number of various readings, in which they differ from a majority of the most ancient authorities. But to this the answer is, that there is no difficulty in accounting for the phenomenon, without the supposition of a Byzantine recension, in the sense in which that term has been used. In every distinct region, where many copies of the Greek Testament were written, a prevalent text was likely to be formed, unlike in some slight shades to that prevalent elsewhere. In different places, the operation of different causes and accidents would produce dissimilar variations from the pure text. In the fourth or fifth century, the prevalent text at Constantinople was probably distinguishable from the prevalent text at Alexandria. In the tenth and eleventh centuries, without supposing the operation of any extraordinary causes, a text must have prevailed in the former city in some degree peculiar. But extraordinary causes were at that time, and had been long before, in operation, to form and to perpetuate a Byzantine text capable of being discriminated from any other. These causes are to be found in the circumstances of the Christian world.

Before the tenth century the Greek empire had been gradually sinking toward that state in which it was at last reduced, to use the words of Gibbon, "to a narrow corner of Europe, to the lonely suburbs of Constantinople;" though during that century it expanded itself again for a moment. The followers of Mahomet had twice besieged its metropolis. Beyond its limits the knowledge of the Greek language was rapidly disappearing; all Grecian literature, such as it was, flying from the Saracens and Northern barbarians, was taking refuge in Constantinople or its neighbourhood; and but few Greek manuscripts were written except within the walls of that city, or in the monasteries of Mount Athos, or others subject to the jurisdiction of its patriarch. A large majority of the manuscripts of the New Testament to be referred to the eleventh and twelfth centuries, concerning which we may ascertain where they were transcribed, either by a note in the manuscript itself, or other probable evidence, were copied at Mount Athos or Constantinople. Two of them were transcribed by patriarchs of the Greek church, both in the eleventh century, one by Sergius II., and the other by Michael Cerularius,* the two patriarchs who renewed and consummated the schism which separated the Greek church from the Roman.

* See the Catalogue of MSS. of the N. T. in Scholz's Prolegomena to his N. T., numbers 39 and 437.

At Mount Athos and at Constantinople transcribers, in the near neighbourhood of each other, may be supposed often to have used, in common, exemplars having the same text, or to have compared their respective texts together, and adjusted the one to the other. They were principally ecclesiastics, and, it is reasonable to suppose, wrote under ecclesiastical supervision; especially when we find two patriarchs so interested in the work as to take a share of the labor. There had likewise been a sort of revival of Greek literature at Constantinople; and the eleventh and twelfth centuries were distinguished for verbal critics, scholiasts, and commentators. The spirit of the age was likely to cause attention to be given to the minutiae of various readings in the New Testament, and would lead, therefore, to the forming and preserving of a uniform text. But the manuscripts written in the Greek Patriarchy during the two centuries mentioned, and the copies which have been made from them, constitute a large majority of modern manuscripts. We are, therefore, without supposing any Byzantine recension, properly so called, able to account for the peculiarities of their text, and their great resemblance to each other, characteristics, it is to be observed, which belong only to a majority of modern manuscripts, and are far from being common to all. I may add, that, in accounting for the peculiarities of the more modern text, it is obvious that we account, at the same time, for those of the more ancient, since the latter are correlative to the former, consisting of passages in which the two texts vary from each other.

From what has been said, I think it evident, that the appearances in our authorities for settling the text of the New Testament afford no countenance to the theory of recensions, maintained by Griesbach and other critics; that there is no ground for a distinction between an Alexandrine and a Western text, of which Griesbach represents the difference as so great, and that the peculiarities of the Byzantine text may be explained without recourse to the supposition of a recension. The hypothesis is equally destitute of historical evidence; yet it is incredible that we should not have found in ancient authors frequent mention of those supposed recensions, if they had actually been made. So far from this, however, their existence is inconsistent with the few notices respecting the history of the text of the New Testament contained in the writers of the first four centuries. The Alexandrine recension is supposed by Griesbach to have been formed before the time

of Origen, and to have been followed by the Alexandrine transcribers, and quoted by the Alexandrine fathers. But, of the manuscripts of the New Testament, Origen says, in a passage already adduced for a different purpose:*" It is evident that there exists much difference among copies; partly from the carelessness of some transcribers; partly from the rashness of others in altering improperly what they find written; and partly from those revisers who add or strike out according to their own judgment." This passage seems to afford sufficient proof, that there was in his time no standard corrected text at Alexandria, no late Alexandrine recension, which transcribers and correctors of manuscripts felt themselves bound to follow. Again, the Byzantine recension is supposed to have become prevalent a little before the time of Chrysostom. Yet, according to a passage quoted from him by Scholz, the most ancient copies were so eagerly sought after, and the sellers of manuscripts were so little disposed to have it thought that their copies were conformed to any new recension, that the fraud was practised of burying manuscripts, lately written, in a heap of grain, in order so to discolor them as to give them an appearance of antiquity. The same preference which we now have for the most ancient manuscripts, as approaching nearer the time of the autographs of the New Testament, and therefore being in general less likely to have suffered from the accidents of transcription, existed, as we might suppose, at an early period. Jerome, in the Preface to his Latin translation of the Gospels, says that he had corrected the errors before existing in the Latin copies by comparing together Greek manuscripts, that is, he proceeds to say, ancient manuscripts. Not a passage has been produced from any Christian writer of antiquity which speaks of a standard corrected text as of authority; nothing answering to the abundant mention in modern writers of the corrected texts of Griesbach, Koppe, and others; nor is there a notice of any collection and comparison of the various readings of the New Testament, or of any book of the New Testament.

We may conclude, then, that all our present authorities for settling the text of the New Testament are to be referred to the original text as their nearer or more remote standard, without the intervention of such recensions as have been supposed. This conclusion is important in regard to the history and criticism of the text of the New Testament,

* See before, pp. 44, 45.

and especially as strengthening our confidence, which the theory of Griesbach is adapted to weaken, in the genuineness and authority of such a corrected text as we have at the present day ample means of forming.

This confidence is still more likely to be weakened by the extravagant language of Griesbach, and other modern critics, respecting the differences among their imaginary recensions, or, what amounts to the same thing, among our authorities for settling the text of the New Testament. How extravagant this language is, has already appeared; but its want of any proper foundation may be made still more apparent. I propose, therefore, to add a few remarks on the character and importance of the various readings of the New Testament.

SECTION III.

On the Character and Importance of the Various Readings of the New Testament.

When attention was first strongly directed to the number of various readings upon the Received Text of the New Testament, and the critical edition of Mill was published, which was said to contain thirty thousand, * two classes of individuals were very differently affected. Some sincerely religious men, among whom was Whitby, who wrote expressly against the labors of Mill, were apprehensive that the whole text of the New Testament, the foundation of our faith, would be unsettled; while the infidels of the age, among whom Collins was prominent, were ready, with other feelings, to adopt the same opinion. The whole number of various readings of the text of the New Testament that have hitherto been noted exceeds a hundred thousand, and may, perhaps, amount to a hundred and fifty thousand.

But this number is, I presume, less in proportion, than that of the various readings extant upon most classic authors, when compared with the quantity of text examined, and the number of manuscripts and

* That is to say, thirty thousand variations from the Received Text. But when the Received Text varies from other authorities, its readings should also be considered as various readings of the text of the New Testament. Including these, therefore, Mill's edition presents about sixty thousand various readings.

other authorities collated in each particular case. * How such an amount of various readings exists upon the text of ancient works, we may understand, when we consider, what every one who has had experience on the subject is aware of, that no written copy of an exemplar

* Bentley, in his "Remarks on Free Thinking," in answer to Collins, says :"Terence is now in one of the best conditions of any of the classic writers; the oldest and best copy of him is now in the Vatican library, which comes nearest to the poet's own hand; but even that has hundreds of errors, most of which may be mended out of other exemplars, that are otherwise more recent and of inferior value. I myself have collated several, and do affirm that I have seen twenty thousand various lections in that little author, not near so big as the whole New Testament; and am morally sure, that if half the number of manuscripts were collated for Terence with that niceness and minuteness which has been used in twice as many for the New Testament, the number of the variations would amount to above fifty thousand.

"In the manuscripts of the New Testament, the variations have been noted with a religious, not to say superstitious, exactness. Every difference in spelling, in the smallest particle or article of speech, in the very order or collocation of words, without real change, has been studiously registered. Nor has the text only been ransacked, but all the ancient versions, the Latin vulgate, Italic, Syriac, Æthiopic, Arabic, Coptic, Armenian, Gothic, and Saxon; nor these only, but all the dispersed citations of the Greek and Latin fathers in a course of five hundred years. What wonder, then, if, with all this scrupulous search in every hole and corner, the varieties rise to thirty thousand? when, in all ancient books of the same bulk, whereof the manuscripts are numerous, the variations are as many or more, and yet no versions to swell the reckoning.

"The editors of profane authors do not use to trouble their readers, or risk their own reputation, by an useless list of every small slip committed by a lazy or ignorant scribe. What is thought commendable in an edition of Scripture, and has the name of fairness and fidelity, would in them be deemed impertinence and trifling. Hence the reader not versed in ancient manuscripts is deceived into an opinion, that there were no more variations in the copies, than what the editor has communicated. Whereas, if the like scrupulousness was observed in registering the smallest changes in profane authors, as is allowed, nay required, in sacred, the now formidable number of thirty thousand would appear a very trifle.

"It is manifest that books in verse are not near so obnoxious to variations as those in prose; the transcriber, if he is not wholly ignorant and stupid, being guided by the measures, and hindered from such alterations as do not fall in with the laws of numbers. And yet even in poets the variations are so very many as can hardly be conceived without use and experience. In the late edition of Tibullus by the learned Mr. Broukhuise, you have a register of various lections in the close of that book; where you may see at the first view that they are as many as the lines. The same is visible in Plautus set out by Pareus. I myself, during my travels, have had the opportunity to examine several manuscripts of the poet