ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 207 



CHAP. IX. 



The HISTORY of the CHRIST- 

 IAN Church, of Herefies, of 

 the Popes and Reformers. 



FROM amidft the thickeft darknefs a light 

 (hone forth : Jefus Chrift, the Saviour of 

 the world, was born at Bethlehem in Judea, on 

 the 25th of December, about the year of the 

 world 4000 ; in the 23d year of the reign of 

 Auguftus, and in the 37th of that of Herod. If 

 Chrift had been nothing more than man, it mud 

 be confefied that he would have been the grcatcd 

 of men, the mod virtuous of the human race, the 

 wifeft of philofophers, and the mod truly learned 

 of all teachers. His docVme would not have been 

 lefs divine. He difcovered to mankind the true 

 and the only principle of all virtue, by laying to 

 them, LOVE. But as he is acknowledged by all 

 Chriftians to be the real Son of God, who came 

 upon the earth to fave mankind, and offered him- 

 felf as a facrifice for the expiation of their fins, 

 it is not in the power of language fully to exprefs 

 that acknowledgment, that gratitude, veneration, 

 and profound devotion which we owe unto him. 



His 



