CHAPTER V.
Records of the Christian Revelation.
25. All the details of this history are clearly stated in the four Gospels and some of the Epistles of St. Paul. Four of his Epistles are practically admitted on all hands to be authentic and genuine: namely, his Epistle to the Romans, that to the Galatians, and the two to the Corinthians. Viewing these Gospels and Epistles only as historical documents, we find in them the clear statement of many of the facts just referred to. For instance, the main fact, that of Christ's Resurrection, is most emphatically appealed to by the Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians (XV), in which he says that Christ died, and was buried, and rose again on the third day, and was seen by the Apostles, and by more than five hundred brethren at once, some of whom still survived when he wrote the Letter. His preaching, he says, is vain if Christ be not risen; and he claims to have himself seen the risen Christ, and to have receded instructions directly from Him. The Letters show St. Paul to have been a man of conspicuous ability; he had been a persecutor, he was now persecuted; his sincerity is undoubted.
26. We will next consider the reliability of the Gospels. The word "Gospel" means "good tidings;" from the Anglo-Saxon "god," good, and "spell," tidings. The exact equivalent of Greek origin is "Evangel". Each Gospel is a biography of Christ; the "good news"
