testimony of Suetonius concerning Chrestus, the leader, why should they
accept it concerning the Christians, the followers? Paley, of course,
although he quotes Suetonius, omits all reference at this stage to the
unlucky Chrestus; his duty was to present evidences of, not against,
Christianity. Most dishonestly, however, he inserts a reference to it
later on (p. 73), where, in a brief _résumé_ of the evidence, he uses it
as a link in his chain: "When Suetonius, an historian contemporary with
Tacitus, relates that, in the time of Claudius, the Jews were making
disturbances at Rome, Christus being their leader." Why does not Paley
explain to us how Jesus came to be leading Jews at Rome during the reign
of Claudius, and why he incited them to riot? No such incident is
related in the life of Jesus of Nazareth; and if Suetonius be correct,
the credit of the Gospels is destroyed. To his shame be it said, that
Paley here deliberately refers to a passage, _which he has not ventured
to quote_, simply that he may use the great name of Suetonius to
strengthen his lamentably weak argument, by the pretence that Suetonius
mentions Jesus of Nazareth, and thus makes him a historical character.
Few more disgraceful perversions of evidence can be found, even in the
annals of controversy. H. Horne refers to this passage in proof of the
existence of Christ (Introduction, vol. i., page 202); but without
offering any explanation of the appearance of Christ in Rome some years
after he ought to have been dead.

Juvenal is next dragged forward by Paley as a witness, because he
mentioned the punishment of some criminals: "I think it sufficiently
probable that these [Christian executions] were the executions to which
the poet refers" ("Evidences," p. 29.) Needless to say that there is not
a particle of proof that they were anything of the kind; but when
evidence is lacking, it is necessary to invent it.