THE PROOFS
OF
CHRIST’S RESURRECTION;
FROM A LAWYER’S STANDPOINT.
BY
CHARLES R. MORRISON.
ANDOVER:
WARREN F. DRAPER.
1882.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882,
By WARREN F. DRAPER,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
All Rights Reserved.
The present treatise is intended to give what the authorhas often felt the need of—a compact and thoroughly reliablestatement of the principal historical facts to the authenticityand integrity of the New Testament writings concerning ourLord, and the presumptions from them which establish hisclaims as our Divine Redeemer and Saviour.
The question of his Resurrection from the dead is selectedas the pivot, because everything hinges upon it. This question,whichever way it is determined, is decisive. It is aquestion which greatly concerns every one. It is a questionof evidence, and as such is especially deserving of carefulinquiry by members of the legal profession. For, as Prof.Greenleaf observed in his work hereafter cited,—“If a closeexamination of the evidences of Christianity may be expectedof one class of men more than another, it would seem incumbenton us, who make the law of evidence one of our peculiarstudies.”
As the question of Christ’s Resurrection is the objectivepoint of our inquiries, all other questions are subordinatedto it, and examined so far only as deemed material to themain question.
The author has availed himself of a lawyer’s privilege, andmade use of the researches, arguments, and conclusions ofothers who may justly be regarded as authority, and towhom he has given credit as far as practicable, but has endeavoredto form an independent judgment in view of allaccessible sources of information.
The work is, in the main, as published in a series of articlesin the New Hampshire Journal, and also in the VermontChronicle, from March 5, 1881, to April 1, 1882, which willexplain the use of the common version in the earlier chaptersand the New Revision in the later ones.
While the proofs have been marshalled around the principalfact, those to establish the subsidiary question of ourFour Gospels and the Book of Acts have been largelycentered upon the “Memoirs” mentioned in the confessedlygenuine writings of Justin Martyr. Justin, in his FirstApology, so called, written before the year one hundred andfifty of our era, and probably ten years earlier, has given agraphic account of the usages in the churches generally.In this account he says that, on the “day called Sunday,”Memoirs of Christ were read with the Prophets, in all theirassemblies. Hence, when it is ascertained that these Memoirswere our Canonical Gospels, we make a long stride towardthe conclusion of their undoubted authenticity and genuineness.
To all questions of evidence which arise, the author applieslegal principles and presumptions derived from experienceand constantly acted upon in courts of justice. He asks ofthe re