No wonder that there is no trace at all in the Roman catacombs, nor in Christian art, of this fictitious story, until about the beginning of the fifth century.[174:1] Never would Herod dared to have taken upon himself the odium and responsibility of such a sacrifice. _Such a crime could never have happened at the epoch of its professed perpetration._ To such lengths were the early Fathers led, by the servile adaptation of the ancient traditions of the East, they required a _second edition_ of the tyrant Kansa, and their holy wrath fell upon Herod. The Apostles of Jesus counted too much upon human credulity, they trusted too much that the future might not unravel their maneuvers, the sanctity of their object made them too reckless. They destroyed all the evidence against themselves which they could lay their hands upon, but they did not destroy it all.
[166:1] _A heavenly voice_ whispered to the foster-father of Jesus, and told him to fly with the child into Egypt, which was immediately done. (See Matthew, ii. 13.)
[166:2] Life and Relig. of the Hindoos, p. 134.
[166:3] Anacalypsis, vol. i. p. 129. See also, Cox: Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 134, and Maurice: Hist. Hindostan, vol. ii. p. 331.
[166:4] Asiatic Researches, vol. i. pp. 273 and 259.
[167:1] See Prog. Relig. Ideas, vol. i. p. 61.
[167:2] See Higgins: Anacalypsis, vol. i. 130, 13-, and Maurice: Indian Antiquities, vol. i. pp. 112, 113, and vol. iii. pp. 45, 95.
[167:3] Indian Antiquities, vol. i. pp. 112, 113.
[167:4] Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 259.
[167:6] See Introduction to Gospel of Infancy, Apoc.
[168:1] Beal: Hist. Buddha, pp. 103, 104.
[168:4] Bonwick: Egyptian Belief, pp. 158 and 186.
[169:2] Calmet's Fragments, art. "Abraham."
[169:3] See Dupuis: Origin of Religious Belief, p. 240.
[169:4] See Prog. Relig. Ideas, vol. i. "Religions of Persia."
[170:1] In the Apocryphal Gospel of the Birth of Mary and "Protevangelion."
[170:2] See Bell's Pantheon, vol. i. p. 9. Cox: Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 58, and Bulfinch: The Age of Fable, p. 161.
[170:3] Bell's Pantheon, vol. i. p. 27. Cox: Aryan Mytho. vol. ii. p. 34.
[170:4] Cox: Aryan Mytho. vol. ii. p. 44.
[170:5] Ibid. p. 69, and Tales of Ancient Greece, p. xlii.
[170:6] Cox: Aryan Mythology, vol. ii. p. 14.