wass auty wher, to one per asminesval deward & general ana se when de has received the mentiinn undirlity, sues and sues and fourchases what is necesta, and promisses Rim with port in abundann and all osten Fangs off, が ཟ་ you mony for in winter tire are thick cloaks found in The Ammer light cheap months, so thats when wante me is at liberty without restraint, and fatechishen fina de chooses; once what belong to one belas hätt and on the other hand whaten belays to the whit རྨ་་གི་་ /ཏ་/k་་་་་{、/་ན དུ belongs to so pach individual. And again if any, Liis cured frame the common resources, being. The general cape and anxiety of the white In the Treatise on team tim ilatier aife, & Boking Fran ed to pray ers the elblos sit down to meat, stile observing the order or for they do not look an then as elders who are advanced in gears fray ancient but in some very they have at tacked Thumselves to this what only lately, but there when izey car elders are those who from the earliest infond have grown ups & arrived at ouationity in the speculatifin Berting & hilosophy, which is the comost beautiful "And the women also share in the feast, the gran Party punity. ( not in and outs, necessity, as one the Freeks, who have been compelled to resever ཟོ་་་་ང crued hair due PRINTED BY RICHARD KINDER, GREEN ARBOUR COURT, OLD BAILEY. the express command by reystée expressions in all firies in the exforme ments seem tole the body cealed under le The soul!" ["S; [Parabass. is “))ང་་、/7་ན A body and the invisita me желист beneath the plain words resuntles helle billett, but the spirit giveth (4) Alegories in the Epistles Bi) & Fed, xx for they dave left behind them on PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. ལ་ཡུ་ form in the t ཟ་^ལ་།U No Lavey Ince, have also the writinful ancientmen been the founders & one out on another, lave left behind ་་་་་ manji ཨ་མ་k() mystein The allegorical by tein off writing take asu tundy mode = "no vol 1. %). Dexplanation, where they take a sa To those whose interest is already so much awakened The hypothesis, that there is a mixture of truth and what they are to believe or disbelieve on the subject of the Christian religion. The following pages are the result of an investigation undertaken with this view, and pursued for some time with the expectation that, at least, the principal miraculous facts supposed to lie at the foundation of Christianity would be found to be impregnable; but it was continued with a gradually increasing conviction that the true account of the life of Jesus Christ, and of the spread of his religion, would be found to contain no deviation from the known laws of nature, nor to require, for their explanation, more than the operation of human motives and feelings, acted upon by the peculiar circumstances of the age and country whence the religion originated. The analysis of the four Gospels, proceeding on the admission that they may contain a mixture of truth and error, is a very complicated but not impracticable task. It is necessary to form an opinion as to the date of each writing, the general character of each author, and his peculiarities as a writer; to institute continual comparisons between the events or discourses which he relates, and the opinions and controversies which arose subsequently to his own time; to weigh the probability in favour of the real occurrence of a fact, considered in reference to the ascertained history of the time, with that in favour of its invention by the author or some intermediate narrator; to consider what greater degree of weight is due to the testimony from the accordance of all, or of several of the writers; and to ascertain whether they wrote independently, or copied from each other. By this labo rious method of sifting and examining, it must be admitted that it would be possible to obtain a tolerably correct history from a collection of records acknowledged to be of a very mixed character. The doctrine of the divine inspiration, or of the unquestionable veracity, of the Gospel writers, has hitherto hindered the full application of this free method of investigation to the New Testament, on the part of believers in Christianity; and unbelievers seem generally to have been more intent upon raising objections and cavils to the narratives as they stand, than in searching out the real truth. Hence it has frequently been observed, that no clear and intelligible account has been given of the life of Jesus Christ on simply natural grounds; whence it has been argued, that no alternative remains but to regard him as the miraculous endowed personage presented to us in the four Gospels. The first two chapters of this work give a sketch of conclusions formed in the manner above stated, from the study of the Old and New Testament, and of Josephus. It is admitted that some parts of this sketch cannot claim a higher character than that of plausible conjecture. The authority of the main sources of information being shaken, it is evident that conjecture is, in many cases, all to which the utmost research can attain. The whole is, however, expressed in the historical style, for the sake of simplicity; consequently, when the reader meets with some assertions not sufficiently supported by the notes, his patience is entreated until he arrives at the chapters which follow. |