Excerpt from The History Jesus of Nazara, Vol. 1: Freely Investigated in Its Connection With the National Life of Israel, and Related in Detail Task, the same life of Jesus has become the focus into which are gathered the brightest lights of Israel. As to the second point, I cannot, it is true, pretend to have attained altogether to Strauss' freedom from presupposition. I, like so many kindred minds in Germany and Switzerland, have not sacrificed my heart's interest in the religious Sphere of Christianity to a cold neutrality-standpoint, the very neutrality of which becomes the rallying-point of a party, and which, in the case of Strauss, in spite of a perceptible, indeed successful, striving after calm objectivity, has emerged from its Chrysalis in the form of a predilection for philosophical presuppositions. On the contrary, I believe that in me are to be found submissiveness and free dom, religion and a pursuit of truth regardless of consequences, in such a state of equilibrium that neither yields to the special pleading of the other, neither dominates the other; and that, by their equable adjustment, justice is more fully done to the truth itself. That the old and ready reproaches of hermaphroditism, incongruous combination, and contradiction, which have ever been heaped upon strictly undogmatic history, will be repeated, is a necessity springing from the nature of man, from variety of standpoints, from the difficulties of the subject, and from the Shortcomings of the workman. I hope, nevertheless, that my readers will be satisfied with facts with or without comment; that they will not weaken the force of laborious prodfs by sarcasm; and that they will not require me to lend an ear to objections which pretentiously reproduce upon the stage ques tions long since decided. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.