back; and to give to those who know him, good and sufficient
reasons for past conduct, of which those to whom he is known,
cannot be ignorant; and finally, he thought it right, and proper, and
humane, to give to the world a work which contained the reasons
for the unbelief of the countrymen of Jesus; who for almost
eighteen hundred years have been made the unresisting victims of,
as the reader will find, groundless misrepresentation, and the most
amazing cruelty; because they refused to believe what it was
impossible that they should believe, on account of reasons their
persecutors did not know, and refused to be informed of.

If the arguments and statements contained in this volume should be
found to be correct, he believes that every honest and candid man,
after his first surprise that they should not have been made known
before, will feel for the victims of a mistake so singular and so
ancient as the one which is the subject of the following pages; and
will think with the author, that it is time, high time, that the truth
should be known, and justice be done to them.*

There is not in existence a more singular instance of the
mischievous mistakes arising from taking things for granted which
require proof, than the case before the reader. The world has all
along been in total error with regard to the reasons and the motives
which have prevented the Hebrew nation from receiving the
system of the New Testament. They have been successfully
accused of incorrigible blindness and obstinacy; and while
volumes upon volumes have been written against them, and the
arguments therein contained, supported and enforced by the power
of the Inquisition, and the oppressions of all Christendom, these
unfortunate people have not been willingly suffered to offer to the