"Christians may not be surprised that we often acquit the Jews of crimes of which they are not guilty, since justice so requires. No partiality is implied in accusing those of injustice and oppression who have been guilty of them. We have no intention to injure the Jews any more than to flatter them.... In the decay and dregs of centuries men have adopted a spirit of cruelty and barbarism towards the Jews. They were accused of being the cause of all the disasters which happened, and charged with a multitude of crimes of which they never even dreamed. Numberless miracles were invented to convict them, or rather the better to satisfy hatred under the shade of religion. We have made a collection of laws, which councils and princes published against them, by means of which people can judge of the malice of the former and the oppression of the latter. Men did not, however, confine themselves to the edicts, but everywhere military executions, popular riots, and massacres took place. Yet, by a miracle of Providence, which must excite the astonishment of all Christians, this hated nation, persecuted in all places for a great number of centuries, still exists everywhere.... Peoples and kings, heathens, Christians, and Mahometans, opposed to one another in so many points, have agreed in the purpose of destroying this nation, and have not succeeded. The bush of Moses, surrounded by flames, has ever burned without being consumed. The Jews have been driven out of all the cities of the world, and this has only served to spread them abroad in all cities. They still live in spite of the contempt and hatred which follow them everywhere, while the greatest monarchies have fallen, and are known to us only by name." Basnage, who by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes through the Catholic intolerance of Louis XIV was banished to Holland, could to some degree appreciate the feelings of the Jews during their long exile. He had acquired sufficient knowledge of Jewish literature to consult the authorities in the execution of his work. The historical works of Abraham ibn Daud, Ibn Yachya, Ibn Verga, David Gans, and others were not neglected; they served Basnage as building material wherewith to rear the great fabric of Jewish history of the sixteen centuries since the origin of Christianity.