18. And now, since that it is evident that it is forbidden the _Iewes_ to eat any manner of bloud, and that to kill a man is directly prohibited by our law, and the reasons before given are consentaneous and agreeable to every ones understanding, I know it will be inquired by many, but especially by those who are more pious, and the friends of truth, how this calumnie did arise, and from whence it derived its first originall. I may answer, that this wickednesse is laid to their charge for divers reasons. First, _Ruffinus_ the familiar friend of S. _Hierome_ in his version of _Iosephus_ his second book that he writ against _Apion_ the Grammarian (for the Greek text is there wanting) tells us how _Apion_ invented this slander to gratifie _Antiochus_, to excuse his sacriledge, and justifie his perfidious dealing with the _Iewes_, making their estates supply his wants. _Propheta vero aliorum est Apion_ &c. _Apion_ is become a Prophet, and said that _Antiochus_ found in the temple, a bed, with a man lying upon it, and a table set before him, furnished with all dainties both of sea and land, and fowles, and that this man was astonished at them, and presently adores the entrance of the King, as coming to succour and relieve him, and prostrating himself at his knees, & stretching out his right hand, he implores liberty; whereat the King commanding him to sit down and declare who he was, why he dwelt there, and what was the cause of this his plentifull provision? the man with sighs and tears, lamentably weeps out his necessity: and tells him that he is a _Grecian_, and whilst he travelled about the province to get food, he was suddenly apprehended, and caught up by some strange men, and brought to the temple, and there shut up, that he might be seen by no man, but be there fatted with all manner of dainties, and that these unexpected benefits wrought in him at the first joy, then suspicion, after that astonishment, and last of all, advising with the Minister that came unto him, he understood that the _Iewes_ every year, at a certain time appointed according to their secret and _ineffable_ law, take up some Greek stranger, and after he hath been fed delicately for the space of a whole year, they bring him into a certain wood, and kill him. Then according to their solem rites and ceremonies, they sacrifice his body, and every one tasting of his intrails, in the offering up of this Greek, they enter into a solemn oath, that they will bear an immortall feude and hatred to the Greeks. And then they cast the reliques of this perishing man into a certain pit. After this _Apion_ makes him to say, that onely some few dayes remained to him, before his execution, & to desire the King that he, fearing and worshipping the Grecian gods, would revenge the bloud of his subjects upon the _Iewes_, and deliver him from his approaching death. This fable (saith _Iosephus_) as it is most full of all tragedy, so it abounds with cruell