, and that impression of
melancholy sensibility which the mind experiences after long periods
of revolution, gave birth on all sides to unlimited hopes.

[Footnote 1: Egl. iv. The _Cumaeum carmen_ (v. 4) was a sort of
Sibylline apocalypse, borrowed from the philosophy of history familiar
to the East. See Servius on this verse, and _Carmina Sibyllina_, iii.
97-817; cf. Tac., _Hist._, v. 13.]

In Judea expectation was at its height. Holy persons--among whom may
be named the aged Simeon, who, legend tells us, held Jesus in his
arms; Anna, daughter of Phanuel, regarded as a prophetess[1]--passed
their life about the temple, fasting, and praying, that it might
please God not to take them from the world without having seen the
fulfillment of the hopes of Israel. They felt a powerful presentiment;
they were sensible of the approach of something unknown.

[Footnote 1: Luke ii. 25, and following.]

This confused mixture of clear views and dreams, this alternation of
deceptions and hopes, these ceaseless aspirations, driven back by an
odious reality, found at last their interpretation in the incomparable
man, to whom the universal conscience has decreed the title of Son of
God, and that with justice, since he has advanced religion as no other
has done, or probably ever will be able to do.

CHAPTER II.

INFANCY AND YOUTH OF JESUS--HIS FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

Jesus was born at Nazareth,[1] a small town of Galilee, which before
his time had no celebrity.[2] All his life he was designated by the
name of "the Nazarene,"[3] and it is only by a rather embarrassed and
round-about way,[4] that, in the legends respecting him, he is made
to be born at Bethlehem. We shall see later[5] the motive for this
supposition, and how it was the necessary consequence of the Messianic
character attributed to Jesus.[6] The precise date of his birth is
unknown. It took place under the reign of Augustus, about the Roman
year 750, probably some years before the year 1 of that era which all
civilized people date from the day on which he was born.[7]

[Footnote 1: Matt. xiii. 54, and following; Mark vi. 1, and following;
John i. 45-46.]

[Footnote 2: It is neither named in the writings of the Old Testament,
nor in Josephus, nor in the Talmud.]

[Footnote 3: Mark i. 24; Luke xviii. 37; John xix. 19; _Acts_ ii. 22,
iii. 6. Hence the name of _Nazarenes_ for a long time applied to
Christians, and which still designates them in all Mohammedan
cou