as said above, be no extraordinary thing to you, who say that Mercury is the angelic word of God.  But if anyone objects that he was crucified, in this also he is on a par with those reputed sons of Jupiter of yours, who suffered as we have now enumerated....  And if we even affirm that he was born of a virgin, accept this in common with what you accept of Perseus.  And in that we say that he made whole the lame, the paralytic, and those born blind, we seem to say what is very similar to the deeds said to have been done by AEsculapius” (Ibid, ch. xxi.).  “Plato, in like manner, used to say that Rhadamanthus and Minos would punish the wicked who came before them; and we say that the same thing will be done, but at the hand of Christ” (Ibid, ch. viii.) In ch. liv.  Justin argues that the devils invented all these gods in order that when Christ came his story should be thought to be another marvellous tale like its predecessors!  On the whole, we can scarcely wonder that Caecilius (about A.D. 211) taunted the early Christians with those facts:  “All these figments of cracked-brained opiniatry and silly solaces played off in the sweetness of song by deceitful poets, by you, too credulous creatures, have been shamefully reformed, and made over to your own God” (as quoted in R. Taylor’s “Diegesis,” p. 241).  That the doctrines of Christianity had the same origin as the story of Christ, and the miracles ascribed to him, we shall prove under section ii., while section iii. will prove the same as to his morality.  Judge Strange fairly says:  “The Jewish Scriptures and the traditionary teaching of their doctors, the Essenes and Therapeuts, the Greek philosophers, the neo-platonism of Alexandria, and the Buddhism of the East, gave ample supplies for the composition of the doctrinal portion of the new faith; the divinely procreated personages of the Grecian and Roman pantheons, the tales of the Egyptian Osiris, and of the Indian Rama, Krishna, and Buddha, furnished the materials for the image of the new saviour of mankind; and every surrounding mythology poured forth samples of the ‘mighty works’ that were to be attributed to him to attract and enslave his followers:  and thus, first from Judaism, and finally from the bosom of heathendom, we have our matured expression of Christianity” ("The Portraiture and Mission of Jesus,” p. 27).  From the mass of facts brought together above, we contend that the Gospels are in themselves utterly unworthy of credit, from (1) the miracles with which they abound, (2) the numerous contradictions of each by the others, (3) the fact that the story of the hero, the doctrines, the miracles, were current long before the supposed dates of the Gospels; so that these Gospels are simply a patchwork composed of older materials.

We have thus examined, step by step, the alleged evidences of Christianity, both external and internal; we have found it impossible to rely on its external witnesses, while the internal testimony is fatal to its claims; it is, at once, unauthenticated without, and incredible within.  After earnest study, and a careful balancing of proofs, we find ourselves forced to assert that THE EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY ARE UNRELIABLE.