BY THE SAME AUTHOR 3rd edition. A SHORT HISTORY OF FREETHOUGHT. 2 vols. tional essays on cognate subjects. Second edition. With addi BUCKLE AND HIS CRITICS: a Sociological Study. THE SAXON AND THE CELT: a Sociological Study. MODERN HUMANISTS: Studies of Carlyle, Mill, Emerson, Arnold, Ruskin, and Spencer. Fourth edition. THE FALLACY OF SAVING: a Study in Economics. THE EIGHT HOURS QUESTION: a Study in Economics. CHRISTIANITY AND MYTHOLOGY. Second edition. A SHORT HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY. Second edition. TENNYSON AND BROWNING AS TEACHERS. ESSAYS IN ETHICS. ESSAYS IN SOCIOLOGY. 2 vols. LETTERS ON REASONING. Second edition. DID SHAKESPEARE WRITE “TITUS ANDRONICUS " ? PIONEER HUMANISTS: Machiavelli, Bacon, Hobbes, Spinoza, Shaftesbury, Mandeville, Gibbon, and Mary Wollstonecraft. TRADE AND TARIFFS. COURSES OF STUDY. Second edition. CHAMBERLAIN: a Study. CHARLES BRADLAUGH. (Part I. By Mrs. Bradlaugh Bonner. Part II. RATIONALISM. THE BACONIAN HERESY: a Confutation. THE EVOLUTION OF STATES. (New edition of "An Introduction to English Politics.") ELIZABETHAN LITERATURE. WHAT TO READ. New edition. WAR AND CIVILIZATION. THE GERMANS. THE HISTORICAL JESUS A SURVEY OF POSITIONS BY JOHN M. ROBERTSON [ISSUED FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED] LONDON: 17 JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STREET, E.C. 11-20-44 MOL 7-16-44 CHAPTER I.-THE SNARE OF PRESUPPOSITION Presupposition in science. The Copernican theory. reception of Galileo, Harvey, and Darwin. Blinding effects of scholarship. The theological record. Mutations of Chris- tian opinion. Defence of the belief in witchcraft. Leibnitz CHAPTER II.-MODES OF CONSERVATIVE FALLACY Persistence of the theological temper. Each abandoned posi- tion first defended with the same fierceness. Saner forms of conservatism. Persistence in presupposition. Canon Inge on Jesus and Paul. The logical hiatus. Mill's precedent. His dithyrambic mood and critical inadequacy. Disregard of the documentary evidence. Need to face the CHAPTER III.—ILLUSIONS AS TO GOSPEL ETHIC Mill's method and mind non-historical. "The historic sense." Dr. J. E. Carpenter's. The concept of “sublimity." God portraiture. Its limitations. The Gospel ethic. Signi- ficance of the contradictions. The parable of the Good Samaritan. Incompetent verdicts of theologians. The story of Lycurgus and Alcander. Plutarch on forgive- ness of enemies. Fanaticism of Christian estimates of CHAPTER IV.-THE METHOD OF BLUSTER The historic problem. Its treatment by a Unitarian cleric. 18 |