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WE have related the affairs of queen Alexandra, and her death, in
the foregoing book and will now speak of what followed, and was connected
with those histories; declaring, before we proceed, that we have nothing
so much at heart as this, that we may omit no facts, either through ignorance
or laziness; 1
for we are upon the history and explication of such things as the greatest
part are unacquainted withal, because of their distance from our times;
and we aim to do it with a proper beauty of style, so far as that is derived
from proper words harmonically disposed, and from such ornaments of speech
also as may contribute to the pleasure of our readers, that they may entertain
the knowledge of what we write with some agreeable satisfaction and pleasure.
But the principal scope that authors ought to aim at above all the rest,
is to speak accurately, and to speak truly, for the satisfaction of those
that are otherwise unacquainted with such transactions, and obliged to
believe what these writers inform them of.
1 Reland takes notice here, very justly, how Josephus's declaration, that it was his great concern not only to write "an agreeable, an accurate," and "a true" history, but also distinctly not to omit any thing [of consequence], either through "ignorance or laziness," implies that he could not, consistently with that resolution, omit the mention of [so famous a person as] "Jesus Christ."
Flavius Josephus. The Works of Flavius Josephus. Translated by. William Whiston, A.M. Auburn and Buffalo. John E. Beardsley. 1895.
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