THE rise and progress of the Christian religion,—its influence on every state and kingdom by which it has been embraced,—and the amelioration of the condition of the human race, through its means, by the conversion of rude barbarians to a degree of improvement unknown to classic ages, — all concur to render an impartial account of it, almost as interesting to the philosopher and the politician as it is tothe sincere disciple of the Savior.

The history now offered to the public, has, however, been compiled with a more direct and special view to the information of the latter class of readers than of either of the former; and it may not be without its use, before we enter immediately on the subject itself, to pause, and take a cursory view of the actual state of the world in the age in which the gospel dispensation had its commencement. Christianity claims an heavenly origin, and professes to have conferred, and indeed still to confer, blessings on mankind to which no other religion has any pretensions. What, from age to age, it is doing for ourselves, few of us need to be told: but without reverting to the condition of our species at the time of its first promulgation, and distinctly marking its progress in the subversion of the idolatrous rites and absurd superstitions of Paganism, we can never appreciate, as we ought to do, the extent of those benefits which have resulted from the introduction. and-establishment of this divine institution in the world. It appears highly desirable therefore, by way of introduction to the following work, that the reader be presented with a sketch of the general state of the world at the time of the Savior’s birth; and that his attention be also particularly called to the state of the Jewish nation at the same interesting period.

PART A VIEW OF THE STATE OF THE WORLD IN GENERAL, AT THE TIME OF CHRIST’S BIRTH.

THE inspired historians, who have narrated the life and actions of the Lord Jesus Christ, have particularly specified the time of his birth, as being under the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus, and when Herod the Great was king of Judea. (Luke 2:1; Matthew 2:1.) At this period the Roman empire was in the zenith of its extent and power; that military people having reduced the greatest part of the habitable earth under the dominion of its arms; and even the land of Judea, once so renowned as the kingdom over which David and Solomon had swayed the royal scepter, had sunk into a province of this mighty empire.

The ancient Roman empire was at this epoch of the world a most magnificent object. It extended from the river Euphrates in the east, to the Atlantic or western ocean; that is, in length more than three thousand miles. In breadth too, it was more than two thousand; and the whole included above sixteen hundred thousand square miles. This vast extent of territory was divided into provizices; and they comprised the countries called Spain, Gaul, (since France) the greater part of Britain, Italy, Rhoetia, Noricum, Pannonia, Dalmatia, Moesia, Dacia, Thrace, Macedonia, Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Phoenicia, Palestine, Egypt, Africa, and the Mediterranean Sea, with its islands and colonies. This extended territory lay between the twenty-fourth and fifty-sixth degrees of northern latitude, which was certainly the most eligible part of the temperate zone, and it produced in general all the conveniences and luxuries of life. From the days of Ninus, who lived about three hundred years after the flood, to those of Augustus Caesar, was a period of two thousand years; in which interval, various empires, kingdoms, and states, had gradually arisen and succeeded each other. The Assyrian or Babylonian empire may be said to have taken the lead. It not only had the precedence in point of time, but it was the cradle of Asiatic elegance and arts, and exhibited the first examples of that refinement and luxury which have distinguished every subsequent age in the annals of the east. But that gigantic power gave place to the empire of the Medes and Persians, which itself, in process of time yielded to the valor of the Greeks; while the empire of Greece, so renowned for splendor in arts and in arms, had sunk under the dominion of Imperial Rome, who thus became mistress of all the civilized world. ROME is said to have owed her dominion as much to the manners as to the arms of her citizens. Whenever the latter had subdued a particular territory, they prepared to civilize it. They transferred into each of the conquered countries their laws, manners, arts, sciences. and literature. The advantages that resulted from the bringing of so many different nations into subjection under one people, or to speak more properly, under one man, were no doubt, in many respects, considerable. For by this means the people of various countries, alike strangers to each other’s language, manners, and laws, became associated together in amity and enjoyed reciprocal intercourse. By Roman magnificence, which spared no expence to render the public roads commodious to travelers, an easy access was given to parts the most distant and remote. Literature and the arts became generally diffused, and the euhivation of them extended even to countries that had previously formed no other scale by which to estimate the dignity of man, than that of corporeal vigor, or muscular strength. In short, men that had hitherto known no other rules of action, or modes of life, than those of savage and uncultivated nature, had now before them the example of a polished nation, and were gradually instructed by their conquerors to form themselves after it. These things deserve mention, because, as they contributed in some measure to facilitate the propagation of the gospel by the labors of the apostles, they may consequently be entitled to rank among those concurring events which constituted the period of our Lord’s advent, “the fullness of time.”

The subjects of the Roman empire, at this period, have been estimated at about one hundred and twenty millions of persons, and divided into three classes, namely, Citizens, Provincials, and Slaves. The first class enjoyed ample liberty and were entitled to peculiar immunities; the second had only the shadow of liberty without any constitutional freedom; while the last were entirely dependant on the arbitrary will of their masters, who, as best suited their purpose, either enfranchised, or oppressed, or barbarously punished and destroyed them. Enthusiastic in the cause of liberty themselves, the Romans studied the most prudent methods of rendering the provinces of the empire insensible to the yoke that was imposed on them. They treated willing captives with commendable liberality; and used the conquered countries with that moderation which evinced that their leading object was, not the destruction of mankind, but the increase of the empire. They colonized foreign countries with Romans, who introduced agriculture, arts, sciences, learning, and commerce. Having made the art of governing a particular branch of study, they excelled in it above all the inhabitants of the globe. Their history, indeed, exhibits wise councils, prudent measures, equitable laws; and all classes of men are represented to us as conducting themselves so as to command the admiration of posterity.

Having thus briefly glanced at the state of civilization which prevailed in the Roman empire at the date of the Christian aera we shall dismiss the subject, in order to examine more particularly its condition with regard to morals and religion; for it is with these that the history of the Christian church is more especially concerned. And that we may have a more enlarged and distinct view of the matter, it may be profitable for us to go back in our enquiries, and take a rapid glance of the state of the Gentile world from a much earlier period. The prophet Isaiah, rapt in prophetic vision, and transported to that distant age when God should perform the mercy promised to the fathers, breaks out into the following sublime strains: “Behold darkness shall covet the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee.” (Isaiah 60:2,3.)

Much has been said of late respecting the sufficiency of reason to direct the human mind in its pursuit of the chief good, or of the knowledge of the true character of God and of obedience to his will: the enquiry on which we are entering may possibly serve to evince how far such representations are entitled to regard, and perhaps tend to prove the truth of the apostle’s assertion that “the world by wisdom knew not God.” (1 Corinthians 1:21.)

Our knowledge of the state of any of those nations which were situated beyond the confines of the Roman empire, is necessarily very imperfect and obscure, arising from the paucity of their historical monuments and writers. We have sufficient light, however, to perceive that the eastern nations were distinguished by a low and servile spirit, prone to slavery and every species of abject humiliation; whilst those towards the north, prided themselves in cherishing a warlike and savage disposition, that scorned even the restraint of a fixed habitation, and placed its chief gratification in the liberty of roaming at large through scenes of devastation, blood, and slaughter. A soft and feeble constitution both of body and mind, with powers barely adequate to the cultivation of the arts of peace, and chiefly exercised in ministering at the shrine of voluptuous gratification, may be considered as the characteristic trait of the former: a robust and vigorous corporeal frame, animated with a glowing spirit that looked with contempt on life, and every thing by which its cares are soothed, that of the latter.

The minds of the people inhabiting these various countries, were fettered by superstitions of the most degrading nature, though the sense of a Supreme Being, from whom all things had their origin, and whose decrees regulate the universe, had not become wholly extinct; yet in every nation a general belief prevailed, that all things were subordinate to an association of powerful spirits, who were called gods, 2 and whom it was incumbent oil every one, who wished for a happy and prosperous course of life, to worship and conciliate. One of these deities was supposed to excel the rest in dignity, and to possess a supereminent authority, by which the tasks or offices of the inferior ones were allotted, and the whole of the assembly, in a certain degree, directed and governed. His rule, however, was not conceived to be by any means arbitrary; neither was it supposed that he could so far invade the provinces of the others, as to interfere with their particular functions; and hence it was deemed necessary for those who would secure the favor of heaven, religiously to cultivate the patronage of every separate deity, and assiduously to pay that homage to each of them which was respectively his due.

Every nation, however, did not worship the same gods, but each had its peculiar deities, differing from those of other countries, not only in their names, but in their nature, their attributes, their actions, and other respects: nor is there any just foundation for the supposition which some have adopted, that the gods of Greece and Rome were the same with those worshipped by the Germans, the Syrians, the Arabians, the Persians, the Egyptians, and others. The Greeks and Romans, indeed, pretended that the deities which they acknowledged were equally revereneed in every other part of the world; and it might probably be the case with most nations, that the gods of other countries were held in a sort of secondary reverence, and perhaps, in some instances, privately worshipped; but it is certain that each country had its appropriate deities, and that to neglect or disparage the established worship of the state was always considered as an offense of the most atrocious kind. This diversity of deities and religious worship seldom generated animosity: for each nation readily conceded to others the right of forming their own opinions, and of judging for themselves in religious matters; and they left them, both in the choice of their deities and mode of worshipping them, to be guided by whatever principles they might think proper to adopt. Those who were accustomed to regard this world in the light of a commonwealth, divided into several districts, over each of which a certain order of deities presided, could with an ill-grace assume the liberty of forcing other nations to discard their own favorite deities, and receive in their stead the same objects of adoration with themselves. It is certain that the Romans were extremely jealous of introducing any new divinities, or of making the least change in the public religion; yet the citizens were never denied the privilege of individually conforming to any foreign mode of worship, or of manifesting, by the most solemn acts of devotion, their veneration for the gods of other countries. The principal deities of most nations consisted of heroes renowned in antiquity, emperors, kings, founders of cities, and other illustrious persons, whose eminent exploits, and the benefits they had conferred on mankind, were treasured up and embalmed in the breasts of posterity, by whose gratitude they were crowned with divine honors and raised to the rank of gods. And in no other respects were the heathen deities supposed to be distinguished beyond the human species, than by the enjoyment of power and an immortal existence. And to the worship of divinities of this description was joined in many countries, that of some of the noblest and most excellent parts of the creation; the luminaries of heaven in particular, the sun, the moon, and the stars, in whom, as the effects of their influence was always perceptible, an intelligent mind was supposed to reside. The superstitious practices of some countries were carried to an almost endless extreme: mountains, rivers, trees, the earth, the sea and the winds, even the diseases of the body, the virtues and the vices (or rather certain tutelary genii, to whom the guardianship and care of all these things was conceived to belong) were made the object of adoration, and had divine honors regularly paid to them.

Buildings of the most superb and magnificent kind, under the names of temples, fanes, etc. were raised and dedicated by the people of almost every country to their gods, with the expectation that the divinities would condescend to make these sumptuous edifices the places of their own immediate residence. They were not all open to the public, for some of them were confined to the exercise of private devotion; but those of either description were internally ornamented with images of their deities, and furnished with altars and the requisite apparatus for offering sacrifice. The statues were supposed to be animated by the deities whom they represented: for though the worshippers of gods, such as have now been described, must, in a great measure, have relinquished every dictate of reason, they were not willing to appear by any means so destitute of every principle of common sense, as to pay their adoration to a mere idol of metal, or wood, or stone; they always maintained that their statues, when properly consecrated, were filled with the presence of those divinities whose impress they bare. The religious homage paid to these deities, consisted chiefly in the frequent performance of various rites; such as the offering up of victims and sacrifices, accompanied by prayers and other ceremonies. The sacrifices and offerings were different, according to the nature and attributes of the gods to whom they were addressed. Brute animals were commonly devoted to this purpose; but in some nations of a more savage and ferocious character, the horrible practice of sacrificing human victims prevailed. And it has been remarked by the learned Bishop Warburton, that the attributes and qualities assigned to their gods, always corresponded with the nature and genius of the government of the country.

If this was gentle, benign, compassionate and forgiving, goodness and mercy were considered as most essential to the deity; but if severe, inexorable, captious or unequal, the very gods were supposed to be tyrants; and expiations, atonements, lustrations, and bloody sacrifices, then composed the system of religious worship. In the words of the Poet, “Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust, Whose attributes were rage, revenge or lust; Such as the souls of cowards might conceive, And, form’d like tyrants, tyrants would believe.” Of the prayers of Pagan worshippers, whether we regard the matter or the mode of expression, it is impossible to speak favorably: they were not only destitute, in general, ofevery thing allied to,the spirit of piety, but were sometimes framed expressly for the purpose of obtaining the countenance of heaven to the vilest undertakings. Indeed the greater part of their religious observances were of an absurd and ridiculous kind, and in many instances strongly tinctured with the most disgraceful barbarism and obscenity. Their festivals and other solemn days were polluted by a licentious indulgence in every species of libidinous excess; and on these occasions, they were not prohibited even from making their consecrated places, the supposed mansions of their gods, the scenes of vile and beastly gratification. The care of the temples, together with the superintendance and direction of all religious ordinances, was committed to a class of men bearing the title of priests or flamens. It belonged to the province of these ministers to see that the ancient and customary honors were paid to the publicly acknowledged deities, and that a due regard was manifested in every other respect for the religion of the state. These were their ordinary duties; but superstition ascribed to them functions of a far more exalted nature. It considered them rather in the light of intimate and familiar friends of the gods, than in that of officiating ministers of their altar; and consequently attributed to them the highest degree of sanctity, influence, and power.

With the minds of the people thus prepossessed in their favor, it could not be very difficult for an artful and designing set of men, possessed of a competent share of knowledge, to maintain a system of spiritual dominion of the most absolute and tyrannical kind.

Besides the public worship of the Pagan deities, several nations, such, for instance, as the Persians, the Greeks, the Egyptians, the Indians, and some others, had recourse to a dark and concealed species of worship, under the name ofMYSTERIES. None were admitted to see or participate of these mysteries, but such as had approved themselves worthy of that distinction by their fidelity and perseverance in the practice of a long course of initiatory forms. The votaries were enjoined, on peril of instant death, to observe the most profound secrecy respecting every thing that passed: 8 a circumstance which alone sufficiently accounts for the difficulty that we find in obtaining any information respecting the nature of these recluse practices, and for the discordant and contradictory opinions concerning them, that are to be found in the writings of various authors both ancient and modern. According to the learned Warburton, each of the Heathen deities, besides the worship paid to him in public, had a secret worship, which was termed the mysteries of the god. These, however, were not performed in every place where he was publicly worshipped, but only where his chief residence was supposed to be. We learn from Herodotus, Diodorus, and Plutarch, that these mysteries were first invented in Egypt, from whence they spread into most countries of Europe and Asia. In Egypt they were celebrated to the honor of Isis and Osiris; in Asia to Mythras; in Samothrace to the mother of the gods; in Boeotia to Bacchus; in the isle of Cyprus to Venus; in Crete to Jupiter; in Athens to Ceres and Proserpine; and in other places to other deities of an incredible number.

The most noted of these mysteries were the Orphic, those in honor of Bacchus, the Eleusinian, the Samothracian, the Cabiri, and the Mythraic.

But the Eleusinian mysteries, which were statedly celebrated by the people of Athens, at Eleusis, a town of Attica, in honor of Ceres and her daughter Proserpine, in process of time supplanted all the rest, for according to the testimony of Zosimus, “These most holy rites were then so extensive, as to take in the whole race of mankind.” This sufficiently accounts for the fact, that ancient writers have spoken more of the Eleusinian mysteries than of any other. They all, nevertheless, proceeded from one fountain, consisted of similar rites, and are supposed to have had the same object in view.

We are informed by the same learned prelate, Warburton, that the general object of these mysteries was, by means of certain shews and representations, accompanied with hymns, to impress the senses and imaginations of the initiated with the belief of the doctrines of religion, according to the views of them which the inventors of the mysteries entertained. And in order that the mystic exhibitions might make the deeper impressions on the initiated, they were always performed in the darkness of night. The mysteries were divided into two classes, the lesser and the greater: the former were intended for the common people—the latter for those in higher stations and of more cultivated understandings.

But if the design of these mysteries really was, as some have conjectured, to impress the minds of the initiated with just notions of God, of providence, and of a future state, it is demonstrable that they must have been grossly perverted from their original intent. Bishop Warburton, who stiffly contends for this high honor in their primary institutions, is obliged to admit that the orgies of Bacchus, and the mysteries of the mother of the gods, and of Venus, and of Cupid, being celebrated in honor of deities who were supposed to inspire and to preside over the sensual appetites, it was natural for the initiated to believe that they honored these divinities when they committed the vicious actions of which they were the patrons. He further acknowledges, that the mysteries of these deities being performed during nocturnal darkness, or in gloomy recesses, and under the seal of the greatest secresy, the initiated indulged themselves on these occasions, in all the abominations with which the object of their worship was supposed to be delighted. In fact, the enormities committed in celebrating the mysteries of these impure deities ultimately became so intolerable, that their rites were proscribed in various countries, as those of Bacchus were at Rome. And from this short account of the matter, we may learn how properly the apostle Paul denominated the boasted Heathen mysteries, “the unfruitful works of darkness,” Ephesians 5:11. — Works unproductive of any good either to those who performed them, or to society: and how very properly he prohibited Christians from joining in or “having any fellowship with them;” because the things that were done in them, under the seal of secresy, were such as it was even base to mention, ver. 12. Warburton assures us, that while all the other mysteries became exceedingly corrupt, through the fully or wickedness of those who presided at their celebration, and gave occasion to many abominable impurities, by means of which the manners of the Heathens were entirely vitiated, the Eleusinian mysteries long preserved their original purity. But at last they also, yielding to the fate of all human institutions, partook of the common depravity, and had a very pernicious influence on the morals of mankind. In proportion therefore as the gospel made its progress in the world, the Eleusinian mysteries themselves fell into disrepute; and, together with all the other Pagan solemnities, were at length suppressed. THE RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS AT the time of the birth of Christ, the religion of Rome, or to speak more properly, the established superstition of the empire, had been received, together with its government and laws, by a great part of the then known world. Much of this system of superstition had been borrowed from the Greeks; and hence the propriety of classing the religion of the two people under one head. There was, however, a difference between the two, and in some points rather material. The framers of the Grecian system seem to have admitted the existence of one supreme, intelligent, great first cause, the author of every thing, visible and invisible, mid the supreme governor of the world; but they did not think it either necessary or proper to impart this idea to the multitude, whose gross conceptions they thought might be amused by a variety of fabulous tales, and whose hopes and fears would be more excited by a plurality of deifies than by the unity of an over-ruling power. The divinities first introduced in consequence of this opinion, were the sun, and the principal planets, to which were soon added the elements of fire, air, earth, and water. These fictitious deities were invested with the human form, and all the passions incident to human nature were attributed to them. The fabricated tales of their adventures, comprehended an indulgence of the most vicious propensities and the perpetration of enormous crimes. The Greeks adored Jupiter as at the head of the celestial association, the protector of mankind, and the governor of the universe; while their philosophers, who appear in general to have been atheists, by this personage typified the higher region of the air; and by his wife (Juno) the lower atmosphere diffused between the heavens and the sea. And whilst the common people paid homage to Cybele, as the mother of the gods, the more, refined part of the nation intended nothing more than the earth by that object of worship. Fire was deified, and the great body of water had also its divine representative. Apollo was the sun, and the moon was his sister, Artemis, or Diana. Thus by the fertile imagination of the Greeks, their deities were gradually multiplied to a remarkable excess; indeed the poet Hesiod, swells the amount toTHIRTY THOUSAND!

According to their mythology, all parts of nature teemed with divine agents, and a system which it must be owned was in some respects elegantly fanciful, was characterised, under other views, by features of the grossest absurdity.

Worship was originally offered to their deities in the open air, in groves, or upon eminences; but the Greeks, in the progress of their superstition, were led to believe lhat their deities would be better pleased with the erection of buildings peculiarly devoted to their service; and temples, at first simple and unadorned, afterwards magnificent and sumptuous, were the fruits of their opinion. Of the extent to which this point was ultimately carried, we have indeed a striking instance in the case of the temple of Diana, at Ephesus, the length of which, Pliny tells us, was 425 feet, and in breadth 220. It was supported by 107 pillars, each of them 60 feet high. This magnificent structure was erected at the expence of all Asia, and 250 years were spent in finishing it. At first these temples were without images; but in process of time wooden figures of their gods were exhibited for public reverence. Stone or marble was soon deemed preferable for this use; metals of various kinds were also adopted; and the rudeness of early fabrication was succeeded by elegant workmanship.

Sacrifices formed an essential part of the superstitious worship of the Greeks, as well as of the Romans. Grateful respect for the favors conferred on them by their imaginary deities,—the desire of averting their anger after the commission of any offense,—and an eagerness to secure their blessing on a projected enterprise, were the inducements to these oblations. Herbs were the earliest offerings, and it was usual to burn them that the smoke might ascend towards heaven. Barley, and cakes made of that grain, were afterwards substituted for ordinary herbs; and ultimately some of the most useful animals were immolated at their altars, (See Acts 14:11-13.) upon which also milk, oil, and wine were poured. Those who served at the altar were required to prepare themselves by abstaining even from lawful pleasures for one or more preceding days; and all who entered the temples, on the occasions, dipped their hands into consecrated water. When the people were assembled about the altar, the priest sprinkled them with holy water, and offered up a short prayer for them: he next examined the victim, to ascertain its freedom from defects or blemishes; prayer was then resumed; frankincense was strewed upon the altar; hymns were sung; the animal was killed with ceremonious precision; pieces of its flesh were offered and burnt as first-fruits, and the principal devotees carried off the rest.

The religious system which Romulus planted on the banks of the Tiber, corresponded pretty much with that of Greece as above described. A multiplicity of divine beings, graciously superintending human affairs, formed the prevailing creed. All the deities had priests and ministers, sacrifices and oblations. The augurs, or soothsayers, in whose art or imposture the founder of Rome excelled, were considered as an important and necessary part of the establishment. Each tribe had one of these pretended prophets, who announced the will of the gods with regard to any future enterprise, from an observance of the flight or the noise of birds, from the feeding of poultry, the movement of beasts, and other appearances. The high priest and his associates not only regulated the public worship, but acted as judges in all cases which had any reference to religion, and exercised a censorial and authoritative jurisdiction over inferior ministers.

The sacrifices in which the different priests officiated did not agree in every particular; but the following usages and ceremonies were the most prevalent. When a sacrifice was intended, a solemn procession was made to the temple of some deity. In the first place a preeco, or public cryer, called the attention of the people to the pious work: then appeared the flute-players and harpers, performing in their best manner. The victims followed, wearing white fillets, with their horns gilt, As soon as the priest reached the altar, he prayed to the gods, imploring pardon for his sins, and a blessing upon his cuntry. Having commanded all impure and vicious persons to withdraw, he threw grain, meal, and frankincense upon the heads of the animals, and poured wine between the horns of each; and, having first scored them on the back, he gave orders to his attendants to slay them. The entrails were closely inspected, and from their particular appearance, omens were deduced, or inferred, supposing the gods to intimate their will by such minutiae to sagacious and devout observers.

Some portions of the flesh were then placed upon the altar, for the gratification of that deity to whose honor the temple had been reared— the remainder was divided among the attendant rotaries.

What has been now said of the superstition of the ancient Romans, refers particularly to the manner of conducting their worship in the city of Rome, but similar arrangements prevailed in the provinces; and in our own country there were twenty-eight flamins, or Pagan priests, according to the number of the cities, and three arch-flamins; namely, one at London, a second at York, and a third at Caerleon. But to enter into a more particular detail of these things would carry me beyond the limits of this prefatory discourse; suffice it therefore to say, that the whole originated in the vulgar superstitions of the most remote ages of Paganism, and it would be difticult to say, which part was Trojan, which Egyptian, or which Chaldean. The Romans in general knew the whole to be an imposition, and many of them ridiculed the pretense that the institution was divine; and perhaps the subject cannot be more fitly and aptly expressed than it has been by Mr. Gibbon, in the following words: “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 thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord.” THE RELIGION OF THE INDIANS, EGYPTIANS, PERSIANS,AND CELTS IN reviewing the various systems of Polytheism which prevailed at that time, those which were cultivated by the Indians, the Persians, the Egyptians, and the Celts, are entitled to distinguished notice. Of these the Indians and Celts are chiefly remarkable for having selected for the object of their adoration a set of ancient heroes and leaders, whose memory so far from being rendered illustrious by their virtues, had descended to posterity disgraced and loaded with vice and infamy. Both these classes of men believed that the souls of men survived the dissolution of their bodies; the former conceiving that all of them, without distinction, entered at death into other bodies on this earth; while the latter, on the contrary, considering immortality to be the reward which heaven bestows on valor alone, supposed that the bodies of the brave, after being purified by fire, again became the receptacles of their souls, and that the heroes thus renewed were received into the council and society of the gods. Authority of the most despotic kind was committed to their priests by the people of either country. Their official duties were not restricted to the administration of the concerns of religion, but extended to the enacting of laws, and the various other departments of civil government.

In describing the religion of the Egyptians, we must distinguish between the general religion of the country, and the practice of particular provinces or districts. The liberty which every city and province enjoyed of adopting what deities it preferred, and of worshipping them under any forms which the inhabitants might think proper to institute, necessarily gave rise to a great variety of private systems. In the choice of their public or national gods, no sort of delicacy was manifested: the greater part of them being indiscriminately composed of mortals renowned in history for their virtues, and others distinguished alone by the enormity of their crimes; such were Osiris, Seraphis, Typhon, His, and others. With the worship of these was joined that of the constellations, the sun, the moon, the dog-star, animals of almost every kind, certain sorts of plants, etc. etc.

Whether the religion of the state, or that which was peculiar to any province or city be considered, it will be found equally remote in its principles from every thing liberal, dignified, or rational. Some parts were ridiculous in the extreme, and the whole in no small degree contaminated by a despicable baseness and obscenity. In fact the religion of the Egyptians was so remarkably distinguished by absurd and disgraceful traits, that it was made the subject of derision even by those whose own tenets and practice were by no means conspicuous for wisdom. The Egyptian priests had a sacred code peculiarly their own, founded on principles very different from those which characterised the popular superstition, and, which they studiously concealed from the prying eye of the public, by wrapping it up in hieroglyphical characters, the meaning and power of which were only known to themselves.

The Persians derived their religious system from Zoroaster. The leading principle of their religion was, that all things are derived from two common governing causes: the one the author of all good, the other of all evil: the former the source of light, of mind, and of spiritual intelligence; the latter that of darkness and matter with all its grosser incidents. Between these two powerful agents they supposed a constant war to be carried on.

Those, however, who taught upon this system, did not all explain it in the same way, or deduce the same conclusions from it: hence uniformity was destroyed, and various sects originated. The most intelligent part of the Persians maintained that there was one supreme God, to whom they gave the name ofMYTHRA, and that under him were two inferior deities, the one called Oromasdes, the author of all good; the other Ariman, the cause of all evil. The common people, who equally believed in the existence of a supreme being, under the title ofMYTHRA, appear to have confounded him with the sun, which was the object of their adoration; and it is probable, that with the two inferior deities they joined others of whom little or nothing is now known.

None of these various systems of religion appear to have contributed in any degree towards a reformation of manners, or exciting a respect for virtue of any kind. The gods and goddesses who were held up as objects of adoration to the multitude, instead of presenting examples of excellence for their imitation, stood forth to public view the avowed authors of the most flagrant and enormous crimes. The priests took no sort of interest in regulating the public morals; neither directing the people by their precepts, nor inviting them by exhortation and example to the pursuit of what is lovely and of good report: on the contrary, they indulged themselves in the most unwarrantable licentiousness, maintaining that the whole of religion was comprised in performing the rites and ceremonies instituted by their ancestors, and that every species of sensual gratification was freely allowed by their deities to those who regularly ministered to them in this way. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, and of a future state of rewards and punishments, was but little understood, and of course only very partially acknowledged. Hence at the period when Christ appeared, any notions of this kind found little or no acceptance among the Greeks and Romans, but were regarded in the light of old wives’ fables, fit only for the amusement of women and children. No particular points of belief respecting the immortality of the soul being established by their public standards of religion, every one was at liberty to avow what opinion he pleased on that subject.

It can excite no reasonable surprise, therefore, that under the influence of such circumstances, the state of society should have become in the highest degree vicious and depraved. The lives of men of every class, from the highest to the lowest, were spent in the practice of the most abominable and flagitious vices. Even crimes, the horrible turpitude of which was such, that decency forbids the mention of them. were openly practiced with the greatest impunity. Should the reader doubt of this, he may be referred to\parLUCIAN among the Greek authors, and toJUVENAL andPERSIUS among the Roman poets—or even to the testimony of the apostle Paul, in the first chapter of his Epistle to the Romans. In the writings of Lucian, for instance, he will find the most unnatural affections and detestable practices treated of at large, and with the utmost familiarity, as things of ordinary and daily occurrence. And when we turn our attention to those cruel and inhuman exhibitions which are well known to have yielded the highest gratification to both the Greeks and Romans, the two most polished nations of the world—the savage conflicts of the gladiators in the circus; when we cast an eye on the dissoluteness of manners by which the walks of private life were polluted; the horrible prostitution of boys, to which the laws opposed no restraint; the liberty of divorce which belonged to the wife as well as the husband; the shameful practice of exposing infants, and procuring abortions; the multiplicity of stews and brothels, many of which were consecrated to their deities;— when we reflect on these and various other excesses, to the most ample indulgence in which the laws opposed no restraint; who can forbear putting the question, that, if such were the people distinguished above all others by the excellency of their laws, and the superiority of their attainments in literature and arts, what must have been the state of those nations who possessed none of these advantages, but were governed solely by the impulses and dictates of rude and uncultivated nature!

VIEW OF THE DIFFERENT SYSTEMS OF GENTILE PHILOSOPHY AT the time of Christ’s appearance upon earth, there were two species of philosophy that generally prevailed throughout the civilized world;the one that of Greece, the other what is usually termed the Oriental. The philosophy of the Greeks was not confined to that nation, for its principles were embraced by all such of the Romans as aspired to any eminence of wisdom. The Oriental philosophy prevailed chiefly in Persia, Chaldea, Syria, Egypt, and other eastern countries. Both these species of philosophy were split into various sects, but with this distinction, that those which sprang from the Oriental system all proceeded on one common principle, and of course had, many similar tenets, though they might differ as to some particular inferences and opinions: whilst those to which the philosophy of Greece gave rise, were divided in opinion respecting the elements or first principles of wisdom, and were consequently widely separated from each other in the whole course of their discipline. The apostle Paul is generally supposed to have adverted to each of these systems—to that of Greece, in Colossians 2:8, and to the Oriental, in 1 Timothy 1:4; 4:7. and 6:20.—in all which places, he strongly warns Christians to beware of blending the doctrines of either with the simple gospel of Jesus Christ. Happy had it been for the Christian church, could they have taken the admonition which was thus given them by the apostle; but vain and presumptuous man could not rest satisfied with “the truth as it is in Jesus”—the wisdom that leads to eternal life, as it came pure from above; but must exercise his ingenuity in fruitless attempts to reconcile it; first of all with the principles of the Oriental philosophy, and afterwards to many of the dogmas of the Grecian sects.

The Greek philosophers, whose doctrines were also much cultivated by the Romans, may be divided into two classes: the first comprehended those whose tenets struck at the root of all religionma species of Atheists, who, while they professed to support and recommead the cause of virtue, in reality nourished the interests of vice, giving color to almost every kind of criminality: the other was composed of such as acknowledged the existence of a Deity, whom it was the duty of men to worship and obey, and who inculcated an essential and eternal distinction between good and evil, virtue and vice, but who nevertheless subverted these just principles, by connecting with them various notions absurd or trifling in their nature.

Under the first of these classes may be ranked the disciples of Epicurus, and those who passed under the name of Academics.

The Epicureans maintained that the universe arose out of a fortuitous concurrence of atoms; that the gods, whose existence they hesitated absolutely to deny, were totally indifferent and unconcerned about all human affairs, or rather entirely unacquainted with them; that our souls are born and die; that all things depend on and are determined by accident; that in every thing voluptuous gratification was to be sought after asTHE CHIEF GOOD; and even virtue itself was only to be pursued, inasmuch as it might minister at the shrine of pleasure. The votaries of a system like this, which iadeed included nearly all the children of prosperity, the rich, the noble, and the powerthl, naturally studied to pass their lives in one continued round of luxurious enjoyment. The only restraint they imposed on themselves arose out of a desire to avoid, at all times, such an excessive or immoderate addictedness to pleasure as might generate disease, or tend in any other shape to abridge the capacity for future indulgence.

The Academics , though they affected to be influenced by wiser principles than the former, yet entertained maxims of an equally lax and pernicious tendency with them. They were nearly allied to the Sceptics; in fact, the main distinction lay in this, — that whereas the Sceptics contended that nothing should be assented to, but every thing made the subject of dispute; the Academics, on the contrary, maintained that our judgments should acquiesce in all things which bear the appearance of truth, or which may be considered in the light of probabilities. But as they were always undetermined respecting what constituted the sort of probability to which a wise man should assent, their doctrines contributed, no less than that of the Sceptics, to render every thing vague and unsettled. To make it, as they did, a matter of doubt and uncertainty, whether the gods existed or not; whether the soul was perishable or immortal; whether virtue was preferable to vice, or vice to virtue; was certainly nothing less than to undermine the fundamental principles of religion and morality. The Academic system of philosophy fell into such disrepute as to be, at one time, quite neglected and utterly lost; but Cicero revived it at Rome, a little before the birth of Christ; and so much weight was attached to his example and authority, that it was soon embraced by all who aspired to the chief honors of the state.

The Peripatetics belonged to the other class of philosophers, for they acknowledged the existence of a God, and the obligations of morality; yet their tenets were not much calculated to inspire a reverence for the one, or a love for the other. The doctrine which Aristotle, their great master, taught, gave to the Deity an influence not much beyond that of the moving principle in a piece of machinery. He indeed considered him to be of an highly refined and exalted nature, happy in the contemplation of himself, but entirely unconscious of what was passing here below; confined from all eternity to the celestial world, and instigating the operations of nature rather from necessity than from volition or choice. In a deity of this description, differing but little from the god of the Epicureans, there surely was nothing that could reasonably excite either love, respect, or fear. It is difficult to ascertain precisely what were the sentiments of this class of philosophers respecting the immortality of the soul; but it may fairly be asked, Could the interests of religion or morality be in any shape effectually promoted by teachers like these, who denied the superintendance of divine providence, and insinuated, in no very obscure terms, a disbelief of the soul’s future existence?

The Stoics assigned to the Deity somewhat more of majesty and influence, than the disciples of Aristotle, They did not limit his functions merely to the regulating of the clouds, and the numbering of the stars; but conceived him to animate every part of the universe with his presence, in the nature of a subtle, active, penetrating fire. They regarded his connection with matter, however, as the effect of necessity, and supposed his will to be subordinate to the immutable decrees of fate; hence it was impossible for him to be considered as the author either of rewards to the virtuous, or of punishment to the wicked. The Stoics denied the immortality of the soul, and thus deprived mankind of the strongest motive to a wise and virtuous course of life. In short, the moral discipline of the Stoics may be compared to a body of a fair and imposing external appearance, but which, on closer examination, is found destitute of those essential parts which alone can give it either energy or excellence, The Platonits seem, of all the Grecian philosophers, to have made the highest advances in knowledge, and the nearest approach to true wisdom.

Yet the system ofPLATO had its defects. He considered the Deity as supreme governor of the universe, a being of the highest wisdom and power, and totally unconnected with any material substance. The souls of men he conceived to proceed from this pre-eminent source; and, as partaking of its nature, to be incapable of death. His system gave the strongest encouragement to virtue, and equally discountenanced vice, by holding out to mortals the prospect of a future state of rewards and punishments. Yet after all, his notions of the Deity were very contracted, since he never ascribes to him the attributes of infinity, immensity, ubiquity, omnipotence, omniscience, but supposes him to be confined within certain limits, and that the direction of human affairs was committed to a class of inferior spiritual agents, whom he termed daemons.

This notion of ministering daemons, as well as those points of doctrine which relate to the origin and condition of the human soul, greatly disfigured the morality of Plato; inasmuch as they tend to generate superstition, and to confirm men in the practice of worshipping a number of inferior deities. His doctrine, moreover, that the soul, during its continuance in the body, was in a state of imprisonment, and that we ought to endeavor, by means of contemplation, to set it free, and restore it to an alliance with the divine nature, had a pernicious tendency, in prompting persons of weak minds to withdraw a proper degree of attention from the body and the concerns of this life, and to indulge in the dreams and fancies of a disordered imagination.

The Eclectics , were a sect of philosophers that took their leading principles from the system of Plato. They considered almost every thing which he had advanced respecting the Deity, the soul, the world, and the daemons, as indisputable axioms: on which account they were regarded by many as altogether Platonists. Indeed this title, so far from being disclaimed, was rather affected by some of them, and particularly by those who joined themselves to Ammonins Sacca, another celebrated patron of the Eclectic philosophy. Yet with the doctrines held by Plato, they very freely intermixed the most approved maxims of the Pythagoreans, the Stoics, the Peripatetics, and the Oriental philosophers; taking due care, however, to admit none that were in opposition to the tenets of their favorite guide and instructor.

OF THE ORIENTAL PHILOSOPHY IT is a subject of much regret among the learned, that the Greek writers, to whom we are chiefly indebted for our knowledge of the ancient history of philosophy, have taken so little pains to inform posterity concerning the opinions which, during the time that the Greek sects flourished, were taught in other countries, particularly in Egypt and Asia. It is owing to this, that the documents which have hitherto come to light relating to the Oriental philosophy are so few, and consequently our knowledge on the subject so imperfect. Some insight, however, into its nature and principles may be obtained from what has been handed down lo us, respecting the tenets of several of the earlier sects that sprang up in the Christian church.

The Oriental philosophy, as a peculiar system of doctrines concerning the divine nature, is said to have originated in Chaldea, or Persia; from whence it passed through Syria, Asia Minor, and Egypt; and mixing with other systems, formed many different sects. There seems also to be sufficient ground for referring the formation of the leading doctrines of this philosophy into a regular system to Zoroaster, whose name the followers of this doctrine prefixed to some of their spurious books, and whose system is fundamentally the same with that which was subsequently adopted by the Asiatic and Egyptian philosophers.

The mixture of Platonic notions which is found in the Asiatic philosophy, as well as of Oriental doctrines among the later Platonists, may be easily accounted for, from the intercourse which subsisted between the Alexandrian and Asiatic philosophers, after the schools of Alexandria were established. From that time, many Asiatics who were addicted to the study of philosophy, doubtless visited Alexandria, and became acquainted with the then popular doctrines of Plato; and by blending these with their own, formed an heterogeneous mass of opinions, which in its turn mixed with the systems of the Alexandrian schools. This union of Oriental and Grecian philosophy was further promoted by the dispersion of the philosophers of Alexandria, in the reign of Ptolemy Physcon: many of whom, to escape from tyranny, fled into Asia, and opened schools in various places.

It is supposed to have been at the time when the Platonic philosophers of Alexandria visited the Eastern schools, that certain professors of the Oriental philosophy, prior to the existence of the Christian heresies, borrowed from the Greeks the name of Gnostics, to express their pretensions to a more perfect knowledge of the Divine Nature than others possessed. The Pagan origin of this appellation is supposed to be plainly intimated by the apostle Paul in two passages of his writings; in one of which he cautions Timothy against “the opposition of false science,” (1 Timothy 6:20,) and in the other warns the Colossians not to be imposed upon by a “vain and deceitful philosophy,” framed according to human tradition, and the principles of the world, and not according to the doctrine of Christ. — Colossians 2:8. But whatever may be thought concerning the name, there is little room left to doubt, that the tenets, at least, of the Gnostics, existed in the Eastern schools long before the rise of the Gnostic sects in the Christian church under Basilides, Valentine, and others; consequently must have been imported or derived by the latter from the former. The Oriental doctrine of Emanation seems frequently alluded to in the New Testament, as hath been already observed, and in terms which cannot so properly be applied to any other dogmas of the Jewish sects.

The Oriental philosophers, though divided into a great variety of sects, seem to have been generally agreed in believing matter to be the cause of all evil, though they were much divided in opinion as to the particular mode or form under which it ought to be considered as such. They were unanimous in maintaining that there had existed from all eternity a divine nature, replete with goodness, intelligence, wisdom, and virtue, a light of the most pure and subtle kind diffused throughout all space, of whom it was impossible for the mind of man to form an adequate conception.

Those who were conversant with the Greek language gave to this preeminent being the name of buqov, (BUTHOS) in allusion to the vastness of his excellence, which they deemed it beyond the reach of human capacity to comprehend. The space which he inhabits they named plh>rwma , (Pleroma ) but occasionally the term a>iwn (Aion or Oeon ) was applied to it. This divine nature, they imagined, having existed for ages in solitude and silence, at length, by the operation of his own omnipotent will, begat of himself two minds or intelligences of a most excellent and exalted kind, one of either sex. By these, others of a similar nature were produced; and the faculty of propagating their kind being successively communicated to all, a class of divine beings was in time generated, respecting whom no difference of opinion seems to have existed, except in regard to their number; some conceiving it to be more and others less. The nearer any one of this celestial family stood in affinity to the one grand parent of all, the closer were they supposed to resemble him in nature and perfection; the farther they were removed, the less were they accounted to partake of his goodness, wisdom, or any other attribute. Although every one of them had a beginning, yet they were all supposed to be immortal, and not liable to any change; on which account they were termed a>iw~nev , that is, immortal beings placed beyond the reach of temporal vicissitudes or injuries. Beyond that vast expanse refulgent with everlasting light, which was considered as the immediate habitation of the Deity, and of those natures which had been generated from him, these philosophers placed the seat of matter; where, according to them, it had lain from all eternity, a rude, undigested, opaque mass, agitated by turbulent irregular motions of its own provoking; and nurturing, as in a seed-bed, the rudiments of vice and every species of evil. in this state it was found by a genius, or celestial spirit of the higher order, who had been either driven from the abode of Deity for some offense, or commissioned by him for the purpose; and who reduced it into order, and gave it that arrangement and fashion which the universe now bears, Those who spake the Greek tongue were accustomed to refer to the Creator of the world by the name of\parDEMIURGUS. Matter received its inhabitants, both man and other animals, from the same hand that had given to it disposition and symmetry.

Its native darkness was also illuminated by this creative spirit with a ray of celestial light, either secretly stolen, or imparted through the bounty of the Deity. He likewise communicated to the bodies he had formed, and which would otherwise have remained destitute of reason and uninstructed, except in what relates to mere animal life, particles of the divine essence, or souls of a kindred nature to the Deity. When all things were thus completed,DEMIURGUS, revolting against the Great First Cause of all things, the all-wise and omnipotent God, assumed to himself the exclusive govermnent of this new state, which he apportioned out into provinces or districts; bestowing the administration and command over them on a number of genii, or spirits of inferior degree, who had been his associates and assistants.

Man therefore, whilst he continued in this world, was supposed to be compounded of two principles, acting in direct opposition to each other; — an earthly, corrupt, or vitiated body — and a soul partaking of the nature of the Deity, being derived from the region of purity and light. The soul, or etherial part, being through its connection with the body, confined as it were within a prison of matter, was constantly exposed to the danger of becoming involved in ignorance, and acquiring every sort of evil propensity, from the impulse and contagion of the vitiated mass by which it was enveloped. But the Deity, touched with compassion for the hapless state of those captive minds, was ever anxious that the means of escaping from this darkness and bondage, into liberty and light, should be extended to them; and had, accordingly, at various times, sent amongst them teachers, endowed with wisdom, and filled with celestial light, who might communicate to them the principles of true religion, and thus instruct them in the way by which deliverance was to be obtained from their wretched and forlorn state.DEMIUROUS, however, and his associates, unwilling to resign any part of that dominion, of whose sweets they were now become so sensible, or to relinquish the divine honors which they had usurped, set at work every engine to obstruct the Deity; and not only tormented and slew the messengers of heaven, but endeavored, by means of superstition and sensual attractions, to root out and extinguish every spark of celestial truth. The minds that listened to the calls of the Deity, and who having renounced obedience to the usurped authorities of this world, continued steadfast in the worship of the great First Parent, resisting the evil propensities of the corporeal frame, and every incitement to illicit gratification, were supposed, on the dissolution of their bodies, to be directly borne away, pure, aerial, and disengaged from every thing gross or material, to the immediate residence of God himself; whilst those who, notwithstanding the admonitions they received, had persisted in paying divine honors to him who was merely the fabricator of the world, and his associates, worshipping them as gods, and suffering themselves to be enslaved by the lusts and vicious impulses to which they were exposed from their alliance with matter, were denied the hope of exaltation after death, and could only expect to migrate into new bodies, suited to their base, sluggish, and degraded condition. When the grand work of setting free all these minds or souls should be accomplished, God, it was supposed, would dissolve the fabric of this lower world; and having once more confined matter, with all its contagious influence, within its original limits, would throughout all future ages live in consummate glory, and reign surrounded by kindred spirits, as he did before the foundation of the world.

The moral discipline deduced from this system of philosophy, by those who embraced it, was by no means of an uniform cast, but differed widely in its complexion, according to their various tempers and inclinations.

Such, for instance, as were naturally of a morose disposition, maintained that the great object of human concern should be to invigorate the energies of the mind. and to quicken and refine its perceptions, by abstracting it as much as possible from every thing gross or sensual. The body, on the contrary, as the source of every depraved appetite, was, according to them, to be reduced and brought into subjection by hunger, thirst, and every other species of mortification, and neither to be supported by flesh or wine, nor indulged in any of those gratifications to which it is naturally prone; in fact, a constant self-denial was to be rigorously observed in every thing which might contribute either to the convenience or pleasantness of life; so that the material frame being thus by every means weakened and brought low, the celestial spirit might the more readily escape from its contagious influence and regain its native liberty. Hence it was that the Manichseans, the Marcionites, the Encraitites, and others, passed their lives in one continued course of austerity and mortification.

On the other hand, those who were constitutionally inclined to voluptuousness and vicious indulgence, found the means of accommodating the same principles to a mode of life that admitted of the free and uncontrouled gratification of all their inclinations. The essence of piety and religion, they said, consisted in a knowledge of the Supreme Being, and maintaining a mental intercourse and association with him.

Whoever had become an adept in these attainments, and from the habitual exercise of contemplation, had acquired the power of keeping the mind abstracted from every thing corporeal, was no longer to be considered as affected by, or answerable for, the impulses and actions of the body, and consequently could be under no necessity to control its inclinations, or resist its propensities. Hence the dissolute lives of the Carpocratians and others, who assumed the liberty of doing whatever pleased them; and maintained that the practice of virtue was not enjoined by the Deity, but imposed on mankind by that power whom they regarded as the prince of this world, the maker of the universe.

From this concise review of the state of the Gentile world at the time of Christ’s appearance on earth, the inferences to be deduced, are, it is presumed, sufficiently obvious. Mankind had been furnished with abundant experience of what reason and philosophy, in their highest state of cultivation, could do. in the way of directing the human mind to the attainment of virtue and happiness; and what was the result? The very wisest among them were bewildered in fruitless speculations about the nature of theCHIEF GOOD, and equally so about the way of attaining it.

Some of them, indeed, admitted that it consisted in virtue; but then if we enquire wherein they supposed virtue to consist, we shall find their notions as discordant and undefined as their ideas of happiness itself were vague and desultory.ARISTOTLE made the existence of virtue to depend upon the possession of an abundance of the good things of this world; and even laid it down as a principle, that “without the gifts of fortune, virtue is not sufficient for happiness, but that a wise man must be miserable in poverty and sickness;”DIOGOENES, from whose pride and stoical austerity one might have expected sentiments of a different nature, maintained that a poor old man was the most miserable thing in life. Even\parPLATO, the great preceptor of Aristotle, taught his followers that happiness comprehended the possession of wisdom, health, good fortune, honor, and riches; and maintained that the man who enjoyed all these must be perfectly happy.ZENO and his followers held it as a principle, that all crimes were equal.THALES, the founder of the I0nian sect, being asked how he thought a mall might bear affliction with the greatest ease, answered, “By seeing his enemies in a worse condition.”EPICURUS had no notion of justice but as it was profitable, and the consequence was that the morals of his followers were proverbially scandalous; for though their master taught that happiness consisted in virtue, he made virtue itself to consist in following nature, and thus he eventually led his disciples into such gross immorality, that, according to their manner of life, virtue and voluptuousness seemed to be convertible terms with them: and ever since, an Epicure is a title appropriate to every character in which excess and sensual indulgence are found to meet.

Such was the hopeless and forlorn condition into which the human race had sunk, and such the wretched aspect of the Heathen or Gentile world, at the time of the Messiah’s appearance upon earth. The Greeks and Romans had civilized the world; philosophy had done its utmost; literature, and arts, and the sciences in every department, had been cultivated to the highest perfection; but what, under all these advantages, was the real condition of our species in reference to man’s highest end and aim, the knowledge of the true God and the duties which he owes him — the actual state of religion and morals? We have it strikingly described by the great apostle of the Gentiles. “They walked in the vanity of their mind; having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that was in them, because of the blindness of their heart; and being past feeling, they had given themselves over unto lasAviousness, to work all uncleanness, with greediness;—they were without hope, and without God in the world.” — Ephesians 2:12, and ch. 4:17, 18 PART ON THE STATE OF THE JEWISH NATION AT THE PERIOD OF THE BIRTH OF CHRIST.

THE privileges which the Jews at this time enjoyed above all other nations, were many and distinguished; but in enumerating them, the apostle Paul lays the principal stress upon their being favored with a divine revelation, to guide them in matters of the highest importance to their present and everlasting happiness:—they had the oracles of God in their hands; the writings of Moses and the prophets, those holy men of God who spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (Romans 3:2; and 2 Peter 1:21.) Yet with these incalculable advantages, the condition of the people in general was not much superior to that of the Gentiles.

The civil government of Judea, at the time of Christ’s birth, was vested in the hands of a Roman stipendiary, named Herod the Great; —a title to which he could have no pretensions, except from the magnitude of his vices. Nature, it is true, had not withheld from him the talents requisite for a lofty and brilliant course of life; but such was his jealous disposition, such the ferocity of his temper, his devotedness to luxury, pomp, and magnificence so madly extravagant, and so much beyond his means; in short, so extensive and enormous was the catalogue of his vices, that he became an object of utter detestation to the afflicted people over whom he swayed the kingly scepter. Instead of cherishing and protecting his subjects, he appears to have made them sensible of his authority merely by oppression and violence; so that they complained to the Emperor Augustus, at Rome, of his cruelties, declaring they had suffered as much as if a wild beast had reigned over them; and Eusebius affirms, that the cruelty of this nefarious despot far surpassed whatever had been represented in tragedy! Herod was not ignorant of the hatred which he had drawn upon himself, but to soften its asperity he became a professed devotee to the Jewish religion, and at a vast expence restored their temple, which through age had fallen into decay; but the effect of all this was destroyed by his still conforming to the manners and habits of those who worshipped a plurality of gods; and so many things were countenanced in direct opposition to the Jewish religion, that the hypocrisy of the tyrant’s professions were too manifest to admit of a doubt.

On the death of Herod, the government of Judea was divided by the Emperor Augustus amongst his three surviving sons. Archelaus, the elder of the three, was appointed governor of Judea, ldumoea, and Samaria, under the title of Ethnarch. Antipas presided over Galilee and Peroea; whilst Batanea, Trachonitis, Auranitis, with some of the neighboring territory, were assigned to Philip. The two latter, from their having a fourth part of the province of Judea allotted to each, were styled Tetrarchs. Archelaus, who inherited all the vices of his father, with but few of his better qualities, compldtely exhausted the patience of the Jews; and by a series of the most injurious and oppressive acts, drove them, in the tenth year of his reign, to lay their complaints before the emperor Augustus, who, after investigating the merits of the case, deposed the Ethnarch, and banished him to Yienne in Gaul.

On the expulsion of Archelaus, the greater part oI Palestine, or Judea, was reduced by the Roman government into the form of a province, and placed under the superintendance of a governor, who was subject to the control of the president of Syria. It is probable that this arrangement at first met with the ready concurrence of the Jews, who, on the death of Herod, had petitioned Augustus that the distinct regal government might no longer be continued to them, but that their country might be received under his own immediate protection, and treated as a part of the Roman empire. The change, however, instead of producing an alleviation of misery to this unhappy people, brought with it an intolerable increase of their calamities.

For, independent of the avarice and injustice of the governors, to which there were no bounds, it proved an intolerable grievance to them, who considered their nation to be God’s peculiar people, that they should be obliged to pay tribute to a heathen, and an enemy of the true God, like Caesar, and live in subjection to those who worshipped false deities. Add to which, that the extortion of the publicans, who after the Roman manner were entrusted with the collection of the revenue, and for whose continual and flagrant abuses of authority it was seldom possible to obtain any sort of redress, became a subject of infinite dissatisfaction and complaint. And, to crown the whole, the constant presence of their governors, surrounded as they were by a multitude of foreign attendants of all descriptions, and protected by a Roman military guard, quartered with their eagles and various other ensigns of superstition, in the center of Jerusalem, their holy city, kept the sensibility of the Jews continually on the rack, and excited in their minds a degree of indignation bordering on fury. They naturally considered their religion to be disgraced and insulted by these innovations—their holy places defiled—and in fact themselves, with all that they held sacred, polluted and brought into contempt. To these causes, are to be attributed the frequent tumalts, factions, seditions, and murders, by whioh it was well known that these unfortunate people accelerated their own destruction.

If any vestige of liberty or happiness could have been possessed by a people thus circumstanced, it was effectually cut off by those who held the second place in the civil government under the Romans, and the sons of Herod, and who also had the supreme direction in every thing pertaining to religion, namely, the chief priests and the seventy elders, of whom the Sanhedrim or national council was composed. Josephus tells us, that the high priests were the most abandoned of mortals, and that they generally obtained their dignified stations either through the influence of money, or court sycophancy; and that they shrank from no species of criminality that might contribute to support them in the possession of an authority thus iniquitously purchased. Under a full conviction of the precarious tenure on which they held their situation, it became a leading object of their concern, to. accumulate, either by fraud or force, such a quantity of wealth, as might enable them to gain the rulers of the state over to their interest, and drive away all competitors, or else yield them, when deprived of their dignity, the means of living at their ease in retirement.

The Sanhedrim, or national council, being composed of men who differed in opinion respecting some of the most important points of religion, nothing like a general harmolay was to be found amongst its members: on the contrary, having adopted the principles of various sects, they allowed themselves to be carried away by all the prejudice and animosity of party; and were too often more intent on the indulgence of private pique, than studious of advancing the cause of religion, or promoting the public welfare. A similar depravity prevailed among the ordinary priests, and the inferior mixlisters of religion. The common people, instigated by the shocking examples thus held out to them, by those whom they were taught to consider as their guides, precipitated themselves into every species of vicious excess; and giving themselves up to sedition and rapine, appeared alike to defy the vengeance, both of God and man.

There were, at that time, two prevailing systems of religion in Palestine, the Jewish and the Samaritan; and what contributed not a little to the calamities of the Hebrew nation, the followers of each of these regarded those of the other persuasion with the most virulent and implacable hatred, mutually venting their rancorous animosity in the direst curses and imprecations. The nature of the Jewish religion may be collected from the books of the Old Testament; but at the time of Christ’s appearance, it had lost much of its. original beauty and excellence, and was corrupted by errors of the most flagrant kind, that had crept in from various sources.

The public worship of God was indeed still continued in the temple of Jerusalem, with all the rites of the Mosaic institution; and their festivals never failed to draw together all immense concourse of people at the stated seasons; nor did the Romans ever interfere to prevent those observances.

In domestic life also, the ordinances of the law were in general punctually attended to; but it is manifest, from the evidence adduced by various learned men, that even in the service of the temple itself, numerous ceremonies and observances, drawn from the religious worship of heathen nations, had been introduced and blended with those of divine institution; and that, in addition to superstitions like these of a public nature, many erroneous principles, probably brought from Babylon and Chaldea, by the ancestors of the people at their return from captivity, or adopted by the inconsiderate multitude, in conformity to the example of their neighbors the Greeks, the Syrians, and the Egyptians, were cherished and acted on in private.

The opinions and sentiments of the Jews respecting the Deity, the divine nature, the angels, daemons, the souls of men, their duties, and similar subjects, appear to have been far less extravagant, and formed on more rational grounds, than those of any other nation or people. Indeed, it was scarcely possible that they should wholly lose sight of that truth, in the knowledge of which their fathers had been instructed through the medium of revelation; especially as this instruction was rendered habitual to them, even at a tender age, by hearing, reading, and studying the writings of Moses and the prophets. In all their cities, towns, and villages, and indeed throughout the empire, wherever any considerable number of Jews resided, a sacred edifice, which they called a synagogue, was erected, in which it was customary for the people regularly to assemble, for the purposes of prayer and praise, and hearing the law publicly read and expounded. In most of the larger towns, there were also schools established, in which young persons were initiated in the first principles of religion, as well as instructed in the liberal arts.

But though the Jews certainly entertained many sentiments more rational and correct than their neighbors—sentiments which they had adopted from their own Scriptures—yet they had gradually incorporated with them so large a mixture of what was fabulous and absurd, as nearly to deprive the truth of all its force and energy. Hence the many pointed rebukes which Jesus Christ gave to the Scribes and Pharisees, the prime leaders of religion in his day; telling them that they taught for doctrines the commandments of men, and that they had made the divine law void through their traditions. 1 Their notions of the nature of God, are supposed to have been closely allied to the oriental philosophy on that subject, while to the prince of darkness, and his associates and agents, they attributed an influence over the world and the human race so predominant as scarcely to leave a superior degree of power even to the Deity himself.

Of various terrific conceits, founded upon this notion, one of the principal was, that all the evils and calamities which befal the human race, were to be considered as originating with this prince of darkness and his ministering spirits, who had their dwelling in the air, and were scattered throughout every part of the universe. Their notions also, and manner of reasoning respecting angels, or ministers of divine Providence, were nearly allied to those maintained by the Babylonians or Chaldeeans, as may be readily perceived by those who will give themselves the trouble to investigate the subject.

But on no one point were the sentiments of the Jews of that day, more estranged from the doctrine that was taught by their prophets, than on that which regarded the character of their Messiah. The greatest part of the Jewish nation were looking with eager desire for the appearance of the deliverer whom God had promised to their fathers. But their hopes were not directed to such an one as the Scriptures described: they expected not a spiritual deliverer, to rescue them from the bondage of sin and Satan, and to bestow upon them the blessings of salvation, the forgiveness of sins, peace with God, the adoption of children into his family, and the hope of an eternal inheritance in the world to come; they looked for a mighty warlike leader, whose talents and prowess might recover for them their civil liberty. Fondly dreaming of a temporal kingdom for their Messiah, their carnal minds were so rivetted under the dominion of this master prejudice, that, in general, their hearts were blinded to the real scope of the law and the prophets.

It is abundantly manifest from the New Testament Scriptures, that at the time of Christ’s appearance, the Jews were divided into various sects, widely differing in opinion from each other, not merely on subjects of smaller moment, but also on those points which enter into the very essence of religion. Of the Pharisees and Sadducees, the two most distinguished of these sects, both in number and respectability, mention is made in the writings of the evangelists and apostles. Josephus, Philo, and others, speak of a third sect, under the title of the Essenes; and it appears from more than one authority, that several others of less note were to be found among them. The evangelist Matthew notices the Herodians; a class of men who, it seems highly probable, had espoused the cause of the descendants of Herod the Great, and contended that they had been unjustly deprived of the greater part of Palestine by the Romans.

Josephus makes mention also of another sect, bearing the title of Philosophers; composed of men of the most ferocious character, and founded by Judas, a Galilean—a strenuous and undaunted assertor of the liberties of the Jewish nation, who maintained that the Hebrews, the favorite people of heaven, ought to render obedience to God alone, and consequently were continually stimulating one another to throw off the Roman yoke and assert their national independance.

The Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes, the three most powerful of the Jewish sects, were cordially anited in sentiment respecting all those fundamental points which constituted the basis of the Jewish religion. All of them, for instance, rejected with detestation the notion of a plurality of gods, and would acknowledge the existence of but one almighty power, whom they regarded as the Creator of the Universe, and believed to be endowed with the most absolute perfection and goodness. They were equally agreed in the opinion, that God had selected the Hebrews from amongst all the other nations of the earth as his peculiar people, and had bound them to himself by an unchangeable and everlasting covenant. With the same unanimity, they maintained the divine mission of Moses;that he was the ambassador of Heaven, and consequently that the law delivered at Mount Sinai, and promulgated by his ministry was of divine original. It was also the general belief among them, that in the books of the Old Testament were contained ample instructions respecting the way of salvation and eternal happiness; and that whatever principles or duties were inculcated in those writings, must be reverently received and implicitly obeyed. But an almost irreconcileable difference of opinion, and the most vehement disputes, prevailed among them, respecting the original source or fountain from whence all religion was to be deduced. Both the Sadducees and Essenes rejected with disdain the oral law, to which the Pharisees, however, paid the greatest deference. And the interpretation of the written law, yielded still further ground for acrimonious contention.

The Pharisees maintained that the law as committed to writing by Moses, and likewise every other part of the sacred volume, had a two-fold sense or meaning; the one plain and obvious to every reader, the other abstruse and mystical. The Sadducees, on the contrary, would admit of nothing beyond a simple interpretation of the words, according to their strict literal sense. The Essenes, or at least the greater part of them, differing from both of these, considered the words of the law to possess no force or power whatever in themselves, but merely to exhibit the shadows or images of celestial objects, of virtues, and of duties. So much dissension and discord respecting the rule of religion, and the sense in which the divine law ought to be understood, could not fail to produce a great diversity in the forms ot religious worship, and naturally tended to generate the most opposite and conflicting sentiments on subjects of a divine nature.

The Pharisees , in point of number, riches, authority, and influence, took precedence of all the Jewish sects. And as they constantly manifested an extraordinary display of religion, in an apparent zeal for the cultivation of piety and brotherly love, and by an affectation of superior sanctity in their opinions, manners, and dress, the influence which they possessed over the minds of the people was unbounded; insomuch that they may be almost said to have given whatever direction they pleased to public affairs. It is unquestionable, however, that the religion of the Pharisees was, for the most part, founded in consummate hypocrisy; and that in reality, they were generally the slaves of every vicious appetite; proud, arrogant, and avaricious, consulting only the gratification of their lusts, even at the moment of their professing themselves to be engaged in the service of their Maker. These odious features in the character of the Pharisees, drew upon them the most pointed rebukes from our Lord and Savior; with more severity indeed than he bestowed on the Sadducees, who although they had departed widely from the genuine principles of religion, yet did not impose upon mankind by a pretended sanctity, or devote themselves with insatiable greediness to the acquisition of honors and riches. The Pharisees admitted the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, and of a future state of rewards and punishments. They admitted, to a certain extent, the free agency of man; but beyond that, they supposed his actions to be controuled by the decrees of fate. These points of doctrine, however, seem not to have been understood or explained by all the sect in the same way, neither does it appear that any great pains were taken to define and ascertain them with accuracy and precision, or to support them by reasoning and argument.

The Sadducees , if we may credit the testimony of Josephus concerning them, were a sect much inferior in point of number to that of the Pharisees, but composed entirely of persons distinguished for their opulence and prosperity. He also represents those who belonged to it, as wholly devoid of the sentiments of benevolence and compassion towards others; whereas the Pharisees, according to him, were ever ready to relieve the wants of the indigent and afflicted. He further describes them as fond of passing their lives in one uninterrupted course of ease and pleasure; insomuch that it was with difficulty they could be prevailed on to undertake the duties of the magistracy, or any other public function. Their leading tenet was, that all our hopes and fears terminate with the present life; the soul being involved in one common fate with the body, and, like it, liable to perish and be annihilated. Upon this principle, it was very natural for them to maintain, that obedience to the divine law would be rewarded by the Most High with length of days, and an abundance of the good things of this life, such as honors, distinctions, and riches; whilst the violators of it would, in like manner, find their punishment in the temporary sufferings and afflictions of the present time. The Sadducees, therefore, always connected the favor of heaven with a state of worldly prosperity, and could not regard any as virtuous, or the friends of heaven, but the fortunate and happy; they had no bowels of compassion for the poor and the miserable; their desires and hopes centered in a life of leisure, ease, and voluptuous gratification—for such is precisely the character which Josephus gives us of them. And, indeed, it appears to be countenanced by the inspired writings—especially if, as is now generally admitted by the learned, our Lord, in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, (Luke, ch. 16.) designed, in the person of the former, to delineate the principles and manner of life of a Sadducee. Considering the parable in this point of view, we cannot fail to see great force and beauty in it, which do not appear upon any other hypothesis. That the rich man was a Jew is evident, from his terming Abraham his father; and his request that the latter would send Lazarus to his father’s house, for the purpose of converting his brethren to a belief of the soul’s immortality, and the certainty of a future state of rewards and punishments, is convincing evidence that during his life-time he had imagined that the soul would perish with the body, and had treated with derision the doctrine maintained by the Pharisees respecting the happiness or misery of a future state; and that the brethren whom he had left behind, entertained similar sentiments — sentiments which decidedly mark them as the votaries of that impious system to which the Sadducees were devoted.

The Essenes , though not particularly mentioned by the writers of the New Testament, existed as a sect in the days of our Lord, and are frequently spoken of by Josephus, who divides them into two branches; the one characterized by a life of celibacy, dedicated to the instruction and education of the children of others; whilst the other thought it proper to marry, not so much with a view to sensual gratification, as for the purpose of propagating the human species. Hence they have been distinguished by some writers into the practical and the theoretical Essenes.

The practical Essenes were distributed in the cities and throughout the countries of Syria, Palestitle, and Egypt. Their bond of association embraced not merely a community of tenets, and a similarity of manners and particular observances, like that of the Pharisees or the Sadducees; but it extended also to an intercommunity of goods. Their demeanor was sober and chaste;and their mode of life was, in every other respect, subjected to the strictest regulations, and submitted to the super-intendance of governors, whom they appointed over themselves. The whole of their time was devoted to labor, meditation and prayer; and they were most sedulously attentive to the calls of justice and humanity, and every moral duty. In common with the rest of the Jews, they believed in the unity of God; but from some of their institutes, it appears that they entertained a reverence for the sun; probably, considering that grand luminary as a deity of an inferior order, or perhaps regarding him as the visible image of the Supreme Being. They supposed the souls of men to have fallen, by a disastrous fate, from the regions of purity and light, into the bodies which they occupy; during their continuance in which, they considered them to be con-filled, as it were, within the walls of a loathsome dungeon. For this reason, therefore, they did not believe in the resurrection of the body; although it was their opinion that the soul would be rewarded or punished in a future state according to its deserts. They cultivated great abstinence, allowing themselves but little bodily nourishment or gratification, from an apprehension that the immortal spirit might be thereby encumbered and weighed down. It was their endeavor, too, by constant meditation, to withdraw the mind as much as possible from the contagious influence of the corrupt mass by which it was unhappily enveloped. The ceremonies, or external forms, which were enjoined in the law of Moses to be observed in the worship of God, were totally disregarded by many of the Essenes; it being their opinion that the words of Moses were to be understood in a mysterious and recondite sense, and not according to their literal meaning.

Others of them, indeed, so far conformed as to offer sacrifices, but they did this at home; for they were wholly averse from the rites which it was necessary for those to observe who attended the temple worship. Upon the whole, it does not seem an improbable conjecture, that the doctrine and discipline of the Essenes arose out of an ill-judged attempt to make the principles of the Jewish religion accord with some tenets which they had fondly imbibed from the Oriental philosophy, of which we have already treated.

Though the practical Essenes were very much addicted to superstition, society derived no inconsiderable benefit from their labor, and the strictness of their morals. Those of the theoretical class, however, seem to have set scarcely any bounds whatever to their silly extravagance.

Although they professed themselves to be Jews, and were desirous to be considered as the disciples of Moses, they were almost entirely strangers to the Mosaic discipline. Renouncing employment of every description, and all worldly possessions, they withdrew themselves into solitary places, and there dispersed about in separate cells, passed the remnant of their days without engaging in any kind of bodily labor, and neither offering sacrifices, nor observing any other external form of religious worship. In this state of seclusion from the world and its concerns, they studied to reduce and keep the body low, by allowing it nothing beyond the most slender subsistence, and, as far as possible, to detach and disengage the soul from it by perpetual contemplation, so that the immortal spirit might, in defiance of its corporeal imprisonment, be kept constantly aspiring after its native liberty and light, and be prepared, immediately on the dissolution of the body, to re-ascend to those celestial regions from whence it originally sprang. Conformably to the practice of the Jews, the theoretical Essenes were accustomed to hold a solemn assembly every seventh day. On these occasions, after hearing a sermon from their president, and offering up their prayers, it was usual for them to feast together,—if that can indeed be called a feast, which was restricted to a mutual participation of salt and bread and water. This repast is said to have been followed by a sacred dance, which was continued through, out the whole night, until the dawn appeared. At first the men and women danced in two separate parties; but at length, their minds, according to their own account, kindling with a sort of divine extacy, the two companies joined in one, mutually striving, by various shouts and songs of the most vehement kind, accompanied with the most extravagant motions and gesticulations of the body, to manifest the fervent glow of that divine love with which they professed to be enflamed. To such an extent of folly may men be led by the spirit of enthusiasm, and in consequence of their entertaining erroneous principles respecting the Deity, and the origin of the human soul!

As to the moral doctrine of these sects of the Essenes, as well as that of the Pharisees and Sadducees, into which the Jewish people were divided, it cannot be considered as having in any degree contributed towards promoting the interests of virtue and genuine piety. The Pharisees, as was frequently objected to them by Christ, who knew their hearts, were destitute of the love of God and their neighbor, the essential principles of righteousness—they weere hypocritical in their acts of worship—proud and self-righteous—harsh and uncharitable in their judgment of others— while they made the divine law void through their traditions. They paid little or no regard to inward purity or sanctity of mind, but studied by all possible means to attract the eyes of the multitude towards them, by an ostentatious solemnity of carriage, and the most specious external parade of piety and brotherly love. They were continually straining and perverting the most important precepts of the divine law; whilst at the same time, they enforced an unreserved obedience to ordinances which were of mere human institution. The Sadducees regarded all those persons as righteous, who strictly conformed themselves to the ritual observances prescribed in the law of Moses, and that did no injury to any of the Jewish nation, from whom they had received none. And as their principles forbade men to look forward to a future state of rewards and punishments, and placed the whole happiness of man in the possession of riches and in sensual gratification, they naturally tended to generate and encourage an inordinate love of money, a brutal insensibility to the calls of compassion, and a variety of other vices equally pernicious and degrading to the human mind. The Essenes labored under the influence of a depressing superstition; so that, whilst they were scrupulously attentive to the demands of justice and equity in regard to others, they appear to have altogether overlooked the duties which men owe to themselves. Those of them who were distinguished by the name of Therapeutae, or theoretical Essenes, were a race of men who resigned themselves entirely to the dictates of the most egregious fanaticism and folly. They would engage in no sort of business or employment on their own account; nor would they be instrumental in forwarding the interests of others. In short, they appear to have considered themselves as released from every bond by which human society is held together, and at liberty to act in direct opposition to almost every principle of moral discipline.

It cannot therefore excite any reasonable surprise that, owing to the various causes which we have thus enumerated, the great mass of the Jewish people were, at the period of the birth of Jesus Christ, sunk in the most profound ignorance as to divine things; and the nation, for the most part, devoted to a flagitious and dissolute course of life. That such was the miserable state of degradation into which this highly privileged people had fallen, is incontestibly proved by the history of our Lord’s life, and the tenour of his discourses and conversations which he condescended to address to them. Hence his comparison of the teachers among them to blind guides, who professed to instruct others in a way with which they were totally unacquainted themselves; and the multitude to a flock of lost sheep, wandering without a shepherd. Matthew 15:14. John 9:39.

Matthew 10:6. and ch. 15:24.

In addition to what has been already said respecting the sources of error and corruption among the Jews, we have still further to remark, that, at the time of Christ’s appearance, numbers among them had imbibed the principles of the Oriental philosophy respecting the origin of the world, and were much addicted to the study of a mystical sort of learning to which they gave the name of Cabbala. The Samaritans are spoken of in the New Testament as a sect altogether distinct from the Jews; and as they were inhabitants of Palestine, they merit attention in this place. Their sacred rites were performed in a temple erected on Mount Gerizim; they were involved in the same calamities which befel the Jewish people, and were no less forward than the Jews in adding to their other afflictions, the numerous evils produced by factions and intestine tumults. They were not, however, divided into so many religious sects; although the instances of Dositheus, Menander, and Simon Magus, plainly prove that there were not wanting among them some who were carried away by the love of paradox and a fondness for novel speculations; and that they debased the religion of their ancestors, by incorporating with it many of the principles of the Oriental philosophy.