touch each other; when simplicity reasons, it is often a little sophistical); we find that sometimes he courted misconceptions, and prolonged them intentionally;[6] his reasoning, judged according to the rules of Aristotelian logic, was very weak.  But when the unequaled charm of his mind could be displayed, he was triumphant.  One day it was intended to embarrass him by presenting to him an adulteress and asking him what was to be done to her.  We know the admirable answer of Jesus.[7] The fine raillery of a man of the world, tempered by a divine goodness, could not be expressed in a more exquisite manner.  But the wit which is allied to moral grandeur is that which fools forgive the least.  In pronouncing this sentence of so just and pure a taste:  “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her,” Jesus pierced hypocrisy to the heart, and with the same stroke sealed his own death-warrant.

[Footnote 1:  John viii. 13, and following.]

[Footnote 2:  Matt. xxi. 23-37.]

[Footnote 3:  Matt. xxii. 23, and following.]

[Footnote 4:  Matt. xxii. 42, and following.]

[Footnote 5:  Matt. xxii. 36, and following, 46.]

[Footnote 6:  See especially the discussions reported by John, chapter viii., for example; it is true that the authenticity of such passages is only relative.]

[Footnote 7:  John viii. 3, and following.  This passage did not at first form part of the Gospel of St. John; it is wanting in the more ancient manuscripts, and the text is rather unsettled.  Nevertheless, it is from the primitive Gospel traditions, as is proved by the singular peculiarities of verses 6 and 8, which are not in the style of Luke, and compilers at second hand, who admitted nothing that does not explain itself.  This history is found, as it seems, in the Gospel according to the Hebrews. (Papias, quoted by Eusebius, Hist.  Eccl., iii. 39.)]

It is probable, in fact, that but for the exasperation caused by so many bitter shafts, Jesus might long have remained unnoticed, and have been lost in the dreadful storm which was soon about to overwhelm the whole Jewish nation.  The high priesthood and the Sadducees had rather disdained than hated him.  The great sacerdotal families, the Boethusim, the family of Hanan, were only fanatical in their conservatism.  The Sadducees, like Jesus, rejected the “traditions” of the Pharisees.[1] By a very strange singularity, it was these unbelievers who, denying the resurrection, the oral Law, and the existence of angels, were the true Jews.  Or rather, as the old Law in its simplicity no longer satisfied the religious wants of the time, those who strictly adhered to it, and rejected modern inventions, were regarded by the devotees as impious, just as an evangelical Protestant of the present day is regarded as an unbeliever in Catholic countries.  At all events, from such a party no very strong reaction against Jesus could proceed.  The official priesthood, with its attention turned toward political power, and intimately connected with it, did not comprehend these enthusiastic movements.  It was the middle-class Pharisees, the innumerable soferim, or scribes, living on the science of “traditions,” who took the alarm, and whose prejudices and interests were in reality threatened by the doctrine of the new teacher.