BETHLEHEM 
TTTE now enter on that portion of our Volume which traces the early steps of 
’ ’ Christianity; and we approach it with a reverence due to the most solemn 
transaction of the world. 
Religion is the key of History; and the more closely we investigate the course 
of Providence, the more distinctly shall we comprehend the course of man. The 
three great Revelations, the Patriarchal, the Jewish, and the Christian, will be found 
to have been adapted to the three great periods of Society, and to have been adapted 
with a foresight and a completeness, which argue their origin Divine. In each instance, 
the Religion long preceded the period, a proof that it was not the work of human 
necessities; and the Period was always the subject of both Prophecy and Miracle, 
a proof that it was also the operation of the will of Heaven. 
The first stage of human society after the Dispersion of the descendants of Noah 
was Clanship; an existence by small tribes, widely separated, and roving over the 
wastes of the world. That this form of society was by a Divine ordinance is evident, 
from the prophetic name of the Patriarch, Peleg (Dispersion), in whose time this 
extraordinary change was to be effected; and from the miracle expressly wrought to 
counteract the establishment of an Empire at Babel; that miracle, too, having the 
object of even increasing the dispersion, by breaking up the universal language. The 
Religion had been given five hundred years before, by the Covenant with Noah, 
itself only a renewal of the Religion given at the gates of Paradise; its simple tenets 
being, the’ Existence of a God, the Sin of Man, and the hope of a Redeemer; its 
simple ritual being Sacrifice, and its only priest the father of the family. A Religion 
whose simplicity, while it contained all the essential truths of Revelation, was obviously 
suited to the narrow means and rude capacities of wanderers through the wilderness of 
the globe. 
But another Period was to come, when a new and vast stimulant was to be 
given to the progress of mankind, by a new system of Society. The scattered clans 
were to he gathered into condensed masses. Government was to begin; and the 
passions, powers and enjoyments of mankind, were to be moulded, excited, and elevated 
by the force, the fear, and the splendour of the Sceptre. In this period, the civilized 
world was to be placed under four successive great Sovereignties: and the singularity 
