the convenient flexibility of his own orthodoxy. He is known in private to laugh at the folly of his own doctrines, as in public he ventured to declare, that though he believed in the Articles of the Church of England collectively, he did not believe in them separately. Here is, in fact, a first draft of the whole Christian scheme, existing in a country neighbouring on Judea,many hundreds of years before it became moulded into its present shape. Jesus Christ, the son of a king, is offered by God to himself, to avert his own vengeance, and this is repeatedly called the mystery of the Gospel, (Col. i. 26). Had the Gospel been matter of fact, there could have been no mystery in it. "And they put on him a scarlet robe." Matt. xxvii. 28. "And they clothed him with purple." Mark xv. 17. "And arrayed him in a gorgeous robe." Luke xxiii. 11. "And they put on him a purple robe." John xix. 2. And set up over his head, his accusation, written"THIS IS JESUS, THE KING OF THE JEWS." "THE KING OF THE JEWs.” "THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS." "JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS." Matt. xxvii. 37. Mark xv. 26. Luke xxiii. 38. John xix. 19. Such a mockery of a dying malefactor, never, in any other instance, disgraced the judicial administration of a Roman magistrate. The addition of the important words, Jesus of Nazareth, in the later Gospel of St. John, strongly indicates the intention of making the circumstances of a previously existing Gospel apply to a newly-invented name for the old hero. CHAPTER XXIV. CHRISHNA. "THAT the name of CHRISHNA, and the general outline of his story," says the pious and learned Sir William Jones, "were long anterior to the birth of our Saviour, and probably to the time of Homer, we know very certainly.”— Asiatic Researches, vol. 1, p. 259. "In the Sanscrit Dictionary, compiled more than two thousand years ago, we have the whole story of the incarnate deity born of a virgin, and miraculously escaping in his infancy from the reigning tyrant of his country.". Ibid. pp. 259, 260. 267. 272, 273. "I am persuaded," continues this great author, than whom higher authority cannot be adduced-"I am persua ded, that a connection existed between the old idolatrous nations of Egypt, India, Greece, and Italy, long before the time of Moses."-Ibid. p. 259. "Very respectable natives have assured me, that one or two missionaries have been absurd enough in their zeal for the conversion of the Gentiles, to urge, that the Hindus were even now almost Christians; because their Brahma, Vishnou and Mahesa, were no other than the Christian Trinity: a sentence, in which we can only doubt whether folly, ignorance, or impiety, predominates. The Indian triad, and that of Plato, which he calls the Supreme® Good, the Reason, and the Soul, are infinitely removed from the holiness and sublimity of the doctrine which pious Christians have deduced from the texts in the Gospel."-Ibid. p. 272. The celebrated poem Bhagavat, contains a prolix account of the life of Chrishna :-"Chrishna, the incarnate deity of the Sanscrit romance, continues to this hour the darling god of the Indian women. The sect of Hindus, who adore him with enthusiastic and almost exclusive devotion, have broached a doctrine which they maintain with eagerness, that he was distinct from all the avatars (or prophets), who had only a portion of his divinity, whereas Chrishna was the person of Vishnou (God) himself in a human form."*-Ibid. p. 260. Chrishna was believed to have been born from the left intercostal rib of a virgin of the royal line of Devaci. "He passed a life of a most extraordinary and incomprehensible nature. His birth was concealed, through fear of the tyrant Cansa, to whom it had been predicted that one born at that time, in that family, would destroy him.' Ibid. p. 259. "He was fostered, therefore, in Mathura, by an honest *"For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily."-2 Colossians, 9. herdsman, surnamed Ananda, or the Happy, and his amiable wife, Yasoda."—Asiatic Researches, vol. 1, p. 260. "Chrishna, when a boy, slew the terrible serpent Caliya, with a number of serpents and monsters. He passed his youth in playing with a party of milk-maids; and at the age of seven years, he held up a mountain on the tip of his little finger. He saved multitudes, partly by his arms, and partly by his miraculous powers. He raised the dead, by descending for that purpose to the lowest regions. He was the meekest and best-tempered of beings. He washed the feet of the Brahmins, and preached very nobly indeed, and sublimely, but always in their favour. He was pure and chaste in reality, but exhibited an appearance of excessive libertinism; and had wives or mistresses too numerous to be counted. Lastly, he was benevolent and tender, yet fermented and conducted a terrible war."— Ibid. p. 273. “The adamantine pillars of our faith cannot be shaken by an investigation of heathen mythology. I, who cannot help believing the divinity of the Messiah, from the undisputed antiquity, and manifest completion of many prophecies, &c. am obliged, of course, to believe the sanctity of the venerable books to which that SACRED PERSON refers." -Ibid. p. 233. The above extracts are taken literally from the 1st volume of the Asiatic Researches, chapter 9th, on the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India, written in 1784, and since revised by the president, Sir William Jones. I have thought it supremely important to present the text of this great author, and leave the reader to draw his own conclusion. Higher authority could not be quoted. One better acquainted with the Hindostanee language, and with the documents and evidence from which such information could be acquired, could hardly be conceived to exist; and certainly, never was any man further from the intention of supplying arms to infidelity. The unquestionable orthodoxy of Sir William Jones must, therefore, give to admissions surrendered by him, the utmost degree of cogency; while his unequalled and unrivalled learning stands as a tower of strength, to render our position impregnable, upon the lines to which he has authorized our advance, and recognized our right. Nothing in the whole compass of ecclesiastical history has so perplexed and distressed the modern advocates of Christianity, as these surrenders made by their own best and ablest champion, to the cause of infidelity. Our evangelical polemics, indeed, lose all temper upon hearing but an allusion to this most unluckily discovered prototype of their Jewish deity. No language of insolence against those who point out the resemblance, is too outrageousno shift or sophistication to evade or conceal it, too pitiful. The sun is not more dissimilar to the moon, say our Unitarian divines, than is Chrishna to Christ.* No man in his senses, say our evangelicals, could believe that the two personages were identical. Our Methodists + meanly and pitifully alter the spelling of the name from the original orthography, which rests on the high authority of Sir William Jones, and invariably print it as Krishnu, or Krishna, to screen the resemblance from the eye's observance; while they accuse their opponents of spelling it as they do (correctly), for the contrary purpose of making the resemblance more striking. DR. BENTLEY'S THEORY. Dr. Bentley, as a dernier resource, flies to astrologysource inexhaustible of all that is wild in conjecture, and delusive in argumentation, to supply his drowning hypothesis with a straw to swim on. "My attention," says he, "was first drawn to this subject, by finding that a great many Hindu festivals marked in the calendar, had every appearance of being modern; for they agreed with the modern astronomy only, and not with the ancient. I observed also several passages in the Geeta having a reference to the new order of things. I was, therefore, induced to make particular inquiries about the time of Krishna, who, I was satisfied, was not near so ancient as pretended.‡ In these inquiries, I was told the usual story, that Krishna lived a great many ages ago; that he was contemporary with Yudheshthira; that Garga, the astronomer, was his priest; and that Garga was present at his birth, and de * Rev. Mr. Beard's Third Letter to the Author, p. 87. † Rev. Dr. John Pye Smith, in Answer to the Author, p. 54. A truly sublime specimen of evangelical malignity. This holy Parthian throws his stone, and protects himself under pretence of treating his adversary with contempt ! He was satisfied, it seems, before he began to inquire-a pretty good security to ensure that the result of his inquiry would be satisfactory. He who is in possession of what he pretends to seek for, before he commences his search, will be sure to know when and where to find it. termined the position of the planets at that moment; which position was still preserved in some books to be found among the astronomers: besides which, there was mention made of his birth in the Harivansa, and other Puranas. These I examined, but found they were insufficient to point out the time ;* I therefore directed my attention towards obtaining the JANAMPATRA of Krishna, containing the positions of the planets at his birth, which at length I was fortunate to meet with; from which it appears that Chrishna was born on the 23d of the moon Sravana." The writer then gives the position of the planets at the birth of Krishna, and states that "they place the time of the fiction in the year A. D. 600, on the 7th of August, at midnight."-Bentley on Ancient and Modern Hindu Astronomy, quoted by Mr. Beard, in his 3rd Letter to the Author, p. 90. Dr. Bentley is indeed a name of first-rate honour among Christian theologues, and is frequently appealed to as one of their highest authorities, "the learned Bentley," "the prince of critics," &c. The reader, however, cannot be better led to judge how he should appreciate this great man's decision, than by consulting the temper and spirit which appears in the annexed specimen of his manner of answering the objections of unbelievers, and which I find quoted by his zealous admirer :-" What a scheme would these men make? What worthy rules would they prescribe to Providence? And pray, to what great use or design? To give satisfaction to a few obstinate, untractable wretches; to those who are not convinced by Moses and the prophets, but want one to come from the dead and convert them! Such men mistake the methods of Providence, and the very fundamentals of religion, which draws its votaries by the cords of a man; by rational, ingenuous, and moral motives; not by conviction mathematical, not by new evidence miraculous, to silence every doubt and whim that impiety and folly can suggest. And yet all this would have no effect upon such spirits and dispositions. If they now believe not Christ and his Apostles, neither would they believe if their own schemes were complied with."-Phileleutherus Lipsiensis, p. 114. The reader is here in full possession of the Christian argument. He must bear in mind, however, that the argument, as thus far stated, is entirely in Christian hands. * Aye, to be sure! to be sure ! they pointed the wrong way! |
