soul of history; what must be sought is not the petty certainty about
trifles, it is the correctness of the general sentiment, the
truthfulness of the coloring. Each trait which departs from the rules
of classic narration ought to warn us to be careful; for the fact
which has to be related has been living, natural, and harmonious. If
we do not succeed in rendering it such by the recital, it is surely
because we have not succeeded in seeing it aright. Suppose that, in
restoring the Minerva of Phidias according to the texts, we produced a
dry, jarring, artificial whole; what must we conclude? Simply that the
texts want an appreciative interpretation; that we must study them
quietly until they dovetail and furnish a whole in which all the parts
are happily blended. Should we then be sure of having a perfect
reproduction of the Greek statue? No; but at least we should not have
the caricature of it; we should have the general spirit of the
work--one of the forms in which it could have existed.

This idea of a living organism we have not hesitated to take as our
guide in the general arrangement of the narrative. The perusal of the
Gospels would suffice to prove that the compilers, although having a
very true plan of the _Life of Jesus_ in their minds, have not been
guided by very exact chronological data; Papias, besides, expressly
teaches this.[1] The expressions: "At this time ... after that ...
then ... and it came to pass ...," etc., are the simple transitions
intended to connect different narratives with each other. To leave all
the information furnished by the Gospels in the disorder in which
tradition supplies it, would only be to write the history of Jesus as
the history of a celebrated man would be written, by giving pell-mell
the letters and anecdotes of his youth, his old age, and of his
maturity. The Koran, which presents to us, in the loosest manner,
fragments of the different epochs in the life of Mahomet, has yielded