sus, a companion of the Apostles, and had
seen and no doubt conversed with Mary. When he wrote his Gospel
everything was fresh in his mind, and there could be no object, on his
part, in writing the life of Jesus, to state falsehoods or omit
important truths in order to deceive his countrymen. If what is stated
in the _interpolated_ first two chapters, concerning the miraculous
birth of Jesus, were true, Matthew would have known of it; and, knowing
it, why should he omit it in giving an account of the life of
Jesus?[134:3]

The Ebionites, or Nazarenes, as they were previously called were
rejected by the Jews _as apostates_, and by the Egyptian and Roman
Christians _as heretics_, therefore, until they completely disappear,
their history is one of tyrannical persecution. Although some traces of
that obsolete sect may be discovered as late as the fourth century, they
insensibly melted away, either into the Roman Christian Church, or into
the Jewish Synagogue,[134:4] and with them perished the _original_
Gospel of Matthew, _the only Gospel written by an apostle_.

"Who, where masses of men are burning to burst the bonds of time and
sense, to deify and to adore, wants what seems earth-born, prosaic fact?
Woe to the man that dares to interpose it! Woe to the sect of faithful
Ebionites even, and on the very soil of Palestine, that dare to maintain
the earlier, humbler tradition! Swiftly do they become heretics,
revilers, blasphemers, though sanctioned by a James, brother of the
Lord."

Edward Gibbon, speaking of this most unfortunate sect, says:

"A laudable regard for the honor of the first proselytes has
countenanced the belief, the hope, the wish, that the
Ebionites, or at least the Nazarenes, were distinguished only
by their obstinate perseverance in the practice of the Mosaic
rites. Their churches have disappeared, _their books are
obliterated_, their obscure freedom might allow a latitude of
faith, and the softness of their infant creed would be
variously moulded by the zeal of prejudice of three hundred
years. Yet the most charitable criticism must refuse these
sectaries any knowledge of the pure and proper _divinity of
Christ_. Educated in the school of Jewish prophecy and
prejudice, they had never been taught to elevate their hope
above _a human_ and temporal Messiah. If they had courage to
hail their king when he appeared in a plebeian garb, th