XI PECULIAR CONTROVERSIAL METHODS 409 



it is decently probable. Now it is not decently 

 probable, hardly indeed conceivable, that any one 

 who has read Josephns, or any other historian of 

 the Jewish war, should be unaware that there 

 were Jews (of whom Joseplms himself was one) 

 who " Romanised " and, more or less openly, 

 opposed the war party. But, however that may 

 be, I assert that Mr. Gladstone neither has 

 produced, nor can produce, a passage of my 

 writing which affords the slightest foundation for 

 this particular article of his indictment. 



PROP. 5. His examination of the text of 

 Josephus is alike one-sided, inadequate, and 

 erroneous. 



Easy to say, hard to prove. So long as the 

 authorities whom I have cited are on my side, I 

 do not know why this singularly temperate and 

 convincing dictum should trouble me. I have yet 

 to become acquainted with Mr. Gladstone's claims 

 to speak with an authority equal to that of scholars 

 of the rank of Schiirer, whose obviously just and 

 necessary emendations he so unceremoniously 

 pooh-poohs. 



PROP. 6. Finally, he sets aside, on grounds not 

 critical or historical, but partly subjective, the 

 primary historical testimony on the subject, namely, 

 that of the three Synoptic Evangelists, who write as 

 contemporaries and deal directly with the subject, 

 neither of which is done ly any other authority. 



Really this is too much ! The fact is, as anybody 



