Moses.—O Lord, be not so hasty. All is in Thy hands. Let Moses perish, rather than one soul in Israel.
After several discourses of this sort, the echo of the mountain says to Moses, "Thou hast but five hours to live." At the end of five hours God sends for Gabriel, Zinguiel and Samael. He promises Moses that he shall be buried and carries away his soul.
When we reflect that nearly the whole earth has been infatuated by similar stories, and that they have formed the education of mankind, the fables of Pilpay, Lokman, or Æsop appear quite reasonable.
Apocryphal Books of the New Law.
There were fifty gospels, all very different from one another, of which there remain only four entire—that of James, that of Nicodemus, that of the infancy of Jesus, and that of the birth of Mary. Of the rest we have nothing more than fragments and slight notices.
The traveller Tournefort, sent into Asia by Louis XIV., informs us that the Georgians have preserved the gospel of the Infancy, which was probably communicated to them by the Azmenians.
In the beginning, several of these gospels, now regarded as apocryphal, were cited as authentic, and were even the only gospels that were cited. In the Acts of the Apostles we find these words uttered by St. Paul (chap. xx., ver. 35), "And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, it is more blessed to give than to receive."
St. Barnabas, in his Catholic Epistle (Nos. 4 and 7), makes Jesus Christ speak thus: "Let us resist all iniquity; let us hate it. Such as would see Me enter into My kingdom must follow Me through pain and sorrow."
St. Clement, in his second Epistle to the Corinthians, puts these words into the mouth of Jesus Christ: "If you are assembled in My bosom and do not follow My commandments, I shall reject you and say to you, 'Depart from Me; I know you not; depart from Me, ye workers of iniquity.'"
He afterwards attributes to Jesus Christ these words: "Keep your flesh chaste and the seal unspotted, in order that you may receive eternal life."