y. Nor could
any plan be devised more certain to arouse the fury of the pagan
priesthood, than to denounce the craft by which they had their wealth,
and to preach that they are no gods which are made by hands. The most
degraded wretch, who perishes by the hand of the hangman is not so
contemptible in our eyes, as the crucified malefactor was in the eyes of
the Roman people; nor could anything more disagreeable to the Jewish
nation be invented than the declaration, that the Gentiles should become
partakers of the kingdom of God. What then should induce any man in his
senses to provoke such an opposition to a new religion, and to make it
so contemptible and disagreeable to those whom he sought to convert, if
he were manufacturing a lie to gain power and popularity?

The religion they preached was not adapted to please sensual men, nor to
allow its preachers in sensual gratifications. "Our exhortation," says
Paul--and every reader of the New Testament knows that he says
truth--"Our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor of
guile." Infidels admit that they preached a pure morality. But it is a
long time since men learned the proverb, "Physician, heal thyself."
"Thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that
sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? Thou
that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?" It could not, then,
be to obtain license for lust that these men preached holiness.

There is only one other conceivable motive which should induce men to
confederate together for the propagation of falsehood--the design of
making money by it. But their new religion made no provision for any
such thing. One of their first acts was to desire the church to elect
deacons who might manage its money matters, and allow them to give
themselves wholly to prayer and to the ministry of the word. Twenty-five
years after that they could appeal to the world that "Even to this
present hour, we" (the Apostles) "both hunger and thirst, and are naked,
and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place, and labor working
with our hands; being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it:
we are counted as the filth of the world, and the offscouring of all
things to this day." Their book opens with the story of their Master's
birth in a stable, with the manger for his cradle, and one of its last
pictures is that of his venerable apostle chained in a dungeon, and
begging