generally remaining long
unknown, it at length fulfills the prophecies concerning its career,
while the fate which he has vainly sought to shun falls upon him who had
desired to slay it. There is a departure from the ordinary type, in the
case of Jesus, inasmuch as Herod does not actually die or suffer any
calamity through his agency. But this failure is due to the fact that
Jesus did not fulfill the conditions of the Messiahship, according to
the Jewish conception which Matthew has here in mind. Had he--as was
expected of the Messiah--become the actual sovereign of the Jews, he
must have dethroned the reigning dynasty, whether represented by Herod
or his successors. But as his subsequent career belied the expectations,
the evangelist was obliged to postpone to a future time his accession to
that throne of temporal dominion which the incredulity of his countrymen
had withheld from him during his earthly life.

The story of the slaughter of the infants which is said to have taken
place in Judea about the time of the birth of Jesus, is to be found in
the second chapter of _Matthew_, and is as follows:

"When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of
Herod the king, there came wise men from the East to
Jerusalem, saying: 'Where is he that is born _king of the
Jews_? for we have seen _his star_ in the East and have come
to worship him.' When Herod the king had heard these things,
he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him. Then Herod, when
he had privately called the wise men, enquired of them
diligently what time the star appeared. And he sent them to
Bethlehem, and said: 'Go and search diligently for the young
child; and when ye have found him, bring me word.'"

The wise men went to Bethlehem and found the young child, but instead of
returning to Herod as he had told them, they departed into their own
country another way, having been warned of God _in a dream_, that they
should not return to Herod.

"Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men,
was exceeding wroth, _and sent forth, and slew all the
children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts
thereof, from two years old and under_."

We have in this story, told by the _Matthew_ narrator--which the writers
of the other gospels seem to know nothing about,--almost a counterpart,
if not an exact one, to that related of _Crishna_ of India, which shows
how closely the