X KEEPERS OF THE HERD OF SWINE 371 



using very strong language respecting either his 

 sanity or his veracity. And, if an analogous charge 

 has been brought in reference to the Gadarene 

 story, there is certainly no excuse producible, on 

 account of any lack of plain speech on my part. 

 Surely no language can be more explicit than that 

 which follows : 



" I can discern no escape from this dilemma ; 

 either Jesus said what he is reported to have said, 

 or he did not. In the former case, it is inevitable 

 that his authority on matters connected with the 

 * unseen world' should be roughly shaken; in the 

 latter, the blow falls upon the authority of the 

 synoptic Gospels'' (p. 173). "The choice then 

 lies between discrediting those who compiled the 

 Gospel biographies and disbelieving the Master, 

 whom they, simple souls, thought to honour by 

 preserving such traditions of the exercise of his 

 authority over Satan's invisible world " (p. 174). 

 And I leave no shadow of doubt as to my own 

 choice : " After what has been said, I do not 

 think that any sensible man, unless he happen to 

 be angry, will accuse me of ' contradicting the Lord 

 and his Apostles ' if I reiterate my total disbelief 

 in the whole Gadarene story " (p. 178). 



I am afraid, therefore, that Mr. Gladstone must 

 have been exceedingly angry when he committed 

 himself to such a statement as follows : 



So, then, after eighteen centuries of worship offered to our 

 Lord by the most cultivated, the most developed, and the most 



