And Jeremiah prophesied that this would
happen, speaking by the Holy Ghost thus: 'A voice was heard in
Ramah, lamentation and much wailing, Rachel weeping for her
children, and she would not be comforted, because they are not.'"
(Dial. ch. lxxviii.)
Now any unprejudiced reader, on examining this account, would instantly
say that Justin had derived every word of it from the Gospels of St.
Matthew and St. Luke, but that, instead of quoting the exact words of
either Evangelist, he would say that he (Justin) "reproduced" them. He
reproduced the narrative of the Nativity as it is found in each of these
two Gospels. He first reproduces the narrative in St. Matthew in
somewhat more colloquial phrase than the Evangelist used, interspersing
with it remarks of his own; and in order to account for the Birth of
Christ in Bethlehem he brings in from St. Luke the matter of the census,
(not with historical accuracy but) sufficiently to show that he was
acquainted with the beginning of Luke ii.
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