Christ, or if the former are untrue, he maintained that there was no better ground for believing the latter to be true. Voltaire, Le Grand d’Aussy, and Castillon all wrote to the same effect. It is even said by some that Castillon’s French translation was dedicated to Pope Clement XIV., with an ironical preface, signed Philalethes, and supposed to have been written by Frederick II. As a natural consequence, in Germany more especially, numberless refutations were written in answer to these modern imitators of Hierocles. But it was agreed on both sides that the work of Philostratus was written and published in a spirit decidedly hostile to Christianity.
There was no doubt that a reaction would take place in so exaggerated a notion, and that reaction is now visible in the writings of Buhle, Jacobs, and Neander. It is quite true that they have gone into the opposite extreme. It has been denied of late that there ever was any intentional reference in the life of Apollonius to Christianity or to the Gospel writings. Great stress has been laid upon the cir-
