lain about the _lateness_ of
our Lord's nativity, cease from their grievances, as if what
was _carried out_ in later ages of the world, had not been
impending _in time past_. . . .

"What the Apostles preached, the prophets (in Israel) had
announced before, and what has _always been (universally)
believed_, cannot be said to have been _fulfilled_ too late.
By this delay of his work of salvation, the wisdom and love of
God have only made us more fitted for his call; so that, _what
had been announced before by many Signs and Words and
Mysteries during so many centuries_, should not be doubtful or
uncertain in the days of the gospel. . . God has not provided
for the interests of men by a _new council_ or by a _late
compassion_; but he had instituted from the beginning for all
men, _one and the same path of salvation_."[515:2]

This is equivalent to saying that, "God, in his '_late compassion_,' has
sent his Son, Christ Jesus, to save _us_, therefore do not complain or
'murmur' about 'the lateness of his coming,' for the Lord has already
provided for those who _preceded us_; he has given them '_the same path
of salvation_' by sending to _them_, as he has sent to _us_, a
_Redeemer_ and a _Saviour_."

Justin Martyr, in his dialogue with Typho,[515:3] makes a similar
confession (as we have already seen in our last chapter), wherein he
says that there exists not a people, civilized or semi-civilized, who
have not offered up prayers in the name of a _crucified Saviour_ to the
Father and Creator of all things.

Add to this medley the fact that St. Irenaeus (A. D. 192), one of the
most celebrated, most respected, and most quoted of the early Christian
Fathers, tells us on the authority of his master, Polycarp, who had it
from St. John himself, and from all the old people of Asia, that Jesus
was not crucified at the time stated in the Gospels, but that he lived
to be nearly _fifty_ years old. The passage which, most fortunately, has
escaped the destroyers of all such evidence, is to be found in Irenaeus'
second book against heresies,[515:4] of which the following is a
portion:

"As the chief part of thirty years belongs to youth, and
every one will confess him to be such till the fortieth year:
but from the fortieth year to the fiftieth he declines into
old age, _which our Lord (Jesus) having attained he taught us
the Gospel, and a