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- Herausgeber: Booksell-Verlag
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
In "Evidences of Christianity," William Paley masterfully constructs a compelling argument for the truth of Christianity through a careful examination of historical and philosophical evidence. Written in the early 19th century, this work reflects the Enlightenment's emphasis on reason and evidence, intertwining logical reasoning with theological inquiry. Paley employs a systematic approach, addressing miraculous events and the moral teachings of Christ while engaging in dialogues about the nature of truth and faith, thus placing the text within the context of a rational discourse surrounding religion during his era. William Paley (1743-1805) was an English theologian and philosopher whose intellectual roots were deeply interwoven with the natural theology movement. His background in classical education and clerical life led him to explore the intersections between faith and reason. Paley's previous work, "Natural Theology," established his reputation for intelligent analysis of divine creation, which informed his approach to evidencing the Christian faith, revealing a fervent desire to make a reasoned case for belief in an increasingly skeptical world. "Evidences of Christianity" is not only a seminal text for those studying theology but is also an essential read for anyone grappling with questions of faith and reason. Paley's eloquence and clarity offer profound insights into the foundations of Christian belief, making it a vital addition to the library of scholars, believers, and inquisitive minds alike. In this enriched edition, we have carefully created added value for your reading experience: - A succinct Introduction situates the work's timeless appeal and themes. - The Synopsis outlines the central plot, highlighting key developments without spoiling critical twists. - A detailed Historical Context immerses you in the era's events and influences that shaped the writing. - A thorough Analysis dissects symbols, motifs, and character arcs to unearth underlying meanings. - Reflection questions prompt you to engage personally with the work's messages, connecting them to modern life. - Hand‐picked Memorable Quotes shine a spotlight on moments of literary brilliance. - Interactive footnotes clarify unusual references, historical allusions, and archaic phrases for an effortless, more informed read.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
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Evidences of Christianity
Table of Contents
Introduction
Can the claims at the heart of Christianity be weighed and found credible by the same historical reasoning and common-sense judgment that guide responsible inquiry in courts, classrooms, and daily life, and if so, what would it look like to assemble, test, and fairly assess such evidence?
A View of the Evidences of Christianity, commonly referred to as Evidences of Christianity, is an eighteenth-century work of Christian apologetics by the English clergyman and philosopher William Paley. First published in 1794 in Britain, it enters the intellectual milieu shaped by Enlightenment habits of inquiry, where historical proof, probability, and testimony were vigorously debated. Paley writes as a churchman conversant with philosophy and as a careful reader of historical documents. The book does not narrate events but evaluates them, asking what a rational person might conclude from records, witnesses, and the early fortunes of a movement that altered the moral and cultural landscape of the West.
Readers encounter a sustained, cumulative case rather than a single dramatic demonstration. Paley proceeds methodically, inviting the audience to consider how evidence from history can support or undermine a set of claims. He appeals to public facts, documentary materials, and patterns of human behavior as they are ordinarily understood. The tone is lucid and measured, the voice patient and didactic, and the mood steady rather than polemical. The experience he offers is that of following a disciplined examination: each part designed to reduce ambiguity, clarify relevant criteria, and show how converging lines of reasoning might bear on the credibility of early Christian testimony.
At its core, the book explores how we judge testimony, weigh probabilities, and infer conclusions from incomplete records. Paley’s project reflects an era alert to the strengths and limits of historical reasoning, and it treats belief not as a leap into obscurity but as a verdict rendered after responsible review. Themes include the character and conduct of witnesses, the resilience of a message under pressure, and the practical effects of convictions on communities. The work also probes the relation between moral transformation and credibility, asking whether certain outcomes in life and society can function as indirect confirmations of earlier claims.
Although rooted in its time, Evidences of Christianity continues to speak to contemporary concerns about truth, trust, and public reasoning. In an age that frequently asks what counts as sufficient proof, Paley’s emphasis on accessible standards—those a lay reader can apply without specialized training—has enduring appeal. The book raises questions familiar to readers of history, law, and journalism: How reliable are sources? What weight belongs to independent attestations? When does the convergence of many modest arguments yield a robust conclusion? Without requiring technical philosophy, it cultivates intellectual virtues that remain valuable across disciplines and debates.
Paley’s style rewards patient reading. He writes with an eye to clarity and fairness, distinguishing what can be known from what must be acknowledged as uncertain. The rhythm is expository rather than confrontational, making space for readers to examine premises before they are asked to accept conclusions. Those drawn to careful argumentation will find a coherent structure and a consistent appeal to publicly accessible considerations. Those curious about the intersection of faith and reason will find a model of engagement that neither dismisses doubts nor treats conviction as immune to scrutiny. The result is simultaneously rigorous and accessible.
The work’s historical significance is also notable. It influenced debates within Anglican thought and circulated widely among educated readers; during the nineteenth century it was studied in British universities, including Cambridge. For modern audiences, it serves as a window into how late Enlightenment thinkers handled questions of religion in a historical key. More than a period piece, however, it invites renewed attention to habits of fair-minded assessment. Approached on its own terms, Evidences of Christianity offers a disciplined exercise in reasoning about the past, challenging readers to consider how responsible inquiry might guide belief today.
Synopsis
William Paley’s Evidences of Christianity sets out to assess the truth of Christianity by the standards of historical testimony. He proposes a cumulative, legal-style argument rather than a theological exposition, distinguishing between direct and auxiliary evidences. The book follows a clear progression: establish what the original witnesses affirmed, test the credibility of that testimony, examine the documents that preserve it, and weigh corroborating circumstances and objections. Paley largely confines his inquiry to facts alleged in the New Testament, particularly the public miracles and the resurrection, and argues that, if those facts are credibly attested, the main conclusion follows. He frames the whole as a measured inquiry into probability.
Paley begins with the direct historical evidence: that the first Christian teachers professed to have seen miracles performed by Jesus and afterward by themselves, and to have witnessed his resurrection. He treats these as public, sensible facts, different from doctrines or internal impressions. The narrative sources are the Gospels and Acts, which he considers records of those claims. He insists that the kind of events described were detectable by crowds and authorities, not confined to private vision. The question, therefore, is whether such testimony, existing in these writings and traditions, can be judged honest and competent, and whether circumstances render deception or mistake unlikely.
To test sincerity, Paley surveys the conduct and condition of the first preachers. He assembles evidence that they faced hardships, dangers, and punishments, and that a willingness to suffer is a practical proof of conviction. He notes the absence of worldly inducements—wealth, power, or popular favor—in their undertaking. He also emphasizes the plain, unadorned character of the narratives and the writers’ incidental self-disclosures. Differences among accounts are acknowledged, yet he argues these variations suggest independence rather than collusion, while their substantial agreement supports a common core. From these features he infers that the testimony originated with sincere witnesses, not schemers or dupes.
Paley then examines early effects as indirect confirmations. The rapid spread of Christian communities through diverse regions, under opposition and without force, is presented as consistent with real underlying facts. He points to settled institutions—the Lord’s Supper, baptism, weekly assemblies on the first day—as memorial practices that presuppose public events. External notices from non-Christian writers, such as references to believers’ sufferings and to the name and execution of Christ, are cited as corroborating context. He argues that the persistence and uniformity of these observances, and the hazards attached to the profession, make it unlikely that the religion arose from fiction or transient enthusiasm.
The authenticity of the principal Christian writings becomes the next focus. Paley collects testimonies from early church fathers, catalogues of sacred books, ancient translations, and the usage of heretical groups, to show that specific texts—the four Gospels, Acts, and several epistles, especially those of Paul—were widely known and received from an early date. He distinguishes these from apocryphal compositions, which lacked universal acceptance. Particular stress is placed on letters bearing marks of real correspondence and interlocking with known history. The wide geographical dissemination, public reading in worship, and the accumulation of commentaries and citations are offered as evidence of stable transmission and recognized authority.
He supplements external attestation with internal considerations. The narratives display simplicity, incidental detail, and an absence of rhetorical flourish typical of honest reporting. The portrait of Jesus and the tenor of apostolic teaching are judged morally serious and practical, not contrived to flatter or excite. Congruities with the political and social setting of first-century Judea and the Roman world provide background verisimilitude. Paley treats these features as auxiliary, not decisive alone, but cumulative. They support the impression that the documents arose near the events they describe and from participants or their close associates, thereby strengthening the case that the testimony is both competent and sincere.
Addressing objections, Paley evaluates alleged contradictions among the evangelists and contends they do not overthrow the substance of the story. He compares Christian miracles with those reported in other religions, arguing differences in timing, publicity, and documentation. He deals with the suggestion of universal credulity by stressing the presence of alert adversaries in the narrative and the legal standards of testimony. Alternative hypotheses—fraud, imposture, or enthusiastic mistake—are considered and found incompatible with the hazards, consistency, and restraint evident in the accounts. Variations in minor particulars are allowed, while the main facts, he argues, remain sufficiently supported for historical assent.
Paley also explores auxiliary evidences beyond the apostolic testimony. He treats post-apostolic miracle claims cautiously, maintaining that the argument does not depend on them. He considers prophecies associated with Christianity, especially those relating to the destruction of Jerusalem and the continued distinctness of the Jewish people, as supportive when soberly handled. He points to the religion’s moral efficacy and beneficial reforms as secondary confirmations, not primary proofs. Throughout, he aims to separate matters essential to the case from questions of lesser weight, so that doubts about later phenomena or subsidiary topics need not disturb the force of the central historical claim.
The work concludes that Christianity, viewed as a set of public facts attested by early witnesses and embodied in widely received records, meets the criteria by which other historical truths are admitted. Paley represents the proof as cumulative, where converging lines—testimony, document authenticity, early practice, and external notices—establish a strong probability. He does not argue for every doctrinal proposition, but for the credibility of the foundational narrative. The overall message is that, on ordinary rules of evidence, assent is warranted. The book’s structure and tone aim to offer readers a careful, methodical basis for judging the Christian story historically true.
Historical Context
William Paley’s A View of the Evidences of Christianity appeared in London in 1794, amid the turbulence of late Georgian Britain under George III. The author, a Cambridge-trained cleric and moral philosopher, had become Archdeacon of Carlisle in 1782; his intellectual formation in Christ’s College, Cambridge, and the university’s Baconian-Newtonian culture shaped his evidential method. Britain was at war with Revolutionary France (from 1793), public debate was inflamed by pamphlets and trials, and the Church of England faced both internal reform pressures and external criticism. The book was produced within a robust print marketplace, addressing educated readers in a country balancing long-standing confessional establishments with widening demands for toleration and rational inquiry.
The Enlightenment’s critique of revelation formed the principal intellectual backdrop. David Hume’s Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748), especially “Of Miracles,” challenged the credibility of testimonial evidence for supernatural claims. English deists—John Toland (Christianity Not Mysterious, 1696) and Matthew Tindal (Christianity as Old as the Creation, 1730)—pressed for a purely rational religion. Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (vols. 1–6, 1776–1788) treated Christian expansion in sociological terms. On the Continent, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1774–1778) published the Wolfenbüttel Fragments of Reimarus. Paley’s Evidences directly answers this milieu by arguing, through historical testimony and cumulative probability, that the apostolic witness and early Christian sufferings render the resurrection credible.
The French Revolution, beginning in 1789, and its violent dechristianization gave immediate urgency to apologetic writing in Britain. The Civil Constitution of the Clergy (1790) subordinated French church governance to the state; by 1793–1794, the Cult of Reason and the closure of churches accompanied the Reign of Terror. Britain entered war with France in February 1793; domestic anxieties led to the 1794 Treason Trials and the Seditious Meetings Act (1795). Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason (parts published 1794–1795 in Paris and London) popularized deistic critiques. Paley’s 1794 book, written at this volatile juncture, sought to steady public opinion by defending Christianity on empirical grounds, distinguishing rational faith from both fanaticism and radical irreligion.
Paley’s argument leans on concrete data from Roman imperial history, emphasizing persecution and testimony. Tacitus (Annals 15.44) reports Nero’s persecution after Rome’s Great Fire in 64 CE; Suetonius (Nero 16) alludes to Christians; and Pliny the Younger’s letters to Trajan (Ep. 10.96–97, c. 112 CE) describe interrogations of Christians in Bithynia-Pontus and the emperor’s policy. Later empire-wide threats included Decius’s edict (249–251) and Diocletian’s Great Persecution (303–311), chronicled by Eusebius. Paley correlates such external attestations with the New Testament’s internal claims, arguing that sustained, geographically dispersed witness under social hazard makes deliberate fabrication improbable. By foregrounding martyrdom and administrative records, he frames Christianity’s rise as a historically traceable phenomenon.
The rise of empirical science and probabilistic reasoning in Britain set the methodological template Paley employed. Isaac Newton’s Principia (1687) and the Baconian ethos shaped Cambridge’s curriculum; Paley, who graduated Senior Wrangler in 1763, tutored at Christ’s College and prized clear evidentiary argument. Thomas Bayes’s posthumous Essay (1763) and Bishop Butler’s Analogy (1736) diffused probabilistic and cumulative-case reasoning into moral and religious discourse. Paley’s Horae Paulinae (1790) pioneered “undesigned coincidences” to test the authenticity of Pauline epistles. In Evidences (1794), he extends this empirical posture: multiple independent witnesses, coherence with hostile sources, and the costs borne by early Christians collectively raise the posterior credibility of the gospel narratives in a recognizably Enlightenment evidential framework.
The British abolition movement formed a conspicuous moral campaign in the 1780s–1790s. The Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade was founded in London in 1787 by Thomas Clarkson and others; William Wilberforce’s major parliamentary speech came in 1789; mass petitions surged in 1792; and the Slave Trade Act passed in 1807. Paley, in The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785), condemned slavery on Christian and utilitarian grounds and lent clerical authority to abolitionist arguments. While Evidences is not a reform tract, it underscores Christianity’s historical fruits and moral transformation, implicitly linking the religion’s truth with its capacity to inspire humanitarian movements visible in Britain’s public life during Paley’s career.
The American Revolution (1775–1783) and the era’s debates over religious liberty reshaped Anglophone political theology. The United States’ First Amendment (ratified 1791) disestablished religion at the federal level, while Britain’s domestic scene saw incremental relief for Protestant Dissenters (e.g., the 1779 relief act) and unrest such as the Gordon Riots (1780) over Catholic toleration. Paley’s Principles (1785) articulated political obligation and defended a prudent, utilitarian case for established religion’s civic utility. Evidences complements this by arguing that Christianity rests on public facts, not mere authority, thereby supporting social order without coercion. The book thus participates in late eighteenth-century negotiations over faith’s role in constitutional settlements across the Atlantic world.
As a social and political intervention, the book critiques fashionable skepticism among elites while resisting revolutionary irreligion and authoritarian dogmatism. By grounding belief in accessible historical evidence, Paley exposes the era’s credulity toward reductive deism and the moral hazards of dismissing religious conscience amid war and reform. His deference to testimony from marginalized early Christians amplifies concerns about justice and truth against coercive power, resonating with contemporary campaigns like abolition. The work also addresses class divides by modeling a public reason that neither presumes clerical privilege nor yields to populist excess, proposing Christianity as a rational, stabilizing force within Britain’s contested sphere of law, governance, and civil society.
Evidences of Christianity
PART 1.
OF THE DIRECT HISTORICAL EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY, AND WHEREIN IT IS DISTINGUISHED FROM THE EVIDENCE ALLEGED FOR OTHER MIRACLES.
Proposition stated
PROPOSITION I.
That there is satisfactory Evidence, that many professing to be original Witnesses of the Christian Miracles passed their Lives in Labours, Dangers, and Sufferings, voluntarily undergone in Attestation of the Accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their Belief of those Accounts; and that they submitted, from the same Motives, to new Rules of Conduct.
CHAPTER I
Evidence of the Suffering of the first Propagators of Christianity[1], from the Nature of the Case.
CHAPTER II
Evidence of the Sufferings of the first Propagators of Christianity, from Profane Testimony[2].
CHAPTER III
Indirect Evidence of the Sufferings of the first Propagators of Christianity, from the Scriptures and other ancient Christian Writings.
CHAPTER IV
Direct Evidence of the same.
CHAPTER V
Observations upon the preceding Evidence.
CHAPTER VI
That the Story for which the first Propagators of Christianity suffered was miraculous.
CHAPTER VII
That it was, in the main, the Story which we have now proved by indirect Considerations.
CHAPTER VIII
The same proved from the Authority of our Historical Scriptures.
CHAPTER IX
Of the Authenticity of the historical Scriptures, in eleven Sections
SECT. 1 Quotations of the historical Scriptures by ancient Christian Writers. SECT. 2 Of the peculiar Respect with which they were quoted. SECT. 3 The Scriptures were in very early Times collected into a distinct Volume. SECT. 4 And distinguished by appropriate Names and Titles of Respect. SECT. 5 Were publicly read and expounded in the religious Assemblies of the early Christians. SECT. 6 Commentaries, &c., were anciently written upon the Scriptures. SECT. 7 They were received by ancient Christians of different Sects and persuasions. SECT. 8 The four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, thirteen Epistles of St. Paul, the first Epistle of John, and the first of Peter, were received without doubt by those who doubted concerning the other Books of our present Canon. SECT. 9 Our present Gospels were considered by the adversaries of Christianity as containing the Accounts upon which the Religion was founded. SECT. 10 Formal Catalogues of authentic Scriptures were published, in all which our present Gospels were included. SECT. 11 The above Propositions cannot be predicated of those Books which are commonly called Apocryphal Books of the New Testament.
Recapitulation.
CHAPTER X.
OF THE DIRECT HISTORICAL EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY, AND WHEREIN IT IS DISTINGUISHED FROM THE EVIDENCE ALLEGED FOR OTHER MIRACLES.
PROPOSITION II.
CHAPTER I
That there is not satisfactory Evidence, that Persons pretending to be original Witnesses of any other similar Miracles have acted in the same Manner, in Attestation of the Accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their Belief of the Truth of those Accounts.
CHAPTER II
Consideration of some specific Instances
PART II.
OF THE AUXILIARY EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY,
CHAPTER I
Prophecy
CHAPTER II
The Morality of the Gospel
CHAPTER III
The Candour of the Writers of the New Testament
CHAPTER IV
Identity of Christ's Character
CHAPTER V
Originality of our Saviour's Character
CHAPTER VI
Conformity of the Facts occasionally mentioned or referred to in Scripture with the State of things in these Times, as represented by foreign and independent Accounts.
CHAPTER VII
Undesigned Coincidences.
CHAPTER VIII
Of the History of the Resurrection.
CHAPTER IX
Of the Propagation of Christianity. SECT. 2 Reflections upon the preceding Account. SECT. 3 Of the Religion of Mahomet.
PART III
A BRIEF CONSIDERATION OF SOME POPULAR OBJECTIONS.
CHAPTER I
The Discrepancies between the several Gospels.
CHAPTER II
Erroneous Opinions imputed to the Apostles.
CHAPTER III
The Connection of Christianity with the Jewish History.
CHAPTER IV
Rejection of Christianity.
CHAPTER V
That the Christian Miracles are not recited, or appealed to, by early Christian Writers themselves, so fully or frequently as might have been expected.
CHAPTER VI
Want of Universality in the Knowledge and Reception of Christianity, and of greater Clearness in the Evidence.
CHAPTER VII
Supposed effects of Christianity.
CHAPTER VIII
Conclusion.
PREPARATORY CONSIDERATIONS.
I deem it unnecessary to prove that mankind stood in need of a revelation because I have met with no serious person who thinks that, even under the Christian revelation, we have too much light, or any degree of assurance which is superfluous. I desire, moreover, that in judging of Christianity, it may be remembered that the question lies between this religion and none: for, if the Christian religion be not credible, no one, with whom we have to do, will support the pretensions of any other.
Suppose, then, the world we live in to have had a Creator; suppose it to appear, from the predominant aim and tendency of the provisions and contrivances observable in the universe, that the Deity, when he formed it, consulted for the happiness of his sensitive creation; suppose the disposition which dictated this counsel to continue; suppose a part of the creation to have received faculties from their Maker, by which they are capable of rendering a moral obedience to his will, and of voluntarily pursuing any end for which he has designed them; suppose the Creator to intend for these, his rational and accountable agents, a second state of existence[4], in which their situation will be by their behaviour in the first state, by which suppose (and by no other) the objection to the divine government in not putting a difference between the good and the bad, and the inconsistency of this confusion with the care and benevolence discoverable in the works of the Deity is done away; suppose it to be of the utmost importance to the subjects of this dispensation to know what is intended for them, that is, suppose the knowledge of it to be highly conducive to the happiness of the species, a purpose which so many provisions of nature are calculated to promote: Suppose, nevertheless, almost the whole race, either by the imperfection of their faculties, the misfortune of their situation, or by the loss of some prior revelation, to want this knowledge, and not to be likely, without the aid of a new revelation, to attain it; under these circumstances, is it improbable that a revelation should be made? Is it incredible that God should interpose for such a purpose? Suppose him to design for mankind a future state; is it unlikely that he should acquaint him with it?
Now in what way can a revelation be made, but by miracles? In none which we are able to conceive. Consequently, in whatever degree it is probable, or not very improbable, that a revelation should be communicated to mankind at all: in the same degree is it probable, or not very improbable, that miracles should be wrought. Therefore, when miracles are related to have been wrought in the promulgating of a revelation manifestly wanted, and, if true, of inestimable value, the improbability which arises from the miraculous nature of the things related is not greater than the original improbability that such a revelation should be imparted by God.
I wish it, however, to be correctly understood, in what manner, and to what extent, this argument is alleged. We do not assume the attributes of the Deity, or the existence of a future state, in order to prove the reality of miracles. That reality always must be proved by evidence. We assert only, that in miracles adduced in support of revelation there is not any such antecedent improbability as no testimony can surmount. And for the purpose of maintaining this assertion, we contend, that the incredibility of miracles related to have been wrought in attestation of a message from God, conveying intelligence of a future state of rewards and punishments, and teaching mankind how to prepare themselves for that state, is not in itself greater than the event, call it either probable or improbable, of the two following propositions being true: namely, first, that a future state of existence should be destined by God for his human creation; and, secondly, that, being so destined, he should acquaint them with it. It is not necessary for our purpose, that these propositions be capable of proof, or even that, by arguments drawn from the light of nature, they can be made out to be probable; it is enough that we are able to say concerning them, that they are not so violently improbable, so contradictory to what we already believe of the divine power and character, that either the propositions themselves, or facts strictly connected with the propositions (and therefore no further improbable than they are improbable), ought to be rejected at first sight, and to be rejected by whatever strength or complication of evidence they be attested.
This is the prejudication we would resist. For to this length does a modern objection to miracles go, viz., that no human testimony can in any case render them credible. I think the reflection above stated, that, if there be a revelation, there must be miracles, and that, under the circumstances in which the human species are placed, a revelation is not improbable, or not to any great degree, to be a fair answer to the whole objection.
But since it is an objection which stands in the very threshold our argument, and, if admitted, is a bar to every proof, and to all future reasoning upon the subject, it may be necessary, before we proceed further, to examine the principle upon which it professes to be founded; which principle is concisely this, That it is contrary to experience that a miracle should be true, but not contrary to experience that testimony should be false.
Now there appears a small ambiguity in the term "experience," and in the phrases, "contrary to experience," or "contradicting experience," which it may be necessary to remove in the first place. Strictly speaking, the narrative of a fact is then only contrary to experience, when the fact is related to have existed at a time and place, at which time and place we being present did not perceive it to exist; as if it should be asserted, that in a particular room, and at a particular hour of a certain day, a man was raised from the dead, in which room, and at the time specified, we, being present and looking on, perceived no such event to have taken place. Here the assertion is contrary to experience properly so called; and this is a contrariety which no evidence can surmount. It matters nothing, whether the fact be of a miraculous nature, or not. But although this be the experience, and the contrariety, which Archbishop Tillotson alleged in the quotation with which Mr. Hume opens his Essay, it is certainly not that experience, nor that contrariety, which Mr. Hume himself intended to object. And short of this I know no intelligible signification which can be affixed to the term "contrary to experience," but one, viz., that of not having ourselves experienced anything similar to the thing related, or such things not being generally experienced by others. I say "not generally" for to state concerning the fact in question, that no such thing was ever experienced, or that universal experience is against it, is to assume the subject of the controversy.
Now the improbability which arises from the want (for this properly is a want, not a contradiction) of experience, is only equal to the probability there is, that, if the thing were true, we should experience things similar to it, or that such things would be generally experienced. Suppose it then to be true that miracles were wrought on the first promulgation of Christianity, when nothing but miracles could decide its authority, is it certain that such miracles would be repeated so often, and in so many places, as to become objects of general experience? Is it a probability approaching to certainty? Is it a probability of any great strength or force? Is it such as no evidence can encounter? And yet this probability is the exact converse, and therefore the exact measure, of the improbability which arises from the want of experience, and which Mr. Hume represents as invincible by human testimony.
It is not like alleging a new law of nature, or a new experiment in natural philosophy; because, when these are related, it is expected that, under the same circumstances, the same effect will follow universally; and in proportion as this expectation is justly entertained, the want of a corresponding experience negatives the history. But to expect concerning a miracle, that it should succeed upon a repetition, is to expect that which would make it cease to be a miracle, which is contrary to its nature as such, and would totally destroy the use and purpose for which it was wrought.
The force of experience as an objection to miracles is founded in the presumption, either that the course of nature is invariable, or that, if it be ever varied, variations will be frequent and general. Has the necessity of this alternative been demonstrated? Permit us to call the course of nature the agency of an intelligent Being, and is there any good reason for judging this state of the case to be probable? Ought we not rather to expect that such a Being, on occasions of peculiar importance, may interrupt the order which he had appointed, yet, that such occasions should return seldom; that these interruptions consequently should be confined to the experience of a few; that the want of it, therefore, in many, should be matter neither of surprise nor objection?
But, as a continuation of the argument from experience, it is said that, when we advance accounts of miracles, we assign effects without causes, or we attribute effects to causes inadequate to the purpose, or to causes of the operation of which we have no experience of what causes, we may ask, and of what effects, does the objection speak? If it be answered that, when we ascribe the cure of the palsy to a touch, of blindness to the anointing of the eyes with clay, or the raising of the dead to a word, we lay ourselves open to this imputation; we reply that we ascribe no such effects to such causes. We perceive no virtue or energy in these things more than in other things of the same kind. They are merely signs to connect the miracle with its end. The effect we ascribe simply to the volition of Deity; of whose existence and power, not to say of whose Presence and agency, we have previous and independent proof. We have, therefore, all we seek for in the works of rational agents—a sufficient power and an adequate motive. In a word, once believe that there is a God, and miracles are not incredible.[1q]
Mr. Hume states the ease of miracles to be a contest of opposite improbabilities, that is to say, a question whether it be more improbable that the miracle should be true, or the testimony false: and this I think a fair account of the controversy. But herein I remark a want of argumentative justice, that, in describing the improbability of miracles, he suppresses all those circumstances of extenuation, which result from our knowledge of the existence, power, and disposition of the Deity; his concern in the creation, the end answered by the miracle, the importance of that end, and its subserviency to the plan pursued in the work of nature. As Mr. Hume has represented the question, miracles are alike incredible to him who is previously assured of the constant agency of a Divine Being, and to him who believes that no such Being exists in the universe. They are equally incredible, whether related to have been wrought upon occasion the most deserving, and for purposes the most beneficial, or for no assignable end whatever, or for an end confessedly trifling or pernicious. This surely cannot be a correct statement. In adjusting also the other side of the balance, the strength and weight of testimony, this author has provided an answer to every possible accumulation of historical proof by telling us that we are not obliged to explain how the story of the evidence arose. Now I think that we are obliged; not, perhaps, to show by positive accounts how it did, but by a probable hypothesis how it might so happen. The existence of the testimony is a phenomenon; the truth of the fact solves the phenomenon. If we reject this solution, we ought to have some other to rest in; and none, even by our adversaries, can be admired, which is not inconsistent with the principles that regulate human affairs and human conduct at present, or which makes men then to have been a different kind of beings from what they are now.
But the short consideration which, independently of every other, convinces me that there is no solid foundation in Mr. Hume's conclusion, is the following. When a theorem is proposed to a mathematician, the first thing he does with it is to try it upon a simple case, and if it produce a false result, he is sure that there must be some mistake in the demonstration. Now to proceed in this way with what may be called Mr. Hume's theorem. If twelve men, whose probity and good sense I had long known, should seriously and circumstantially relate to me an account of a miracle wrought before their eyes, and in which it was impossible that they should be deceived: if the governor of the country, hearing a rumour of this account, should call these men into his presence, and offer them a short proposal, either to confess the imposture, or submit to be tied up to a gibbet; if they should refuse with one voice to acknowledge that there existed any falsehood or imposture in the case: if this threat were communicated to them separately, yet with no different effect; if it was at last executed; if I myself saw them, one after another, consenting to be racked, burnt, or strangled, rather than live up the truth of their account;—still if Mr. Hume's rule be my guide, I am not to believe them. Now I undertake to say that there exists not a sceptic in the world who would not believe them, or who would defend such incredulity.
Instances of spurious miracles supported by strong apparent testimony undoubtedly demand examination; Mr. Hume has endeavoured to fortify his argument by some examples of this kind. I hope in a proper place to show that none of them reach the strength or circumstances of the Christian evidence. In these, however, consists the weight of his objection; in the principle itself, I am persuaded, there is none.
PART I.
OF THE DIRECT HISTORICAL EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY, AND WHEREIN IT IS DISTINGUISHED FROM THE EVIDENCE ALLEGED FOR OTHER MIRACLES.
The two propositions which I shall endeavour to establish are these:
I. That there is satisfactory evidence that many professing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.
2. That there is not satisfactory evidence that persons professing to be original witnesses of other miracles, in their nature as certain as these are, have ever acted in the same manner, in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and properly in consequence of their belief of those accounts.
The first of these prepositions, as it forms the argument will stand at the head of the following nine chapters.
CHAPTER I
There is satisfactory evidence that many, professing to be original witness of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their of belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.
To support this proposition, two points are necessary to be made out: first, that the Founder of the institution, his associates and immediate followers, acted the part which the proposition imputes to them: secondly, that they did so in attestation of the miraculous history recorded in our Scriptures, and solely in consequence of their belief of the truth of this history.
Before we produce any particular testimony to the activity and sufferings which compose the subject of our first assertion, it will be proper to consider the degree of probability which the assertion derives from the nature of the case, that is, by inferences from those parts of the case which, in point of fact, are on all hands acknowledged.
First, then, the Christian Religion exists, and, therefore, by some means or other, was established. Now it either owes the principle of its establishment, i. e. its first publication, to the activity of the Person who was the founder of the institution, and of those who were joined with him in the undertaking, or we are driven upon the strange supposition, that, although they might lie by, others would take it up; although they were quiet and silent, other persons busied themselves in the success and propagation of their story. This is perfectly incredible. To me it appears little less than certain, that, if the first announcing of the religion by the Founder had not been followed up by the zeal and industry of his immediate disciples, the attempt must have expired in its birth. Then as to the kind and degree of exertion which was employed, and the mode of life to which these persons submitted, we reasonably suppose it to be like that which we observe in all others who voluntarily become missionaries of a new faith. Frequent, earnest, and laborious preaching, constantly conversing with religious persons upon religion, a sequestration from the common pleasures, engagements, and varieties of life, and an addiction to one serious object, compose the habits of such men. I do not say that this mode of life is without enjoyment, but I say that the enjoyment springs from sincerity. With a consciousness at the bottom of hollowness and falsehood, the fatigue and restraint would become insupportable. I am apt to believe that very few hypocrites engage in these undertakings; or, however, persist in them long. Ordinarily speaking, nothing can overcome the indolence of mankind, the love which is natural to most tempers of cheerful society and cheerful scenes, or the desire, which is common to all, of personal ease and freedom, but conviction.
Secondly, it is also highly probable, from the nature of the case, that the propagation of the new religion was attended with difficulty and danger. As addressed to the Jews, it was a system adverse, not only to their habitual opinions but to those opinions upon which their hopes, their partialities, their pride, their consolation, was founded. This people, with or without reason, had worked themselves into a persuasion, that some signal and greatly advantageous change was to be effected in the condition of their country, by the agency of a long-promised messenger from heaven.* The rulers of the Jews, their leading sect, their priesthood, had been the authors of this persuasion to the common people. So that it was not merely the conjecture of theoretical divines, or the secret expectation of a few recluse devotees, but it was become the popular hope and Passion, and, like all popular opinions, undoubting and impatient of contradiction. They clung to this hope under every misfortune of their country, and with more tenacity as their dangers and calamities increased. To find, therefore, that expectations so gratifying were to be worse than disappointed; that they were to end in the diffusion of a mild unambitious religion, which, instead of victories and triumphs, instead of exalting their nation and institution above the rest of the world, was to advance those whom they despised to an equality with themselves, in those very points of comparison in which they most valued their own distinction, could be no very pleasing discovery to a Jewish mind; nor could the messengers of such intelligence expect to be well received or easily credited. The doctrine was equally harsh and novel. The extending of the kingdom of God to those who did not conform to the law of Moses was a notion that had never before entered into the thoughts of a Jew.
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* "Pererebuerat oriento toto vetus et contans opinio, esse in fatis, ut eo tempore Judaea profecti rerum potirsatur." Sueton. Vespasian. cap. 4—8.
"Pluribus persuasio inerat, antiquis sacerdotum literis contineri, eo ipso tempore fore, ut valesecret oriens, profectique Judaea rerum potirentur." Tacit. Hist. lib. v. cap. 9—13. _________
The character of the new institution was, in other respects also, ungrateful to Jewish habits and principles. Their own religion was in a high degree technical. Even the enlightened Jew placed a great deal of stress upon the ceremonies of his law, saw in them a great deal of virtue and efficacy; the gross and vulgar had scarcely anything else; and the hypocritical and ostentatious magnified them above measure, as being the instruments of their own reputation and influence. The Christian scheme, without formally repealing the Levitical code[3], lowered its estimation extremely. In the place of strictness and zeal in performing the observances which that code prescribed, or which tradition had added to it, the new sect preached up faith, well-regulated affections, inward purity, and moral rectitude of disposition, as the true ground, on the part of the worshipper, of merit and acceptance with God. This, however rational it may appear, or recommending to us at present, did not by any means facilitate the plan then. On the contrary, to disparage those qualities which the highest characters in the country valued themselves most upon, was a sure way of making powerful enemies. As if the frustration of the national hope was not enough, the long-esteemed merit of ritual zeal and punctuality was to be decried, and that by Jews preaching to Jews.
The ruling party at Jerusalem had just before crucified the Founder of the religion. That is a fact which will not be disputed. They, therefore, who stood forth to preach the religion must necessarily reproach these rulers with an execution which they could not but represent as an unjust and cruel murder. This would not render their office more easy, or their situation more safe.
With regard to the interference of the Roman government which was then established in Judea, I should not expect, that, despising as it did the religion of the country, it would, if left to itself, animadvert, either with much vigilance or much severity, upon the schisms and controversies which arose within it. Yet there was that in Christianity which might easily afford a handle of accusation with a jealous government. The Christians avowed an unqualified obedience to a new master. They avowed also that he was the person who had been foretold to the Jews under the suspected title of King. The spiritual nature of this kingdom, the consistency of this obedience with civil subjection, were distinctions too refined to be entertained by a Roman president, who viewed the business at a great distance, or through the medium of very hostile representations. Our histories accordingly inform us, that this was the turn which the enemies of Jesus gave to his character and pretensions in their remonstrances with Pontius Pilate. And Justin Martyr, about a hundred years afterwards, complains that the same mistake prevailed in his time: "Ye, having heard that we are waiting for a kingdom, suppose without distinguishing that we mean a human kingdom, when in truth we speak of that which is with God."* And it was undoubtedly a natural source of calumny and misconstruction.
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* Ap. Ima p. 16. Ed. Thirl. _________
The preachers of Christianity had, therefore, to contend with prejudice backed by power. They had to come forward to a disappointed people, to a priesthood possessing a considerable share of municipal authority, and actuated by strong motives of opposition and resentment; and they had to do this under a foreign government, to whose favour they made no pretensions, and which was constantly surrounded by their enemies. The well-known, because the experienced, fate of reformers, whenever the reformation subverts some reigning opinion, and does not proceed upon a change that has already taken place in the sentiments of a country, will not allow, much less lead us to suppose that the first propagators of Christianity at Jerusalem and in Judea, under the difficulties and the enemies they had to contend with, and entirely destitute as they were of force, authority, or protection, could execute their mission with personal ease and safety.
Let us next inquire, what might reasonably be expected by the preachers of Christianity when they turned themselves to the heathen public. Now the first thing that strikes us is, that the religion they carried with them was exclusive. It denied without reserve the truth of every article of heathen mythology, the existence of every object of their worship. It accepted no compromise, it admitted no comprehension. It must prevail, if it prevailed at all, by the overthrow of every statue, altar, and temple in the world, It will not easily be credited, that a design, so bold as this was, could in any age be attempted to be carried into execution with impunity.
For it ought to be considered, that this was not setting forth, or magnifying the character and worship of some new competitor for a place in the Pantheon, whose pretensions might he discussed or asserted without questioning the reality of any others: it was pronouncing all other gods to be false, and all other worship vain. From the facility with which the polytheism of ancient nations admitted new objects of worship into the number of their acknowledged divinities, or the patience with which they might entertain proposals of this kind, we can argue nothing as to their toleration of a system, or of the publishers and active propagators of a system, which swept away the very foundation of the existing establishment. The one was nothing more than what it would be, in popish countries, to add a saint to the calendar; the other was to abolish and tread under foot the calendar itself.
Secondly, it ought also to be considered, that this was not the case of philosophers propounding in their books, or in their schools, doubts concerning the truth of the popular creed, or even avowing their disbelief of it. These philosophers did not go about from place to place to collect proselytes from amongst the common people; to form in the heart of the country societies professing their tenets; to provide for the order, instruction and permanency of these societies; nor did they enjoin their followers to withdraw themselves from the public worship of the temples, or refuse a compliance with rites instituted by the laws.* These things are what the Christians did, and what the philosophers did not; and in these consisted the activity and danger of the enterprise.
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* The best of the ancient philosophers, Plato, Cicero, and Epictetus, allowed, or rather enjoined, men to worship the gods of the country, and in the established form. See passages to this purpose collected from their works by Dr. Clarke, Nat. and Rev. Rel. p. 180. ed. v—Except Socrates, they all thought it wiser to comply with the laws than to contend. _________
Thirdly, it ought also to be considered, that this danger proceeded not merely from solemn acts and public resolutions of the state, but from sudden bursts of violence at particular places, from the licence of the populace, the rashness of some magistrates and negligence of others; from the influence and instigation of interested adversaries, and, in general, from the variety and warmth of opinion which an errand so novel and extraordinary could not fail of exciting. I can conceive that the teachers of Christianity might both fear and suffer much from these causes, without any general persecution being denounced against them by imperial authority. Some length of time, I should suppose, might pass, before the vast machine of the Roman empire would be put in motion, or its attention be obtained to religious controversy: but, during that time, a great deal of ill usage might be endured, by a set of friendless, unprotected travellers, telling men, wherever they came, that the religion of their ancestors, the religion in which they had been brought up, the religion of the state, and of the magistrate, the rites which they frequented, the pomp which they admired, was throughout a system of folly and delusion.
Nor do I think that the teachers of Christianity would find protection in that general disbelief of the popular theology, which is supposed to have prevailed amongst the intelligent part of the heathen public. It is by no means true that unbelievers are usually tolerant. They are not disposed (and why should they?) to endanger the present state of things, by suffering a religion of which they believe nothing to be disturbed by another of which they believe as little. They are ready themselves to conform to anything; and are, oftentimes, amongst the foremost to procure conformity from others, by any method which they think likely to be efficacious. When was ever a change of religion patronized by infidels? How little, not withstanding the reigning scepticism, and the magnified liberality of that age, the true principles of toleration were understood by the wisest men amongst them, may be gathered from two eminent and uncontested examples. The younger Pliny, polished as he was by all the literature of that soft and elegant period, could gravely pronounce this monstrous judgment:—"Those who persisted in declaring themselves Christians, I ordered to be led away to punishment, (i. e. to execution,) for I DID NOT DOUBT, whatever it was that they confessed, that contumacy and inflexible obstinacy ought to be punished." His master Trajan, a mild and accomplished prince, went, nevertheless, no further in his sentiments of moderation and equity than what appears in the following rescript:—"The Christians are not to be sought for; but if any are brought before you, and convicted, they are to be punished." And this direction he gives, after it had been reported to him by his own president, that, by the most strict examination, nothing could be discovered in the principles of these persons, but "a bad and excessive superstition," accompanied, it seems, with an oath or mutual federation, "to allow themselves in no crime or immoral conduct whatever." The truth is, the ancient heathens considered religion entirely as an affair of state, as much under the tuition of the magistrate as any other part of the police. The religion of that age was not merely allied to the state; it was incorporated into it. Many of its offices were administered by the magistrate. Its titles of pontiffs, augurs, and flamens, were borne by senators, consuls, and generals. Without discussing, therefore, the truth of the theology, they resented every affront put upon the established worship, as a direct opposition to the authority of government.
Add to which, that the religious systems of those times, however ill supported by evidence, had been long established. The ancient religion of a country has always many votaries, and sometimes not the fewer, because its origin is hidden in remoteness and obscurity. Men have a natural veneration for antiquity, especially in matters of religion. What Tacitus says of the Jewish was more applicable to the heathen establishment: "Hi ritus, quoquo modo inducti, antiquitate defenduntur." It was also a splendid and sumptuous worship. It had its priesthood, its endowments, its temples. Statuary, painting, architecture, and music, contributed their effect to its ornament and magnificence. It abounded in festival shows and solemnities, to which the common people are greatly addicted, and which were of a nature to engage them much more than anything of that sort among us. These things would retain great numbers on its side by the fascination of spectacle and pomp, as well as interest many in its preservation by the advantage which they drew from it. "It was moreover interwoven," as Mr. Gibbon rightly represents it, "with every circumstance of business or pleasure, of public or private life, with all the offices and amusements of society." On the due celebration also of its rites, the people were taught to believe, and did believe, that the prosperity of their country in a great measure depended.
I am willing to accept the account of the matter which is given by Mr. Gibbon: "The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true, by the philosopher as equally false, and by the magistrate as equally useful:" and I would ask from which of these three classes of men were the Christian missionaries to look for protection or impunity? Could they expect it from the people, "whose acknowledged confidence in the public religion" they subverted from its foundation? From the philosopher, who, "considering all religious as equally false," would of course rank theirs among the number, with the addition of regarding them as busy and troublesome zealots? Or from the magistrate, who, satisfied with the "utility" of the subsisting religion, would not be likely to countenance a spirit of proselytism and innovation:—a system which declared war against every other, and which, if it prevailed, must end in a total rupture of public opinion; an upstart religion, in a word, which was not content with its own authority, but must disgrace all the settled religions of the world? It was not to be imagined that he would endure with patience, that the religion of the emperor and of the state should be calumniated and borne down by a company of superstitious and despicable Jews.
Lastly; the nature of the case affords a strong proof, that the original teachers of Christianity, in consequence of their new profession, entered upon a new and singular course of life. We may be allowed to presume, that the institution which they preached to others, they conformed to in their own persons; because this is no more than what every teacher of a new religion both does, and must do, in order to obtain either proselytes or hearers. The change which this would produce was very considerable. It is a change which we do not easily estimate, because, ourselves and all about us being habituated to the institutions from our infancy, it is what we neither experience nor observe. After men became Christians, much of their time was spent in prayer and devotion, in religious meetings, in celebrating the Eucharist, in conferences, in exhortations, in preaching, in an affectionate intercourse with one another, and correspondence with other societies. Perhaps their mode of life, in its form and habit, was not very unlike the Unitas Fratrum, or the modern methodists. Think then what it was to become such at Corinth, at Ephesus, at Antioch, or even at Jerusalem. How new! How alien from all their former habits and ideas, and from those of everybody about them! What a revolution there must have been of opinions and prejudices to bring the matter to this!
We know what the precepts of the religion are; how pure, how benevolent, how disinterested a conduct they enjoin; and that this purity and benevolence are extended to the very thoughts and affections. We are not, perhaps, at liberty to take for granted that the lives of the preachers of Christianity were as perfect as their lessons; but we are entitled to contend, that the observable part of their behaviour must have agreed in a great measure with the duties which they taught. There was, therefore, (which is all that we assert,) a course of life pursued by them, different from that which they before led. And this is of great importance. Men are brought to anything almost sooner than to change their habit of life, especially when the change is either inconvenient, or made against the force of natural inclination, or with the loss of accustomed indulgences. It is the most difficult of all things to convert men from vicious habits to virtuous ones, as every one may judge from what he feels in himself, as well as from what he sees in others.* It is almost like making men over again.
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* Hartley's Essays on Man, p. 190. _________
Left then to myself, and without any more information than a knowledge of the existence of the religion, of the general story upon which it is founded, and that no act of power, force, and authority was concerned in its first success, I should conclude, from the very nature and exigency of the case, that the Author of the religion, during his life, and his immediate disciples after his death, exerted themselves in spreading and publishing the institution throughout the country in which it began, and into which it was first carried; that, in the prosecution of this purpose, they underwent the labours and troubles which we observe the propagators of new sects to undergo; that the attempt must necessarily have also been in a high degree dangerous; that, from the subject of the mission, compared with the fixed opinions and prejudices of those to whom the missionaries were to address themselves, they could hardly fail of encountering strong and frequent opposition; that, by the hand of government, as well as from the sudden fury and unbridled licence of the people, they would oftentimes experience injurious and cruel treatment; that, at any rate, they must have always had so much to fear for their personal safety, as to have passed their lives in a state of constant peril and anxiety; and lastly, that their mode of life and conduct, visibly at least, corresponded with the institution which they delivered, and, so far, was both new, and required continual self-denial.
CHAPTER II.
There is satisfactory evidence that many, professing to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct.
After thus considering what was likely to happen, we are next to inquire how the transaction is represented in the several accounts that have come down to us. And this inquiry is properly preceded by the other, forasmuch as the reception of these accounts may depend in part on the credibility of what they contain.
The obscure and distant view of Christianity, which some of the heathen writers of that age had gained, and which a few passage in their remaining works incidentally discover to us, offers itself to our notice in the first place: because, so far as this evidence goes, it is the concession of adversaries; the source from which it is drawn is unsuspected. Under this head, a quotation from Tacitus[5], well known to every scholar, must be inserted, as deserving particular attention. The reader will bear in mind that this passage was written about seventy years after Christ's death, and that it relates to transactions which took place about thirty years after that event—Speaking of the fire which happened at Rome in the time of Nero, and of the suspicions which were entertained that the emperor himself was concerned in causing it, the historian proceeds in his narrative and observations thus:—
"But neither these exertions, nor his largesses to the people, nor his offerings to the gods, did away the infamous imputation[8] under which Nero lay, of having ordered the city to be set on fire. To put an end, therefore, to this report, he laid the guilt, and inflicted the most cruel punishments, upon a set of people, who were holden in abhorrence for their crimes, and called by the vulgar, Christians. The founder of that name was Christ, who suffered death in the reign of Tiberius, under his procurator, Pontius Pilate[6]—This pernicious superstition, thus checked for a while, broke out again; and spread not only over Judea, where the evil originated, but through Rome also, whither everything bad upon the earth finds its way and is practised. Some who confessed their sect were first seized, and afterwards, by their information, a vast multitude were apprehended, who were convicted, not so much of the crime of burning Rome, as of hatred to mankind. Their sufferings at their execution were aggravated by insult and mockery; for some were disguised in the skins of wild beasts, and worried to death by dogs; some were crucified; and others were wrapped in pitched shirts,* and set on fire when the day closed, that they might serve as lights to illuminate the night. Nero lent his own gardens for these executions, and exhibited at the same time a mock Circensian entertainment[7]; being a spectator of the whole, in the dress of a charioteer, sometimes mingling with the crowd on foot, and sometimes viewing the spectacle from his car. This conduct made the sufferers pitied; and though they were criminals, and deserving the severest punishments, yet they were considered as sacrificed, not so much out of a regard to the public good, as to gratify the cruelty of one man."
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* This is rather a paraphrase, but is justified by what the Scholiast upon Juvenal says; "Nero maleficos homines taeda et papyro et cera supervestiebat, et sic ad ignem admoveri jubebat." Lard. Jewish and Heath. Test. vol. i. p. 359. _________
Our concern with this passage at present is only so far as it affords a presumption in support of the proposition which we maintain, concerning the activity and sufferings of the first teachers of Christianity. Now, considered in this view, it proves three things: 1st, that the Founder of the institution was put to death; 2dly, that in the same country in which he was put to death, the religion, after a short check, broke out again and spread; 3dly, that it so spread as that, within thirty-four years from the Author's death, a very great number of Christians (ingens eorum multitudo) were found at Rome. From which fact, the two following inferences may be fairly drawn: first, that if, in the space of thirty-four years from its commencement, the religion had spread throughout Judea, had extended itself to Rome, and there had numbered a great multitude of converts, the original teachers and missionaries of the institution could not have been idle; secondly, that when the Author of the undertaking was put to death as a malefactor for his attempt, the endeavours of his followers to establish his religion in the same country, amongst the same people, and in the same age, could not but be attended with danger.
Suetonius, a writer contemporary with Tacitus, describing the transactions of the same reign, uses these words: "Affecti suppliciis Christiani genus hominum superstitionis novae et maleficae." (Suet. Nero. Cap. 16) "The Christians, a set of men of a new and mischievous (or magical) superstition, were punished."
Since it is not mentioned here that the burning of the city was the pretence of the punishment of the Christians, or that they were the Christians of Rome who alone suffered, it is probable that Suetonius refers to some more general persecution than the short and occasional one which Tacitus describes.
Juvenal, a writer of the same age with the two former, and intending, it should seem, to commemorate the cruelties exercised under Nero's government, has the following lines: (Sat. i. ver. 155)
"Pone Tigellinum, taeda lucebis in illa, Qua stantes ardent, qui fixo gutture fumant, Et latum media sulcum deducit arena" (Forsan "deducis.")
