Q. How would the copying of each other's works, by the Evangelists, affect the question?

A. If they had done so, though it might diminish their character as testimonies strictly independent, it would diminish little their separate authority or mutual confirmation.

Q. Illustrate this by some examples.

A. If the most disadvantageous supposition be allowed; if Mark composed his history from Matthew and Luke, if these histories were not in fact by them, yet, if Mark, a contemporary and companion of the Apostles, made this compilation, it follows, that the history was then in great esteem and credit. If, again, the Gospel of Mark be called an epitome of Matthew, if a person in the situation of Mark made it, it is the strongest possible attestation to the character of the original.

Q. How are the parallelisms between Matthew and Luke explained?

A. By supposing either that Luke consulted Matthew's history, or, what is not incredible, that brief memoirs of it had been written at the time, which both admitted into their account.

Q. Is not either supposition consistent with the professed formation of Luke's narrative?

A. Certainly; he professes not to be an eye witness, but to have investigated the original of every account. Whatever supposition, therefore, be made concerning the other Gospels, if St. Luke's be genuine, we have in it credible evidence to the point.

Q. What is the nature of St. John's Gospel? A. It is allowed on all hands to be an independent testimony, strictly and properly so called.

Q. Should not the aggregate authority of the written evidences of Christianity be next considered?

A. Yes; and this our habitual mode of reading the Scriptures sometimes causes us to overlook. If we had been accustomed to read either of the Gospels alone, and found for the first time in any of the others, the same facts recorded, our minds would be strongly impressed by this fresh evidence.

Q. Would the existence of four separate histories confirm our belief?

A. When we observed the same facts to stand in all, we should conclude that those facts, at least, were fixed in credit and publicity.

Q. How should we be impressed by the subsequent discovery of a continuation of the history, and of a number of letters upon the business, and always assuming the original story?

A. The reality of the original story would in no small degree be established by the former, and in every one of the latter, we should find a still further support to our conclusion.

Q. Why is the weight of this successive confirmation in a great measure unperceived?

A. Because we have from our infancy regarded the New Testament as one book.

Q. What do the discrepancies in the volume prove?

A. If all other proof were wanting that originally, they were separate, and most of them independent productions.

Q. Is it probable, that in the harassed and une settled life of the Apostles, they would immediately write histories for the information of posterity?

A. Not while the transaction was recent, but emergencies might draw from somer of them occa sional letters to converts, upon the subject of their mission.

Q. From whence would they learn the expediency of sending forth authentic accounts of their master?

A. From the possible circulation of imperfect narratives, when the extension of the Christian society forbad the personal intercourse of the Apostles with its members.

Q. Would the appearance of authentic accounts from the Apostles, cause spurious accounts to fall into disuse.

A. Yes; those maintaining their reputation under the test of time, inquiry, and contradiction, might be expected to make their way into the hands of Christians of all countries.

Q. Do the records in our possession correspond with this, the natural progress of the business.?

A. Strictly; we have many letters of the kind described, and five histories written by persons. acquainted, from their situation, with the truth of their narrative; and these were treated with the; deference which such authorities might expect.

Q. How do you account for the loss of some ancient histories ?

A. Though the magnitude and novelty of the occasion would cause such to swarm, yet, when better accounts came forth, they died away; our histories superseded others.

Q. Is not the genuineness of the books of the New Testament an important point?

A. Undoubtedly, their evidence is strengthened by our knowledge of the authors, and we can produce firm grounds of persuasion, that they are by the persons whose names they bear.

Q. Is this point essential?

A. Not so essential as that the fate of the argument depends upon it.

Q. If we possessed no other accounts of these books, than that they were written by early Christians, and received as authentic histories of their religion by Christians whom the Apostles instructed, what would be our inference.

A. That this reception would be a valid proof that these books, whoever were their authors, must have accorded with what the Apostles taught.

Q. Is the fact of their early existence and reputation made out by any ancient testimonies?

A. Yes; by some which do not specify the names of the writers.

Q. How do some averments in the body of two of the Gospels bear upon the question?

A. They fix the time and situation of the writers;

viz., that one was written by an eye witness of Christ's sufferings, and the other by a cotemporary of the Apostles. St. John mentions himself, though not by name, as an eye witness, and Luke, in the Acts, declares himself to have been a cotemporary of all, and a companion of one of the original preachers.

CHAPTER IX.

Q. WHAT does this chapter treat of?
A. The authenticity of the Scriptures.

Q. What preliminary reflections are necessary for the close and particular discussion of the subject? A. Six, of the following nature.

Q. What is the first?

A. We can produce a great number of ancient manuscripts, all anterior to printing, some certainly seven or eight hundred years old, and some probably more than one thousand; also, ancient versions, both proving that the Scriptures were not of modern contrivance.

Q. What does the number and wide dispersion of those manuscripts argue.

A. As the number far exceeds those of any other book, it argues that the Scriptures anciently, were more read than other books, and that in many different countries.

Q. What is the force of Bentley's observation ?