What is remarkable, too, neither of these Jewish writers makes any reference to the Gospels, nor to the miracles or prodigies spoken of in them; nor does either make mention of the miraculous conception and birth of Christ. All these things sprang from the Greeks. To be sure, Paul preached the resurrection; but he believed because he saw Christ after the crucifixion, in a vision, James is silent on the greatest event since the creation, of which, if true, he was a witness. The hand of the spoiler failed to leave his mark on the pages of James the son of Alpheus. Addressed to the "Twelve tribes which are scattered abroad," the epistle which bears his name had obtained too wide a circulation, and was in the hands of too many, before the age of forgery commenced, to be an easy subject for mutilation. It was written in Judea, and addressed to the whole Jewish people. It was for them alone, and in their special custody, and if it comes down to us without a spot or stain, as it came from the pen of the writer, it is because it was too well guarded and protected by its friends to admit of corruption. Why did James withhold from the twelve tribes the great fact that Christ had risen from the dead? He speaks of his cruel death; why not mention the still more important fact, that he rose superior to the grave, and put death under his feet? "Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you." (James v. 6.) CHAPTER XVII. No Christians in Rome from A. D. 66 to A. D. 117. From the death of Paul in A. D. 66, as we have before stated, to the reign of Adrian in A. D. 117, Rome was without a Christian population. Such is history when properly rendered. The course of Nero filled them with horror, and at the time of his death Rome was deserted by them. After he ceased to reign there followed the civil wars, the most fearful in the annals of Rome. Galba, after all obstacles in his way to power had been removed by the sword, entered the city through a scene of blood, and men expected nothing less than the renewal of all the cruelties of Nero's reign. (_Annals of Tacitus_, Appendix to book xvi.) Then commenced the civil war between Vespasian and Vitellius, which was the cause of untold misery to the Roman people. The city of Rome was burned to the ground. "From the foundation of the city to that hour, the Roman people had felt no calamity so deplorable, no disgrace so humiliating." (__Tacitus, book iii. sec. 22.) The condition of the times is truly depicted in the concise and eloquent language of the author of the "Decline and Fall": "During fourscore years (excepting only the short and doubtful respite by Vespasian's reign) Rome groaned beneath an unrelenting tyranny which exterminated the ancient families of the Republic, and was fatal to almost every virtue and every talent that arose during that unhappy period." (Vol. I. page 47)