III
THE GOSPEL OF THE NATIVITY
OF MARY.
As Bishop Ellicott has said, "This Gospel is usually found among the works of Jerome, and has been edited separately by Fabricius, Thilo, and after them by Tischendorf. It has gained no little celebrity from having been admitted nearly entire into the Aurea Legenda." Judging from the style, it would seem to be less a translation than a Latin recension of the popular story respecting the birth and childhood of Mary. The writer uses the Latin Vulgate, and therefore wrote after that was published. It is far less extravagant, and in a better style, than some other compilations of its class, both earlier and later. Mary is represented as being fourteen years of age before she was espoused to Joseph, who afterwards went into Galilee to take her as his wife. The birth of Jesus is simply said to have occurred at Bethlehem, 'as the holy evangelists have taught,' and the book concludes with a doxology to the Holy Trinity.
