But as for the [distinct] political laws by which we are governed,
I have delivered them accurately in my books of Antiquities; and have only
mentioned them now, so far as was necessary to my present purpose, without
proposing to myself either to blame the laws of other nations, or to make
an encomium upon our own; but in order to convict those that have written
about us unjustly, and in an impudent affectation of disguising the truth.
And now I think I have sufficiently completed what I proposed in writing
these books. For whereas our accusers have pretended that our nation are
a people of very late original, I have demonstrated that they are exceeding
ancient; for I have produced as witnesses thereto many ancient writers,
who have made mention of us in their books, while they had said that no
such writer had so done. Moreover, they had said that we were sprung from
the Egyptians, while I have proved that we came from another country into
Egypt: while they had told lies of us, as if we were expelled thence on
account of diseases on our bodies, it has appeared, on the contrary, that
we returned to our country by our own choice, and with sound and strong
bodies. Those accusers reproached our legislator as a vile fellow; whereas
God in old time bare witness to his virtuous conduct; and since that testimony
of God, time itself hath been discovered to have borne witness to the same
thing.
