which teftimony comes not more than fifty years after that of St. Paul, is very applicable to the fubject under confideration. The character which this writer gives of the Christians of that age, and which was drawn from a pretty accurate enquiry, because he confidered their moral principles as the point in which the magiftrate was interested, is as follows:-He tells the emperor, "that fome of those who had relinquifhed the fociety, or who, to fave themselves, pretended that they had relinquished it, affirmed that they were wont to meet together, on a stated day, before it was light, and fung among themfelves alternately a hymn to Chrift as a God; and to bind themselves, by an oath, not to the commiffion of any wickedness, but that they would not be guilty of theft or robbery, or adultery; that they would never falfify their word, nor deny a pledge committed to them, when called upon to return it. This proves that a morality, more pure and ftrict than was ordinary, prevailed at that time in Chriftian focieties.

And

And to me it appears, that we are authorised

to carry this teftimony back to the age of to the the apoftles; because it is not probable that the immediate hearers and difciples of Chrift were more relaxed than their fucceffors in Pliny's time, or the miffionaries of the religion than those whom they taught,

CHAP.

CHAP. VI.

There is fatisfactory evidence that many, profeffing to have been original witnesses of the Chriftian miracles, paffed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undergone in atteftation of the accounts which they delivered, and folely in confequence of their belief of the truth of thofe accounts; and that they alfo fubmitted, from the fame motives, to new rules of conduct.

WHEN we confider, first, the prevalency

of the religion at this hour; fecondly, the only credible account which can be given of its origin, viz. the activity of the founder and his affociates; thirdly, the oppofition which that activity muft naturally have excited ; fourthly, the fate of the founder of the religion, attefted by heathen writers as well as our own; fifthly, the testimony of the fame writers to the sufferings of Christians, either Contemporary with, or immediately fucceed

ing, the original settlers of the institution; fixthly, predictions of the fufferings of his followers afcribed to the founder of the religion, which afcription alone proves, either that fuch predictions were delivered and fulfilled, or that the writers of Chrift's life were induced by the event to attribute fuch predictions to him; feventhly, letters now in our poffeffion, written by fome of the prin cipal agents in the tranfaction, referring exprefsly to extreme labours, dangers, and fufferings, fuftained by themfelves and their companions; laftly, a hiftory, purporting to be written by a fellow traveller of one of the new teachers, and, by its unfophisticated correspondency with letters of that person ftill extant, proving itself to be written by fome one well acquainted with the subject of the narrative, which history contains accounts of travels, perfecutions, and martyrdoms, anfwering to what the former reafons lead us to expect: when we lay together these confiderations, which, taken feparately, are, I think, correctly fuch as I have ftated them in the preceding chapters, there cannot much doubt

doubt remain upon our minds, but that a number of perfons at that time appeared in the world, publicly advancing an extraordinary story, and, for the fake of propagating the belief of that ftory, voluntarily incurring great perfonal dangers, traverfing feas and kingdoms, exerting great induftry, and sustaining great extremities of ill ufage and perfecution. It is alfo proved that the fame perfons, in confequence of their perfuafion, or pretended perfuafion of the truth of what they afferted, entered upon a course of life in many refpects new and fingular,

From the clear and acknowledged parts of the cafe, I think it to be likewife in the highest degree probable, that the ftory, for which these perfons voluntarily expofed themselves to the fatigues and hardships which they endured, was a miraculous ftory; I mean, that they pretended to miraculous evidence of fome kind or other. They had nothing else to ftand upon. The defignation of the person, that is to fay, that Jefus of Nazareth, rather than any other perfon, was

the