From all these statements, and from the reference that Philo makes in the _Legatio ad Gaium_,[332] there is very little that we can gather with certainty. This much, however, seems established: an attempt was made to check the spread both of Judaism and of Isis-worship. In this attempt a certain number of Jews were expelled from the city or from Italy. Four thousand soldiers—actual or reputed Jews—were transferred to Sardinia for the same reason. There are certain difficulties, however, in the way of supposing that it really was a general expulsion of all Jews, as Josephus and Suetonius, but not Tacitus, say. Tacitus’ omission to state it, if such a general expulsion took place, is itself a difficulty; but like every _argumentum ex silentio_, it scarcely permits a valid inference. It seems strange, to be sure, that a severe and deserved punishment of the _taeterrima gens_, “that disgusting race,” should be represented to be something much milder than really was the case. But Tacitus is neither here nor in other places taking pains to cite the decree accurately, and the omission of even a significant detail may be laid to inadvertence. But what Tacitus does say cannot be lightly passed over. Four thousand men, _libertini generis_, “of the freedmen class,” were transferred to Sardinia for military service. All these four thousand were _ea superstitione infecti_, “tainted with this superstition.” Now, the Jews who formed the community at Rome in the time of Cicero may have been largely freedmen, but their descendants were not classed as _libertini generis_. The phrase is not used in Latin of those who were of servile origin, but solely of those who were themselves emancipated slaves. There is, however, scarcely a possibility that there could have been at Rome in 19 C.E. so large a body of Jewish freed slaves of military age. There had been no war in recent times from which these slaves could have been derived. We may assume therefore that most, if not all, of these men were freedmen of other nationalities who were converts to Judaism. This is confirmed by the words _ea superstitione infecti_, “tainted with this superstition.” These words are meaningless unless they refer to non-Jewish proselytes.[333] Men who were born Jews could not be so characterized. If Tacitus had meant those who were Jews by birth, it is scarcely conceivable that he would have used a phrase that would suggest just the opposite. The words, further, imply that many of these four thousand were rather suspected of Jewish leanings than definitely proselytes. Perhaps they were residents of the districts largely inhabited by Jews, notably the Transtiberine region.