The writers were frauds—this was long ago the hypothesis of the superficial Hamburg Professor, _Samuel Reimarus_, whose “Fragments” were published by _Lessing_. But even to a _D. F. Strauss_ “such a suspicion was repulsive.” The Heidelberg Professor, _H. E. Paulus_, sought his salvation in trying to reduce the reports of miracles to a natural sense, by doing painful violence to the text: for instance, the Lord did not walk _upon_ the sea, but only _along_ the sea; the miracle of the wine at Cana was only a wedding joke. Then came _D. F. Strauss_ (died 1874), and he tried it in a different way. “If the Gospels are really historical documents, then the miracle cannot be removed from the life of Jesus.” Hence, it is to remain? Indeed not! The Gospels must not be accepted as historical sources. They are products of purposeless poetic legends, the miracles are garlands of religious myths, gradually twined around the picture of Jesus. Myths, however, need time for their formation, hence _Strauss_ fixes the date of the Gospels within the second century. He openly admits that his hypothesis would fall to the ground if but a single Gospel has been written in the first century. As a fact, more recent rationalistic criticism has found itself constrained to drop this hypothesis. _F. Ch. Baur_ (died 1860) fell back upon the fraud-hypothesis of a _Reimarus_. It, too, has been laid among the dead. Thus they have exhausted themselves in the attempt to shake off the burdensome yoke of truth. Influenced by _Strauss_, _Baur_, and other German critics, _E. Renan_ (died 1892) wrote his “Life of Jesus,” a frivolous romance. Quite frank are the words he wrote down in the preface to the thirteenth edition of his “Vie de Jésus” (1883): “If miracle has any reality, then my book is nothing but a tissue of errors.... If the miracle and the inspiration of certain books are real things, then our method is abominable.” But he silences all doubts by the phrase: “To admit the supernatural is alone sufficient to place one’s self outside of science.” The newer “historical-critical” school, while having disposed of many contentions of the old schools, is nevertheless in its research bound just as energetically by the postulate of conformity to natural laws. The fourth Gospel is pushed aside: in the others all miraculous occurrences are expounded away, till the “historically credible core” is reached. The books of the Old Testament fare even worse, if possible.