These essays may at first give the impression of being no more than hatchet jobs in which Thomas Carlyle, Benedetto Croce, T.S. Eliot, Martin Heidegger, Immanuel Kant, Bishop John A.T. Robinson, John Ruskin, Gilbert Ryle, A.N. WHitehead and others are taken to task for various linguistic imbecilities. In fact the author's purpose lies not so much in putting down the mighty from their seats as in dissecting some common types of worthless writing. The lessons he draws - founded on the theory of human thought and behaviour he propounded in his two earlier (posthumously published) books - have wider applications.

Did Jesus actually exist as a historical personage roughly corresponding to the various stories given in the four New Testament gospels? Was he really born In Bethlehem and crucified by Pilate? These questions are usually answered with an unqualified 'yes', and often with an expression of outrage or ridicule that any such doubts could even be voiced. Yet it is considered quite normal to question the historical existence of other legendary figures, such as King Arthur or William Tell, who, like Jesus, are not attested to by any surviving contemporary records. In The Jesus Legend, G. A. Wells explains how the story of Jesus developed through telling and re-telling, from an early version in the letters of Paul (who does not mention Jesus in connection with any specific time or place) to the more elaborate and detailed pictures later presented in the New Testament gospels. Professor Wells also replies to recent criticisms of his own radical theory of the origin of Christianity.