282 AGNOSTICISM: A REJOINDER vm 



grounds can a reasonable man be asked to believe 

 any more ? So far as the narrative in the first 

 gospel, on the one hand, and those in the third 

 gospel and the Acts, on the other, go beyond what 

 is stated in the second gospel, they are hopelessly 

 discrepant with one another. And this is the more 

 significant because the pregnant phrase "some 

 doubted/' in the first gospel, is ignored in the 

 third. 



But it is said that we have the witness Paul 

 speaking to us directly in the Epistles. There is 

 little doubt that we have, and a very singular 

 witness he is. According to his own showing, 

 Paul, in the vigour of his manhood, with every 

 means of becoming acquainted, at first hand, with 

 the evidence of eye-witnesses, not merely refused 

 to credit them, but " persecuted the church of God 

 and made havoc of it." The reasoning of Stephen 

 fell dead upon the acute intellect of this zealot for 

 the traditions of his fathers : his eyes were blind 

 to the ecstatic illumination of the martyr's 

 countenance " as it had been the face of an 

 angel ; " and when, at the words " Behold, I see 

 the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing 

 on the right hand of God/' the murderous mob 

 rushed upon and stoned the rapt disciple of Jesus, 

 Paul ostentatiously made himself their official 

 accomplice. 



Yet this strange man, because he has a vision 

 one day, at once, and with equally headlong zeal, 



