ne) 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 Schuerer, 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 by any other authority_.

Really this is too much! The fact is, as anybody can see who will turn
to my article of February 1889 [VII. _supra_], out of which all this
discussion has arisen, that the arguments upon which I rest the
strength of my case touching the swine-miracle, are exactly
"historical" and "critical." Expressly, and in words that cannot be
misunderstood, I refuse to rest on what Mr. Gladstone calls
"subjective" evidence. I abstain from denying the possibility of the
Gadarene occurrence, and I even go so far as to speak of some physical
analogies to possession. In fact, my quondam opponent, Dr. Wace,
shrewdly, but quite fairly, made the most of these admissions; and
stated that I had removed the only "consideration which would have
been a serious obstacle" in the way of his belief in the Gadarene
story.[114]

So far from setting aside the authority of the synoptics on
"subjective" grounds, I have taken a great deal of trouble to show
that my non-belief in the story is based upon what appears to me to be
evident; firstly, that the accounts of the three synoptic Gospels are
not independent, but are founded upon a common source; secondly, that,
even if the story of the common tradition proceeded from a
contemporary, it would still be worthy of very little credit, seeing
the manner in which the legends about mediaeval miracles have been
propounded by contemporaries. And in i