have made them sensible of the propriety of confining their discourses to the doctrine which they had received from him, without entering into dispute with their adversaries about the objects of their worship. Thus he instructed them to inculcate on their hearers, the existence and government of oue true God; the certainty of a future state; the necessity of repentance and reformation as preparatory to final retribution. His own example had already illustrated the wisdom and utility of this precaution. Our Lord had no object nearer his heart than the destruction of idolatry, and of the immoral practices which it entailed on its votaries; yet during the whole of his ministry, he never gave a hint that this was his ultimate end, until the time was ripe for its accomplishment; and even then his commission to the apostles was to go, not to destroy the gods of the nations, but to initiate the nations in the knowledge of one common Father-to bless and reform them with the gospel of his Son, and finally to sanctify and confirm them by the gift of the Holy Spirit. In a word, his advice to them seems to have been to communicate to the people whom they addressed, a few momentous truths, which when received could not fail to undermine their vices and errors without unnecessarily inflaming their prejudices. The apostles, with Paul in the number, strictly conformed to this wise injunction of their divine Master. Questions that came within the province of reason, they left to the progress of reason to determine. They neither disputed with the Heathen philosophers respecting the nature of God, of the human soul, or of a future state; nor with the Pagan priests about the vanity and immoral tendency of their worship. On the contrary, by holding forth a few grand points, for the truth of which they had the evidence of their senses, and which constituted the funda mental principles of the gospel, they sought to supersede the whole mass of Heathen superstition with as little violation as possible to the previous habits and prepossessions of its votaries."-Pp. 7, 8. We concur entirely in this welldrawn picture of apostolic labours, and therefore we demur to the statement in p. 5, that our Lord discarded the popular notion of the immortality of the soul, as unworthy of attention. The heads of Chap. II. are, "The Disciples at first did not expect to be called upon to publish Memoirs of their Divine Master.-Luke wrote his Gospel to set aside certain false Gospels circulated in Egypt.-The mira culous Birth of Jesus taught in those Gospels and contradicted as false by Luke." We have here some acute observations on the preface to Luke's Gospel compared with the preface to the Acts of the Apostles. From the latter Dr. Jones draws the conclusion, we humbly think illogically, that we have the Evangelist's "authority for saying that the first two chapters now found in his Gospel, never came from his hands, but are a forgery ascribed to him in after-days.” P. 12. There is more reason in the following argument upon the introduction to the Gospel of Mark: "Mark is thought to have written his Gospel at Rome, and under the inspection of Peter. His narrative, therefore, has the sanction of that Apostle, and their omission of the miraculous birth imputed falsehood. The Christians at Rome had to Jesus stamps upon it the character of no authentic history of Christ, but that which was composed for them by this Evangelist: nor is it to be supposed that he would have left them ignorant or uncertain on so important a subject as the supernatural birth of Jesus, if the story were really true. It is in vain to plead that Mark has passed over in silence many other things in the ministry of his divine Master. The miracles and sayings which he has recorded, are sufficient to prove his delegation from God. The miracles omitted by him, could not prove more than this. The doctrine that Christ was born in a supernatural manner, was intended to prove that he is a supernatural being, and inasmuch as Mark is silent in regard to this proof, it is obvious that neither the proof itself, nor the object of it, was in the opinion of this honest man founded in truth. "It is a remarkable fact, that, as we shall presently see, the miraculous birth of Jesus was taught by certain impostors in Rome, before Mark published his Gospel. This Evangelist was therefore called upon by his peculiar situation, not only not to give his sanction to this story, but to set it aside as a fiction unworthy of credit. His Gospel, rendered verbatim from the original, begins thus: The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God (as it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way in thy presence) was a voice crying in Lord, and make his paths straight.' the wilderness, Prepare the way of the "According to the tale of our Lord's miraculous birth, he was pointed out as King of the Jews' at the very time in which he was born. If this were true, Contrary to the generally-received opinion, Dr. Jones contends that Luke was an eye-witness to the facts recorded in his Gospel. upon He has an ingenious criticism Luke's precision in defining the time of Christ's public appearance. He supposes that the first teachers of the miraculous conception and birth of Jesus represented him as much older than he really was, wishing it to be believed that he had studied magic in Egypt, in order to account for his miracles. "The language of Luke carries a pointed reference to the misrepresentation of the impostors, 'Jesus himself was beginning to be about thirty years old. In English the word avros, himself, has no meaning, and its reference to the forgers alone renders it proper and significant. Thus, as if he had said, The pretended historians of Jesus, who teach bis miraculous birth, represent him as an old man at this time, but this was a Jesus of their own fiction; Jesus himself, the real and true Jesus, was but thirty years old.' I beg to assure my readers that I do not refine when I thus explain the term autos: for it has no other meaning but what is here ascribed to it, namely, emphasis, or opposition to some other object expressed or implied in the context. This pronoun occurs frequently in every writer; aud this import must be assigned to it, or it has no sense or propriety at all."-P. 15. The sum of the argument is the surprising fuct (we quote Dr. Jones's own words, pp. 17, 18), " that Luke, who is supposed to have written an account of the miraculous birth of Jesus, does in reality contradict it as a falsehood. He asserts that he begins his gospel with the word of God which came to John the Baptist; and he defines the period of that event with unexampled precision; he demonstrates the whole scheme to be a fiction, by shewing that Jesus was not really born till after the death of Herod the Great; he asserts, in language the most positive and unequivocal, that Jesus was the son of Joseph; and confirms this as a fact, by the register of his birth, and the testimony of the people of Nazareth." The title of Chap. III. is "The Divinity of Christ suggested by Heathenism, in order to account for his Miracles, and adopted by the Pagan Philosophers to set aside the Truth of his Gospel." In support of this proposition, which will startle some readers, the author appeals to the discourse of Paul at Athens. "To introduce a new god at Athens was a capital crime. Three centuries before, Socrates was put to death under that very charge; and they instantly conducted the Apostle to the Areopagus, to have him condemned for the same charge, by holding forth Jesus as a man offence. Paul effectually sets aside the appointed of God to judge the world; and raised from the grave by the power of the Almighty. The notion of one supreme God as the creator and governor of the universe, was not unknown to the Athenian philosophers; but lest the preaching of this Great Being should be made the grounds of a new accusation against the apostle, he, with admirable it by an appeal to their own writers, and wisdom and presence of mind, precludes especially to an altar erected to the unknown God in that very city. Here we are presented with a very remarkable fact, most worthy the notice of those who believe that Paul taught the deity of our Saviour. The people of Athens, misled by Polytheism, charged that apostle with holding forth the divinity of And what did this great champion of the Christ as an object of their acceptance. religion of Jesus do, in consequence? Did he meet the charge and avow it? This he certainly would have done, had it been well-founded, even at the risk of his life. On the contrary, he cuts up the charge by the roots, as grounded in misconception and he was accordingly discharged. Had he attempted to justify that doctrine, he would have been instantly condemned. His acquittal is an unequivocal fact that he negatived it, as a mere dictate of Heathenism."-Pp. 19, 20. Dr. Jones asserts that the enemies of the gospel adopted the supposition of Jesus being a Demon or God, to account for his miracles and appearance after death, without the necessity of admitting his resurrection to be a proof of a future state. There appears to us to be some obscurity in this part of the argument. The facts alleged are, 1, That the Pharisees, when they could no longer deny the works of Jesus, asserted that he was aided by a demon, and that the Emperor Alexander Severus believed in the divinity of Christ, as is attested by Elius Lampridius: 2, That Hadrian in his letter to the Consul Servianus, preserved by Vopiscus, asserts that the devotees of Serapis were believers in Christ, that is, in his divinity: these were the Gnostic teachers, of whom Basilides was chief: 3, That those who first believed, or affected to believe, that our Lord was a supernatural being, changed Christus into Chrestus, an epithet which the Pagans applied to such of the demons as they considered benign or useful to mankind: in the number of these Pagans was Suetonius. The philosophers of the Alexandrian School, according to Dr. Jones, had recourse to the same reasoning, exerting "all their talents and reputation to destroy Christianity, upon no other ground than that the founder was himself supposed to be a supernatural being." These facts, he concludes, decide the controversy between the advocates of the Orthodox and those of the Unitarian faith, and are “a sure proof that Christianity as vulgarly received and established, whether by prejudice or power, contains the very essence of Antichrist." Chap. IV. is headed "The Gnostic Svsteni and Antichrist the sameGnosticism explained-Its Origin and Authors pointed out by Christ." The Gnostics, Tywixo, pretended, says our author, to possess superior wisdom to that of Christ and the apostles. They were Christians only in profession, but in reality Epicurean Jews, and the most deadly enemies of the gospel. In the Appendix, Dr. Jones presents us with a view of their principles. "The system of the Gnostics was founded in three principles; one was their rejection of the Creator as the supreme God and benevolent Father of mankind; the second was their rejection of the man Jesus, while they pretend (pretended) to receive the Christ who was a God within him; the third was, that Christ did not come from the Almighty with a commission to save the world on the terms of repentance and reformation, but that he came to destroy the works of the Creator, and to authorize his followers to continue in the indulgence of their favourite sins. These impious sentiments, while they are attested by the Greek and Latin fathers, are obviously alluded to in the apostolic writings: see Jude ver. 1; John ii. 22. They gave various names to the supreme God, which they pretended to reveal, such as, Propater, Proarche, Bythos or Bathos, the depth. To this John alludes in Rev. ii. 24, as well as Paul in Rom. viii. 39. This chief divinity they coupled with a female called Sige. This pair gave birth to another, called Nous and Aletheia. These again uniting begot Logos and Zoe, who in their turn produced Anthropos and Ecclesia. Hence finally arose the ones or angels, or the boundless genealogies to which Paul alludes in 1 Tim i. 4; see Iren. pp. 7, 8. These fictions, Origen, in his answer to Celsus, p. 294, thus characterizes : Cel sus ought to know that there exist those who having espoused the cause of the Serpent (Ops) are called (Opiavoi) Serpentists. Their fictions exceed the fictions of the Titans and the Giants.' These men being Egyptians, pretended, that the Christ or the divinity in the man Jesus, was the same with Horus, or Serapis, or Pan; see Epiphanius, Vol. I. p. The Egyptians 171; Iren. pp. 17, 18. had their elder and younger Horus ; of the old, the other of the new dispenhence the impostors had two Christs, one ་ sation. Duos quidem Deos ausos esse hæreticos dicere et duos Christos audivimus: Origen wɛρ Apxwv, lib. ii. c. 7. The same learned writer thus bears testimony to the manner in which they cursed the Lord Jesus, while they pretended to honour the divinity within him. They vilify Jesus no less than Celsus; nor do they admit any one into their society, unless he first deposit curses upon Jesus.' Contra Cels. 294. This doctrine was taught by the impostors at Corinth. To this, as we have seen, Paul pointedly alludes in 1 Cor. xii. 3, and also at the end. It is with much truth and propriety, that the following assertion is made in the interpolated letter to the Trallians, c. 6: They (the heretics) speak of Christ, not that they might preach Christ, but that they might supersede him; and they profess the law, in order to establish a system of iniquity.' It is a remarkable fact that Josephus speaks of the Jewish Gnostics under the name of Zealots; and the description which he has given us of their wickedness, throws much light on the second Epistle of Peter, and that of Jude. The Jewish historian and these apostles will appear, when duly compared, to speak of the same people; and hence the authenticity of these two Epistles will be placed beyond the reach of reasonable doubt." Pp. 271–273. The author thinks that Christ points out the Gnostics in the parable of the Tares and other passages. He interprets John Baptist's severe language to the Pharisees and Sadducees, of the same sect, whose system is the Antichrist of the New Testament. The Vth Chapter, which contains the Reply to the Author of "The New Trial of the Witnesses," is in our view of great merit. It contains "the Proofs of the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ." The author lays great and just stress upon our Lord's having predicted his own sufferings. He finds such predictions where a common reader would not discover them, and we are pleased with his ingenuity even when we are not wholly convinced by his argument. "At first, Jesus only hints at the sufferings that awaited him, as they were brought to his mind by the appearance and language of those around him. Thus Luke writes, iv. 23, Ye will tell me this parable, Physician, by all means heal thyself. The Evangelist considered this saying as having an immediate refer ence to the request which the Jews made to our Lord, to do such things in his own country, as they heard he had performed in Capernaum; but the use of EpETTE, ye will say, in the future tense, demonstrates that he at the same time alluded to some saying that was yet future; and if we turn our eyes to chap. xxiii. 37, we shall find the very words addressed to him by his enemies, which he here anticipates, And they mocked him, saying, If thou be King of the Jews, save thyself. Near the close of his ministry, or, according to the arrangement of John, near the commencement of it, Jesus foretold his destruction by the Jews, and his subsequent restoration to life, in terms suggested by the sight of the temple, which terms, as implying the demolition of that temple when literally taken, became deeply rooted in the memories of those present, in consequence of the astonishment which they excited, and of the offence which they occasioned. Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.' John ii. 20. Johu is the only one who has recorded this incident; yet that Jesus did actually deliver these words before they were accomplished in his sufferings and resurrection, we have the indirect but sure testimony of his enemies, recorded by Matthew; And those who passed by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying, Thou who destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days, save thyself. Pp. 37, 38. resurrection of Christ, Dr. Jones cites the case of the soldier that pierced his body upon the cross. "If a candid and enlightened sceptic were asked, what circumstance, connected with the death and subsequent resurrection of Christ, would, if proved to be true, be most likely to remove his doubts of the divine origin of Christianity, and secure his own practical faith in its fundamental points, he perhaps would reply, that nothing could so effectually answer this end, as that the very soldiers employed by the Jewish rulers in his execution, and especially that soldier who drove the spear into his side, should themselves soon after become converts to the faith, and attest the truth of the wonders which they had beholden, though urged by tortures to their denial. And this is a circumstance which the wisdom of Providence caused to have taken place, and even to be recorded by apostolic authority, in order to remove the objec tions of infidelity in all succeeding generations. The passage to which I allude is as follows: Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first and of the other which were crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs. But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came thereout blood and water. And he who saw it bore testimony, and his testimony is true; that man, too, knoweth that what the writer saith is true, that ye might believe. For these things were done, that the Scriptures might be fulfilled,-A bone of him shall not be broken. And again, another Scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.' John xix. 32-37. "It is supposed that by the person here said to have seen this event, and borne testimony to it, is meant the Evangelist himself. But a little attention to the original will be sufficient to convince us that the historian means the soldier who had pierced him. The two actions 'bore testimony,' and 'saith,' though expressed by two distinct verbs, one in the past tense, the other in the present, must, on the supposition that John meant himself, be the same: which is absurd. The original μεμαρτυρηκε means, when employed by early Christian writers, to bear testimony to the faith in circumstances of torture or of death; and this acceptation is so generally given to it, that the corresponding noun μaρtup, which before simply signified a witness, came to denote a martyr to the truth. It is to be observed, too, that the writer has employed the perfect tense; and he Amongst other testimonies to the could not therefore so properly intend himself, now writing, as some other person who had previously borne a signal testimony to the fact in question. "If the Evangelist meant himself, there would have been little propriety in the appeal which he makes, as it would be only an appeal to his own authority. On the contrary, nothing was more decisive and forcible, than appealing, in corroboration of the death of Jesus, to the evidence of a man, who, like himself, was an eye-witness of the event, and who suffered torments in attestation of its truth. "That the soldiers alluded to became converts to the gospel, and that the sacred writer had, on this occasion, their conversion in view, is demonstrable from the prophecy which he cites, and of which he considers that conversion to be the accomplishment,' And again, another Scripture saith, They shall look upon him whom they have pierced.' That is, "They shall now love him, whom they before hated without a cause; they shall regard with regret and compassion the Saviour whom they had cruelly slain; or, in the words of Zachariah, whence the Evangelist has copied this prophecy, They shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him as one is in bitterness for his first born. Zach. xii. 10. "That the soldiers whom the Jewish rulers intrusted with the execution of Jesus, did, after they had put him to death, receive him as their Saviour, is a fact very probable, from the Evangelists Mark and Luke, who represent the leader of those soldiers, as openly declaring his belief in the divine mission of the illustrious sufferer, while yet standing at the foot of the cross: And when the centurion which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out and gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God;' Mark xv. 39. Lastly, it is not only handed down as a vague tradition in the Christian Church that the centurion and the soldier became converts, but the Greek and Latin Churches have a festival instituted in memory of their martyrdom, which surely could not have taken place, if their conversion had not been a notorious fact."-Pp. 41-43. asserts, for example, that Luke himself was one of the two disciples whom Jesus joined on the road to Emmaus ! And this fact, he says in the Appendix, P. 274, may be gathered from the nar rative, for the historian speaks in more places than one in the first person. Is this correct? In every place where the first person is used in the narrative, the historian is relating the conversation of the disciples. "They said. we trusted," &c. They said one to another, Did not our heart burn?" &c. In relating a dialogue an historian does not, surely, put off the third person and assume the persons of the speakers; especially when he notifies to the reader that he is recording a conversation. [To be continued.] ART. II.-Dissenting Registers of Births, Marriages and Burials, examined as Documents of Evidence. By A Barrister. 8vo. pp. 50. Offor. 1823. Is. 6d. THIS is the production of a re spectable Dissenter in the legal profession. If it does no more, it shews the uncertainty of the law on the point in question, and this is ground sufficient for the author's recommendation of a general application on the part of the Dissenters for some parliamentary measure that shall take their property of inheritance out of jeopardy. A late decision in the Rolls' Court has, we think, occasioned unnecessary alarm with regard to the validity of the Register of Births kept by the Deputies at Dr. Williams's Library. It never was supposed that this register was legal evidence of the first degree it is however good evidence of the second degree; and there are, we believe, cases to shew that this evidence is admissible in most courts,* provided that better cannot be obtained. No form of certificate amongst Dissenters can be equal to a parochial registry; but it would be extreme folly in them to neglect this security before they gain another and better. We say in most courts, because legal decisions are sometimes influenced by the personal character of judges. Cases of this kind, affecting Dissenters, will occur to the recollection of every reader. |