[357:2] See Knight: Anct. Art and Mytho., p. 16. Cox: Aryan Mytho., vol.
ii. p. 128. Fergusson's Tree and Serpent Worship, and Squire's Serpent
Symbol.

[357:3] Deane: Serpent Worship, p. 213.

[357:4] Tree and Serpent Worship, p. 7, and Bulfinch: Age of Fable, p.
397.

[357:5] Aryan Mytho., vol. ii. p. 36.

[357:6] Monumental Christianity, p. 293.

[357:7] Bunsen's Angel-Messiah, p. 44.

[357:8] See ch. xxix.

[357:9] Monumental Christianity, pp. 323 and 234.

[357:10] Knight: Anct. Art and Mytho., p. 169.

[358:1] Knight's Ancient Art and Mythology, p. 170.

[358:2] See also R. Payne Knight's Worship of Priapus, and the other
works of Dr. Thomas Inman.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

THE BIRTH-DAY OF CHRIST JESUS.

Christmas--December the 25th--is a day which has been set apart by the
Christian church on which to celebrate the birth of their Lord and
Saviour, Christ Jesus, and is considered by the majority of persons to
be really the day on which he was born. This is altogether erroneous, as
will be seen upon examination of the subject.

There was no uniformity in the period of observing the Nativity among
the early Christian churches; some held the festival in the month of May
or April, others in January.[359:1]

The _year_ in which he was born is also as uncertain as the month or
day. "The year in which it happened," says Mosheim, the ecclesiastical
historian, "has not hitherto been fixed with certainty, notwithstanding
the deep and laborious researches of the learned."[359:2]

According to IRENAEUS (A. D. 190), on the authority of "The Gospel," and
"all the elders who were conversant in Asia with John, the disciple of
the Lord," Christ Jesus lived to be nearly, if not quite, _fifty years
of age_. If this celebrated Christian father is correct, and who can say
he is not, Jesus was born some twenty years before the time which has
been assigned as that of his birth.[359:3]

The Rev. Dr. Giles says:

"Concerning the _time_ of Christ's birth there are even
greater doubts than about the _place_; for, though the four
Evangelists have noticed several contemporary facts, which
would seem to settle this point, yet on comparing these dates
with the general history of the period, we meet with serious
discrepancies, which involve the subject in the greatest
uncertainty."[359:4]

Again he says:

"Not only do we date our time from the exact year in which
Christ _