Jewish and Gentile scholars. Realizing the hopelessness of reviving the
ancient faith among the enlightened clement of society, and the
impossibility of proselyting them to a new form of superstition, these
professors resolved to institute a system of worship exclusively for
the Jews and the lower and neglected classes of Gentiles, including the
slaves and criminals. To that end they rewrote the scriptures of the
Jewish or ancient Christianity, which had been preserved among the
secret archives of the University. Retaining their teachings relative
to the finale of the plan of redemption, and its monasticism; also the
land of Judea as the scene of its version of the Gospel story, and the
name of its saviour, to which they added the Latin terminal "us," thus
making it Iesus or Jesus, they perpetuated the Greek name of
Bacchus--the same that was ultimately perverted into the monogram
which, consisting of the Roman letters I. H. S., is found in all
Catholic churches, and in some Protestant ones, is falsely supposed to
stand for Jesus Hominum Salvator, or Jesus, Saviour of Men. Conforming
their version of the Gospel story to the lowly condition of its
expected votaries, they attached to the saviour the characteristics of
poverty, and made it teach that he was born in a manger, that his
disciples were but humble fishermen and that the poor would be the only
elect in the kingdom of heaven. Dropping the name of Essenes or
Therapeutae, and retaining that of Christian, they incorporated a
thread of real history corresponding to the reign of Augustus, and
arbitrarily made the Christian era begin at that time. Having thus
completed their scheme, they prudently destroyed the original from
which they compiled their scriptures, and sending out missionaries to
all parts of the Empire commissioned them to preach salvation only to
the Gentile rabblement and to the Jews.

That the sacred records of the ancient Essenes or Therapeutae