Another contemporary annalist relates, that about thirty years after the death of Christ, his disciples at Rome were numerous enough to be well known and distinguished in that populous city, and generally styled Christians, after the name of their Founder; who, he adds, was put to death in the reign of Tiberius, by his Procurator, Pontius Pilate. The same author proceeds to describe the sufferings which they endured from the tyranny of Nero, who endeavoured to divert from himself the accusation of having set fire to his capital, and to fix the stigma upon them 2.

Another sort of collateral evidence, equally unexceptionable, is furnished by a long epistle of Clement, Bishop of Rome, which was addressed by him to the Corinthian Christians, about fifty years after the death of Jesus: the whole tenour of which proves, that the society of Christians had been long established in that city. Several letters of another bishop, Ignatius, dated twenty

2 Tacitus, Annal. xv. 44.

five years later, confirm the same point, with regard to many Christian communities in Asia. About the same period we have similar testimony from Pliny, proconsul under Trajan, who describes the Christian churches, in Bithynia and Pontus, as consisting of many of all ages and of both sexes; and calls the religion a contagious superstition, which has spread not only through cities, but over villages and the whole country 3.

To this open testimony it would be easy to add allusions, more or less clear, from almost every writer of note during that period, whose works have remained. But my only object was to show, that we have firm ground to set out upon. If Christians were known as a tangible body in Rome, upon whom a popular stigma might be attached, within thirty years of the death of Jesus; and if they could be collectively addressed in epistles sent to various parts of Greece and Asia; and if within seventy years of

3 Epist. Lib. x. Ep. 91.

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the same event they could be described as a vast multitude, numbers of every age, of both sexes 4;" it is quite clear that the system was not gradually formed, but regular and authoritative from the first; and also, that we may assume the date to which the origin of Christianity is commonly referred, as one which is probably exact to a year, and even a day; but which cannot possibly be materially wrong.

2. Having settled this preliminary question, we come to another of more importance, respecting the Author of this religion. Did such a person as Jesus exist, or no? Antichristian writers do not seem to have made up their mind upon this point. Some assert that he did exist, and some that he did not 5: and others,

+ Ingens multitudo, multi omnis ætatis, utriusque sexûs.

Pliny.

5 Volney who accounts for the origin of Christianity in the following summary way : "The great Mediator and first Judge was expected, and his advent desired, that an end might be put to so many calamities. This was so much the subject of conversation, that some one was said to have seen him; and a rumour of this kind was all that was wanting to establish a general certainty. The popular report became a

strange to say, suppose both. And the reader, into whose hands this treatise may fall, must make up his mind one way or other. The religion may be an imposture, though Jesus did exist. But it must have been an imposture if he did not if his name were merely ascribed, like those of Hercules or Bacchus, to adventures which never took place; or, like that of Brahma, to doctrines which had no divine authority.

On the supposition, however, that no such person ever really existed, but was merely an allegorical or imaginary personage, or the hero of a romantic tale, we must believe what follows; we must believe, that a set of persons undertook to persuade their countrymen that a man had

demonstrated fact. The imaginary being was realized; and all the circumstances of mythological tradition being in some manner connected with this phantom, the result was a regular and authentic history, which from henceforth it was blasphemous to doubt." Such is infidelity!

Paine, in different parts of his " Age of Reason." I should not notice such writers as these, if any thing more rational had been advanced by others.

grown up and lived among themselves, and had rendered himself conspicuous by his works and doctrines, and had at last been put to death at the most solemn and frequented festival of their own nation;-when no such person had ever been executed, or even seen, or heard of. And more, that they did persuade their countrymen to believe all this. For the first Christians were converts from the city in which the principal scene was laid, and became so at the very time when these transactions are said to have happened.

It is disagreeable to speak of the Gospel as an imposture. I am sure that many, who do not in any real sense believe it, would start at the idea of using so harsh a term. But we must not deceive ourselves. If Jesus did not exist, nay, further, if he were not, indeed, the Son of God, it is an imposture. Those, therefore, who framed it must have considered how they could in the surest and easiest manner deceive the world. And certainly they would not begin by asserting such a fact as the birth, public ministry, and