far as men are not driven blindly onward by 
 their unreasoning passions, they are governed by 
 their opinions. The opinions of an individual are 
 but another name for the whole body of principles 
 from which he professes to act, so far as he pro- 
 fesses to act reasonably. It is, therefore, a matter 
 of essential concern to us, that our opinions should 
 be correct. But the opinions of a great majority 
 of men are determined, the opinions of all men are 
 influenced more or less powerfully, by a regard to 
 the representations and reasonings, true or false, 
 or by a mere regard to the determinations, of those 
 who are, or those who are esteemed to be, distin- 
 guished by their intellectual superiority. It is, 
 then, of the utmost importance to us, that our 
 guides should be trustworthy. Our hope for the 
 regeneration and improvement of our race must be 
 in the prevalence of truth, of Christian truth, 
 of truth concerning our nature, intellectual and 
 moral, our condition in this world, our means of 
 self-improvement, our relations to our fellow-men, 
 and our connection with all those realities beyond 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 171 
 
 the sphere of the senses, from which Christianity 
 has withdrawn the veil. "I was born for this 
 end," said he whom God sent to the world to save 
 the world, "I was horn for this end, and for 
 this end have I come to the world, to bear testi- 
 mony to the Truth. Every one who loves the 
 Truth obeys my voice." 
 
 Those great truths which essentially concern all 
 that men do and feel are the principles on which 
 our characters should be formed. They are the 
 most important objects of our intellect, because 
 they relate to the most important objects of our 
 existence. They do not spontaneously develop 
 themselves. In order to establish those truths 
 among men and give them their due supremacy, 
 intellectual discipline is necessary, a wide knowl- 
 edge of facts, the acquisition of clear ideas, the 
 habit of using language correctly, and the power 
 and the art of reasoning. When a knowledge of 
 them is thus attained, if it be distinctly put before 
 men, it may be widely communicated ; for these 
 truths have a natural affinity with all that is 
 excellent in our nature. The deductions of the 
 most profound and enlightened philosophy corre- 
 spond with and confirm the dictates of plain good 
 sense. It is with the highest exertions of intel- 
 
172 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 lect as with the noblest productions of what is 
 popularly called genius. The results are compre- 
 hended and felt by millions with whom they could 
 not have originated ; and this community of com- 
 prehension and feeling may bring us into close 
 association with the master minds of the world. 
 Inferior as may be our creative or reasoning 
 powers, we become conscious of an essential equal- 
 ity with them when we can enter into their con- 
 ceptions, sympathize in their sentiments, and follow 
 them in their reasoning. 
 
 IN this country we have peculiar advantages for 
 the attainment and promulgation of truth. There 
 doubtless exist here mistakes and prejudices in 
 abundance. But we have not to encounter those 
 prejudices existing elsewhere, which have become 
 rigid and unyielding through age, and which de- 
 rive vitality and vigor from being incorporated 
 with the love of power, rank, and wealth, in priv- 
 ileged classes, whose distinctions depend on them 
 for support. We have our share of that clear- 
 sightedness and good sense by which those who 
 inherit the English tongue and English literature 
 are distinguished as a general characteristic, and 
 which may prevent us from being easily, or, at 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 173 
 
 least, from being long, imposed upon by false pre- 
 tences. But, on the other hand, there are discour- 
 aging circumstances. There is a want among us 
 of a proper appreciation of the importance of intel- 
 lectual discipline, of that discipline through which 
 men are formed to reason rightly on subjects that 
 concern their highest interests, but which are not 
 immediately connected with their ordinary busi- 
 ness. We cultivate successfully the physical and 
 exact sciences, and especially those through which 
 the arts of life are promoted. We are distinguished 
 by our skill in their application, by the number 
 and ingenuity of our mechanical inventions. But 
 these are not the studies on which the essential 
 well-being of man depends. Their cultivation 
 alone can do nothing to save a nation from moral 
 degeneracy and ruin. Nowhere in Europe have 
 they flourished more than in that country which, 
 having long suffered from accumulating causes of 
 misery, irreligion, and vice, has, since the latter 
 part of the last century, been restlessly and vio- 
 lently changing its forms of government, and 
 remodelling the constitution of society, without 
 finding a remedy for its evils. There are other 
 departments of thought and learning of far higher 
 importance, because truth and error, knowledge 
 
 15* 
 
174 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 and ignorance, concerning the subjects which they 
 embrace, are of far more interest to human happi- 
 ness. 
 
 I will refer, for example, to two sciences, which 
 relate less immediately to the formation of individ- 
 ual character, but rather concern the present well- 
 being of masses of men, the science of political 
 government, and the science of political economy. 
 There is, as I believe, no literary institution in 
 our country in which they are so taught as to fur- 
 nish those resorting to it for instruction with such 
 knowledge, such principles, and such habits of 
 reasoning, as to prepare them for those duties to 
 which they may be called as public men. Nor 
 are these institutions centres from which may 
 spread through the great body of our people those 
 correct notions concerning the principles of public 
 policy which it is important should exist, when, 
 as with us, the course of public policy is ultimately 
 determined by the great body of the people. Our 
 colleges and universities do not afford the encour- 
 agement necessary to form in connection with them 
 a body of men fitted to be the teachers and guides 
 of the community in these departments of learning. 
 They have not sufficient means, if they have any, 
 for the support of professorships, which such men 
 might be ambitious of holding. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 175 
 
 Of the evils of ignorance in these departments 
 of knowledge, the Old World is presenting appall- 
 ing examples. We see in France that principles 
 of government, the truth of which has been forced 
 on the conviction of every intelligent American 
 through his experience of the workings of our re- 
 publican institutions, are unknown or disregarded. 
 As the next of those disastrous experiments on 
 the happiness of society of which that nation has 
 tried so many, it appears that all the powers of 
 government are, for as long a time as such a con- 
 stitution may last, to be concentred in one large 
 Convention, which will be as unrestrained and as 
 uncontrollable in its exercise of them as the fierce 
 democracy of Athens, or as that Convention of the 
 Reign of Terror, of which the dreadful memory 
 might seem to have died away in the country over 
 which it tyrannized, if it were not for the exculpa- 
 tory eulogies which are uttered on the disinterest- 
 edness, patriotism, and energy of some of its most 
 atrocious members. In the very formation of any 
 central power which is alone to exercise through- 
 out the country all the functions of the govern- 
 ment, in the cry of " The Republic, one and 
 indivisible" we Americans perceive another fun- 
 damental mistake. Republican institutions, re- 
 
176 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 publican even only in form and name, cannot 
 exist for the happiness of a large community, they 
 cannot exist at all for any long time, without a 
 distribution of powers to bodies subordinate to 
 the general government, each independent in its 
 own sphere, each taking charge of its own partic- 
 ular concerns, and each ready to check all en- 
 croachments of the central power. With what a 
 burst of indignation and repulsion would a prefect 
 be received who should be sent from a convention 
 at Washington to govern my native State of Mas- 
 sachusetts! or how in any town or city of this 
 State would an officer be welcomed who should be 
 despatched from a body of delegates in Boston to 
 take on himself the management of its affairs'? 
 The present condition of France affords no hope 
 of the speedy restoration of internal quiet and the 
 formation of a well-ordered community. So long 
 as the supreme, undivided power resides nominally 
 in a national assembly convened in Paris, it seems 
 clear that the main element in the actual govern- 
 ment of the country will be the mob of Paris, or 
 the army by which it is controlled, the general 
 who commands the latter, or the demagogues who 
 rule the former. 
 
 When we turn from France to Germany, the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 177 
 
 prospect is not less gloomy. There the structure 
 of society seems to be falling to pieces, without 
 either power or skill for its reconstruction. The 
 false philosophy that has prevailed in that country 
 has destroyed in a great degree men's ability to 
 reason, and substituted visionary theories and blind 
 fanaticism in its place. It has not only unsettled 
 all just notions of the political relations of men, 
 but, through its irreligious and demoralizing char- 
 acter, has done very much to destroy those princi- 
 ples on which all right conceptions of our duties 
 to our fellow-men, and all right feelings toward 
 them, must be founded. 
 
 THE establishment of truth in those departments 
 of science which concern the present well-being of 
 men as members of civil society must be the result 
 of the correct exercise of intellect. In order, 
 therefore, to cultivate those departments of science 
 successfully, other studies are requisite. They are 
 those which inform and discipline the intellect, so 
 that it may be correctly exercised. They are those 
 that instruct us in the constitution of the mind, 
 its powers, and the manner in which they are to be 
 employed, that make known to us the causes of 
 our intellectual errors and misjudgments, and teach 
 
178 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 the art of thinking clearly and of reasoning justly, 
 and consequently, what is implied in this, the art 
 of properly using words, the embodiments and the 
 instruments of thought. These are studies which 
 have of late been generally neglected. The philos- 
 ophy which has flourished in Germany requires no 
 qualification of this remark ; on the contrary, the 
 reception of that philosophy there and elsewhere 
 proves its correctness. 
 
 The intellectual discipline of which I speak is 
 equally necessary for the establishment of the truth 
 in those higher departments of knowledge which 
 essentially concern all that is most important in our 
 being, our relations to God and to eternity, and 
 our fundamental relations to our fellow-men. The 
 study of these subjects, of the sciences of religion 
 and morals, and of the vast body of facts connect- 
 ed with them, has shared with us the neglect into 
 which it has fallen elsewhere. There is no strong 
 prevailing sense of the importance of teaching men 
 to think and reason aright concerning them ; no 
 operative conviction of the importance of estab- 
 lishing the truth concerning them. It would seem 
 to be thought that the solution of those great 
 problems, the true or the false solution of which 
 affects the whole of character and conduct, the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 179 
 
 well-being of men equally in this world and in the 
 next, has been determined by traditionary author- 
 ity, or may be left to men's consciousness, so called, 
 their natural instincts, their intuitions, or to a sort 
 of special inspiration, vouchsafed to those who do 
 not interfere with it by any action of their own 
 minds ; so that the inquiry after truths and prin- 
 ciples is only an unprofitable speculation. The 
 times have altered since the most eminent theolo- 
 gians and moralists of their respective ages were 
 the men most distinguished for their intellectual 
 powers and acquisitions, such men as Grotius and 
 Locke and Le Clerc. They have altered since the 
 days of the heathen philosophers, of such men 
 as Socrates and Plato and Cicero, by whom, very 
 imperfect as were their conceptions, theology, the 
 science of things divine, was regarded, as it is, as 
 the highest philosophy. 
 
 The study of theology, embracing as its funda- 
 mental requisite the study of Christianity, is essen- 
 tially connected with almost all the other impor- 
 tant branches of knowledge. It is- connected with 
 the natural sciences ; for their highest value con- 
 sists in making known to us the works of God. 
 It stands in yet another, very different, relation to 
 them, through the fact that the progress of knowl- 
 
180 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 edge in some of these sciences has brought them 
 into conflict with false doctrines which have been 
 zealously represented as fundamental in Christian 
 faith. On the other hand, the study of religion is 
 intimately connected with the whole of metaphys- 
 ical science, the science of mind, which in its wid- 
 est extent embraces all our knowledge of man's 
 nature, except of his corporeal part, and all our 
 knowledge of Him who formed man in his own 
 likeness. It requires the study of the languages 
 which introduce us to an acquaintance with the 
 Old World as it existed before Christianity, and 
 which thus form the connecting link between 
 ancient and modern civilization. It is blended 
 throughout with the history of opinions, that is, 
 with the history of the human mind and character; 
 for in the formation of the most important opinions, 
 religion, true or false, has been the main agent, 
 and false opinions have reacted powerfully on re- 
 ligion. It has other connections, which, had they 
 not been so neglected, it might seem unnecessary 
 to point out. If religion be true, if Christian- 
 ity be a revelation from God, then the study of 
 religion, of Christianity, and of morals, which 
 ought to be based on Christianity, should enter 
 as the most essential element into all those inqui- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 181 
 
 ries that concern the social and political relations 
 of men. 
 
 But the tendency of our times is to disconnect 
 the truths of religion, and the more high and 
 comprehensive principles of morality, from the 
 discussion of those subjects of politics and political 
 economy which concern immediately the present 
 well-being of men. I will take a single example 
 from that theory concerning the causes of want, 
 misery, and vice which teaches, in effect, that the 
 more fortunate portion of men, having no direct 
 means of rendering effectual aid to the suffering, 
 have no important duties to perform towards 
 them, except the duty of providing them with 
 clergymen and schoolmasters, of whose proffered 
 instruction the terrible pressure of want must ren- 
 der them unapt recipients, and especially the du- 
 ty of exhorting them to put a stop to the increase 
 of population. Compare the practical deductions 
 from this theory with the spirit which pervades 
 the precepts of our Saviour, and especially with 
 his most solemn words, not their verbal mean- 
 ing, for in that no man of sense can take refuge 
 from their true purport, but with the spirit of 
 those words : " Then will they also answer, Lord, 
 when did we see thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stran- 
 
 16 
 
182 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not 
 minister to thee ] Then he will answer them, I tell 
 you in truth, In not doing so to one of the hum- 
 blest of these, you did not do so to me." And ob- 
 serve further, that no attempt is made to reconcile 
 the deductions from the theory in question with 
 the precepts of Christ. 
 
 There is very much to be learned and to be 
 taught in the science of religion, and the twin 
 science of morals. As regards religion, the present 
 anarchy of opinion is obviously such, that this re- 
 mark requires no confirmation. It follows as a 
 corollary from this state of unsettled opinion con- 
 cerning religion, that the true principles of moral 
 action have not been established, and are not gen- 
 erally understood. This again may be asserted 
 without hazard, as it is made evident by the want 
 of agreement concerning them. The development 
 and application of the supposed principles of moral 
 science are a matter of still greater uncertainty, 
 and contrariety of opinion. How differently are 
 the same qualities and actions estimated by differ- 
 ent men ! With what opposite sentiments are the 
 same characters regarded ! I mean, of course, 
 when the facts which determine the character are 
 equally well known. How unlike would be the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 183 
 
 judgment of a "Hero-worshipper" concerning them 
 to that of a Christian philosopher ! What admira- 
 tion is given to the union of atrocious wickedness 
 with great intellectual energy! What toleration 
 is shown for those whose vices assume the garb of 
 pleasure, in whose baskets of flowers asps lie hid, 
 and who purchase their indulgences through the 
 degradation and misery of others and of themselves ! 
 What contrary decisions are pronounced in cases 
 which may seem to present a conflict of duties ! 
 How zealously do those who see but one side of 
 such questions often contend that right is to be 
 done without regard to consequences ; as if, when 
 a doubt may arise, there were other modes of deter- 
 mining what is right and wrong beside a regard to 
 the good or evil consequences of conduct ! How 
 differently do different men judge of the lawfulness 
 of subscribing to the Articles and conforming to the 
 Liturgy of the Church of England, by those who 
 have no faith in many of its doctrines according to 
 the obvious meaning of the words in which they 
 are expressed ! doctrines which, thus understood, 
 no intelligent man at the present day, who has 
 made them a subject of conscientious thought, can 
 persuade himself that he believes, however he may 
 persuade himself that he is justified in giving his 
 
184 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 aid to the Church to impose them on the commu- 
 nity as doctrines taught by God. What diversity 
 of judgment exists concerning the lawfulness or 
 unlawfulness of many modes of action, especially 
 those involved in the internal and external policy 
 of nations ! What declamation may be heard about 
 human rights from teachers without any correct 
 notion, often without any notion at all, of what 
 constitutes a right ! What talk about conscience 
 as an infallible guide, as the voice of God in our 
 hearts, with the reservation that this infallible 
 guide must be well instructed by us ! How little 
 are our obligations to our fellow-men understood, 
 the perpetual control which they should have over 
 our conduct, the extent of Christian charity, and 
 the necessary modifications of its exercise ! How 
 few men think much on these subjects, or regulate 
 their conduct by a regard to the highest, that is, 
 Christian principles ! 
 
 There is, as I have said, no proper provision 
 made in our literary institutions for the prosecu- 
 tion of those studies on which the development of 
 the intellect and character mainly depends. They 
 do not afford to the generality of young men who 
 resort to them for instruction facilities and in- 
 ducements adapted to lead them to attend to 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 185 
 
 those studies with interest and success. Such 
 young men, after completing their course of edu- 
 cation, often pass into the world without the 
 knowledge and the habits of reasoning that might 
 enable them to form correct opinions, and without 
 a strong feeling, which there has been nothing to 
 produce, of the importance of truth and of the evil 
 of error. As regards the most important of sub- 
 jects, religion, so far as any proper discipline of 
 mind is concerned, they are left very much to derive 
 their opinions opinions often assented to rather 
 than embraced from accident, from traditional 
 influences, or from the far worse influences that 
 may act upon them in the world. It may be said, 
 that instruction in all that relates to the study of 
 religion is given to those preparing for the clerical 
 profession in schools expressly intended for this 
 purpose. It is most earnestly to be wished that 
 these schools, collectively, formed a more important 
 exception to the remarks which have been made 
 respecting our institutions of learning, and were of 
 more avail for their professed end. But what is far 
 more desirable is, that intellectual men, through- 
 out the community, should comprehend that the 
 duty of understanding the religion which they pro- 
 fess is not a duty confined to a particular order. 
 
 16* 
 
186 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 The great want in our country is the want of a 
 body of men whose minds have been so informed 
 and so disciplined as to qualify them to be trust- 
 worthy assistants and teachers of others in those 
 branches of knowledge which concern the present 
 well-being and the unchangeable, eternal interests 
 of our race, a body of men so enlightened, that 
 for very shame, if this were all, they could not 
 wilfully countenance essential error, and who might 
 be ever ready to throw the weight of their influence 
 into the scale of public opinion to counteract it. 
 How such a body of men is to be formed among 
 us is a question which cannot here be treated. 
 Various suggestions of improvement in the consti- 
 tution of our seats of learning, and in the condi- 
 tion of our clergy, might be offered and discussed. 
 But we have been led, though by a natural and 
 connected train of thought and feeling, to a sub- 
 ject foreign from the main purpose of this work ; 
 and this is not the place to enter into its details. 
 
 THE publication and the extended reception of 
 such books as that of Strauss, and there have 
 been very many of a like character, and the 
 popularity of that literature of infidelity and vice, 
 that " literature of despair," as it was called by one 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 187 
 
 who had contributed much to its formation, which 
 has been connected with such speculations, are 
 among the worst indications of the character of 
 our age. But even in the productions of scholars 
 and of men of genius, who are far from recklessly 
 offending against religion and morals, we too often 
 miss a correct tone of sentiment, an open, high- 
 minded, manly recognition of those truths which 
 lie at the foundation of all virtue and happiness. 
 Yet only in proportion as they are recognized can 
 civilized society, where it is now thrown into such 
 terrible confusion, be happily reorganized; and 
 where its elements are not yet broken up, its pres- 
 ervation must depend on the continuance, and its 
 improvement on the increase, of their influence. 
 We, in these United States, share in the same 
 common nature with the inhabitants of those 
 States which are spread over the more southern 
 portion of our continent ; and nothing has saved 
 us from the same anarchy and despotism, the same 
 internal commotions and wars, with all their at- 
 tendant depravation and misery, but a clearer 
 perception and a deeper sense of the truths of 
 religion and morals. 
 
 Vous etes I'avenir du monde, were words ad- 
 dressed by Madame de Stael to an American, a 
 
188 GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 
 
 short time before her death. Her words were 
 true. Through the providence of God, and the 
 circumstances in which he has placed us, we have 
 become the advanced guard of the civilized world. 
 Our position is not to be viewed by us with any 
 foolish spirit of vainglory, but with a strong feel- 
 ing of our great responsibilities, our great defi- 
 ciencies, and our manifold dangers. One truth it 
 should impress upon us most deeply, that we are 
 not to look to the prevailing sentiments, habits, 
 and moral estimates of the Old World as guides 
 for our opinions or conduct, but only to those 
 eternal principles of right and wrong, which the 
 Lawgiver of the Universe has sanctioned. We 
 are acting acting for good or evil not for our- 
 selves, nor for our posterity, alone. Over a great 
 part of the civilized world the heavens are covered 
 with thick clouds. But there is light still shining 
 in the West. May it not be overcast. May it be 
 the augury of a better day for mankind. 
 
PART II. 
 
 ON THE 
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCES 
 
 OP THE 
 
 GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS; 
 
 BEING 
 
 PORTIONS OF AN UNFINISHED WOKE. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CONSISTENCY OF THE NARRATIVE IN THE GOSPELS 
 WITH ITSELF, AND WITH ALL OUR KNOWLEDGE BEARING 
 ON THE SUBJECT. 
 
 THE ultimate purpose in proving the genuine- 
 ness of the Gospels is to establish their authen- 
 ticity. If genuine, they are the works of Apos- 
 tles, who themselves witnessed the actions and 
 heard the discourses of Christ ; or of men who 
 during a great part of their lives were conver- 
 sant with Apostles, and derived from them the 
 information which they have given us. By es- 
 tablishing their genuineness, the discussion of 
 their authenticity or truth is reduced within 
 narrow limits, and may easily be decided. These 
 two subjects, however, though intimately con- 
 nected, are in their own nature distinct, and 
 admit of separate proof. But there are in the 
 Gospels many intrinsic evidences of authenticity, 
 which, at the same time, are evidences of genuine- 
 ness. The peculiar character of these histories is 
 
192 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 such as to show that they proceeded from the 
 pens or from the lips of those who witnessed 
 what is related. In regard to this internal evi- 
 dence, therefore, the two subjects require to be 
 treated in connection. 
 
 Among those proofs, then, equally of authen- 
 ticity and of genuineness, which are found in the 
 Gospels, one of the most important may be thus 
 stated. In the narratives of the Evangelists, the 
 existence of many facts which are not expressly 
 mentioned is implied. In order to understand 
 fully what is told, and to perceive its bearing 
 and application, we must take into view very 
 much that is not told. There is to be found in 
 almost every part of the Gospels a latent refer- 
 ence to some existing state of things which is not 
 described. But when we attend to the character 
 of those facts with which different portions of the 
 narrative are thus connected, we find that they 
 are all probable or certain ; that we have distinct 
 evidence of them from other sources ; or that, 
 supposing the truth of what is related in the 
 Gospels, and viewing this in connection with all 
 our other knowledge on the subject in question, 
 they are such as must or might have existed. 
 The inferences from these histories, though many 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 193 
 
 and various, are all consistent with the histories 
 themselves, and with whatever we can learn from 
 other sources. In tracing out the necessary or 
 probable bearing of those actions and discourses 
 which are recorded, or in assigning their prob- 
 able occasions or consequences, we detect no 
 inconsistency with the history itself, and find no 
 contradiction of known facts ; but, on the con- 
 trary, we are continually perceiving new marks of 
 probability and truth. This coincidence between 
 what is told and what is implied, this correspond- 
 ence between the actions and discourses related 
 and that state of things and series of events to 
 which they refer as existing contemporaneously 
 and running parallel with them, does not appear 
 here and there only, but discovers itself through- 
 out the Gospels. 
 
 But this consistency of the narrative with itself, 
 both in what is told and in what may be inferred 
 from it, and its consistency with all other known 
 facts having a bearing upon it, is evidently not 
 the work of study or artifice. It is not worth 
 while to inquire whether it could in any case be 
 produced by such means; because there is no 
 dispute that the whole character of the Gospels is 
 opposed to such a supposition. They are very 
 
 17 
 
194 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 inartificial compositions. If, moreover, the coin- 
 cidences of which we speak had been factitious, 
 and intended to give an air of probability to the 
 narrative, they would not have been left so latent 
 and obscure as they often are. The writer would 
 have taken care that they should be noticed by 
 the reader. On the contrary, those to which we 
 particularly refer are obviously undesigned. If, 
 then, the appearances which have been described 
 really exist, they can be accounted for only by 
 the truth of the history. It is impossible that a 
 fiction pretending to the character of true history, 
 especially a fiction relating to such events as are 
 recorded in the Gospels, should be so consistent 
 with itself, with probability, and with known facts, 
 in such a number and variety of latent coinci- 
 dences. 
 
 What has been said may be further illustrated 
 by the following remarks. In the Gospels, Christ 
 appears as a divine messenger endued with mirac- 
 ulous powers. "We learn that the great purpose 
 of his ministry was the moral and religious refor- 
 mation of mankind; and accounts are given of 
 what he said and did to effect this purpose. But 
 we find in these books only some very general and 
 imperfect notices of the moral and intellectual 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 195 
 
 character, the external state, the manners, usages, 
 opinions, prejudices, and passions of those who 
 were the immediate subjects of his ministry. Re- 
 specting these topics, however, we can gain much 
 knowledge from a variety of sources, either by di- 
 rect information or by probable inferences. Now, 
 in proportion as our knowledge becomes more ac- 
 curate and extensive, we perceive in a more clear 
 and striking manner the reference and adaptation 
 of what Christ is represented to have said and done 
 to the character and circumstances of those whom 
 he addressed, as well as its consistency with the 
 character and purpose ascribed to Christ him- 
 self. But, further, the claims of such an extra- 
 ordinary teacher, assuming to be a messenger from 
 God himself, his miracles, and his discourses, must, 
 admitting the representation given of them in the 
 Gospels, have produced, in their operation upon 
 those around him, consequences of a very remark- 
 able character, different from and opposite to each 
 other. Such a preacher could not have acted 
 upon the mass of the Jewish nation, or upon those 
 individuals with whom he was more nearly con- 
 nected, without causing very marked and extra- 
 ordinary phenomena as the result of his minis- 
 try. But here, again, the different effects of our 
 
196 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 Saviour's ministry are but very partially described 
 in the Gospels; and an explanation of these ef- 
 fects by a reference to the different circumstances 
 of his hearers, or to their different states of mind, 
 is scarcely, if at all, attempted. What is not told, 
 however, is often unconsciously implied ; and what 
 is implied is always what we might expect, or what 
 we can account for as necessary or probable. In 
 proportion, likewise, as we attain a more just and 
 comprehensive view of the effects of his preaching, 
 we perceive the occasion of many facts, and the im- 
 mediate purpose of many discourses, which are not 
 stated in the narrative, and of which, therefore, we 
 may have had before no right conception. These 
 coincidences are so numerous, and at the same 
 time so obviously unstudied, as to give to the 
 whole history the most decisive marks of truth, 
 those which cannot be imitated. 
 
 The argument which it has been my purpose to 
 state, if just, is important ; and it is one not often, 
 if at all, adverted to. I may, therefore, be excused 
 for presenting it under a still different form. 
 
 There is, then, in the Gospels, a great deal that 
 requires explanation. The narrative is often im- 
 perfect. We do not at once perceive the meaning, 
 relation, and purpose of much, which, we are told, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 197 
 
 was said or done by Christ or by others. We can- 
 not, without examination and thought, refer the ac- 
 tions and discourses recorded to that state of mind 
 in the speaker, or to that existing state of things, 
 by which they were occasioned. In order to un- 
 derstand different portions of these books, we are 
 obliged to take into consideration many circum- 
 stances not expressly recorded, or not recorded in 
 connection with the portion to be explained. In 
 the careful study of these writings, therefore, we 
 bring together a great variety of facts, which, cor- 
 responding with different parts of the narrative, 
 serve to explain what the writers themselves have 
 left unexplained. We regard these in connection 
 with the general view which they have given us 
 of the character of Christ and the purpose of his 
 ministry. We thus obtain something like a full 
 and correct conception of that state of things and 
 series of events, not expressly related, which must 
 have accompanied the ministry of Christ, suppos- 
 ing the truth of what is actually related concern- 
 ing it. But of this state of things and series 
 of events only a very partial account is given in 
 the Gospels. The narratives in these writings, 
 however, accord with all that we can learn or rea- 
 sonably infer respecting the subject. But there is 
 
 17* 
 
198 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 something more to be said. The narratives in the 
 Gospels require, for their explanation, to be con- 
 sidered in connection with all our knowledge con- 
 cerning the subjects to which they relate. They 
 are but fragments of the great history of the times ; 
 and we must complete the tablet, as far as we can, 
 in order to perceive their proper place and connec- 
 tion. Now such a consistency between fiction or 
 error, on the one hand, and truth and probability, 
 on the other, that the latter should be required to 
 explain the former, may fairly be regarded as im- 
 possible. If the Gospels were not true, we could 
 not succeed in explaining them by attempting to 
 do so in the manner described ; that is, by proceed- 
 ing throughout on the false supposition of their 
 being true. In such a case, our facts and infer- 
 ences, instead of continually affording new illus- 
 tration, would be continually presenting new con- 
 tradictions, inconsistencies, and difficulties. This 
 argument applies with peculiar force to the Gos- 
 pels, with far greater force than to any other 
 writings whatever; because the Gospels contain 
 accounts of events so extraordinary, and which 
 must have had such important bearings and rela- 
 tions ; and because they are composed so inartifi- 
 cially, the narratives contained in them are so 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 199 
 
 often imperfect, facts are so nakedly recorded, 
 with so little explanation and so few circumstances, 
 and the relation of different portions to each 
 other, or to what is not stated in the books them- 
 selves, is so rarely pointed out. From the nature 
 of the facts related, they are subjected to the 
 strongest test of credibility, and at the same time, 
 from the mode of their relation, there is a con- 
 stant demand for explanation. We are continu- 
 ally obliged to bring what is before us into com- 
 parison with what we know from other sources, 
 or with what we may reasonably or consistently 
 suppose to be true. 
 
 It appears, therefore, that the writers of the 
 Gospels had, generally speaking, a very just and 
 lively conception of that most extraordinary state 
 of things, and of those numerous facts and cir- 
 cumstances, which must or which might have 
 existed if their history be true, but which cer- 
 tainly did not exist if it be a fiction. Supposing 
 the truth of the Gospels, the justness of this con- 
 ception is easily accounted for. It was the result 
 of personal knowledge and experience. Their 
 writers were themselves familiar with the facts 
 relating to the history of Christ, or derived their 
 knowledge from those who were so. But, sup- 
 
200 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 posing the Gospels to be narratives not of real, 
 but of fictitious events, then it could have been 
 only by a most vigorous and most singular effort 
 of imagination, that the writers of them thus 
 brought before their minds all' the bearings of 
 different portions of these narratives upon a state 
 of things not described, and the numerous partic- 
 ulars and important consequences involved in the 
 supposed truth of the wonderful events which they 
 relate. These writers must, at the same time, have 
 exercised an unaccountable forbearance in leaving 
 the connections and bearings of their narratives so 
 obscure, and in not pointing out or intimating to 
 their readers what might appear to explain or con- 
 firm their relations in so striking a manner. The 
 extraordinary faculties supposed, and this extraor- 
 dinary use of them, must likewise have been found, 
 not in one only, but in four contemporary individ- 
 uals. But it is useless to multiply objections to 
 an hypothesis so improbable as to give an air of 
 trifling to the arguments brought against it. I 
 will, therefore, only add, that it would imply a fact 
 opposite to the evident and undisputed character 
 of these histories ; that is, it would imply that they 
 were works of consummate skill and artifice. 
 The appearances in the Gospels, if they are 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 201 
 
 such as have been stated, admit of no other ex- 
 planation, than that the narratives rest on the 
 authority of those who were witnesses of what is 
 related, and were themselves concerned in the 
 transactions recorded. It follows, therefore, that 
 these histories were committed to writing either 
 by some of the immediate disciples of Christ, or by 
 persons who derived, generally speaking, correct 
 and particular information from such disciples. 
 But if this conclusion be admitted, no important 
 doubt can remain that they are the works of those 
 particular individuals to whom they have always 
 been ascribed. Their character establishes the 
 truth of the testimony to their genuineness. 
 
 THE argument which I have endeavored to 
 state is of the kind technically called cumulative. 
 Its strength does not appear in any individual 
 case, but in the number and accumulation of in- 
 stances which may be adduced. Its whole force 
 is to be perceived only by a careful and judicious 
 study of the Gospels. In proportion as they are 
 better understood, the latent marks of truth which 
 run through every part of them will become more 
 apparent and irresistible. All I shall now attempt 
 will be to give a very few examples of its applica- 
 
202 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 tion, in order to afford some illustration of its na- 
 ture. 
 
 In the eighteenth chapter of the Gospel of 
 St. Matthew, we find a narrative which may be 
 thus rendered. 
 
 " That day the disciples came to Jesus, saying, 
 Who then is to be greatest in the kingdom of 
 Heaven ? And Jesus called a child to him, and 
 placed him in the midst of them, and said, I 
 tell you in truth, Unless you are changed and 
 become as children, you will not enter the king- 
 dom of Heaven. He, then, who shall become 
 humble, and be like this child, will be the greatest 
 in the kingdom of Heaven. And he who gives 
 a kind reception to one such child for my sake, 
 gives a kind reception to me. But should any 
 one cause the humblest believer in me to fall 
 away from me, it would be better for him that he 
 should have a millstone hung round his neck, 
 and be swallowed up in the depths of the sea. 
 Woe for the world on account of the hindrances 
 to my reception! Such hindrances must exist; 
 but woe for him through whom they exist ! 
 
 " If your hand or your foot would cause you to 
 fall away from me, cut it off and cast it from you. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 203 
 
 It is better for you to enter into life having but one 
 foot or one hand, than, having two hands or two 
 feet, to be cast into the eternal fire. And if your 
 eye be causing you to fall away, pluck it out and 
 cast it from you. It is better for you to enter 
 into life having but one eye, than, having two 
 eyes, to be cast into the fire of hell. 
 
 " See that you despise not any one of the hum- 
 blest of my disciples ; for I tell you, that their 
 angels in heaven continually behold the face of my 
 Father in heaven. The Son of Man has come to 
 save the lost. What think you ] If a man have 
 a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, 
 will he not leave the ninety-nine upon the moun- 
 tains, and go and seek that which has gone 
 astray 1 And if he find it, truly I say to you, 
 he rejoices more over it than over the ninety-nine 
 which had not strayed. Even so it is not the 
 will of your Father in heaven that one of the 
 humblest of these should be lost. 
 
 " If your brother sin against you, go alone to 
 him and show him his fault. If he listen to you, 
 you have gained your brother. But if he do not 
 listen to you, go to him yet again with one or two 
 others, that everything may be settled by the 
 words of two or three witnesses. And if he dis- 
 
- 
 
 204: INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 regard them, tell the matter to the assembly of 
 brethren; and if he disregard the assembly, let 
 him be to you as a heathen and a tax-gatherer. 
 
 " Truly I say to you, Whatever you forbid on 
 earth will be forbidden in heaven, and whatever 
 you permit on earth will be permitted in heav- 
 en. Again, I say to you, If two of you agree on 
 earth concerning everything which they ask, their 
 prayers will be granted by my Father in heaven. 
 For where two or three have met together in my 
 service, there am I in the midst of them. 
 
 " Then Peter came to him and said, Master, if 
 my brother sin against me, how often shall I 
 forgive him 1 ? till seven times'? Jesus answered 
 him, I say not, Till seven times ; but, Till seventy 
 times seven." 
 
 I will now endeavor to explain this narrative, 
 for the purpose of pointing out its intrinsic marks 
 of truth. It has reference to a . state of things 
 nowhere described by the Evangelist, but which 
 was the natural result of facts related by him, or 
 known to us from other sources. The narrative 
 forms a counterpart to this state of things. It 
 bears its impression and implies its existence. 
 But this coincidence is clearly undesigned by the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 205 
 
 writer. It is not to be ascribed to his skill and 
 artifice. It therefore affords evidence at once of 
 the truth of the narrative itself, and of the actual 
 existence of that state of things which we sup- 
 pose it to imply. Of this we will now give some 
 account. 
 
 It was, as is well known, the general expecta- 
 tion of the Jews, that their Messiah would be a 
 temporal prince, ruling over the world. At the 
 period to which this narrative relates, the Apos- 
 tles shared in the common error and expectation 
 of their countrymen. Their prejudices and pas- 
 sions clung to this false conception. A little be- 
 fore this time our Saviour had expressly assented 
 to the declaration of Peter affirming him to be the 
 Messiah. His Apostles, therefore, regarding him 
 as sustaining this character, looked forward with 
 undefined hopes to his assuming the power and 
 splendor of the greatest of earthly monarchs. 
 But they had been invited by Christ to connect 
 themselves with him ; they had joined him while 
 he was yet in comparative obscurity and his 
 claims were not generally acknowledged, and 
 they had been distinguished by his peculiar 
 regard. For themselves, therefore, they naturally 
 expected that they should be hereafter among his 
 
 18 
 
206 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 favorites and chief officers. With these feelings, 
 they had begun to contend with each other about 
 their future comparative rank in the kingdom 
 of the Messiah. Jealousies had sprung up ; mu- 
 tual offence had been taken ; and they were be- 
 coming at enmity with each other. Even at a 
 subsequent period, the other disciples, we are 
 told, were moved with indignation at James and 
 John for the ambitious views which they still 
 cherished, notwithstanding our Saviour's present 
 reproof. But all their hopes of worldly ambition 
 were unfounded; and the whole state of mind 
 described was at variance with the character re- 
 quired in the disciples and ministers of him whose 
 kingdom was not of this world. 
 
 Our Saviour, therefore, addressing his Apostles, 
 begins with an inculcation of humility, and of the 
 necessity of a total change in their feelings and 
 purposes. Without this, they could not even be 
 members of his kingdom. The bearing of what 
 immediately follows may not be perceived without 
 some further remarks. 
 
 Peter, James, and John appear to have been 
 eminent among the Apostles for their personal 
 character. They were, on different occasions, 
 particularly distinguished by Christ. John was 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 207 
 
 known as the disciple whom he loved. He had 
 declared that Peter was a rock on which he would 
 build his Church. He had selected the three to 
 witness his transfiguration; and upon this occa- 
 sion, they were separated with their Master during 
 a day and a night from the rest of the Apostles, 
 for a purpose which remained unknown to the 
 latter for a considerable period. They evidently 
 had founded peculiar expectations upon the dis- 
 tinction which they had enjoyed. They appear to 
 have assumed an air of superiority, to which the 
 other disciples were unwilling to submit, and 
 which led to altercation and mutual ill-will. They 
 probably felt and expressed a degree of contempt 
 for the rude and slow conceptions and uninformed 
 minds of some of their associates ; perhaps even for 
 their unambitious views, and for a state of feeling 
 and character more conformed to the spirit of our 
 religion than their own. There was probably a 
 rivalship among the three we have mentioned ; 
 between Peter, on the one side, and James and 
 John, on the other. It may be presumed, likewise, 
 that the rest of the Apostles shared in the feelings 
 described, according to the notions which they re- 
 spectively entertained of their claims to the favor 
 of their Master. But this assumption of superior- 
 
208 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ity, these rivalships and dissensions, would tend to 
 alienate many of the disciples, especially those 
 treated as inferiors. They would be offended and 
 driven away from Christ. Our Saviour, therefore, 
 proceeds to speak of the interest which he felt in 
 all his followers. He who should show kindness 
 to any one of them, though he were but as a child, 
 on account of his relation to Christ, might be re- 
 garded as showing kindness to Christ himself. 
 He insists in the strongest terms upon the guilt 
 of causing any one of his disciples to be offended 
 with him, or to fall away. There would be sin in 
 apostasy ; there would be sin in giving occasion to 
 apostasy. Through either act, one would forfeit 
 the privileges and blessings of a Christian. But 
 there was danger of both ; and our Saviour, there- 
 fore, speaks of the evil and ruin of such sin. It 
 was to be avoided at any sacrifice, by giving up 
 the strongest feelings and passions, by cutting off 
 a limb or plucking out an eye. He then warns 
 those whom he is addressing, not to despise one 
 of the humblest of his disciples. They were all 
 objects of the care of God. The purpose of 
 his own mission was to seek and save the lost. 
 He had come to rescue men from error, sin, and 
 misery. The deliverance of a single individual, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 209 
 
 however humble, was most earnestly to be desired 
 and promoted. God might be regarded as holding 
 the same relation to his disciples, as a shepherd 
 to his flock ; not willing that any should be lost. 
 He then teaches them how to compose those dif- 
 ferences which had arisen. The party injured 
 was to seek reconciliation, and endeavor to lead 
 his brother to better feelings. If unsuccessful, he 
 was still to repeat his efforts, taking with him 
 others who might use their influence to the same 
 end. He was finally to call upon the whole body 
 of disciples to interpose their persuasions and 
 authority ; and he who should persevere in ill-will, 
 in opposition to all these means, was no longer to 
 be considered as a brother. 
 
 The words which follow are not particularly 
 connected with these directions, but generally with 
 the whole discourse. Our Saviour, having at- 
 tempted to repress all improper pride and ambi- 
 tion in his disciples, teaches them their real dig- 
 nity and authority as ministers of his religion. 
 As such they were ministers of God to declare 
 what He forbade and what He commanded. The 
 precepts and directions given by them as announ- 
 cing his will would be ratified in heaven. The 
 jealousies and dissensions among the Apostles 
 
 18* 
 
210 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 appear to have arisen in part from what our Sav- 
 iour had formerly said to Peter : " What you 
 shall forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven, 
 and what you shall permit on earth will be per- 
 mitted in heaven." * In the present discourse, in 
 order to do away any claim of superiority which 
 Peter might have founded on this address, and to 
 prevent it from being a ground of dissension, 
 Christ repeats the same words, and extends the 
 declaration to all his Apostles. He then speaks 
 further of their interest with God as ministers of 
 his religion. But he connects this with a new 
 recommendation of concord and unity. As min- 
 isters of his religion, they were to be united in 
 their purposes, wishes, and prayers ; and they 
 might then be secure of God's peculiar assistance 
 and favor. What they should supplicate in com- 
 mon, as servants of Christ, with such feelings as 
 he required, would be granted by God. It would 
 be as if Christ himself were praying with them. 
 
 When we understand the occasion and bearing 
 of the discourse, we perceive, at once, the coinci- 
 dence in what is related of Peter. "Then Peter 
 came to him and said, Master, if my brother sin 
 
 * Matthew xvi. 19. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 211 
 
 against me, how often shall I forgive him ? " Pe- 
 ter, it is probable, had been particularly exasper- 
 ated in the controversy concerning pre-eminence; 
 and nothing, in his consequent state of feeling, 
 could be more natural than this question. But 
 this coincidence, like all the others which have 
 been pointed out, is left without being in any way 
 indicated by the Evangelist. 
 
 It will be perceived that, in explaining this pas- 
 sage, we go upon the assumption, that the char- 
 acter and office of Christ were such as they are 
 described in the Gospels. We are obliged to 
 suppose that his Apostles had become convinced 
 that he was the Messiah, the most extraordinary 
 messenger from God to men of whom the Jews 
 had an imagination. We next take into view 
 what we learn from other sources was the concep- 
 tion which the Jews had formed of the character 
 and office of the Messiah. We infer that this 
 conception was entertained by the Apostles. We 
 then consider what was the natural effect of their 
 belief upon their minds, in the circumstances in 
 which the history represents them to have been 
 placed. And we bring to bear upon the present 
 passage inferences from facts elsewhere recorded, 
 the connection of which is not pointed out by the 
 
212 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 historian. Pursuing this method, we perceive that 
 the narrative is consistent with all that is else- 
 where expressly told; and with all that may be 
 inferred from what is told, when viewed in con- 
 nection with our other knowledge. This consist- 
 ency extends itself to those relations which are 
 not brought into view by the writer. It is clearly 
 unstudied. But in this passage we have merely 
 a specimen of the sort of illustration which the 
 Gospels throughout admit and require, and of 
 the results which follow from its application. 
 
 WE will proceed to another example, the story 
 of the young man who came to Christ addressing 
 him : " Good teacher, what good thing shall I do 
 to have eternal life 1 " * The false notions which 
 the Jews entertained of religion and its obligations 
 were similar to those which have very commonly 
 prevailed. They did not regard it as the sole 
 governing principle of the affections and conduct ; 
 but rather as enjoining a distinct and peculiar set 
 of observances, a regard to which, though consist- 
 ent with great moral depravity, was looked upon 
 as constituting the religious character. According 
 
 * Matthew xix. 16. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 213 
 
 to them, religion consisted in keeping their Law 
 and their traditions. But of the extent and force 
 of the moral requisitions of the Law they had 
 but a very imperfect conception; and to keep 
 the Law was with them but little more than to 
 observe its ceremonies according to the glosses 
 and with the additions of their Rabbins. The 
 case was with them as it has since been with 
 large bodies of Christians. Kites and arbitrary 
 observances had in their minds taken the place 
 of moral duties. The young man who came 
 to Christ, though he may have had some better 
 and higher notions, appears to have possessed 
 in a great degree the common character of his 
 countrymen, and especially of the leading men 
 among them, to whose number he belonged. Re- 
 garding our Saviour as a new and extraordinary 
 teacher, he appears to have thought that he 
 might enjoin upon him some new and peculiar 
 observance as a means of obtaining God's favor ; 
 something not commanded in the Law, and which 
 others had not practised. 
 
 To the address of the young man our Saviour 
 replied: "Why do you call me good? None 
 is good except God alone. But if you would 
 enter into life, keep the commandments." The 
 
214 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 object of the first part of our Saviour's answer 
 was to refer the young man from himself as a 
 teacher, to Qod ; to give him to understand that 
 no precepts were of any authority except as they 
 proceeded from God ; that there was no other good 
 teacher to whom he was to look for directions by 
 which eternal life might be obtained. According- 
 ly, the purport of what he adds is this: If you 
 would enter into life, obey the commandments of 
 God. The subsequent question of the young man 
 implies, conformably to what has been said, that 
 he was seeking for some peculiar, and, if I may 
 so say, some compendious mode of obtaining fu- 
 ture blessedness ; for he asks which of the com- 
 mandments he should keep, as if there were no 
 obligation to obey them all. Our Saviour, then, 
 in opposition to the common error of the age, 
 directs him to the moral precepts of the Law, 
 mentioning particularly a few of these, as speci- 
 mens and representatives of the whole. The 
 young man, with a confidence which discovered 
 too high an opinion of himself and too narrow 
 conceptions of his duty, replied, "All these 
 precepts have I kept from my youth; in what 
 am I still wanting ? " Our Saviour's preceding 
 answer was not intended as a full reply. There 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 215 
 
 was, now that he had come as a messenger from 
 God, an occasion and a call for high virtues and 
 great sacrifices, such as had not previously been 
 demanded. Men were summoned to become his 
 disciples, and his disciples were to take up the 
 cross and follow him ; to give themselves up to 
 his cause ; to lay aside all regard to their worldly 
 interests ; and to expose themselves as marks for 
 persecution. Our Saviour proposed to the young 
 man no easier and no harder terms than he pro- 
 posed to all his followers. The excellence, he 
 tells him, of which you are ambitious, is to be 
 obtained by devoting yourself to my service, by 
 becoming my follower; but to this end it is 
 necessary to divest yourself of all care for merely 
 earthly concerns. The direction at first sight 
 may seem to be severe, and to have imposed an 
 unnecessary trial; and it is left unexplained by 
 the Evangelist. But when we bring into view 
 the existing state of things, we find it to be such 
 as this state of things demanded ; and we perceive 
 its consistency with what was uniformly required 
 by Christ of his disciples. 
 
 The young man went away sorrowful, and our 
 Saviour turned to his disciples to remark, in the 
 strong, figurative language of the East, upon the 
 
216 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 moral impossibility that those of the class to which 
 he belonged should give up wealth, ease, pleasures, 
 and honors, to become his disciples. But their 
 thoughts still dwelt upon an earthly kingdom ; 
 and could this hold out no rewards to tempt men 
 to become his followers 1 Was the whole course 
 of his disciples through life to be one of privation, 
 labor, and suffering ] " Who then," they ask, 
 " can be saved "? " That is, How are you to col- 
 lect followers'? How is your kingdom to be es- 
 tablished ? It is to this indirect meaning of 
 the question, I conceive, that the reply of Christ 
 is directed. Men would be saved, his religion 
 would be established, not by human means, but 
 by displays of the power of God. 
 
 Peter then, with feelings similar to those which 
 have been before described, brings forward the 
 claims of the Apostles : " Lo ! we have left all 
 to become your followers. What then will be 
 our reward?" Our Saviour answers him in 
 strong, metaphorical language, borrowing the 
 figure which he uses from the thoughts which 
 possessed their minds. " And Jesus said to them, 
 I tell you in truth, that you, my followers, in the 
 regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit on 
 the throne of his glory, shall also sit on twelve 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 217 
 
 thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."* It 
 was thus that he not unfrequently adopted the 
 language in which his hearers might express 
 their ideas, and conformed it to the expression of 
 his own ; in this manner facilitating the reception 
 of the latter by their minds. The expectations of 
 his Apostles would not be literally gratified, but 
 they would be gratified in a much higher sense. 
 When men should be regenerated by his religion, 
 when his spiritual kingdom should be established, 
 they, his Apostles, would be regarded as next 
 to him in authority and dignity. For all their 
 sacrifices, he proceeds to say, they should receive 
 a hundred fold, and should inherit eternal life. 
 
 But the parable which follows, of the laborers 
 in a vineyard, is intended to correct any false 
 hopes, improper confidence, or undue estimation 
 of themselves, which these promises might other- 
 wise have excited in the Apostles. They might 
 naturally think that the mere circumstance of 
 their early adherence to our Saviour, their being 
 his first, or among his first, followers, would 
 
 * It having been in ancient times common in the East for kings 
 to act as judges, the whole exercise of regal authority was sometimes 
 denoted by the word judging, as it is metaphorically in the present 
 passage. " The twelve tribes of Israel " is a figurative expression 
 for the whole people of God. 
 19 
 
218 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 entitle them to peculiar rewards. This might 
 reasonably be expected by the followers of an 
 earthly leader. But the object of this parable 
 was to teach them that the future recompense of 
 men would not be affected by their becoming his 
 followers early or late, if they became such as 
 soon as invited. It would depend only on their 
 moral excellence. In this respect many of those 
 who became converts at a later period might be 
 superior to others who earlier professed themselves 
 his disciples. The last might be first, and the 
 first last. 
 
 IN explaining the passages which we have gone 
 over, we are obliged to suppose much that is 
 nowhere expressly stated by the Evangelist. But 
 what we suppose, follows from what he has re- 
 lated, when we view his history in connection 
 with our knowledge derived from other sources. 
 It is of this remarkable, unobtruded, apparently 
 unstudied consistency, that he who denies the 
 truth of the history is called upon to furnish some 
 other solution.* 
 
 * [For further illustration of the passages remarked upon in this 
 chapter, see the author's Notes on the Gospels.] 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 219 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE CONSISTENCY OF THE NAKEATIVE 
 CONSIDERED. 
 
 WE have been endeavoring to prove the truth 
 of the Gospel history from the consistency of its 
 different parts with each other, with the whole, 
 and with all our knowledge bearing upon the 
 subject in numberless dependences and relations. 
 This consistency, when viewed in connection with 
 the inartificial style of narration, gives the his- 
 tory an air of truth which human skill and ge- 
 nius seem scarcely more capable of counterfeiting, 
 than they are of counterfeiting one of the liv- 
 ing productions of nature. But it may be said 
 that there is an important point in which the 
 argument fails, and may be turned against us. It 
 may be urged that the effect produced by the 
 ministry of Christ upon the great body of the 
 Jewish nation was wholly inconsistent with what 
 we might reasonably expect, supposing his history 
 to be true. Though performing the most astonish- 
 
220 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ing miracles in attestation of his divine authority, 
 he was unable to subdue the incredulity of his 
 countrymen. - It is impossible, it may be said, that 
 men's minds should not have yielded to such 
 proofs as he is related to have given. 
 
 Certainly, if the Gospel history be true, Jesus 
 Christ did give the most unquestionable proofs of 
 his divine mission. But it is an error to suppose 
 that men will always believe and act as it is in 
 the highest degree reasonable that they should 
 believe and act. Our passions and prejudices 
 have power to trample the strongest evidence un- 
 der foot. The Pharisees and the common people 
 whose leaders they were, refused to acknowledge 
 the divine authority of our Saviour. One, at first 
 thought, may be ready to say that nothing can be 
 imagined more unreasonable. Yet no form which 
 their opinions concerning Christ might assume, 
 could involve so gross an absurdity as the doc- 
 trine of transubstantiation. In whatever they 
 might believe, there was, to say the least, no 
 greater dereliction of reason, than in the belief 
 of this article of faith. They persecuted Christ 
 and his followers in defence of their opinions ; 
 but those who have held that doctrine have perse- 
 cuted as madly in its support. They may appear to 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 221 
 
 have rushed upon destruction, struggling against 
 evidence which should have produced conviction. 
 It is an awful and revolting phenomenon. But it 
 is one which has been exhibited since their times. 
 The voice of reason and religion and conscience 
 has been often distinctly uttered to men with- 
 out being heard and obeyed. The truth is, that 
 when we suppose an extraordinary difficulty in 
 the case of the unbelieving Jews, we regard noth- 
 ing but the abstract force of the evidence for the 
 divinity of our Saviour's mission, supposing it to 
 be such as is represented in the Gospels. We 
 do not consider those circumstances which may 
 have produced in their minds a very false esti- 
 mate of the weight of this evidence; nor take, in to 
 view the strength of those prejudices, passions, 
 and vices, that whole constitution of character, by 
 which it was resisted. 
 
 If it be proved that Christ performed real mira- 
 cles, no reasonable man, at the present day, will 
 doubt that he was a messenger from God. But 
 in the time of Christ, this conclusion did not 
 necessarily follow in the mind of a Jew. That 
 the power of performing miracles, that is, of pro- 
 ducing effects which cannot be referred to the 
 laws of nature, must in all cases, when viewed 
 
 19* 
 
222 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 alone, be sufficient evidence that he in whom it 
 resides has received some commission from God, is 
 a proposition which, perhaps, admits of satisfactory 
 proof. This proof, however, is derived from va- 
 rious and complex considerations ; and the truth 
 of the proposition, whether in this abstract form it 
 may be established or not, was certainly not gen- 
 erally admitted by the Jews contemporary with 
 Christ. They were an ignorant and superstitious 
 people. The prevalent belief in the reality of false 
 miracles existed among them equally as among the 
 Heathens. Some narratives in their Scriptures 
 might easily be understood as proving the doc- 
 trine, that the power of performing miracles was 
 not confined to the messengers of God, or to those 
 on whom he looked 'with favor. They believed in 
 the agency of evil spirits as interfering with the 
 course of nature and inflicting diseases of body 
 and mind. There were persons among them who 
 were regarded as able to cure such diseases by 
 casting out daemons. They believed in magic, and 
 consequently had no doubt that miracles might 
 be effected through means and agents condemned 
 by God, and which exposed those who employed 
 them to his displeasure. But, holding such false 
 opinions, they were fully prepared to resist the 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 223 
 
 conviction which the miracles of our Saviour must 
 have produced in men more intelligent and better 
 informed. They were familiar with the imagina- 
 tion and belief of false miracles, and were therefore 
 less likely to be affected by real miracles. Believ- 
 ing such effects to be often produced without the 
 interposition of God, by bad agents, they were fur- 
 nished with what they deemed a sufficient account 
 of the miracles of Christ, though his divine au- 
 thority were denied. His enemies held the same 
 opinion concerning them, which many Christians 
 have held respecting the pretended miracles of 
 Paganism. They regarded them as performed 
 through the assistance of evil spirits. In addition 
 to what has been said, it may be well to recollect, 
 though it is not a consideration of primary im- 
 portance, that the principal scene of Christ's min- 
 istry was in Galilee and the neighboring country, 
 and that it was here that most of his miracles 
 were performed; while, on the other hand, the 
 stronghold of his enemies was at Jerusalem, 
 where his character, preaching, and actions were 
 less known. 
 
 But the majority of the Jews were not likely 
 to be deterred from their opinion respecting the 
 miraculous powers of Christ, either by the holi- 
 
224 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ness of his character, or by the conformity of his 
 doctrines and precepts to our highest conceptions 
 of God. In .order to perceive and feel the display 
 of divine excellence which was manifested in his 
 life and religion, no inconsiderable degree of purity 
 and elevation of mind is required. Moral corrup- 
 tion must shrink from it with aversion and pain. 
 Instead, therefore, of commanding the respect of 
 his countrymen, it was one cause of their offence 
 with him and their hatred against him. But there 
 were other powerful causes in operation. 
 
 The Jews were oppressed by the Roman power, 
 and despised and exasperated by their oppressors. 
 Insulated among nations, not less by mutual feel- 
 ings of hostility than by other causes, they gloried 
 in their peculiar relation to God. They were his 
 people, and the rest of men were their enemies 
 and his enemies. Their pride was their consola- 
 tion and their hope; and the more they were 
 humbled, the more obstinate and deep-rooted it 
 became. It drew strength from all their national 
 and all their religious sentiments. The hour was 
 coming, as they thought, when God would inter- 
 pose for his chosen people, and destroy their 
 oppressors. The times of the Messiah would be 
 a period of deliverance and vengeance and glory. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 225 
 
 This expectation was an article of religious faith, 
 and the cherished object of their strongest pas- 
 sions. But when Christ appeared, it was to pros- 
 trate those hopes, and humble that pride which 
 oppression and suffering had only confirmed. No 
 distinguishing favor of God to the Jewish people 
 was manifested through him. He came to teach 
 them, that they were not, as they believed, a holy 
 people, but sinners and aliens from God ; and that 
 it was only by a renovation of character that they 
 could obtain his favor. He came, not to exalt 
 them in triumph over their enemies, but to place 
 the rest of men on an equality with them, to do 
 away the distinctions in which they had gloried, 
 and to make known the impartial goodness of 
 God. He came, not to gratify their passions, but 
 to require them to relinquish those passions. No 
 shock or discouragement, however, could at once 
 subdue those strong hopes which his appearance 
 had called forth. Though unsatisfied, there were 
 still some of their number who were ready, with, or 
 even without, his consent, " to make him king." 
 But he repelled from him those who came with 
 such feelings. He turned into hostility the pas- 
 sions which he refused to gratify. At the same 
 time, the place of his birth, the condition of his 
 
226 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 family, his mode of life, the character of his few 
 followers, the hopes which he held out to them, 
 were all foreign from what they had expected in 
 their great Deliverer. Was it strange, then, that 
 they refused to acknowledge him as the Messiah, 
 who corresponded to none of their conceptions of 
 the Messiah, and who, instead of accomplishing, 
 had come to destroy, the hopes of his nation 1 
 
 But this was not all. Jesus Christ was, in the 
 highest sense of the words, a moral and religious 
 reformer, the most open and uncompromising, ex- 
 posed to all the hatred which may ever attach to 
 this character. The Jewish religion had become 
 grossly corrupt. It was, as other forms of super- 
 stition have been, little more than a religion of 
 substitutions for holiness and virtue ; not leading 
 men to goodness, but furnishing them with some 
 other imaginary means of obtaining the favor of 
 God. Now when, in any case, a reformer exhibits 
 the true character of such substitutions, and pre- 
 sents to view the real requirements of religion, the 
 natural effect will be, that those who have founded 
 their pride upon the former will regard him as 
 profanely endeavoring to destroy men's reverence 
 for what is sabred. He will be viewed by them 
 as an enemy to religion ; for he is an enemy to 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 227 
 
 what they have thought religion. They will re- 
 gard him with deep-felt hostility ; for he is destroy- 
 ing the support of their self-satisfaction, and of 
 their estimation among men. Their worst pas- 
 sions will be arrayed by their bigotry in the dis- 
 guise of religious zeal. This was eminently true 
 as regards the Jews. With what feelings must 
 the Pharisees have heard a teacher, who, assum- 
 ing the most decisive tone of authority, announced 
 to them that they were hypocrites and sinners, 
 deceiving themselves and their followers ? How 
 must they have listened to one who called upon 
 them to acquire that holiness which they had no 
 doubt of already possessing, through the hard way 
 of humility, repentance, and entire change of char- 
 acter 1 How many of them could be expected to 
 become the disciples of such a teacher 1 ? And 
 what must have been the bitterness and exaspera- 
 tion of those who did not ! In what state of mind 
 were they to estimate fairly the evidence of his 
 divine mission ] Their strongest passions were ex- 
 asperated ; their most deep-rooted prejudices were 
 assailed ; and the whole force of these was turned 
 against him. Even their wavering apprehensions, 
 if any such were felt, that his claims might be well- 
 founded, only served to increase their alarm and 
 
228 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 agitation, and, consequently, to give new strength 
 to the feelings which they had not power to sub- 
 due. The s,tate of mind which existed in the 
 Pharisees must have been common in some de- 
 gree to most of the Jews. The system of doc- 
 trines and duties taught by Christ was at variance 
 with the inveterate errors of his countrymen. The 
 alternative was, whether, becoming as children, 
 they should surrender these errors, having im- 
 plicit faith in Christ as teaching by the authority 
 of God ; or whether they should cling to and de- 
 fend them, regarding him as an impious innova- 
 tor. The latter was the character which many of 
 the Jews ascribed to Christ. The fact is evident 
 from his own discourses. It accounts for the fre- 
 quency and force with which he insisted on his 
 connection with God as His messenger and repre- 
 sentative ; and for the variety of forms in which 
 he presented this truth. It is clear that his ene- 
 mies were under such a strong delusion, as to 
 imagine themselves defending against him the 
 cause of God and of God's people. Their feel- 
 ings of hostility broke out repeatedly with partic- 
 ular violence, when, by an intentional disregard of 
 those ceremonies which they thought of high im- 
 portance, particularly a superstitious observance 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 229 
 
 of the Sabbath, he showed of how little account 
 he esteemed them. An enemy of their faith, a 
 despiser of their traditions, one who made no ac- 
 count of that scrupulousness of conscience which 
 paid tithes even of mint and cumin, but who 
 denounced as hypocrites those holy men whose 
 authority had been most respected; a teacher 
 who taught not as those who had made the Law 
 their study ; a contemner of religious ceremonies ; 
 a breaker of the Sabbath; a companion of tax- 
 gatherers and sinners ; a pretended Messiah who 
 came not to deliver God's chosen people, but as 
 a prophet of evil, denouncing the destruction even 
 of Jerusalem and the temple, it was thus that a 
 bigoted Jew must have regarded Christ ; and what 
 strength of evidence could prove to him that such 
 a one was a messenger from God 1 " He casts out 
 the daemons through the prince of the daemons." 
 This was not a mere timid solution of the difficulty 
 which his miracles presented; it was the strong 
 expression of the feelings which possessed those 
 by whom it was uttered. 
 
 It is a gross error to suppose that miracles are 
 particularly adapted to aifect the minds of a rude 
 and superstitious people. They will produce their 
 
 most powerful impression upon the most enlight- 
 20 
 
230 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ened, upon those who have the most correct con- 
 ceptions of the power and character of God, the 
 most extensive acquaintance with the causes of 
 natural phenomena, who are most free from cre- 
 dulity, and who, in consequence, are not familiar- 
 ized to the imagination and belief of false miracles. 
 To such, a real miracle must be an astonishing 
 and almost appalling event, commanding attention, 
 and affording ground for the strongest conviction. 
 By the ignorant and superstitious it may be re- 
 garded as merely belonging to a class of phenom- 
 ena of not very unfrequent occurrence. 
 
 WHEN, therefore, we attend to the character, 
 opinions, and state of mind of those whom Christ 
 addressed, we perceive that the result of his min- 
 istry was such as we might reasonably expect to 
 find it. I do not urge this coincidence as any 
 evidence of the truth of his history ; for, whether 
 the rest of the history be true or false, there could 
 be but one statement respecting a fact, in its na- 
 ture so notorious. My purpose has hitherto been 
 merely to remove an objection. 
 
 BUT the statements which have been made for 
 this purpose may be viewed under a different as- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 231 
 
 pect. There is, running through the Gospels, a 
 striking correspondence with the representations 
 which have been given. It is nowhere implied 
 in these books, that any doubt was entertained of 
 the reality of Christ's miracles. There is not a sin- 
 gle expression which betrays any apprehension or 
 thought of their truth being denied. There is no 
 attempt to establish it by arguments, by the refu- 
 tation of objections, or by any detail of circum- 
 stances having a bearing upon this point. The 
 facts are told nakedly, as equally indisputable and 
 undisputed. But this is not all. There are re- 
 peated implications, apparently indirect and un- 
 studied, that the reality of Christ's miracles was 
 universally acknowledged, equally by those who 
 did not recognize them as evidences of his divine 
 mission and by those who did. There are, at the 
 same time, repeated exhibitions of the workings 
 of those passions and prejudices which have been 
 supposed. Such, for instance, is the case in the 
 account which the Pharisees are represented to 
 have given of the manner in which Christ's mir- 
 acles were performed, taken in connection with 
 the subsequent remarks of Christ upon what they 
 said.* The whole narrative implies that there was 
 
 * Compare Matthew ix. 34 ; xii. 24, seqq. 
 
232 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 no controversy about the facts themselves. That 
 the words ascribed to the Pharisees were not 
 falsely ascribed to them is further confirmed, it 
 may be observed, by an incidental allusion to them, 
 made by Christ : " If they have called the master 
 of the house Beelzebub, how much more will they 
 so call those of his household ! " * A like indirect 
 acknowledgment of the reality of his miracles, and 
 the operation of a like state of mind, appear in 
 what was said by his fellow-townsmen of Nazareth 
 while refusing to acknowledge his divine authori- 
 ty : " Whence has this man such wisdom, and these 
 mighty powers 1 Is he not the son of the carpen- 
 ter V' t Similar remarks may be made respecting 
 the request of the Pharisees that he would give 
 "a sign FROM HEAVEN." They would not have 
 asked a- sign from heaven of one whom they re- 
 garded as a mere impostor, not possessed of any 
 extraordinary powers. If they could have exposed 
 any deception in his miracles performed on earth, 
 they would not have sought to put him to a new 
 trial. The implication is that these miracles were 
 unsatisfactory ; and that it was necessary for him 
 to give some more decisive proof of his divine 
 mission, by a sign coming evidently from Him 
 
 * Matthew x. 25. | Matthew xiii. 54, 55. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 233 
 
 whom they conceived of as dwelling in the heav- 
 ens. I give these passages merely as examples. 
 A similar character appears more or less distinctly 
 in many others.* 
 
 The remark that the miracles of Christ appear 
 from the Gospels to have been unquestioned, is 
 true of what may be more strictly called his mira- 
 cles. But it is not true of the fact of his resur- 
 rection. Respecting this, St. Matthew relates that 
 there was a story in circulation that his disciples 
 came by night and stole his body away while the 
 guards slept.t The effect of this single exception 
 is to confirm the argument derived from the gen- 
 eral characteristic of the Gospels before mentioned. 
 Here we are told by the Evangelist, that the most 
 important miracle which he records was treated 
 as an imposture. We may fairly conclude, there- 
 fore, that with the same honesty, or the same 
 indifference, or the same incapacity for deception, 
 he would, in some way, have given us information 
 of the fact, if the truth of the other miracles re- 
 corded by him had been called in question. What 
 he here expressly states confirms most strongly the 
 
 * Some of these are mentioned by Paley. (Evidences, Part UL 
 ch. iv.) 
 
 f Matthew xxviii. 1 2, seqq. 
 20* 
 
234 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 correctness of those accounts which imply that their 
 truth was not disputed. But in what manner does 
 he mention this particular story of the unbeliev- 
 ing Jews "? He merely states it, without any at- 
 tempt at refutation, without even a formal denial 
 of it, without a single remark respecting it. He 
 could not have treated it with more indifference, 
 or with more appearance of regarding it as des- 
 titute equally of plausibility and of truth, and 
 wholly unlikely to obtain credit. If the story 
 had been urged with any confidence, if it had 
 been in fact believed by those who brought it for- 
 ward, it could hardly have been passed over with 
 such slight. 
 
 It appears then, that, with the exception just 
 mentioned, the writers of the Gospels nowhere 
 imply that any doubt was professed or entertained 
 of the reality of the miracles which they relate ; 
 but, on the contrary, that the enemies of Christ 
 admitted the fact of his supernatural powers. 
 Now this is a remarkable characteristic of these 
 histories, which corresponds to the supposition of 
 their truth, but does not correspond to any other 
 supposition that can be made. If we suppose 
 the histories to be false, and that Christ did not 
 perform miracles, there are but three suppositions 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 235 
 
 of which the case admits : one, That he falsely pre- 
 tended to have this power ; another, That though 
 he himself did not pretend to this power, yet his 
 disciples believed him to possess it, and to have, 
 in fact, performed many miracles ; and the third, 
 That though Christ neither pretended to this 
 power, nor was believed by his disciples to pos- 
 sess it, yet miracles were falsely attributed to him 
 after his death. The second supposition may ap- 
 pear too improbable to be stated; nor should I 
 have thought of bringing it forward, if it had not 
 actually been maintained. We may say, gener- 
 ally, that the pretence that Christ performed mir- 
 acles was either made during his lifetime by 
 himself or by his disciples; or, not being then 
 urged, was brought forward after his death. In 
 either case, if it had admitted of dispute or denial, 
 there can be no doubt that it would have been 
 disputed and denied. If there had been room 
 even for any cavil or objection, it would have 
 been made. If his miracles had been false, the 
 personal enemies of Christ, or, subsequently to his 
 time, the enemies of the rising sect, would have 
 seized at once upon this decisive ground of attack. 
 It would have been the universal objection of the 
 opposers of Christianity. It is unnecessary to my 
 
236 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 present purpose to observe, that the objection must 
 have been triumphant, and that it is impossible 
 that such a , series of bold and gross fictions as 
 would have existed in the Gospels could have 
 stood their ground, at once against the truth and 
 against violent opposition. I only say, that these 
 relations would have been met on every side with 
 doubts, and strong controversy, and positive denial. 
 The opposers of Christianity did not think them- 
 selves destitute of arguments against it ; and they 
 urged them strenuously and confidently. What 
 they were, we learn not merely from the Gospels, 
 but equally from the Epistles and from other 
 sources. The first preachers of our religion were 
 continually called upon to meet and answer them. 
 There is, however, no indication that the reality 
 of the miracles was disputed. But if this could 
 have been denied, here would have been the tug 
 and strain of the controversy. Upon his miracles 
 the Founder of our religion is represented as hav- 
 ing rested his claims : " If I had not done among 
 them such works as no other ever did, they would 
 not be thus guilty." The first and the last objec- 
 tion to his claims, therefore, would have been, that 
 such works were not performed by him. But if a 
 controversy of the kind we have supposed had 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 237 
 
 really existed, we should have found, I do not say 
 traces, but abundant and decisive proofs of it in 
 the Gospels, as well as in other writings of early 
 Christians. It would have been impossible that 
 such a series of extraordinary narratives, relating 
 to a subject of such deep interest, should have 
 been presented naked to the attacks of unbelievers 
 and enemies, without an attempt to support their 
 authority, or to invalidate the statements of those 
 who denied their truth, and even without any ref- 
 erence to those opposite accounts which must have 
 been notorious to all who cared about the facts 
 in question. The writers of these histories were 
 treading upon ground where they were exposed 
 to continual attack, and must have been constantly 
 in armor. On the contrary, they proceed with 
 the most unaffected air of security. Not only 
 are there no traces in their books of any contro- 
 versy respecting the reality of Christ's miracles, 
 but there runs throughout these writings an im- 
 plication that no doubt of their reality was en- 
 tertained. Now this could not be consummate 
 artifice, though it might tend to deceive readers 
 at the distance of eighteen centuries ; but it must 
 have been consummate folly, for it could deceive 
 no readers at the time when the books appeared. 
 
238 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 It is a folly, however, of which no writers placed 
 in such circumstances as were the Evangelists can 
 be supposed guilty. The characteristic of which 
 we have been speaking implies, therefore, the truth 
 of their history ; and it admits of explanation on 
 no other hypothesis. It is a mark of authenticity 
 which cannot be artificial, but which runs, like 
 the natural veins of an agate, through the very 
 structure of their writings. 
 
 The argument may be thus simply stated. If 
 the reality of Christ's miracles could have been 
 controverted, this would have been the main con- 
 troversy between Christians and their opponents. 
 If such a controversy had existed, we should have 
 found proofs of it in the writings of the early 
 Christians, and especially in the Gospels. But no 
 such proofs are to be found; on the contrary, we 
 perceive decisive implications that the reality of 
 his miracles was not denied. It follows, that no 
 such controversy existed. The reality of his mira- 
 cles was not, because it could not be, denied ; and 
 the narrative of them is therefore true. 
 
 THE history contained in the Gospels may be 
 divided into two parts : one, containing narratives 
 of miraculous events ; and the other, accounts of 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 239 
 
 the discourses of our Saviour, of his actions not 
 miraculous, and of the dispositions, words, and 
 actions of others, his friends, his enemies, and 
 the common multitude. Now between these two 
 portions into which the history may be divided, 
 there is a perfect correspondence. That our Sav- 
 iour was a divine messenger endued with miracu- 
 lous powers is brought into view with almost as 
 much distinctness in one portion of the narrative 
 as in the other. This fact appears in his always 
 demanding to be believed and obeyed simply upon 
 his own authority, as speaking in the name of 
 God; in his appeals to his miracles as the proof 
 on which his claims rested; in his forcibly pre- 
 senting to the minds of his disciples the suffer- 
 ings to be endured by them in this life, and giving 
 nothing but his own promise for the rewards to 
 be expected by them after death; in the distant 
 and submissive respect with which they regarded 
 him; in the very extraordinary effects produced 
 by his ministry ; in the strong disposition of the 
 Jews to believe him to be their Messiah, notwith- 
 standing the opposition between his life and ac- 
 tions and their previous conceptions ; in the other 
 opinions entertained concerning him, " some say- 
 ing that he was John the Baptist ; others, Elijah ; 
 
240 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 and others, Jeremiah, or one of the Prophets " ; in 
 the multitudes that attended him, amounting at one 
 time, and that in a desert place, to five thousand 
 men, besides women and children, an assembly 
 of Galileean Jews, which could not have been drawn 
 together to hear a mere philosopher expounding a 
 refined system of religion and morals; in those 
 indirect acknowledgments of the truth of his mir- 
 acles to which we have just adverted; and, gen- 
 erally, in the correspondence of his whole charac- 
 ter, and of all his actions, doctrines, and precepts, 
 to the conception of a supernatural messenger from 
 God, a subject to be explained more fully here- 
 after. Nor is this all ; the fact of his being en- 
 dued with miraculous powers is clearly implied in 
 various particular passages of the Gospels, not to 
 be referred to any of the heads just mentioned. 
 Allowing the truth of this fact, the whole history 
 is consistent and probable. But if the accounts of 
 Christ's miracles be false, then the remainder of 
 the history must, generally speaking, be false also. 
 It consists of narratives of actions and discourses, 
 which, upon this supposition, become absurd, im- 
 probable, or necessarily untrue. It cannot, there- 
 fore, be said that the accounts of the miracles are 
 false, but that the rest of the history is true. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 241 
 
 There is such a consistency and intimate corre- 
 spondence between the different portions of the 
 narrative, that the whole, generally speaking, must 
 be false, or the whole must be true. 
 
 No reasonable man, however, will contend that 
 the history is merely fictitious, that there was no 
 groundwork of facts for the narrative in the Gos- 
 pels, and that no such person as Christ existed. 
 What seems to be regarded as the most plausible 
 supposition, by those who deny the truth of the 
 Gospel history, is this: That a very enlightened 
 philosopher made his appearance in Galilee, whose 
 purpose was to reform the religion and morals of 
 the Jews, and perhaps of the rest of the world; 
 but that his character and claims have been ex- 
 travagantly misrepresented, and that the narrative 
 of his life has been interpolated with strange fa- 
 bles. But to this or any other supposition which 
 denies the truth of the miracles, the consistency 
 of the history presents a conclusive objection. If 
 the general representation given by the Evange- 
 lists of the character, office, and miracles of Christ 
 had been false, it would have been impossible for 
 such writers as they were to imagine a probable 
 story of a series of events such as must have fol- 
 lowed upon the supposition of its truth ; a story 
 21 
 
242 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 consistent not merely with itself, but with all that 
 we can learn respecting the history and circum- 
 stances of the times to which it refers. If their 
 narratives had not been true, they must have 
 presented a very different aspect from what they 
 now bear, They would have been full of incon- 
 gruities, inconsistencies in the representation of 
 character, and latent and obvious contradictions 
 both of known facts and of statements contained 
 in the narratives themselves. 
 
 According to the supposition which we are con- 
 sidering, Jesus Christ was not the Jewish Messiah, 
 nor did he claim to be; he was not a messenger 
 from God, in any proper sense of those words, nor 
 did he assume that character; he had not the 
 power of performing miracles, nor did he pretend 
 to this power. Yet we have a consistent story, 
 corresponding to a directly opposite conception of 
 his character. This story, then, must be a work 
 of invention, a product of human art and genius. 
 But there could not well have been a more diffi- 
 cult subject for invention. Allowing it, however, 
 to be one capable of execution, it is clear that 
 neither of the four Evangelists possessed the in- 
 tellectual powers and habits necessary for this 
 extraordinary task. A groundwork of real facts, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 243 
 
 instead of assisting them in their fiction, would 
 only have embarrassed the subject, and rendered 
 it more difficult and unmanageable. These facts 
 would have been continually forcing themselves 
 into notice, and obstructing the. free exercise of 
 invention. There would have been evident at 
 first sight a strange mixture of heterogeneous ma- 
 terials in their narrative. We may say, therefore, 
 that, supposing the Evangelists to have set out 
 with the original conception of a divine messen- 
 ger endued with miraculous powers, and placed in 
 such circumstances as those in which Christ is rep- 
 resented to have been, it must have been a work of 
 most extraordinary genius to imagine a thoroughly 
 consistent and probable account of his ministry ; 
 and the necessity of conforming this account to a 
 series of real facts, and of distorting natural events 
 with their consequences into supernatural events 
 with their appropriate consequences, would only 
 have aggravated the difficulty. But such a con- 
 sistent and probable story we do possess in each of 
 the Gospels ; and the only alternative seems to be, 
 that it is either true, or that it is, what no one 
 
 ^ 
 
 will believe, a most uncommon production of skill 
 and genius on the part of the respective authors 
 of these works. To suppose such a consistent 
 
244 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 narrative to be formed by collecting traditions, 
 fables, and exaggerated stories, invented and prop- 
 agated by many individuals deceiving and deceived, 
 is like imagining a fine historical picture to be 
 composed by putting together figures and designs, 
 the work of different unskilful artists, each follow- 
 ing his own fancy. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 245 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST AS IT APPEARS IN THE 
 GOSPELS. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 His Teaching. 
 
 THE perfect exhibition of moral excellence in 
 the teaching and actions of Christ has been often 
 urged as an intrinsic proof of the divinity of his 
 mission. I am about to apply this consideration 
 in a somewhat different manner, and to use it as a 
 proof of the genuineness of the writings in which 
 his character appears, and which profess to afford 
 a record of what he taught. 
 
 The argument is this. The Gospels contain an 
 exhibition of character, real or imaginary, incom- 
 parably more wonderful than is to be found in any 
 other writings. It is the character of a messenger 
 from God, assuming in his name the highest au- 
 thority, constantly exercising supernatural powers, 
 
 and appearing among men for the purpose of 
 21* 
 
246 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 making them acquainted with God, with their 
 own immortal nature, with their duty, and with 
 those ennobling and awful sanctions by which it 
 is enforced. He is represented as discovering to 
 men a perfect system of religion. He always ap- 
 pears, whether teaching, or acting, or suffering, as 
 displaying the highest excellence. His character 
 is everywhere consistent with itself and with the 
 supernatural dignity of his office, though he is rep- 
 resented as passing through scenes the most try- 
 ing and humiliating. We have, then, in these 
 writings, a just conception of a perfect system of 
 religion, as taught by a divine teacher, assuming 
 the highest authority and exercising the most ex- 
 traordinary powers, and displaying throughout a 
 character in which we discover nothing but what 
 is excellent and sublime. 
 
 But the writers of the Gospels derived those 
 conceptions which we find in their works, either 
 from reality, or from their own imaginations. If 
 we allow the former part of .this alternative, the 
 fact that the writings are genuine may, as we shall 
 see hereafter, be rendered in the highest degree 
 probable, though, at the same time, the question 
 of their genuineness becomes comparatively unim- 
 portant. But if it be contended that these writers 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 247 
 
 did not draw from reality, but from imagination, 
 that they are not simple historians, but that their 
 narratives are fiction, the answer to this suppo- 
 sition is, that the conceptions of moral excellence 
 and sublimity which we find displayed and em- 
 bodied in their writings would imply a transcend- 
 ent genius and force of mind, to which there is 
 no parallel, which it is impossible should have 
 existed in four anonymous, unknown authors, and 
 which are irreconcilable with the actual want of 
 extraordinary talents, and of skill in composition, 
 that is discovered in their works. These con- 
 ceptions likewise would imply a correctness of 
 moral principle, and a purity and sublimity of 
 moral feeling, which could not exist in union 
 with intentional falsehood. The argument, there- 
 fore, is briefly this : That the religion and morality 
 of the Gospels, as exhibited in the doctrines, pre- 
 cepts, and life of Christ, are such as could not have 
 been conceived and represented by the writers of 
 the Gospels, if they had not had a living archetype 
 before them ; and that, without such an archetype, 
 the power of conceiving and representing what 
 we find in the Gospels, if it ever existed in 
 any human being, would necessarily imply that 
 that extraordinary being had a character which 
 
248 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 entitled him to perfect confidence. It was wholly 
 out of the power of the writers of the Gospels 
 to deceive us as they must have done, suppos- 
 ing their representations false ; and the very ex- 
 istence of such a power, in any case, would in 
 itself imply the absence of all will to deceive. 
 The intrinsic character of these writings, there- 
 fore, affords positive evidence of their authenticity 
 as to all essential facts, and consequently, as we 
 shall see, strong evidence of their genuineness. 
 
 LET us consider more particularly what we find 
 in the Gospels. According to these histories, at a 
 period when what we now regard as true religion 
 had no existence upon earth, when only some rude 
 and very imperfect notions of morality found their 
 way to the multitude, and when, in consequence, 
 the mass of men were extremely debased, ignorant, 
 and vicious, there appeared a teacher who took 
 upon himself the reformation of mankind. He 
 appeared among the Jews, a nation who were far 
 from sharing in the common intellectual improve- 
 ment of their heathen neighbors ; who probably, 
 with some exceptions, were as depraved as the 
 rest of the world; and whose religion, originally 
 derived from God, had become full of error and 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 249 
 
 corruption. He was a young man, born in the 
 lower class of the people, and brought up in Gali- 
 lee. I mention this latter circumstance, because 
 Galilee had a sort of provincial relation to Judaea ; 
 and the proper Jews regarded the Galilseans as 
 inferior to themselves. He had not been educated 
 even in the common learning of his nation. Yet, 
 amid the ignorance and depravity with which he 
 was surrounded, he developed a system of religion 
 and morals blended together and exhibited in their 
 proper relations, nothing like which had ever been 
 made known before, and which, since it has been 
 made known, human reason has been wholly un- 
 able to improve. 
 
 WHAT, then, were the great characteristics of 
 the preaching of Christ, the fundamental princi- 
 ples which were continually appearing in his dis- 
 courses ] I answer, that he spoke of God, of 
 eternity, and of our relations to our fellow- 
 creatures. 
 
 He spoke of God. His countrymen had been 
 accustomed to regard the Almighty as the partial 
 God of their nation, and the severe judge and 
 enemy of the rest of the world. Their language 
 was : " Among all the multitudes of people, thou, 
 
250 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 O Lord, hast gotten thee one people." " Thou 
 madest the world for our sakes. As for the other 
 people who also come of Adam, thou hast said that 
 they are nothing."* He taught, that " God had so 
 loved THE WORLD as to give his only Son, that 
 every one" (whether Jew or Gentile) " believing in 
 him should not perish, but have eternal life." He 
 presented to view a conception of God, accommo- 
 dated to the weakness of our nature, but which 
 may exhaust the strength of the human intellect 
 in its contemplation. He taught his hearers to 
 regard Him as our Father in heaven, caring for 
 us with more than parental care. " If you, then, 
 though evil, give your children what is good, how 
 much more will your Father in heaven give what 
 is good to those who ask him ! " He spoke of that 
 invisible energy of God which is ever in action, 
 which clothes the flowers of the field in beauty, and 
 without which a sparrow falls not to the ground. 
 He taught his disciples to trust in Him as a Being 
 whose providence nothing escapes, by whom even 
 the hairs of their heads were numbered. In his 
 preaching, our intimate relation to God was con- 
 tinually recognized and insisted upon. He repre- 
 
 * 2Esdrasv. 27; vi. 55, 56. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 251 
 
 sented Him as the moral governor of mankind, with 
 all knowledge and all power to effect His purposes. 
 " He sees what is done in secret, and will reward 
 openly." His will must be the rule of our con- 
 duct. " Not every one who says to me, Master, 
 Master, will enter the kingdom of Heaven ; but 
 he who does the will of my Father in heaven." 
 We are familiar with these words, and they may 
 not at first affect us with all their force. But let 
 us examine them, and we shall find that we can 
 form no higher and juster conception of the man- 
 ner in which a messenger from God to men ought 
 to express himself. They enforce in the strongest 
 terms the necessity of moral virtue as the one thing 
 required to obtain the favor of God, and at the 
 same time convey in the most unaffected manner 
 an impression of the exalted and peculiar dignity 
 of the speaker, and of his complete freedom from 
 all selfish purposes. 
 
 Jesus Christ taught that obedience to God 
 should be a principle of moral conduct maintain- 
 ing supreme authority in the mind, and annihilat- 
 ing, as it were, every consideration which might 
 come in competition with it, whatever its power to 
 allure or to terrify, the love of life and its enjoy- 
 ments, the dread of suffering and of death ; and 
 
252 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 he enforced this requirement in a manner the most 
 solemn and impressive. " I say to you, my friends, 
 Fear not those who kill the body, and after this 
 can do nothing more; but I will instruct you 
 whom to fear: fear Him who has power, after 
 taking away life, to cast into hell ; yea$ I say to 
 you, fear Him." 
 
 This, then, is one distinguishing characteristic 
 of the preaching of Jesus Christ, as it is repre 
 sented by the Evangelists. He continually insists 
 upon a regard to God and his moral government, 
 as the fundamental principle of conduct. Upon 
 this principle all our moral affections and habits 
 are to be founded. The first doctrine of religion, 
 as taught by Christ, is, that God is to be loved 
 with the whole heart and mind. The whole moral 
 nature of man is to be under the government of 
 those affections and principles which result from 
 just conceptions of the Deity, and of our relation 
 to him. If you would detach this truth from the 
 other instructions of Jesus, you must break to 
 pieces and destroy the whole fabric of his religion, 
 leaving nothing but disconnected fragments. 
 
 BUT the being who is thus intimately related to 
 God, how is he to regard himself, and how long 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 253 
 
 is this relation to continue "? It will continue for 
 ever ; he is to regard himself as immortal. We 
 listen to the preaching of Jesus Christ, and the 
 arch of heaven which closed over us, and limited 
 our view to a few objects of this world, rolls away ; 
 all that before surrounded us contracts to a span, 
 and an unlimited prospect is disclosed of scenes 
 the most solemn and splendid, on which we are 
 just about to enter. He continually addresses 
 man as a being of unmeasured powers, who may, 
 nay, who must, indulge in the most glorious expec- 
 tations, who must act habitually under a conscious- 
 ness of his immortality. Look upon the world in 
 which Jesus Christ appeared. It was filled with 
 men sensual, ignorant, debased by their supersti- 
 tions, driven about at the mercy of every passion, 
 unconscious of their nature, engrossed by the 
 objects of this life, scarcely thinking of anything 
 better, and lifting their eyes to contemplate the 
 future only to see death always presenting itself 
 as the termination of all those prospects and pur- 
 suits in which they were most strongly interested. 
 To men such as these, he announced that they 
 were beings of an incomparably higher order than 
 they had imagined themselves ; and that their true 
 interests were of a kind of which they had hardly 
 
254 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 formed a conception. In his preaching, death 
 almost disappeared from view as something un- 
 worthy of regard. " He who puts his trust in me 
 HAS eternal life." " He has passed from death to 
 life." "Whoever obeys my teaching will never 
 see death." 
 
 A short time before his crucifixion, this most 
 extraordinary teacher is represented as having 
 been present with the sisters of a friend whom 
 he loved, and whom they had just laid in the 
 grave. There was everything in their expressions 
 of simple and warm affection, of deep reverence, 
 and of entire trust in his kindness though he had 
 seemed to neglect them, to affect the feelings of 
 one who knew and felt that they who thus loved 
 him were soon to be filled with distress and agony 
 by the horrors of his death, and that to himself all 
 human sympathy would soon only be a new source 
 of pain. He was deeply affected. The whole 
 story is told with perfect nature, and the most 
 touching simplicity. On this occasion, just before 
 presenting himself at that tomb from which he 
 was to recall the dead, he is represented as declar- 
 ing, " I am the resurrection and eternal life. He 
 who has faith in me, though he die, will live ; and 
 whoever lives and has faith in me will never die." 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 255 
 
 It may be said, that these words were never 
 uttered; it may be said, that the character of 
 Christ as displayed in the Gospels is a fiction, 
 and that there is little satisfactory ground for 
 expecting any other existence than the present. 
 Let us allow all this for a moment, and consider 
 what follows. If this be so, then the whole nar- 
 rative, the ascribing to this supposed personage 
 the declaration which I have quoted, under such 
 circumstances, is a conception the most affecting 
 and sublime that ever entered the human mind. 
 It blends together and concentrates in a single 
 sentence the annunciation of a doctrine of the 
 most absorbing interest, and a claim of undefined 
 and overwhelming superiority ; and the expression 
 is at once the most striking and unaffected. We 
 may search long in all poetry and eloquence before 
 we shall discover a parallel to this transcendent 
 burst of genius. It implies an energy of imagina- 
 tion and feeling, which I know not where we 
 shall find displayed except in the Gospels them- 
 selves. 
 
 BUT Jesus Christ did not inculcate the doctrine 
 of immortality merely as a subject of delightful 
 contemplation. He did not teach, as did some of 
 
256 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 the wisest of the ancient philosophers, that, should 
 we exist hereafter, we should certainly exist to be 
 happy. He did not teach anything analogous to 
 what was the prevailing doctrine in his own na- 
 tion, that all the descendants of Israel were, as 
 such, secure of the favor of God. He always ex- 
 hibited the doctrine of immortality in connection 
 with that of the moral government of God ; and 
 thus laid an immovable foundation for the highest 
 and most unworldly virtue. This, then, is another 
 characteristic of his preaching. In addressing men 
 as moral agents, he always addresses them as im- 
 mortal beings. There is in this respect a perfect 
 consistency in his preaching. He never forgets 
 himself so as to speak as if he were addressing 
 mere creatures of this world. The virtue which 
 he required is not the sort of prudential morality 
 which may be learned from the experience of life, 
 but virtue springing from a sense of our relations 
 to God and to eternity. Nothing can be more 
 admirable, and, if we are indeed immortal, nothing 
 can be more reasonable, than the calm, decided, 
 and, if I may so speak, peremptory manner in 
 which he required that the strongest fears and 
 hopes of the present life should give way without 
 resistance to those which regard eternity. "Let 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 257 
 
 him who would be my follower renounce himself, 
 and come after me, bearing his cross. For he who 
 would save his life, will lose it ; and he who may 
 lose his life for my sake, will secure it. What 
 advantage would it be to a man, to gain the whole 
 world with the loss of his life ] " " BLESSED will 
 you be when men shall revile you, and persecute 
 you, and speak all evil against you, falsely, for 
 my sake. REJOICE AND EXULT ; for your reward 
 in heaven will be great." 
 
 IT is to be remembered, that the doctrines of 
 which I have spoken are not truths occasionally 
 adverted to by Jesus Christ, as something not 
 essential to his main purpose. They constitute 
 his religion. They are the doctrines which he 
 came to teach. They are the doctrines to which 
 everything else in his preaching is related, and on 
 which everything depends. He came to reform 
 men, to reconcile them to God, to establish the 
 reign of Heaven ; and these purposes were to be 
 effected by making known to them the true char- 
 acter of God, their relations to Him, and their 
 own nature and destination. These doctrines are 
 the great light which rose upon the nations that 
 were in darkness. He discovered God to men> 
 
 22* 
 
258 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 and made known to them that they were im- 
 mortal. 
 
 IN order to have a just conception of the force of 
 the argument to be derived from these sublime doc- 
 trines, we ought to compare them with those which 
 philosophy had attained before. There is no hea- 
 then teacher who in wisdom and virtue claims a 
 higher rank than Socrates, none between whom 
 and Jesus Christ a parallel may be instituted more 
 fairly. His life forms an era in the history of 
 human improvement. In the record of his dis- 
 courses and instructions preserved by Xenophon, 
 we find much correct, and some false morality ; the 
 whole founded, however, not on very comprehen- 
 sive principles, but on a wise observation of human 
 nature and human life as they lay before him. 
 There are many excellent rules of prudence, and 
 some high and generous sentiments. There are 
 views of the character of the gods, which would be 
 imperfectly true if applied to the one God ; but 
 there is nothing in this work of his very intelli- 
 gent disciple, which affords an intimation that 
 Socrates was not a polytheist. From the writings 
 of Plato, it may be inferred that his master or 
 himself had a conception of one Supreme Being ; 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 259 
 
 but amid the obscurity and the extravagant imagi- 
 nations of that Dialogue in which this conception 
 is particularly developed, it is impossible to dis- 
 cern any definite representation of the Divinity 
 corresponding to what is so clearly presented in 
 the Gospels. The morality of Socrates, as far as 
 it appears in the Memorabilia of Xenophon, is 
 based on the relations of man in the present life, 
 and not at all upon the relations of man to eter- 
 nity. It is true that in the writings of Plato, and 
 especially in that beautiful Dialogue which con- 
 tains the discourse of Socrates on the day of his 
 death, he is represented as believing and teaching 
 the immortality of the soul. In that Dialogue 
 there is a passage which stands out a brightly 
 illuminated point above the common level of hea- 
 then philosophy. It is a distinct and eloquent 
 recognition of the sanctions of the future life as 
 considerations of the highest importance to govern 
 our conduct in the present. It might have been 
 written by a Christian ; but in the writings of a 
 Christian it would be passed over without particu- 
 lar notice. That Socrates should afterward speak 
 doubtfully of the doctrines which he had main- 
 tained, is not, perhaps, strange. But it is with 
 strong feelings of surprise and disappointment 
 
260 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 that we become convinced that the immortality 
 which he taught was an immortality without con- 
 tinued consciousness ; an immortality of the soul, 
 but not of the individual; an immortality in which 
 the spiritual part was to pass through successive 
 changes, losing at each transition the memory of 
 its former state.* After this, it is not matter of 
 much wonder, that the whole should appear to 
 have been father a delightful poetic vision, than a 
 sober and practical speculation. Nor is it surpris- 
 ing to find, when Plato is with difficulty, and, it 
 may be thought, without success, endeavoring to 
 prove that a man should retain his integrity, to 
 whatever evils it may expose him, that he makes 
 no reference to the future life ; that he does not 
 think of saying, with Jesus Christ, " For your re- 
 ward in heaven will be great." 
 
 The speculations of Plato seem often rather a 
 play of the imagination than an exercise of the 
 understanding, and have often probably but a re- 
 mote relation to the practical philosophy of his 
 master. In his Dialogues, Socrates is introduced, 
 like the other speakers, as a dramatic personage. 
 
 * [The passage of Plato here referred to (Phaedo, cc. 129, 130, p. 
 107, C.) is quoted, with remarks, in the Evidences of the Genuineness 
 of the Gospels, Vol. IH. pp. 111-113, note.] 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 261 
 
 Of the real discourses of that philosopher, those 
 discourses which took such strong hold on the 
 minds of men, we have, I conceive, a fair specimen 
 in the Memorabilia, perhaps the most remarkable 
 book which has come down to us from heathen 
 antiquity. In its form and purpose it bears no 
 inconsiderable resemblance to the Gospels. In 
 the latter, however, we have the doctrines and 
 instructions of Christ recorded by four unlettered 
 men ; while in the former we have those of Socra- 
 tes preserved by a philosopher, writing with Attic 
 elegance. We may, then, institute a comparison 
 between them. The Memorabilia contains many 
 correct views of the relations of man to man, some 
 notices of the supposed goodness and wisdom of 
 imagined superior powers, and just directions for 
 attaining our true dignity and happiness, men be- 
 ing regarded only as beings of this world, but 
 still as moral and intellectual beings. Turn now 
 to the Gospels, and consider the doctrines which 
 are there displayed. Forget, as far as you can, all 
 those conceptions with which you have been famil- 
 iar from childhood, and which you have received 
 directly or indirectly from these very works. Come 
 to their study in the state of mind which you may 
 suppose to have been that of an enlightened Hea- 
 
262 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 then who should in any way have become con- 
 vinced of their truth ; and thus lay yourself open, 
 as far as you are able, to a full impression of the 
 overpowering sublimity of the truths which they 
 contain. In reading the work of Xenophon, our 
 state of mind may resemble that of one passing 
 through a pleasant and well-cultivated country, 
 who sees everywhere proofs of convenience and 
 comfort and human ingenuity. In the study of 
 the Gospels, if we do indeed fully comprehend 
 and feel the doctrines which were taught by 
 Christ, our emotions will be like those of a trav- 
 eller placed where the eternal objects of nature 
 rise around him in their grandeur and awfulness, 
 from whose view the works of man with all their 
 littleness have disappeared, and upon whom the 
 feeling comes that he is alone with God. 
 
 LET us now consider what there is characteristic 
 in the moral principles which Jesus Christ is rep- 
 resented by the Evangelists as having inculcated, 
 and which all the doctrines and sanctions of his 
 religion are intended to support and enforce. The 
 morality which he taught is the most pure and 
 comprehensive. It was taught to a world lying in 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 263 
 
 ignorance and wickedness ; and it coincides with 
 the last results of the most enlightened philoso- 
 phy. It was taught eighteen hundred years ago ; 
 yet so extensive are its requirements, that they 
 are still but imperfectly comprehended by many 
 of Christ's disciples. I do not say that they are 
 imperfectly obeyed, this would be universally 
 true, but that there are many by whom they are 
 but partially understood. This is not because 
 they are expressed obscurely, or because they 
 breathe any spirit of fanaticism, or require any 
 course of conduct opposed to nature and reason. 
 It is because there are many who do not under- 
 stand their own nature, their true interest, and 
 their relations to their fellow-creatures. 
 
 We render to every man his due ; we violate 
 no man's rights ; there is no one who can com- 
 plain that we have injured him; we have broken 
 no one of the commandments. All this is very 
 well ; and we fancy, perhaps, that we have fulfilled 
 our obligations. But if this be the whole of our 
 goodness, we are yet very far from the virtue re- 
 quired by Jesus Christ. We do no evil; we are 
 required to exert ourselves habitually to do good. 
 There is a demand upon us for the most disinter- 
 ested and the most active benevolence. He who 
 
264: INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 would be a disciple of Christ must acquire the 
 virtue of Christian charity. He must blend and 
 lose his individual interests in those of his fam- 
 ily, his friends, his country, and mankind. It is 
 the business of a Christian to render services to 
 his fellow-men. "Let him who would be great 
 among you minister to you, and let him who would 
 be chief among you be your servant." What min 
 istry and what services are required appears from 
 the example proposed for imitation in the words 
 which follow: "Even as the Son of Man came 
 not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life 
 to ransom many." " Do good and lend, hoping 
 for nothing in return." " Do to others whatever 
 you would that they should do to you." " I was 
 hungry, and you gave me food ; thirsty, and you 
 gave me drink ; a stranger, and you received me 
 into your houses; naked, and you clothed me; 
 sick, and you took care of me ; in prison, and you 
 came to me In doing so to one of the hum- 
 blest of these my brothers, you did so to me." 
 
 But what are the limits of this charity, as it was 
 inculcated by Jesus Christ I It has none. It 
 must form itself upon the model of the infinite 
 goodness of the common Father. It must tri- 
 umph over inveterate prejudices and bitter hostil- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 265 
 
 ity ; the Samaritan is the neighbor of the Jew. 
 It must forget insult and persecution and cruelty ; 
 and when the occasion of rendering good for evil 
 has come, it must regard an enemy merely as 
 an erring and unhappy fellow-creature, for whose 
 benefit and improvement it is our duty to labor. 
 "You have heard that it was said, Thou shalt 
 love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I 
 say to you, Love your enemies, bless them who 
 curse you, do good to those who hate you, and 
 pray for those who harass and persecute you ; that 
 you maybe children of your Father in heaven; 
 for he causes his sun to rise on the bad and on the 
 good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the 
 unrighteous." The production of happiness is the 
 only ultimate end of the operations of God ; and 
 if we would secure his favor, and attain the perfec- 
 tion of our nature, we must be fellow-workers 
 with God. 
 
 One can scarcely avoid feeling some reluctance 
 to state the extent of these requirements, when he 
 looks around, and sees how imperfectly they have 
 been obeyed; how imperfectly they are obeyed; 
 how many seem scarcely to have a notion of their 
 existence, and how many there are who look with 
 a sort of compassionate or contemptuous superior- 
 
266 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ity upon all conduct which cannot be resolved into 
 prudent selfishness, satisfied with their own sa- 
 gacity, proud of their success, and regarding " the 
 wisdom which is from above " only as the notion 
 of men weak, enthusiastic, and ignorant of the 
 world. 
 
 Compare the precepts of Jesus Christ with the 
 moral principles, and, if you are willing to go still 
 further, with the moral practice of the age in 
 which they were delivered ; compare his code of 
 duty with the conceptions which men have derived 
 from their natural sentiments operated upon by 
 the circumstances common to us all ; and it will be 
 perceived that it is indeed a wonderful system of 
 morals. It coincides, as I have said, with the last 
 results of enlightened philosophy; but it is be- 
 cause philosophy has been enlightened and guided 
 by these very precepts inculcated in the Gospels. 
 How does it happen, for this, it must be recol- 
 lected, is the question before us,, how does it 
 happen that these precepts are found in the Gos- 
 pels ^ How was it that the writers of these books 
 formed a conception of such a teacher as they 
 have described'? 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 267 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST AS IT APPEARS IN THE GOSPELS. 
 (CONTINUED.) 
 
 SECTION II. 
 His Personal Character. 
 
 IN the conception of a divine teacher, much 
 more is required than that his doctrines and in- 
 structions should be worthy of God ; and, conform- 
 ably to this remark, the personal character which 
 in the Gospels is ascribed to Jesus Christ is most 
 striking and original. At the same time, there is 
 such an air of truth in these writings, that, what- 
 ever may be any one's doubts or opinions, he can 
 hardly read them attentively without a strong feel- 
 ing that he is reading a narrative of real events, 
 and without conceiving of the character of Christ 
 as one which actually existed. He is represented 
 as not only destitute of all advantages of rank or 
 station, but, still more, as placed in circumstances 
 
268 INTEKNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 which might expose him to contempt and derision ; 
 yet he constantly appears as maintaining an im- 
 measurable superiority over all other men, by the 
 moral force and dignity of his character. Every- 
 thing in his words and actions is just to the origi- 
 nal conception. He makes claim to the highest 
 authority, calmly, without effort or exaggeration. 
 He announces himself as connected with God in 
 a manner in which no other human being ever 
 was ; but he is able to support himself on the ele- 
 vation which he assumes. There is no taint of 
 human weakness, of vanity or arrogance, in his 
 declarations or actions. On the contrary, he re- 
 gards nothing as humiliating, but what in truth is 
 so. He converses with tax-gatherers and sinners, 
 because his office was to call sinners to reforma- 
 tion. He is content to be surrounded with a com- 
 pany of poor, ignorant Apostles; but they had, 
 or might be formed to have, the moral qualities 
 required in the future ministers of his religion. 
 He travels about in poverty, having no habitation 
 of his own " where to lay his head." He does it, 
 because it was required by the nature of those 
 duties which he had to perform ; and especially in 
 order that, by the example of his own poverty, he 
 might destroy in the most effectual manner all 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 269 
 
 worldly expectations in those who were disposed 
 to join him. He washes the feet of his disciples. 
 There may be abundant ostentation in pretended 
 humility, but there is none here; his object was 
 to give his disciples a lesson which it is evident 
 they needed. In all his actions there is a com- 
 posed, unaffected dignity ; a steady regard to the 
 high purposes of his mission; a perfect corre- 
 spondence between his conduct and his claims. 
 This character is particularly discovered in the 
 exercise of his supernatural powers. He performs 
 the most astonishing miracles, but there is noth- 
 ing of theatrical display. " He was loved by the 
 Father, and the Father had shown him how to do 
 what he himself does." He appears like one of 
 whom this declaration is true ; like one too highly 
 favored by God to be affected by the admiration 
 and astonishment of men. 
 
 I WILL not here repeat what I have had occa- 
 sion to remark before on the distinctive character 
 of his miracles ; but it is proper to observe, that 
 if we suppose no miracles to have been performed, 
 and the narratives of them to be consequently a 
 work of imagination, then the difficult question 
 arises, how it happened that the writers of the Gos- 
 
 23 
 
270 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 pels conceived with such truth the character which 
 the miracles of a messenger from God ought to 
 have, when all other narrators of fictitious miracles 
 have failed so glaringly in every similar attempt. 
 
 BUT in the wonderful history contained in the 
 Gospels there are other traits as striking as 
 those which I have mentioned. Consider, for in- 
 stance, the whole character of Christ's discourses 
 in reference to that object, which, from the nature 
 of the case, he must have had first in view, the 
 gaining of followers and disciples. He uses no 
 arts of seduction. He takes no advantage of the 
 prejudices or passions of those about him. In so 
 far as they were mischievous and evil, he makes no 
 compromise with them. He meets and opposes 
 the darling hopes, the cherished selfishness, and 
 the inveterate and consecrated errors of his coun- 
 trymen, with a tone of authority the most direct 
 and absolute. He speaks to his hearers, in the 
 plainest language, of the hypocrisy and of the 
 vices of those whom they had been accustomed to 
 reverence for their reputed sanctity, and to regard 
 as leaders and examples. He admits but one 
 claim, and demands but one requisite, to his favor, 
 a sincere purpose of obedience to God. He repels 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 271 
 
 from him those who come with any worldly views. 
 There can be nothing more decisive than the lan- 
 guage in which he annihilates all earthly expecta- 
 tions, and presents to his disciples a distinct image 
 of the life of suffering and danger on which they 
 were about to enter. " They will revile you, they 
 will persecute you ; they will speak all evil against 
 you, falsely, for my sake " ; " they will scourge you 
 in their synagogues"; "brother will deliver up 
 brother to death, and the father his child. .... 
 You will be hated by all men for my sake." 
 " He who kills you will think that he is offering 
 a sacrifice to God." 
 
 What shall we say to the conception of a 
 teacher, who is represented as making such pre- 
 dictions to his disciples 1 Is it drawn from real- 
 ity ? or are we indebted to the genius of certain 
 unknown writers for this extraordinary delinea- 
 tion'? 
 
 Let us attend to another example of his mode 
 of addressing those who came to him : " Let him 
 who would be my follower renounce himself, and 
 come after me, bearing his cross." The Common 
 Version, in rendering "deny himself," expresses 
 nothing like the force of the original, which im- 
 plies a total putting off of all selfish affections. 
 
272 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 We are familiar with the figure of " taking up the 
 cross," and the figurative meaning of these words 
 is, for the most part, the only one which presents 
 itself to our minds. "We can hardly feel the im- 
 pression which it must have made upon those to 
 whom the horrible torture of crucifixion, as in- 
 flicted upon the most wretched outcasts of society, 
 was not an uncommon spectacle. He who was to 
 suffer this dreadful death was compelled to bear 
 his cross to the place of execution. It is to this 
 that Christ alludes. No form of words could rep- 
 resent to his followers with more fearful distinct- 
 ness, that they were to prepare themselves for 
 torture and death. 
 
 If it be allowed that these predictions and 
 declarations were really uttered by Jesus Christ, 
 it must be admitted, I think, that he could have 
 gained no proselytes to a life of severe privation 
 and suffering, few converts to the endurance of 
 insults, stripes, and rancorous persecution, except 
 by the most satisfactory evidence that he had 
 something to promise as a compensation, or, in 
 other words, by the clearest and most irresisti- 
 ble proofs of his divine mission and authority. 
 But if it be admitted that he gave such proofs, we 
 arrive at once at the conclusion which we wish to 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 273 
 
 reach ; for there will then be no reason to doubt, 
 that the whole representation of him given in 
 the Gospels is drawn from reality. If it be said, 
 on the other hand, that these words were not 
 uttered by Christ, but were put into his mouth by 
 the writers of these histories, still it must be con- 
 ceded that they correspond with admirable truth 
 to the original conception of him as a messenger 
 from God. He appears as he ought ; clearly an- 
 nouncing to his disciples what they must prepare 
 themselves to suffer; furnishing them, indeed, 
 with the strongest motives to endurance, but 
 motives which touched upon nothing earthly; 
 and preparing them for that hard warfare, in 
 which they were to be the victims, against the 
 vices and passions of men, against obstinate super- 
 stition and malignant bigotry. It is to be recol- 
 lected, likewise, that he speaks, with this severe 
 calmness, of suffering which pressed equally upon 
 himself and upon his disciples. It was for his sake 
 that they would be hated. The conception of him 
 is perfectly just, and in such a case as the present, 
 this is saying very much ; but it is not saying all 
 that we ought. It exhibits a simple and awful 
 composure of mind, compared with which all the 
 poetical representations of Roman stoicism appear 
 
274 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 like mere displays for the theatre. The conception 
 of Jesus Christ calling all men to come to him, 
 and at the same time thus distinctly forewarning 
 them of the earthly fate which awaited equally his 
 followers and himself, if it be not derived from 
 reality, implies a boldness and originality of imagi- 
 nation of which there is no other example. 
 
 IT is as a messenger of God, that Jesus Christ 
 is exhibited in the Gospels ; and his conduct and 
 discourses during the time of his ministry princi- 
 pally have relation to his office. He seldom 
 appears as acting in the common relations of 
 man to man, or under circumstances very anal- 
 ogous to those in which other men may be placed. 
 Comparatively speaking, we see but little of his 
 private character (to use these words in their 
 strictest sense) till the closing scenes of his life, 
 when it breaks forth with unspeakable splendor. 
 Wherever it elsewhere appears, it corresponds to 
 that moral perfection which he manifested in the 
 execution of his peculiar office. In relation to 
 this subject, as well as to others of which I have 
 spoken, there are passages which, as they stand in 
 the Common Version, require explanation, though, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 275 
 
 even if left unexplained, they may not essentially 
 affect our conclusions. But, in regard to the char- 
 acter of Christ, I will here notice one or two 
 concerning which I think the most difficulty may 
 be felt. 
 
 AT the marriage feast at Cana, when the mother 
 of Jesus informs him that the wine is spent, there 
 seems something harsh in his reply: "Woman, 
 what have you to do with me I * My hour has 
 not yet come." But it may be observed, in the 
 first place, that the forms of courtesy, being arbi- 
 trary, vary at different times, and in different 
 countries ; and that to address one by the appel- 
 lation of Woman was not considered disrespectful 
 by the ancients.t By the words, " What have you 
 to do with mel" our Saviour undoubtedly intended 
 to repress all interference of his mother with the 
 exercise of his miraculous powers. Our concep- 
 tions of her are principally formed from the beau- 
 tiful fictions of poetry and painting, in which 
 
 " holiest Mary bends 
 In virgin beauty o'er her blessed babe." 
 
 * Or, " why do you trouble me ? " It is thus that the words should 
 be rendered, not, as in the Common Version, " What have I to do with 
 thee?" 
 
 f [See John xix. 26.] 
 
276 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 There is, indeed, no reason to doubt the real excel- 
 lence of her character; but there is as little doubt, 
 that she entertained the common belief of her 
 countrymen respecting a Messiah who was to be 
 the greatest of princes, far more glorious than his 
 ancestor David. With this belief, trusting that 
 her son was the Messiah, it was scarcely possible 
 that she should not entertain hopes and feelings 
 very inconsistent with what was really to be his 
 fate and her own. The mother of the prince of 
 Israel and of the world must have looked forward 
 to something very different from a life of obscurity 
 and suffering. Moreover, it was not in human na- 
 ture that she should not have had some disposition 
 to exert over her son the authority and influence 
 of a mother. But, in the exercise of his office as 
 the minister of God, it was impossible for him to 
 yield to any human direction. The narrative we 
 are considering implies that she wished him, on 
 the occasion recorded, to make some display of his 
 supernatural powers, or, at least, in some way to 
 manifest himself as the Messiah; and it implies 
 also that she had previously urged him to do so. 
 Without the last supposition, we cannot account 
 for our Saviour's putting the sense which he obvi- 
 ously did upon the very slight intimation of his 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 277 
 
 mother ; nor for her subsequent direction to the 
 servants soon after the discouragement she had 
 received. It was to repress those feelings and 
 dispositions of his mother which I have just de- 
 scribed, feelings and dispositions which could only 
 serve to aggravate her future sufferings, that our 
 Saviour made the answer recorded. It was repel- 
 ling, but it was intended to save her some of the 
 anguish of disappointment; and the nature of his 
 office rendered it necessary to repress all interfer- 
 ence on her part. He was compelled to separate 
 himself in some degree from her, both for her own 
 sake, and because his duties were such as did not 
 admit of his receiving her counsel, or being affected 
 by her influence. He had, probably, announced 
 to her before, that his ministry would be exercised 
 in poverty and suffering, and terminated in a short 
 time by a cruel death ; and she, like his disciples 
 at a subsequent period, had been unable to con- 
 form her mind to the comprehension and belief of 
 what was so utterly foreign to all her previous 
 conceptions respecting the Messiah. It is to his 
 last sufferings that he alludes in the words, " My 
 hour has not yet come.' M His purpose in these 
 
 * The reasons for understanding these words in the sense above as- 
 signed are, first, that the expression is elsewhere in St. John's Gospel 
 24 
 
278 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 words I conceive to have been to bring forcibly 
 home to the mind of his mother what he had be- 
 fore declared to her respecting the intimate con- 
 nection between his office and his death ; and the 
 brief interval which was to intervene between his 
 assuming the former, and his submitting to the 
 latter. Their force is this: "Why do you urge 
 me to manifest myself as the Messiah 1 The hour 
 for my last sufferings has not yet come." 
 
 Having, however, repressed the interference of 
 his mother, it seems to have been partly in com- 
 pliance with her wishes that he performed a mir- 
 acle on this occasion. The miracle itself has been 
 objected to, as giving encouragement to intemper- 
 ance. This charge, however, it must, I think, be 
 allowed, is very inconsistent with the whole char- 
 acter and life of Christ. It is not likely that there 
 was any excess at an entertainment where the wine 
 was deficient through the poverty of the host, as 
 appears to have been the case in the present in- 
 
 used in this sense, as in ch. vii. 30 (and so viii. 20), "No one laid 
 hands on him, for his hour had not yet come " ; xiii. 1, "But Jesus 
 knew that the hour had come for him to pass from this world to the 
 Father"; xvii. 1, "Father, the hour has come": and, secondly, 
 because this sense suits with the connection and .circumstances of the 
 case, which no other that has been proposed seems to me to do. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 279 
 
 stance. When the master of the feast says, " Men 
 commonly produce their good wine first, and, when 
 the guests have drunk freely,* then that which is 
 poorer," he merely mentions a common custom, 
 from which nothing can be inferred respecting the 
 temperance of the guests on the present occasion, 
 or indeed on any other to which his remark might 
 apply, except that it seems a rule rather adapted to 
 check than to promote excess. Intoxication is not 
 a vice to which inhabitants of a warm climate are 
 disposed. The wine used at this time was probably 
 drunk with the meal, rather than subsequent to 
 it ; and we must not transfer to the feast of a poor 
 family in Galilee notions derived from the luxu- 
 rious entertainments of ancient or modern times. 
 Especially we must recollect, that an evident mir- 
 acle was the least likely of all events to promote 
 thoughtless and improper indulgence. 
 
 OUR Saviour's treatment of the Syro-Phcenician 
 woman who besought him to cure her daughter, 
 also requires some explanation.! It is to be recol- 
 
 * Thus the word in the original is to be understood, in the connec- 
 tion in which it stands. In its primary, etymological sense, it means 
 nothing more than " to drink wine," being derived from pedv, "wine." 
 
 f See Matthew xv. 21-29 ; Mark vii. 24-31. 
 
280 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 lected, that his disciples at this time shared in the 
 common narrow prejudices of the Jews in respect 
 to other nations. They would have been dissatis- 
 fied, their feelings would have revolted, if their 
 Master, the Jewish Messiah, had at once performed 
 a miracle for the benefit of a Heathen. By his 
 delay, by suffering her to importune him without 
 an answer, their natural feelings of humanity were 
 left to operate in her favor. They themselves at 
 last take her part, and ask him to " send her away 
 satisfied " ; for their words may express this mean- 
 ing ; and that this was in fact their meaning ap- 
 pears from the reply of Christ. By what he fur- 
 ther said, he gave her an opportunity of showing 
 herself, not merely an object of compassion, but of 
 approbation. He thus afforded her a new source 
 of gratification, and the incident at the same time 
 tended still further to enlarge the feelings of his 
 disciples. The interest which they took in her 
 case, and the praise of her which their Master ex- 
 pressed, must have served to break down their 
 illiberal prejudices. It is be observed, likewise, 
 that the words of Christ have a different effect in 
 the original from what they have as rendered in 
 the Common Version, " It is not meet to take 
 the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs." The 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 281 
 
 last word, in the original, is a diminutive, one 
 
 of that class of diminutives which is commonly 
 
 used in expressions of familiarity or endearment. 
 
 It properly denotes those little dogs which were 
 
 kept as playthings. It is evident whj 
 
 air is given to the whole 
 
 stance. (ftllTIVE RSIT7, 
 
 ^^v 
 
 THE miraculous cure of the Ga< 
 niacs was accompanied by the destruction of a 
 herd of swine ; which was of course a considera- 
 ble loss to the owner.* The miracle forms in this 
 respect an exception to the common, purely benefi- 
 cent character of the miracles ascribed to Christ. 
 I am inclined to think that there was some evi- 
 dent, specific reason for the infliction of this loss, 
 which does not appear in the narrative. The flesh 
 of swine was a food prohibited by the Jewish Law, 
 and if the owner*, as seems most probable, was a 
 Jew, he manifested in keeping them a disregard 
 to the precepts of his religion. We are not 
 obliged, however, to have recourse to any expla- 
 nation of this sort. It is only necessary to recur to 
 general principles. A miracle is, properly speak- 
 
 * See Matthew viii. 28-34 ; Mark v. 1-20 ; Luke viii. 26-39. 
 24* 
 
282 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 ing, an act of God. The human agent to whom 
 we may refer it is merely an ostensible agent, and is 
 to be regarded solely as the minister of God. But 
 of the acts of God we must judge upon very differ- 
 ent principles from those which we apply to the 
 acts of men. When, in the common course of his 
 providence, he deprives us of our possessions, we 
 believe that he does it in infinite wisdom and 
 goodness. It is equally consistent with his wis- 
 dom and goodness, that he should do the same by 
 a miracle. The circumstance that the act is mi- 
 raculous does not in any degree affect its character 
 in other respects. In the exercise of perfect recti- 
 tude and benevolence, God may do, and is contin- 
 ually doing, what it would be most unjust and 
 injurious for one human being to do to another. 
 *N"ow it is not the act of a human being, but the 
 act of God, which we are considering. It was not 
 Christ, but God, who inflicted this loss ; and, viewed 
 in this light, all inquiry respecting the particular 
 cause why it was inflicted, and all discussion of its 
 reason or justice in reference to the owner, are as 
 much out of place as they would be concerning a 
 fire, or a shipwreck, or an earthquake. But, put- 
 ting the question respecting the loss of the owner 
 out of view, there is a reason which may be as- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 283 
 
 signed for the destruction of the animals. It 
 served at once to render the reality of the mira- 
 cle evident and indisputable, and to give it greater 
 notoriety. It does not appear that Christ was at 
 any subsequent period in the country of the Gad- 
 arenes ; his present visit was very short, and it 
 was desirable, therefore, to produce at once a strong 
 impression, and to excite general attention to his 
 ministry. The miracle was of a nature particularly 
 adapted to effect these purposes. That these pur- 
 poses were intended may appear from the direc- 
 tion of Christ to the person whom he had cured, 
 whom he would not suffer to accompany him ; but 
 whom, contrary to his usual practice, he directed 
 to return, and to publish what great things had 
 been done for him. 
 
 WITH one exception, which I shall notice im- 
 mediately, I have now mentioned all those pas- 
 sages concerning which I have at any time felt 
 the most difficulty myself. But these passages are 
 to be viewed under another aspect than that in 
 which we have hitherto regarded them. They 
 serve essentially to strengthen our present argu- 
 ment. They are among those striking and deci- 
 sive proofs, which the Gospels everywhere furnish, 
 
284 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of the fact that their writers had no purpose of 
 deceiving by the display of an imaginary character. 
 It is evident that they had no powers and no 
 habits of mind which would lead them to attempt, 
 or which would enable them, if they did attempt, 
 to produce an effect upon the minds of men by a 
 correct and striking exhibition of beautiful imagi- 
 nations and ideas of their own, well disposed and 
 fitted to each other. But it is, perhaps, even more 
 evident that they had no purpose of this sort ; for, 
 with this purpose, they would never have inserted 
 narratives like those on which we have been com- 
 menting, which present at first view such difficul- 
 ties, and are so liable to objection. They could 
 have had no motive for inserting them but the 
 truth. So far from accommodating their narrative 
 to any abstract conception of what a divine teacher 
 ought to be, they seem never to have formed an 
 abstract conception of wiiat the character of Christ 
 really was. They give no summary view of it ; they 
 do not attempt to generalize their observations in 
 a single instance. They afford us no knowledge 
 of it except by their very brief accounts of what 
 he did and what he said, and of what was done 
 and said by others in relation to him. In these 
 accounts their style is inartificial and defective. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 285 
 
 They write like uneducated men, to whom com- 
 position is an unusual and difficult effort, and 
 who, on account of the labor of writing, express 
 themselves but imperfectly, omit all that is not 
 essential, and leave much unexplained that re- 
 quires explanation. Acquainted with all the par- 
 ticular circumstances of each event which they 
 relate, they seem never to have placed themselves 
 in the situation of readers to whom these circum- 
 stances might not be known, nor to have consid- 
 ered how the narrative might appear to them, or 
 what difficulties and objections might arise in their 
 minds. There are the most evident marks of the 
 absence of all contrivance and all aim at effect. 
 They give no explanations, except a very few quite 
 unimportant. They scarcely make any comments, 
 or point out anything to the observation of the 
 reader. No composition was ever more inartifi- 
 cially put together than their histories. They 
 seem never to have had a thought of making one 
 thing so bear upon and illustrate another as to 
 produce a harmonious whole. When we find, 
 therefore, that from their entire narratives, viewed 
 either separately or together, there results a most 
 wonderful, original, and consistent exhibition of 
 character, it is impossible to ascribe this to any 
 other cause than that they drew from reality. 
 
286 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 There is, without doubt, an air of perfect sim- 
 plicity and truth, which gives a charm to these 
 writings, in the absence of all the common excel- 
 lences of composition. But the character which 
 belongs to them is not, perhaps, that which we 
 might at first view expect or desire. We may be 
 tempted to wish that the life and doctrines of 
 Jesus Christ had been described and explained by 
 such writers as Xenophon and Plato. But the 
 wise providence of God has ordered it otherwise ; 
 and has so ordered it, that the records of our relig- 
 ion carry with them independent evidence of their 
 own authenticity. We are compelled to believe 
 that what the Evangelists have told us is true, be- 
 cause their very writings afford satisfactory proof 
 that they had no ability to conceive and describe 
 what they have told us, if it had not been true. 
 The genius of Xenophon might have enabled him 
 to imagine and delineate the character which he 
 has ascribed to Socrates ; and there is nothing in 
 the discourses of his master which transcends the 
 powers of the disciple. In believing his account, 
 therefore, w r e have to rely upon his veracity, for 
 which we think we have sufficient evidence, and 
 which we find confirmed by some collateral testi- 
 mony. But as regards the writers of the Gospels, 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 287 
 
 we have not only other and much stronger proof 
 of their veracity, but we have, still further, proof 
 of their entire inability to have conceived and 
 exhibited the character and discourses of Christ 
 by any effort of their own power. They must 
 be simple historians, because the splendid fiction 
 which we have otherwise to suppose, if it lies 
 within the possible limits of human genius, was 
 very far removed from the sphere of their minds. 
 
 I HAVE referred to one other passage beside 
 those which I have noticed, as seeming to me to 
 present a difficulty. It is the cry of our Saviour 
 on the cross, which is rendered in the Common 
 Version, " My God, my God, why hast thou for- 
 saken me 1 " * These w r ords may appear, at first 
 sight, to be a mere exclamation, forced from him 
 by the extremity of torture, and having something 
 of the character of impatience and complaint. If 
 this were so, all that could be said would be, that 
 his strength failed for a moment under the most 
 excruciating sufferings. But I am, for various rea- 
 sons, persuaded that the words uttered by Christ 
 are not to be so considered. In the first place, 
 
 * Matthew xxvii. 46 ; Mark xv. 34. 
 
288 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 such an expression is inconsistent with his char- 
 acter as it always appears elsewhere, and particu- 
 larly with those striking proofs of fortitude and 
 self-possession which he really exhibited during 
 his last sufferings. In the next place, it seems to 
 me repugnant to the strongest principles of human 
 nature, that he should have uttered these words in 
 the sense supposed. His cross was surrounded by 
 enemies, reviling and insulting him, and taunting 
 him with being abandoned by God. Supposing 
 his self-command not to have been entirely broken 
 down, it must have been abhorrent to every feeling 
 and to every motive which might act upon his 
 mind for him to heighten their triumph and to 
 harden them in their guilt, by proclaiming with a 
 loud voice a sense of his being forsaken by God. 
 But, in the last place, I think the words admit of 
 a very different explanation, suited to his character 
 and to the circumstances in which they were ut- 
 tered. We may first observe, then, that the word 
 "forsaken," which stands in the Common Version 
 and in all the other principal English translations 
 into which I-have looked, does not correspond to 
 the original word. It has an associated, secon- 
 dary meaning, which that word, as I conceive, is 
 not intended to express. " To forsake " a person 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 289 
 
 means, not simply to leave him, but to leave him 
 through indifference or dislike, or from the opera- 
 tion of some selfish feeling, as fear of common 
 danger; but the term in the original has not 
 necessarily this meaning. The words of Christ, 
 therefore, should be rendered without convey- 
 ing this associated idea: "My God! my God! 
 why hast thou left me?" These are the first 
 words of the twenty-second Psalm ; and we must 
 here recollect several circumstances which may 
 not at once occur to the mind. First, David was 
 regarded by the Jews with the highest veneration. 
 He was considered as a type of the Messiah ; and 
 many of his Psalms were viewed by them as appli- 
 cable to himself, indeed, in their primary sense, 
 but, in their secondary and higher sense, as pro- 
 phetic of the Messiah. Secondly, the Jews were 
 so familiar with their Scriptures, and especially 
 with the Psalms, that the quotation of a small 
 portion of a passage was sufficient to remind 
 them of the remainder. The first verse of a 
 Psalm would bring the whole to their recollec- 
 tion. Thirdly, they were strongly disposed to 
 consider temporal prosperity and affliction as 
 proofs of the favor and of the displeasure of God. 
 The very circumstance that Christ was suffering 
 
 25 
 
290 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 so ignominious and cruel a death was, in their 
 state of feeling towards him, sufficient proof to 
 them that he- was an object of God's wrath. Even 
 the faith of most of his disciples was, there is no 
 doubt, prostrated, at least for a season, by thus 
 seeing their Messiah expiring in torture amid the 
 triumph of his enemies. A crucified Messiah! 
 There was no conception at which a Jew would 
 have revolted with greater horror. 
 
 This being the state of mind of those by whom 
 his cross was surrounded, our Saviour called out 
 with a loud voice, " My God ! my God ! why hast 
 thou left me ? " What would be the natural effect 
 of this exclamation upon the multitude ? It at 
 once brought to their minds the whole Psalm, 
 many parts of which were so strikingly applicable 
 to the sufferer before them. They would under- 
 stand him as applying these passages to himself. 
 Yet this Psalm they believed to have been written 
 by David, and that monarch was the type of the 
 Messiah. Was it so certain, then, that he who 
 could adopt and apply to himself the words of Da- 
 vid was an object of God's displeasure] Was it 
 certain that he was not the Messiah ? Why did 
 his sufferings, any more than the sufferings of 
 David, prove him to be an outcast from God? 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 291 
 
 But the words themselves are the language of 
 strong habitual trust in the favor of God. This 
 feeling is expressed in the repetition of the address, 
 " My God, my God." Imagine a sinner, a male- 
 factor, such as the Jews believed our Saviour to 
 be, thus addressing the Almighty, and you cannot 
 but be struck with the entire inconsistency of 
 the address with such a character. "Why hast 
 thou left me?" That is, Why hast thou left me 
 to suffer? The form of expostulation is to be 
 referred to the bold and passionate style of the 
 East, and the simple meaning is nothing more 
 than what we should express in colder language 
 by saying, " It is through thy appointment, O God, 
 that I suffer." In using the words which he did, 
 our Saviour adopted the language of David for 
 the purpose of bringing the whole Psalm from 
 which he quoted to the minds of those who heard 
 him. In this Psalm there are strong expressions 
 of confidence in God, and the words themselves, 
 which he uttered so that all around him might 
 hear, were meant, not to express a sense of his 
 being forsaken, but to convey to them the senti- 
 ment of his habitual trust in God, and his knowl- 
 edge that his sufferings were by God's appointment. 
 Such, I believe, would be the natural effect of his 
 
292 GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 
 
 words ; what I have stated being their true sense. 
 An address to God like that made by Christ 
 would be wholly incongruous in the mouth of a 
 person who did not feel that he was habitually an 
 object of God's peculiar care and favor. The very 
 form of expostulation marks its character in this 
 respect more strongly. The words were uttered 
 by Christ, like his prayer on another occasion, "for 
 the sake of the people who stood by, that they 
 might believe that God had sent him." Just be- 
 fore expiring he thus professed, for the last time, 
 what he had in his ministry such frequent occa- 
 sion to profess, his confidence in God, and his 
 reference of all his actions and sufferings to Him. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 ON THE ADAPTATION OF THE DISCOURSES OF CHRIST 
 TO THE CHARACTER AND CONDITION OF THE JEWS, 
 AND TO THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH HE WAS 
 PLACED. 
 
 A CONSIDERATION of the character and condition 
 of the people to whom our Lord was sent, and of 
 the circumstances in which he was placed, is neces- 
 sary to the formation of correct views respecting 
 the design and the excellence of his discourses as 
 a teacher of religion and morality. His teachings 
 will excite much stronger admiration when we 
 consider them in these relations, than when we 
 regard them merely in the abstract, as general 
 commendations or precepts of virtue and piety. 
 In the former case, we shall perceive not merely 
 their intrinsic excellence, but also their excellence 
 of, propriety and adaptation. We shall perceive 
 why some virtues were particularly selected and 
 
296 INTEENAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 insisted upon ; and the character, the feelings, and 
 the purposes of our Saviour will appear in bolder 
 relief and more striking colors, when contrasted 
 with those of the persons whom he was addressing. 
 I propose, therefore, to give a sketch of the char- 
 acter and condition of the Jewish people at the 
 time when our Saviour commenced his ministry, 
 and to illustrate what I have been saying by 
 pointing out the reference which he had to their 
 feelings and expectations in those declarations, 
 commonly called the Beatitudes, with which he 
 began his public instructions. 
 
 THE Jews had been separated by God from the 
 rest of mankind, and had received a religion from 
 him, the foundation of which was a knowledge of 
 his existence, his unity, and his supremacy. They 
 had not been made acquainted with a future state 
 of retribution by direct and express revelation. In 
 the time of our Saviour their notions of religion 
 were very imperfect and erroneous. This was the 
 case even in respect to the character of God, though 
 they were especially proud of the distinction of be- 
 ing the only people to whom God was known. The 
 representations of him by the Jewish Rabbis, and 
 their stories concerning him, as they have come 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 297 
 
 down to us, are extremely low and unworthy. 
 Many of them are such as could never have been 
 tolerated by men who had any just conceptions of 
 the Almighty. In respect to his power and domin- 
 ion, they considered him as the God of the world ; 
 but in all other respects they seem to have viewed 
 him as their national god. They appear, gener- 
 ally speaking, to have had no belief that his care 
 and goodness extended beyond themselves, and 
 that his favor toward men was regulated only by 
 a consideration of their moral desert. They seem 
 never to have conceived of him as the common 
 Father of mankind. Scarcely anything in Chris- 
 tianity appears to have given them more offence, 
 than its being a revelation of his impartial good- 
 ness, its representing the Gentiles as equally 
 with themselves the objects of his care, and equally 
 capable with themselves of obtaining his favor. 
 
 As to the doctrine of a future life, it was re- 
 jected, as is well known, by the Sadducees, a sect 
 which comprehended the principal part of the 
 more opulent and noble among the Jews. The 
 Pharisees, however, who were the leaders of the 
 common people in their religious opinions, be- 
 lieved in a future state of retribution, on which 
 men were to enter immediately after death. It is 
 
298 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 not easy to ascertain their precise opinions respect- 
 ing this subject ; but there is no doubt that they 
 were essentially different from those of an enlight- 
 ened Christian. They probably believed in the 
 doctrine of transmigration. 
 
 The notions of the majority of the Jews concern- 
 ing moral and religious excellence were extremely 
 incorrect. What they were appears from the 
 character of the Pharisees ; for the Pharisees were 
 commonly regarded as their most holy men. The 
 nation in general, in the time of our Saviour, was 
 infected with the universal corruption of the age. 
 Their wickedness, at a somewhat later period, is 
 described in the very strongest language by their 
 own historian, Josephus. In the times, however, 
 which immediately preceded the coming of our 
 Saviour, I believe that a large proportion of all 
 the virtue and religion which existed in the world 
 was to be found in Judaea. Certainly there was 
 then quite as much at Jerusalem as could have 
 been discovered at Rome under the reign of Tibe- 
 rius. 
 
 In regard to the political condition of the Jews 
 in the time of our Saviour's ministry, they were 
 subject to the power of the Romans ; Judsea had 
 been converted into a Roman province, and its in- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 299 
 
 habitants were compelled to pay tribute. They en- 
 dured, in common with the other nations subject to 
 Rome, the misery of one of those provincial govern- 
 ments, which, for the most part, were active and 
 vigilant in nothing but oppression and rapacity. 
 There were, however, peculiar aggravations of the 
 hardship of their condition. They regarded them- 
 selves as the sole favorites of Heaven, and as a peo- 
 ple far superior to the rest of mankind, whom they 
 spoke of as " dogs " and " sinners," and hated with 
 a religious hatred. The hatred which they felt to- 
 ward other nations was returned with a full meas- 
 ure of contempt and aversion. We scarcely find a 
 mention of them in any heathen author which is 
 not accompanied with some expression of these 
 feelings. In being subject to heathen masters, 
 therefore, they were exposed to peculiar sufferings 
 from insults offered to their religion, and from ridi- 
 cule cast upon their pretensions. Such servitude 
 they felt not merely as oppression, but as pollu- 
 tion; and, in respect to the Roman government, 
 they hung upon the brink of rebellion, ready to 
 receive an impulse from any hand. 
 
 They were, however, anxiously expecting a de- 
 liverer of no common character. Oppressed and 
 afflicted, they were looking forward to the coming 
 
300 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 of their Messiah, as the termination of their suffer- 
 ings, and the commencement of glory and triumph. 
 He was to be the dispenser of those high blessings 
 which God had so long delayed ; he was the hope 
 of " all who were expecting deliverance in Jerusa- 
 lem"; he was " to save his people," and " to restore 
 the kingdom to Israel " ; and his coming was to be 
 attended with the most wonderful prodigies, and 
 the most extraordinary revolutions. The kingdom 
 which the great body of the Jews expected, " the 
 kingdom of God," " the kingdom of Heaven," " the 
 kingdom of the Messiah," was not such a kingdom 
 as we Christians understand to be expressed by 
 those words. It was a temporal kingdom, to be 
 founded on conquest. Their Messiah was to be a 
 prince and a warrior, not merely to deliver them 
 from subjection to the Romans, but to make them 
 masters of the world. He was to come " with gar- 
 ments rolled in blood," " to tread the wine-press 
 alone, to tread the nations in his anger, and to 
 trample them in his fury." The descendant of 
 David was to darken the glory of his ancestors 
 with the new splendor which he would cast 
 around their throne. He was to establish his 
 residence at Jerusalem, and that city was to be 
 the metropolis of the world. 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 301 
 
 IT was among this people, thus oppressed and 
 afflicted, and thus anxiously waiting for a deliv- 
 erer, that John the Baptist appeared to announce 
 that the kingdom of Heaven was at hand. The 
 expected time was at last arriving. He performed 
 no miracles to confirm his declaration ; and yet it 
 is not wonderful that multitudes flocked to him, 
 whose numbers are thus expressed by the Evan- 
 gelist, in the style of Eastern hyperbole : " Then 
 went out to him Jerusalem and all Judsea and all 
 the country about the Jordan." The people were 
 not surprised, perhaps, at his preaching of reforma- 
 tion, for they might think that some change and 
 reformation of character were necessary to prepare 
 them for the reception of their Messiah. But the 
 teachers of the Law and the Pharisees felt, without 
 doubt, no less wonder than exasperation at the 
 language of severe rebuke in which he addressed 
 them. His preaching must have roused the peo- 
 ple, and tended to produce in them a disposition 
 to commence resistance to the tyranny which they 
 hoped soon to overturn. The exciting character 
 of the preaching of John, and the fear of popular 
 commotions in consequence of it, were probably 
 among the principal causes, as they are stated to 
 have been by Josephus, of his being cast into 
 
 2G 
 
302 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 prison by Herod Antipas, and of his being put to 
 death. It is not unlikely that the immediate oc- 
 casion of his death according to the account of the 
 Evangelists was only a concerted artifice, by which 
 Herod meant to screen himself from some of the 
 odium of the action, and to assume the appearance 
 of doing it reluctantly. 
 
 Before his death, however, the Baptist had ful- 
 filled his office, and pointed out the founder of the 
 kingdom which he had announced. This was a 
 young man of Galilee, a provincial part of Judaea, 
 a citizen of Nazareth, a town proverbially de- 
 spised, the reputed son of a carpenter. We may 
 conceive of him as appearing in the simple dress 
 of a Jewish peasant, the same, probably, as is still 
 worn in that part of the East where he was born. 
 We may represent him to ourselves with that ex- 
 pression of countenance, and that air and manner, 
 which must have been produced by the conscious- 
 ness that he came into the world as the chosen mes- 
 senger of God, under his immediate and sensible 
 direction, with but a single purpose to accomplish, 
 and that purpose high, solemn, and important be- 
 yond all example. He must have had an habitual 
 seriousness and intentness of mind, and perhaps 
 something of melancholy in his appearance, for 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 303 
 
 there was always distinctly in his view a short life 
 of toil and suffering and opposition, to be termi- 
 nated by a death the most cruel and ignominious. 
 He must have had an air of abstraction and disen- 
 gagement from the world, the appearance of a 
 being who had come here only on some purpose 
 of mercy. For he was separated and set apart 
 from mankind, he was in a great measure cut off 
 from human sympathy and support, by the sublime 
 peculiarity of his office, by his moral and intellect- 
 ual superiority, and by the absence of personal 
 interest in the common pursuits of men. In his 
 expressions of benevolence and friendship, there 
 must have been that gentleness and mildness 
 which are produced by freedom from all vulgar 
 feelings and selfish affections, something of the 
 compassion of a superior intelligence mingling 
 with the kindness of a friend, a manner of 
 which perhaps we may see a resemblance in the 
 best of men, when their minds are softened by sor- 
 row and raised above the world by religion. 
 
 He commenced his ministry in Galilee, without 
 at first declaring its full purpose, because this ac- 
 corded so little with the expectations of the Jews 
 that it could not have been at once made known, 
 without exciting passions by which his ministry 
 
304 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 would have been immediately interrupted. He 
 only announced, as John the Baptist had done, 
 that the kingdom of Heaven was at hand, and 
 performed miracles in proof of his being the min- 
 ister of God, without expressly declaring himself 
 to be the Messiah. "And great multitudes fol- 
 lowed him from Galilee and Decapolis and Jeru 
 salem and Judsea, and from the country beyond 
 the Jordan." Having collected a few who joined 
 themselves to him in a particular manner as his 
 disciples, he ascended a mountain, or " the moun- 
 tain," as it is expressed by the Evangelist, that 
 is, either Mount Tabor, or some other well-known 
 mountain near Capernaum, to deliver instruc- 
 tion to his followers. "And when he had sat 
 down," the usual posture in which the Jewish 
 doctors taught, his disciples placed themselves 
 near him, and the multitude by which he was 
 attended gathered round. 
 
 If, then, there had been in all this multitude one 
 man of high intellectual views and moral feelings, 
 one man among these Jews such as Plato was 
 among the Heathens, who had just notions of 
 the impartial goodness of God and of. the charac- 
 ter to be expected in the Messiah, and who had 
 been led to believe that Jesus was indeed this last 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 305 
 
 and greatest messenger from God, with what deep 
 and anxious expectation must he have listened to 
 the discourse now about to he delivered. " If he 
 flatter the prejudices of this people," such an ob- 
 server might have said to himself, "if he add 
 excitement to their passions, if he urge them on 
 to those objects which they now have full in view, 
 if he propose himself as their leader, he is not the 
 Messiah, he is not a messenger from GocJ; his 
 miracles are concerted frauds, or they are perhaps 
 the work of evil daemons." He would not have 
 listened long, however, before all doubt and anxi- 
 ety would have vanished from his mind. To this 
 multitude of Jews, the obstinacy of whose pride 
 no humiliations could subdue ; who gloried in their 
 knowledge of God, and regarded themselves as a 
 holy people, the objects of his peculiar favor ; who 
 thanked God that they were not as other men, but 
 that they were "Abraham's children," "Jews by 
 birth, and not sinners of the Gentiles " ; to this 
 multitude the first address of Jesus Christ was, 
 " Blessed are they who feel their spiritual wants, 
 for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven." They to 
 whom he was speaking were full of the expecta- 
 tion of the highest temporal glory and prosperity 
 about to flow in upon their nation, and were gen- 
 
 26* 
 
306 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 erally in the habit of regarding such prosperity as 
 a pledge of the favor of God; but the enjoyment 
 of this was not to be the lot of his disciples ; and 
 he proceeds, " Blessed are the mourners, for they 
 will be comforted." The Jews were full of deep 
 resentments and angry passions ; their hopes were 
 fixed upon a Messiah who should be a warlike 
 prince, who should inspire his followers with a 
 martial spirit and heroic courage, and lead them 
 under his banner to inflict vengeance upon their en- 
 emies and to subdue the world ; and their Messiah 
 had come at last to declare, " Blessed are the mild, 
 for they will inherit the land." In those whose 
 minds had been already affected by the preaching 
 of John the Baptist and of our Saviour, boundless 
 desires of worldly pleasures had been excited, and 
 had been made eager by what seemed the near 
 prospect of their gratification. It was not with 
 such desires, however, that the kingdom of Heaven 
 was to be entered. " Blessed are they who hunger 
 and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satis- 
 fied." The Jews confined their humane feelings 
 to those of their own nation, and were looking 
 for their own glory to be accomplished amid the 
 punishment and misery of the rest of mankind. 
 " Blessed," says our Saviour, " are the compassion- 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 307 
 
 ate, for they will receive compassion." They 
 made merit to consist principally in the strict 
 observance of ceremonies ordained by their Law 
 or by their traditions, in the practice of austeri- 
 ties, in legal purity, and in frequent ablutions; 
 and the Pharisees taught that there was no guilt 
 in desires, or even intentions, but in actions only. 
 It was a very different morality that was taught 
 by Jesus, a morality which flattered none of their 
 prejudices or passions: "Blessed are the pure 
 in heart, for they will see God." They were 
 ready to engage in rebellion, and were looking 
 for wars of desolation and conquest. Jesus said 
 to them, " Blessed are the peacemakers, for they 
 will be sons of God." They did not perhaps 
 suppose that the commencement of the reign of 
 the Messiah would be free from difficulty and toil 
 and suffering, either to himself or to his followers ; 
 but they expected a full recompense upon earth. 
 Nothing could be further from their thoughts 
 than that his followers should spend their lives 
 as preachers of a new religion, enduring continual 
 persecution and suffering, and looking for their 
 reward only beyond the grave; or that their Mes- 
 siah should begin his ministry with the declara- 
 tion, " Blessed are they who are persecuted for 
 
308 INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF THE 
 
 righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of 
 Heaven. Blessed will you be when men shall 
 revile you, and persecute you, and speak all evil 
 against you, falsely, for my sake." 
 
 THE remainder of the discourse of our Saviour, 
 like the part we have been considering, ought to 
 be viewed in connection with the moral and intel- 
 lectual state of those to whom it was addressed. 
 When it is viewed in such a connection, we shall 
 see at once that he by whom it was delivered was 
 not an impostor, promoting and taking advantage 
 of the prevalent notions respecting the Messiah 
 and his kingdom, nor a fanatic borne away by 
 the popular enthusiasm. He appears throughout 
 patiently endeavoring to correct the errors of the 
 multitude, to enlighten their understandings, to 
 rectify their passions, to change the whole charac- 
 ter of their feelings and motives. And who is this 
 extraordinary teacher whose mind is of so much 
 higher an order than the minds of all those by 
 whom he is surrounded ? If he be a mere human 
 teacher, speaking from himself alone, he is noth- 
 ing more than a peasant of Galilee, the son of a 
 carpenter. But, though in the midst of men gross, 
 sensual, uninformed, unprincipled, his morality is 
 
GENUINENESS OF THE GOSPELS. 309 
 
 the most pure, correct, and sublime ; his views of 
 duty are the most rational and comprehensive; not 
 only does he transcend, beyond all comparison, the 
 rulers and teachers of his own nation, but it is the 
 highest praise of the best philosophers of ancient 
 times, of Socrates and of Cicero, that their notions 
 of religion and duty have some imperfect resem- 
 blance to those of Jesus of Nazareth. Let us 
 examine his discourse. We shall discover no 
 selfish purpose or object. He by whom it was 
 delivered certainly had no design to take advan- 
 tage of the passions and prejudices of his hearers 
 in order to pass himself off for their Messiah. 
 It is all in direct opposition to those passions and 
 prejudices. Its object cannot be mistaken. It is 
 not to make them subservient to any purpose of 
 his own ; it is only to make them wise and virtu- 
 ous and holy. It is not to gain followers to him- 
 self; it is only to lead them back to their duty and 
 to God. Is there any solution that will account 
 for the appearance of a teacher so extraordinary in 
 an obscure part of Judaea I There is one, and but 
 one. He was what he claimed to be. He was a 
 teacher commissioned and instructed by God. 
 
 THE END. 
 

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