emasculated Christians will return to what the primitive Christians, or the Fathers of the Christian Church, really were. Here Christians! here is a test for your religious fidelity!

If Jesus or the Gospel writers have not espoused the rite of circumcision there is nothing said against it, and the assertion that he came to fulfil and not to destroy the Jewish Law is your argument for justification.

If the book of the Acts of the Apostles beareth testimony of any thing, it is, that the first Christians were circumcised and contended that circumcision was essential as a fulfilment of the Jewish Law; but the rite seems to have been so objectionable to the Greeks, and so checked the progress of Christianity, that Peter found it necessary to have a vision upon the subject, and to obtain a dispensation to the Gentiles to abstain from circumcision if they so preferred. But this by no means forbids circumcision to those who may be faithful to the very letter of the law. It only shews the want of faith and firmness in some of the first Christian teachers, such as Peter and Paul are represented to have been in this book of the Acts. This and subsequent neglect of that fulfilment reflects the greater merit upon you the followers of Johanna Southcote in restoring it.

We also find, in this book of the Acts, that special regard was paid to a travelling eunuch, in converting and baptizing him. You may learn from the 8th chapter, that eunuchs were great favourites in heaven; for an angel sent Philip after this Ethiopian Eunuch, that he might not return to Ethiopia unchristianized! If Judge Bailey be religiously honest as your judge, and direct your acquittal, or if the Jury be obstinate, and he as he ought fine yon but in a shilling, I seriously advise you to complete your Christianity, and to add emasculation to circumcision: I will at least, then say, that you are the only honest and conscientious Christians.

The Apostle Paul was the first Christian who wrote against circumcision, and that only because he had been five times whipped by the Jews. Saint Paul was a great prevaricator on this head. His Epistle to the Galatians, which is evidently one of the last of his writings, written at least seventeen years after he had began to preach Christianity, is written expressly against circumcision. And it is written in such a stile as almost to prove, that every preacher of Christianity but himself advocated the necessity of circumcision. He boasteth in this Epistle, that he did not circumcise Titus; but at Acts, chap. xvi. we read, that he circumcised Timothy because of the Jews. At Romans, chap. ii. ver.

25, we find him saying-" For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep the law." This is all that either Jew or Christian can contend for; but circumcision also maketh a part of the law, and the law cannot be kept without it. At chap. iii. ver. 1, he says again-" What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God." This is matter clear and explicit and not to be honestly departed from by a Christian. At chap. xv. ver. 8, he says: "Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers." No prevarication, no soreness at having been five times whipped by the Jews, will suffice to set aside these assertions.

In writing to the Corinthians, 1st Epistle, chap. vii. ver. 19, he began to prevaricate, in saying: "Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God." But circumcision is clearly one of those commandments; therefore circumcision is something, and Saint Paul in error.

We can find nothing more in the New Testament but the further prevarication of Saint Paul upon the subject, and this will not strengthen the argument on the one side nor on the other. But enough has been shewn for your complete justification, and to prove, that the cause of your committal to Gaol was the following of a precept of the Bible. This must be your defence; and you will do weil not to employ a Barrister to speak for you, unless he will defend you upon this ground and justify your conduct as a lover of the Bible and its precepts.

I shall watch your case and not fail to reprobate any punishment after trial, should it be inflicted, as a gross violation of all decency and justice. We have lately seen another man, George Hale, sent to Gaol for too strong an attachment to a particular precept of the Bible; and as matters are now passing, the reign of George the Fourth resembles that of Henry the Eighth, in other matters besides a killing of wives. It resembles it in punishments for religious matters. In that reign, Catholic and Protestant went to the stake upon the same hurdle: in this though we have no faggots the revenge is equally remorseless and Christian and Anti-Christian are alike sent to Gaol for their opinions. Hoping you will come off with less punishment than I have found from these odd or mad Christians,

I am, your well wisher,

RICHARD CARLILE.

The First Gospel of the INFANCY of JESUS

CHRIST.

[Mr. Henry Sike Professor of Oriental Languages at Cambridge, first translated and published this Gospel in 1697. It was received by the Gnostics, a sect of Christians in the second century; and several of its relations were credited in the following ages by other Christians, viz. Eusebius, Athanasius Epiphanius, Chrysostom, &c. Sozomen, says he was told by many, and he credits the relations, of the idols in Egypt falling down on Joseph and Mary's flight thither with Christ; and of Christ making a well to wash his clothes in a sycamore tree, from whence balsam afterwards proceeded. These stories are from this Gospel. Chemnitius, out of Stipulensis, who had it from Peter Martyr, Bishop of Alexandria, in the third century, says, that the place in Egypt where Christ was banished is now called Matarea, about ten miles beyond Cairo; that the inhabitants constantly burn a lamp in remembrance of it; and that there is a garden of trees yielding a balsam, which were planted by Christ when a boy. M. La Crose cites a synod at Angamala, in the mountains of Malabar, A. D. 1599, which condemns this Gospel as commonly read by the Nestorians in that country. Ahmad Ibn Idris, a Mahometan divine, says, it was used by some Christians in common with the other four Gospels; and Ocobius de Castro mentions a Gospel of Thomas, which he says, he saw and had it translated to him by an Armenian Archbishop at Amsterdam, that was read in very many churches of Asia and Africa as the only rule of their faith. Fabricus takes it to be this Gospel, It has been supposed, that Mahomet and his coadjutors used it in compiling the Koran. There are several stories believed of Christ, proceeding from this Gospel as that which Mr. Sike relates out of La Brosse's Persic Lexicon, that Christ practised the trade of a dyer, and his working a miracle with the colours; from whence the Persian dyers honour him as their patron, and call a dye-house the shop of Christ. Sir John Chardin mentions Persian legends concerning Christ's dispute with his schoolmaster about his A B C; and his lengthening the cedarboard which Joseph sawed too short.]

СНАР. І. 1 Caiphas relates, that Jesus when in his cradle, informed his mother, that he was the Son of God. 5 Joseph and Mary going to Bethlehem to be taxed, Mary's time of bringing forth arrives, and she goes into a cave. 8 Joseph fetches in a Hebrew woman.

10 The cave filled with great lights, 11 the infant born, 17 cures the woman, 19 arrival of the shepherds. THE following accounts we found in the book of Joseph the high-priest, called by some Caiphas.

He relates, that Jesus spake even when he was in his cradle, and said to his mother:

3 Mary, I am Jesus the Son of God, that word, which thou didst bring forth according to the declaration of the angel Gabriel to thee, and my Father hath sent me for the salvation of the world. 4 In the three hundred and ninth year of the æra of Alexander, Augustus published a decree, that all persons

:

should go to be taxed in their own country.

5 Joseph therefore arose, and with Mary his spouse he went to Jerusalem, and then came to Bethlehem, that he and bis family might be taxed in the city of his fathers.

6 And when they came by the cave, Mary confessed to Joseph, that her time of bringing forth was come, and she could not go on to the city, and said, Let us go into this cave.

7 At that time the sun was very near going down.

8 But Joseph hastened away, that he might fetch her a mid-wife; and when he saw an old Hebrew woman, who was of Jerusalem, he said to her, Pray come hither, good woman, and go into that cave, and you will there see a woman just ready to bring forth.

9 It was after sunset, when the old woman and Joseph with her reached the cave, and they both went into it.

10 And behold, it was all filled with

1 The wise men visit Christ. 2 Mary gives them one of his swaddling clothes. 3 An angel appears to them in the form of a star. 4 They return and make a fire, and worship the swaddling cloth, and put it in the fire where it remains unconsumed.

AND it came to pass, when the Lord

Jesus was born at Bethlehem, a city of Judæa, in the time of Herod the King; the wise men came from the East to Jerusalem, according to the prophecy of Zoradascht, and brought with them offerings: namely, gold, frank incense, and myrrh, and worshipped him, and offered to him their gifts.

2 Then the Lady Mary took one of his swaddling clothes in which the infant • Zoroaster.