fellow-men the transaction of a Bishop, in relation to the Gospel of St. Matthew, related by Simon in his Critical History of the Text of the New Testament, vol. 1. p. 36; from which work I have before quoted. It appears that under the reign of the Emperor Zeno, in the Isle of Cyprus, Athimius Bishop and Metropolitan of the Island, announced that he had been visited in a dream by St. Barnabas, who told him of the ground-plot where he was interred, and that upon his breast was lying the Gospel of St. Matthew written with his own hand; and that proceeding to the place the next day, he found the Gospel as described by the vision. It was immediately transmitted to the Emperor, who received it with profound respect, and kept it as a precious relic in a church that was in his palace. And the Church at Constantinople read the gospel once every year out of this venerable and august copy of St. Barnabas. Such is the tale of many of the Fathers of the Church, and other ecclesiastical writers. Simon, however, declares, that the whole affair was a fiction, that the above named Bishop feigned this, for the purpose of settling some disputes between himself and some other Bishops, the nature of which he describes. Such, my Lord, was the conduct of one of your pious predecessors, as attested by a high and an eminent Christian authority. Yet we are to believe the Bible to be the word of God, although it comes out of the hands of impostors like these.

I am, my Lord, respectfully,

Salford, August, 15th, 1840.

C. J. HASLAM.

PRINTED BY C. J. HASLAM, SALFORD.

LETTER VI.

TO THE BISHOP OF EXETER:

CONTAINING

MATERIALS FOR DECIDING THE QUESTION,

WHETHER OR NOT

THE BIBLE IS THE WORD OF GOD?

BY C. J. HASLAM.

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR, HULME, MANCHESTER.

Price one Penny.

MY LORD,

Before we give credit to any tale that may be told us, many considerations are necessary. The first, and most important perhaps of all is, who are the parties from whom the tale proceeds, and what are their characters. If we find that the parties have no interest in telling the tale, other than the love of truth, and especially if we find that in no one single instance are they guilty of a falsehood, then we may have some confidence in the tale. But if, on the contrary, we find that they have an interest in telling the tale, that they get a living by it, that they are enabled to live in luxury and splendour from the wages they receive for telling the tale, and if we find besides all this, that in scores

of instances they are guilty of downright, abominable, and in some instances, impious falsehoods, then we have reason to doubt the tale; strong reason to doubt it, my Lord; for what confidence can be placed in men guilty of lying?

Your lordship will not have forgotten, that, at the conclusion of my last Letter, I mentioned the case of a Bishop, who pretended that he had been visited in a dream by St. Barnabas who died some hundreds of years previous, and that St. Barnabas told him of the place where he was. buried, and that upon his breast was lying the Gospel of St. Matthew, written with his own hand; and that the Bishop proceeding to the place the next day, turned up the sod, and found the Gospel as described by the vision.

Your lordship will perhaps be aware, that at this age of the Christian Church, great disputes existed as to which of the various copies of St. Matthew's Gospel, then extant, was the true one. Some contending for one copy, and some for another. The fact was, as your lordship will be aware, seeifig that your occupation implies a thorough acquaintance with all ecclesiastical matters, St. Matthew's Gospel had got lost, and the orthodox Christians had nothing to guide them but the altered and corrupted copies possessed by Heretics. Whether St. Barnabas saw this, and whether he saw the strife that existed in consequence, and whether he got up although dead, and paid a visit to the Bishop, and supplied the Bishop with the original, I have no information to warrant a positive statement. As, however, I stated in my last Letter, Simon, who was a Member of the Royal College at Paris, and an eminent Christian writer, declares that the whole affair was a fiction that the Bishop feigned all this for the purpose of settling some disputes between himself and some other Bishops, which disputes being settled to his satisfaction, he acquired by it a large increase of power and emolu

ment. Similar motives to those which actuated Athimius, Bishop of the Isle of Cyprus, on this occasion, are not entirely absent I believe from the minds of Bishops of the present day. Power and emolument are things of mighty influence.

It appears then, my Lord, that this Bishop, this Christian and pious Bishop, this predecessor of your lordship's, either wrote, or rather manufactured this Gospel of St. Matthew himself, introducing into it such matter and such doctrines as were best calcu

lated to answer his purpose, or he caused it to be written or manufactured, that he placed it upon the breast of a corpse that had lain in its grave for scores of years, and that he deliberately told the impious falsehood, that this corpse was the remains of St. Barnabas, and that the Gospel found thereon, was the original of St. Matthew, written with his own hand, and that he was told this by St. Barnabas himself, who visited him in a dream.

Such, my Lord, was the conduct of one of your predecessors, and above all, such was the conduct of a man from whom comes the tale, that the Bible is a book of divine inspiration.

Reverting to the principle I set out with, viz. that previous to believing a tale, our first consideration ought to be, who are the parties from whom the tale proceeds, and what are their characters; have we not reason, my Lord, to doubt the tale, that the Bible is the word of God, seeing that that tale comes from a man, the conduct of whom I have here described ?

This Gospel of St. Matthew, forged by this Bishop, was accepted and readily believed in by the people, as we may learn from the fact declared by Simon, that it was received with great pomp and solemnity by the Emperor Zeno, and that at Constantinople the gospel was read out of this copy once every year. It was desig

nated the venerable and august copy of St. Barnabas. Are we sure, my Lord, that the Gospel of St. Matthew which we now have in our Bibles, and which we look upon as a pure emanation from the Deity, is not a copy of this venerable and august copy of St. Barnabas ? Are we sure, in short, that it is not a copy of the forged Gospel of this abominable impostor of a Bishop? I for one am not sure of it.

Let none of the readers of these Letters suppose, that this is the only instance on record, of the falsehood and fraud of those on whose authority we believe that the Bible is a book of divine inspiration. Volumes would not suffice to enumerate these instances. I do not wish to be too severe upon my fellow-men, especially when I know that their characters were given them independently of themselves, but I hereby declare, that the practice of lying and forging has been general and incessant with priests, from the day of their first existence, up to the present hour.

Who can enumerate the tales which priests are hatching even in the present day, about the death-beds of Infidels, and scores of other things, every one of which is as false as the mind that hatched it is wicked, and which they cause to be carried, in the shape of Religious Tracts, to the houses of the working classes, for the purpose of deceiving and imposing upon them? They employ for this purpose, young men and women, as innocent as possible, of whom they thus make cat's-paws, and having a sincere and earnest countenance, many of the working people are led to believe the abominable lies that are contained in these Religious Tracts. The Lord's day too, is the day on which they distribute, and on which people are to read, these Religious Tracts. The Lord's day, it seems, is the best day suited for people to read lies.

It is not however of these matters that I am about to speak, they are lies and forgeries of a different character