When the subtle and ambitious John of Gischala, pursuing his own dark course, as it is traced in the “History of the Jews,” joined outwardly the party of Ananus, and was active beyond others in council and camp, he yet kept up a secret correspondence with the Zealots, to whom he betrayed all the movements of the assailants. “To conceal this secret he redoubled his assiduities, and became so extravagant in his protestations of fidelity to Ananus and his party, that he completely over-acted his part, and incurred suspicion.” His intended dupes began gradually, and none too soon, to look with a jealous eye on their too obsequious, most obedient, and most devoted servant. Describing the ten dreary years during which (A.D. 1198-1208), with but short intervals of truce, Germany was abandoned to all the horrors of civil war, Dean Milman observes that “the repeated protestations” of Pope Innocent III., that _he_ was not the cause of these fatal discords, betray the fact that he was accused of the guilt, and that he had to wrestle with his own conscience to acquit himself of the charge. Sir Thomas Overbury suggestively avers that “He that says oft that he is not in love, By repetition doth himself disprove.” Hawthorne remarks that Italian asseverations of any questionable fact, though uttered with rare earnestness of manner, never vouch for themselves as coming from any depth, like roots drawn out of the substance of the soul, with some of the soil clinging to them. Their energy expends itself in exclamation. The vaulting ambition of their hyperboles overleaps itself, and falls on the other side. Swift refers to oaths in the mouth of a gamester, as ever most used as their truth is most questioned. “’Tis not the many oaths that make the truth, But the plain single vow, that is vowed true,” says Shakspeare’s Diana of Florence. And though from Shakspeare to Wolcot is a descent indeed, Peter Pindar is for once quotable when he writes, “Truth needs not, John, the eloquence of oaths, Not more so than a decent suit of clothes Requires of broad gold lace the expensive glare, That makes the linsey-woolsey million stare; Besides, a proverb, suited to my wish, Declares that swearing never catches fish.” That scapegrace guardian of George Canning’s boyhood, Mr. Reddish, is said to have been significantly fond, on quite trivial occasions, of making affidavits,—“the refuge of base and vulgar minds,” Robert Bell calls them,—as if he, Reddish, felt that his word was not to be believed. Cowper is caustic in his application of St. Paul’s statement, that oaths terminate all strife, for “some men have surely then a peaceful life!” he infers, in lines that go on to tell how