trimental to the Christian religion, as that which was styled gnosis, or science, i. e. the way to the true knowledge of the Deity; and which we have above called the oriental doctrine, in order to distinguish it from the Grecian philosophy." The worthy doctor seemed, indeed, disposed to be harsh, and half angry with these Gnostics' notions of Jesus Christ, which he calls impious and extravagant; but to our mind, their notions about Jesus, as far as they can be understood, are the most rational possible-perhaps, that is because they exactly correspond with our own; for, according to Mosheim, they denied his deity, and they rejected his humanity, upon the supposition that every thing concrete and corporeal is, in itself, essentially and intrinsically evil. "From hence (continues the doctor), the greatest part of the Gnostics denied that Christ was clothed with a real body, or that he suffered really for the sake of mankind, the pains and sorrows which he is said to have sustained, in the sacred history." Now, as it is clear that Christ, if he lived at all, had a body, and it is equally clear that a body is a real body-for a body not real, would be nobody at all—and as the Gnostics' declared just after Jesus is said to have lived and died, that "he was not clothed with a real body," why logic would be beggared to prove better that we entirely agree with the Gnostics; for if Jesus neither had a real body nor really suffered on the cross, or anywhere else, for the sake of mankind-if he were neither divine nor human-neither deity nor humanity—what in the name of all the mystics at once was he? As to the senseless lunacy that the Gnostics have mingled with this account of Christ, about his unreal body being the son of God, pleroma, or habitation of the Everlasting Father, for the happiness of miserable mortals, it may be safely averred, that none but the Everlasting Father can know what or where the said pleroma is; or how a body clothed in unrealness-that is, a body without a bodycould be sent for the happiness of miserable mortals! Mosheim complains that they entertained unworthy ideas, both of Christ's person and offices; whereas, to us it appears, that they held no ideas at all of him, worthy or unworthy; for how could they have any idea of a Christ, neither God nor man-neither with form, substance, color, or attributes—a Christ, in short, who neither had a real body, nor really suffered—nor really was anything, suffered anything, or did anything-save in the imaginations of men!

London: H. Hetherington; A. Heywood, Manchester; and all Booksellers. J. Taylor, Printer, 29, Smallbrook Street, Birmingham.

EXISTENCE OF CHRIST

AS A HUMAN BEING,

DISPROVED!

BY IRRESISTIBLE EVIDENCE, IN A SERIES OF LETTERS,

FROM A GERMAN JEW,

ADDRESSED TO CHRISTIANS OF ALL DENOMINATIONS.

LETTER 29.

WEEKLY.

ONE PENNY.

"I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel. Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even I, am the Lord, and besides me there is no Saviour."-ISAIAH XLIII. 3, 10, 11.

CHRISTIANS,

The mental condition of the Jews before and at the time so many false Christs appeared, was touched upon in our last, where it was shewn that the Jews never fully comprehended the grand idea that "the chain of finite causes is indissoluble," and "the impossibility of miracles," which idea, it may be safely affirmed, must be conceived by all people, before they can be guaranteed from political, moral, or religious delusion.

The idea that a miracle is impossible, and involves in it an absurdity, because the eternal chain of causation cannot be broken (there being no exceptions to Nature's mode of operation) has the experience of the wisest of all ages for its basis-that invaluable experience which, though not admissible as logical demonstration, is a practically certain support, though not perfectly safe, is nevertheless, man's safest teacher. Once allow the possibility of a miracle, and that moment is reason and sound philosophy yoked to the car of wild and visionary speculation. We hold, therefore, Strauss was justified in his assertion that the Jews never had an historic age; for that which is properly historic, is a relation of facts, which facts harmonize with experience, and admit no element purely imaginative. Of this Jewish love of the marvellous, Dr. Prideaux, an able commentator, seems fully aware, for he observes, "that the Jews, after

the return from the Babylonish captivity, to the time of our Saviour, were much given to religious romances, as appears from the apocryphal books still extant, which are of this sort." Surely, it would be idle to look among a people given to religious romancings, for clear ideas of what is truly historic; besides, all writers admit, it was confusion worse confounded, that prevailed among the Jews, from the Babylonish captivity up to the period Jesus is said to have lived; nor were they the vulgar merely who were infected with the love of the marvellous, and ready to swallow every gross and idle fiction, for even Josephus, who had some pretensions to philosophy, did not scruple to set forth, with all gravity, the most outrageous balderdash. Of Solomon, he says, "God enabled him to learn that skill which expels demons, which is a science beneficial to man; he composed many incantations also, by which distempers are alleviated, and he left behind him the manner of using exorcisms, by which they drive away demons so that they never return; and this method of cure is of great force unto this day." Again, he says, speaking of one Eleazer, a caster out of devils, upon the principles of Solomon, " He, Eleazer, when he would persuade and demonstrate to the spectators that he held such a power, he set a little way off a cup or basin full of water, and commanded the demon, as he went out of the man, to overturn it, and thereby to let the spectators know that he had left the man; and when this was done, the skill and wisdom of Solomon were shewn very manifestly."

One thing here is shewn manifestly enough, which is, that the historian who wrote the above trash, whatever may be said of his skill, had very little wisdom; except, perhaps, that crooked, lefthanded wisdom, which Euripides ascribes to certain sages who have two tongues; the one to say the truth, the other that accommodates itself to the times." And if we suppose that Josephus was wiser than he could afford to appear, the state of the multitude must have been deplorable indeed to require the wagging of so accommodating a tongue; and if he believed what he himself related, such belief establishes his character as a relater of truth, but destroys his reputation for wisdom-either way, however, the Jewish people must have been excessively credulous, which is all that concerns our present argument.

Corruption and credulity are rarely far asunder, and in the times of which we treat, the Jewish people, drawn into the vortex of superstition, were corrupt as they were credulous. Mosheim ob

serves, "that the period in which our Saviour descended upon earth may justly be styled the pacific age, if we compare it with the preceding times;" if so, in the name of all that is vile, what must have been the condition of the Jews in ages preceding, when, in this "justy styled the pacific age," the same writer tells us "no public laws prohibited the sports of gladiators, the exercise of unnatural lusts, the licentiousness of divorce, the custom of exposing infants, and of procuring abortions—nor the frontless atrocity of consecrating public stews and brothels to certain divinities;" "at the time of Christ's appearance, (he adds) the wisest among mankind looked upon the whole system which then prevailed, as a just object of ridicule and contempt; at that time the religion of the Romans, as well as their arms, had extended itself through a great part of the world :" an odd kind of pacific age, truly! If such were their peaceful times, what shall we think of their warlike? though it can hardly be denied a Roman peace was sometimes even more fatal to virtue and independence, than a Roman war. Hence, the expression of Tacitus," they made a desert, and called it peace."

It is not wonderful, then, that the Jewish people should have groaned under the Roman yoke, and sighed after some mighty deliverer, who should be king over all the earth (Ezek. 14. 9), whose arrow should go forth as the lightning; and the Lord God blow the trumpet, and go with the whirlwinds of the South (Zech. 14). For Mosheim justly says, that at the time he supposes Christ to have appeared," errors of a very pernicious kind had infected the whole body of the people, and the more learned part of the nation were deluded upon points of the highest consequence. All looked for a deliverer, but not such a one as God had promised. Instead of a meek and spiritual Saviour, they expected a formidable and warlike prince, to break their chains, and set them at liberty from the Roman yoke." What Mosheim meant by such a one as God had promised, it is hard to guess; but if he intended to convey the idea that the Jews were not justified in their expectation of a formidable and warlike prince, who should break their chains, &c., by an appeal to Scriptures, and the sayings of the prophets, nothing can be more erroneous; for they clearly allude to the coming in power and glory of a political Saviour, or Saviours, for in Obadiah we read (21)" And Saviours shall come up on mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau ; and the kingdom shall be the Lord's." Surely, Mosheim never read the texts (Isa. 32, 1, 18), “Behold a king shall reign in righteousness, and my people shall dwell in peaceful

habitations, &c."(Jer. 23. 5). "Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment upon all the earth." See also, Malachi 3. 4.-Joel 1. 15, 11, 27, 32,3. 1, 2, 9, 91,— Ezek. 39. 21, 22,-Haggai 11. 6, 7,-Hosea 11, 21, 23; and a host of others, that curious readers may refer to at their leisure. Hennell, who had paid much attention to Jewish history, observes, that "the kings of Judah were called the Lord's anointed therefore the expected restorer of their throne came to be described emphatically as the anointed, or Messiah; and it became a favourite literary amusement with the Jews, to find passages of their Scripture applicable to him." Add to which, that the word Christ, or anointed, always conveyed the idea of king, as may be seen in Sam. 24. 6, where David exclaims "the Lord forbid that I should do this thing unto my master (Saul) the Lord's anointed." How, then, can Mosheim be justified in his ignorant assertion, that the Jews in looking for a political king, a formidable and warlike Saviour, were looking for what God had not promised; for if it be admitted God ever promised anything by the mouths of the Jewish prophets, such prophecies clearly point to a Christ who should deliver them out of their enemies' hands, and establish on earth his temporal kingdom, where he was to sit upon the throne of his glory" in that holy Jerusalem (13, 15, 18), built up with sapphires, and emeralds, and precious stones; its walls and towers, and battlements, with pure gold; its streets paved with beryl, and carbuncle, and the stones of Ophir ; when all her streets should say hallelujah."

Here then, we have clear and simple reason why, as Mosheim expresses it, delirious men set themselves up for the Messiah (for supply is regulated by demand, as well in Messiahs as in corn), and the whole secret of the many false Christs who appeared by the shoal at the period treated of, is this the stupid credulousness of the people, who, doing little else but gape about for the fulfilment of the prophecies, became the easy prey of every shallow impostor; for, as somebody has remarked, knaves just as naturally prey upon fools, as worms do upon dead bodies. For an account of these impostors, we refer the reader to Milner's History of the Jews, Josephus, and other writers on the same subject; as want of space will only allow us to notice one or two. Dositheus, a Samaritan, of whom Mosheim says, "he lived about the time of our Saviour (query, what time, Mosheim, and which Saviour?), and set himself up for the Messiah, whom God had sent to the Jews." The same observation