he bright sun of history;--in whose
very beams, nevertheless, these prodigious icicles are supposed to
have been formed!

As to the second point, you ask me to believe that the thing should
be done almost instantly; for in A.D. 1, we find, by all remains
of antiquity, that both Jews and Gentiles were reposing in the
shadow of their ancient superstitions; and in A. D. 60. multitudes
among different races had become the bigoted adherents of this
novel mythology!

As to the third point, you ask me to believe that such a mythology
as Christianity could have sprung up when those amongst whom it is
supposed to have originated, and those amongst whom it is supposed
to have been propagated, must have equally loathed it. National
prepossessions of the Jews. Why, the kind of Messiah on which the
national heart was set, the inveteracy with which they persecuted
to the death the one that offered himself, and the hatred with
which for eighteen hundred years they have recoiled from him,
sufficiently show how preposterous this notion is! As a nation,
they were, ever have been, and are now, more opposed to Christianity
than any other nation on earth. Prepossessions of the Gentiles! There
was not a Messiah that a Jew could frame a notion of, but would have
been an object of intense loathing and detestation to them all! Yet
you ask me to believe that a mythology originated in the prejudices
of a nation the vast bulk of whom from its commencement have most
resolutely rejected it, and was rapidly propagated among other
nations and races, who must have been prejudiced against
it; who even in its favor those venerable superstitions which were
consecrated by the most powerful associations of antiquity!

As to the fourth point, you ask me to believe that, at a juncture when
all the world was divided between deep-rooted superstition and
incredulous scepticism,--divided, as regards the into Pharisees and
Sadducees, and, as regards the Gentiles, into their Pharisees and
Sadducees, that is, into the vulgar who believed, or at least practised,
all popular religions, and the philosophers who laughed at them all,
and whose combined hostility was directed against the supposed new
mythology,--it nevertheless found favor with multitudes in almost
all lands! You ask me to believe that a mythology was rapidly received
by thousands of different races and nations, when all history
proclaims, that it is with the utmost difficulty that any such
system ev