The notes of time given for the birth of Christ are irreconcilable. According to Matthew he is born in the reign of Herod the King: according to Luke, he is born six months after John Baptist, whose birth is referred to the reign of the same monarch; yet in Luke, he is also born at the time of the census, which must have taken place at least ten years later; thus Luke contradicts Matthew, and also contradicts himself. The discrepancies surrounding the birth are not yet complete; passing the curious differences between Matthew and Luke, Matthew knowing nothing about the visit of the shepherds, and Luke nothing of the visit of the Magi, and the consequent slaughter of the babes, we come to a direct conflict between the Evangelists; Matthew informs us that Joseph, Mary, and the child, fled into Egypt from Bethlehem to avoid the wrath of King Herod, and that they were returning to Judæa, when Joseph, hearing that Archelaus was ruling there, turned aside to Galilee, and came and dwelt "in a city called Nazareth." Luke, on the contrary, says that when the days of Mary's purification were accomplished they took the child up to Jerusalem, and presented him in the Temple, and then, after this, returned to Galilee, to "their own city, Nazareth." Moreover, had Herod wanted to find him, he could have taken him at the Temple, where his presentation caused much commotion. In Matthew, the turning into Galilee is clearly a new thing; in Luke, it is returning home; and in Luke there is no space of time wherein the flight into Egypt can by any possibility be inserted. We may add a wonder why Galilee was a safer residence than Judæa, since Antipas, its ruler, was a son of Herod, and would, _primâ facie_, be as dangerous as his brother Archelaus.