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EXAMINATION OF THE TESTIMONY

OF THE

FOUR EVANGELISTS,

BY

THE RULES OF EVIDENCE ADMINISTERED

IN

COURTS OF JUSTICE.

WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE TRIAL OF JESUS.

BY SIMON GREENLEAF, LL. D.

ROYALL PROFESSOR OF LAW IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

BOSTON:

CHARLES C. LITTLE AND JAMES BROWN.

1846.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1846, by
SIMON GREENLEAF,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

BOSTON:

PRINTED BY FREEMAN AND BOLLES,

DEVONSHIRE STREET.

TO THE

MEMBERS OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION.

GENTLEMEN,

THE subject of the following work I hope will not be deemed so foreign to our professional pursuits, as to render it improper for me to dedicate it, as I now respectfully do, to you. If a close examination of the evidences of Christianity may be expected of one class of men more than another, it would seem incumbent on us, who make the law of evidence one of our peculiar studies. Our profession leads us to explore the mazes of falsehood, to detect its artifices, to pierce its thickest veils, to follow and expose its sophistries, to compare the statements of different witnesses with severity, to discover truth and separate it from error. Our fellow-men are well aware of this; and probably they act upon this knowledge more generally, and with a more profound repose, than we are in the habit of considering. The influence, too, of the legal profession upon the community is unquestionably great; conversant, as it daily is, with all classes and grades of men, in their domestic and social relations, and in all the affairs of life, from the cradle to the grave. This influence we are constantly exerting for good or ill; and hence, to refuse to acquaint ourselves with the evidences of the Christian religion, or to act as though, having fully examined, we lightly esteemed them, is to assume an appalling amount of responsibility.

The things related by the Evangelists are certainly of the most momentous character, affecting the principles of our conduct here, and our happiness forever. The religion of Jesus Christ aims at nothing less than the utter overthrow of all other systems of reli

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