according to a mode of reckoning then in use (see Hales' "Chronology,"
i. 49, 171, and Luke xxiv. 21), was the _first year_ of his successor
Tiberius. The _fifteenth year_ of Tiberius, according to the same mode
of calculation, commenced on the 1st of January 781 of the city of Rome,
and terminated on the 1st of January 782. If then our Lord was born
about the 1st of March 751 of Rome, and if the Baptist was imprisoned
early in 781, it could be said with perfect propriety that Jesus then
"began to be about thirty years of age." This view is further confirmed
by the fact that Quirinius, or Cyrenius, mentioned Luke ii. 2, was
_first_ governor of Syria from the _close_ of the year 750 of Rome to
753. (See Merivale, iv. p. 457, note.) Our Lord was born under his
administration, and according to the date we have assigned to the
nativity, the "taxing" at Bethlehem must have taken place a few months
after Cyrenius entered into office.

This view of the date of the birth of Christ, which differs somewhat
from that of any writer with whom I am acquainted, appears to meet all
the difficulties connected with this much-disputed question. It is based
partly upon the principle, so ingeniously advocated by Whiston in his
"Chronology," that the flight into Egypt took place before the
presentation in the temple. I have never yet met with any antagonist of
that hypothesis who was able to give a satisfactory explanation of the
text on which it rests. Some other dates assigned for the birth of
Christ are quite inadmissible. In Judea shepherds could not have been
found "abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night"
(Luke ii. 8) in November, December, January, or, perhaps, February; but
in March, and especially in a mild season, such a thing appears to have
been quite common. (See Greswell's "Dissertations," vol. i. p. 391, and
Robinson's "Biblical Researches," vol ii. p. 97, 98.) Hippolytus, one of
the earliest Christian writers who touches on the subject, indicates