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principal paffages, John i. 1, and Rom. ix. 5, and this very detrine, inftead of being fhaken by the collections of Mill and Wetlein, has been rendered more certain than ever. This is fo ftrongly felt by the modern reformers in Germany, that they begin to think lefs favourably of that fpecies of criticifin which they at firft fo highly recommended, in the hope of its leading to discoveries more fuitable to their maxims, than the antient fyftem!

The molt important readings, which make an alteration in the sense, relate in general to fubjects that have no connexion with articles of faith, of which the Cambridge manufeript, that differs more than any other from the common text, affords fufficient proof. By far the greatest number relate to trifles, and make no alteration in the fenfe, fuch as xay for και εγώ, έλαττων for ελασσών, Κύριος fur Θεος, which in tuoft cafes may be ufed inditferently." (Pp. 266, 267.)

"The various readings in our manufcripts of the New Teftament have been occafioned by one of the five following caufes, 1. The omillion, addition, or exchange of letters, fyllables, or words, from the mere carelellness of transcribers. 2. Mittakes of the tranfcribers in regard to the true text of the original. 3. Errors or imperfections in the antient manufcript, from which the tranfcriber copied. 4. Critical conjecture, or intended improvements of the original text. 5. Wilful corruptions to ferve the purpoles of a party, whether orthodox or heterodox."

The author fhews that very few paffages indeed have been wilfully corrupted even by Marcion and his followers, who, of all the fects of antiquity, feem to have been moft guilty of this fraud. It was the practice of thefe, and other heretics, to reject in toto fuch parts of the New Teftament as did not harmonize with their preconceived opinions, rather than alter them; which, to any great extent, would indeed have been impoffible. The various fects into which the Chrif tian Church was, at an early period, divided, hated each other too cordially, and kept too vigilant a watch over each other's conduct to permit any great or glaring corruption of what all profeffed to confider as the fountain of truth; and fuch alterations as seem to have been wilfully made, were probably at first marginal notes explanatory of the paflages oppofite to them; which, through the ignorance or careJeffness of tranfcribers, were gradually transferred into the facred text. The author gives fome admirable directions for collating manufcripts, as well as fome very cautious rules for deciding on the various readings; and the whole "chapter has been written, as the learned tranfJator obferves, with the coolness and impartiality," to which we may add accuracy," of a truly learned critic," regardless of every intereft, but the interefts of truth.

Much the fame character may be given of the next chapter. It is replete with learning; but the fubjects of difcuffion are little interefting to the generality of readers, even of readers whofe labours are devoted to the fervice of the church. In thirty eight fections the author gives a critical view of the most celebrated antient verfions of the New Teftament, viz. The Syriac, Coptic, Arabic, Ethiopic, Armenian, Perfian, Latin, Gothic, Ruffian or Slavonian, and Anglo-Saxon. Of thefe verfions he fays that,

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"In cafes where the fenfe is not affected by different readings, or the translator might have taken them for fynonimous, the evidence of the Greek manufcripts is to be preferred to that of an antient verfion. The fame preference is due to the manuscripts, wherever the tranflator has omitted words that appeared of little importance, or a paffage in the Greek original iş attended with a difficulty, which the tranflator was unable to folve, and therefore either omitted or altered, according to the arbitrary dictates of his own judgment. On the other hand, there are cafes in which the antient vertions are of more authority than the original itfelf. The greatest part of those, which will be examined in this chapter, furpaffes in antiquity the oldest Greek manufcripts that are now extant; and they lead to a difcovery of the readings in the very antient manufcript that was used by the translator. By their means, rather than from the aid of our Greek manu!cripts, none of which is prior to the fixth century, we arrive at the certain knowledge that the facred writings have been tranfmitted from the earliest to the present age without material alteration; and that our present text, if we except the pallages that are rendered doubtful by an oppofition in the readings, is the fame which proceeded from the hands of the apofiles. Whenever the reading can be preci ely determined, which the translator found in his Greek manuscript, the verfion is of equal authority with a manufcript of that period; but as it is fometimes difficult to acquire this abfolute certainty, great caution is necellary in collecting readings from the andient verfions." (Vol. II. p. 2.)

Few of our readers perhaps will ever employ themselves in making fuch collections; but many of them may be called upon by duty to compare the collections made by authors with the common printed text. We beg leave, therefore, to caution them against receiving with implicit credit all the various readings which may be offered to them even by collaters of established reputation; for we have here feveral instances of different accounts of the very fame paffage of the very same manuscript, given by men defervedly eminent in the repub lic of letters. Thus, Affeman, in his catalogue of the Medicean library, published at Florence in 1752, afferts that the ftory of the adultere's, John viii. is contained in the Codex Florentinus of the Philoxenian Syriac verfion, while Adler, who carefully examined that manufcript, afferts the direct contrary. "Deeft certe, fays he, et in noftro, et omnibus quæ vidt utriufque verfionis Syriaca exemplis."+ Speaking of this paffage, Storr, according to our author, obferves that, as it ftands in the Paris manufcript, it differs from the text of Ufher's manufcript, from which it was taken for the London Polyglot. (P. 71.) But Mr. Marth, after affuring us that Archbishop Ufher's manufcript has never been heard of fince the publication of the London Polyglot, fays, "I have collated the Syriae text, John viii, 1-11, as printed in the London Polyglot from Archbishop Ufher's manufcript, with

This is probably a mistake.-REV.

See Mr. Marth's 31ft note on Sect, xi. of this chapter.

Note 41, Sect. ii. of this chapter.

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the text of the Paris manufcript of the Philoxenian verfion, printed in Adler's Verfionis Syriacæ, p. 57, and found that the fix first verses agree, word for word, and letter for letter, and that in the following verfes are only four trifling differences in fingle words." Storr indeed fays, that the difference between the Paris manufcript and Ufher's, with respect to this paffage, is only trifling; so that the inaccuracy of the report must here be laid principally to the charge of our author; but when fuch men as he are fo very inaccurate, and when Affeman and Adler, with other collators of manufcripts, directly contradict each other, it is furely prudent to receive with fome hesitation the various readings with which they prefent us.

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Still we are decidedly of opinion that the Greek text of the New Teftament may often be corrected from antient verfions, more efpecially from the Syriac; the Sahidic, of which there are two copies in the British Museum; the Armenian; and the Latin. Among these our author gives the preference to the old Syriac, called Pefbito; though, from his own view of both verfions, we should greatly prefer the Latin. Both are certainly of very high antiquity, not lower, as it appears to us, than the fecond century; and where they differ from other verfions, they generally agree with each other, as well as with the most approved Greek manufcripts. Of the various Latin verfions, of which there was certainly one in the days of Tertullian, we have here an inftructive account. They had become numerous before the age of St. Auguftine, who greatly prefers one of them to the reft; but that version, which has been called the Itala, or old Italic, if it ftill exift, cannot now be diftinguished from the others. We think, indeed, with our author, that it, could not be the verfion which was used in Italy that the bifhop of Hippo preferred; for it is not probable that he was acquainted with an Italian verfion; and the word Itala, which gave rife to the fuppofition, is here fhewn, by very plaufible criticifm, to be an error of the transcribers. The ftyle of all the antient verfions, which is ftill vifible in the Vulgate, is certainly far removed from claffic elegance;

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But, lays our author, the Latin of these verfions is not therefore to be treated with contempt, for though no fcholar would attempt to imitate their ftyle, he may learn by their means the language in a greater extent. For it is certain that no man can know more than the half of a language, nor have an adequate notion of its etymology, who is acquainted only with the fmall portion that is preferved in elegantly written books. Thofe phrafes of common life, which are ufed by men of liberal education at fartheft in epiftolary correfpondence, and even the expreffions of the illiterate, are not unworthy the notice of philology." (P. 115.)

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We have quoted this paffage in fupport of the censure which we have paffed on the author's prefumption in pronouncing barbarous or Cilicifms, certain words or phrafes in the New Teftament, only because he never found them in a Greek claffic. For the reft; his account of these antient Latin verfions; of the collection of them by

Jerom; and of the prefent Vulgate, is equally learned and juft. "The

"The Church of Rome, and the Proteftant Church, confider this Vulgate in a very different light. By fome it is extolled too highly, by others unjustly depreciated, who speak with contempt of an antient and excellent verfion, upon the emendations and editions of which fo great care and pains have been beflowed. Few have preferved a proper medium. The Church of Rome is obliged to treat this verfion with the utmoft veneration, fince the council of Trent, in the fixth feffion, declared the fame to be authentic, and to be ufed whenever the Bible is publicly read, and in all difputations, fermons, and expofitions. Herce feveral bigotted divines of that Church, conclude that the Vulgate is abfolutely free from error, and that no one is at liberty to vary from it in a tranflation or expofition. But the moft fenfible part is of a different opinion, and interpret the words in a moderate fenfe. According to their explanation, authentic fignifies not infallible, but legal*; and the council has not declared this verfion to be authentic in all cafes, but only in public readings, difputations, fermons, and exhortations; that is, no other verfion fhall be read in the Church. The words being thus explained, the council of Trent did no more than every church has a right to do, with respect to a tranflation that contains no errors of faith; and the Church of Rome is the more to be juftified, as it has given the preference to a verfion of the highest antiquity." (P. 128.)

The eighth chapter is employed on the manufcripts of the Greek Teftament, which were written before the invention of printing. These are undoubtedly of very great importance; for though our common text may be, and probably is, more correct on the whole than any one manuscript now exifting, yet, as our author obferves, no printed edition can be held as authority to decide on the genuineness of a controverted text. Some over-zealous proteftants, by endeavouring to convict the Church of Rome of altering the Greek manufcripts in order to bring them to a closer agreement with the Vulgate, have done what they can to deprive even the manufcripts themselves of this authority, and of courfe to undermine the foundations of the doctrine of Chrift; but it is here completely proved that this charge against that Church is a groundless calumny. Some fuch alterations may have been introduced into modern manufcripts by thofe Greeks who took refuge in Italy from the fury of the Turks, and who, with the fycophantifh fpirit of their degenerate nation, wifhed to gain the favour of the court of Rome; but there is not even the fhadow of evidence that any defign was entered into at the council of Florence to corrupt the antient manufcripts. Thofe manuscripts were indeed so dispersed, and many of them, at that period, fo utterly unknown, that no fuch defign could have been effectually carried into execution.

Of antient manufcripts there appears to our author to have exifted four principal editions.

"Ift. The Western edition, or that formerly used in countries where the Latin language was spoken, for our modern manuscripts have been

This was unquestionably the meaning of the council.-Rev.

chiefly

chiefly brought from Greece. With this edition coincide the Latin version, which was made from it, more efpecially as it flood before the time of Jerom, and the quotations of the Latin fathers, not excepting those who lived in Africa, though Jerom, in his correction of the Vulgate, made frequent ule of manufcripts that were written in Greece.

"2d. The Alexandrine or Egyptian edition. With this, as might be naturally expected, coincide the quotations from Origen, which Griesbach has collated with very particular care, as alfo the Coptic vertion.

"3d. The Edetiene edition, which comprehends thofe manufcripts from which the old Syriac vertion was made. Of this edition we have at prefent no manufcripts, a circumftance by no means extraordinary, when we recollect that the Syriac literati had an early prejudice for whatever was Grecian, and that the Eaft, during many ages, that clapied after the fifth century, was the feat of war and devastation. But by fome accident, which is difficult to be explained, we find manufcripts in the Weft of Europe, accompanied even with a Latin tranflation, fuch as the Codex Beze, which to eininently coincide with the Syriac verfion, that their relationship is not to be denied. All these three editions, though they fometimes differ in their readings, harmonize very frequently with each other. This is to be a cribed in a great meature to their high antiquity, for our oldest manufcripts belong to one [or other] of thefe editions, and the tranflations themlelves are very antient. A reading, confirmed by the evidence of all these three editions, is fupported by the very highest authority, but it must not be confidered as infallible, fiuce the true reading may be fometimes found only in the fourth.

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4th. The Byzantine edition, or that in general ufe at Conftantinople, after this city was become the capital and metropolitan See of the eastern empire. With this edition those of the neighbouring provinces were clofely allied. To it are likewife to be referred the quotations of Chryfoftom, and Theophylact, bishop of Bulgaria, with the Slavonian, or Ruthian verlion." (Pp. 175, 176, 177.)

Of these four editions, our author and his learned tranflator have described no fewer than 469 manufcripts, which have been wholly or partially collated; and of these manufcripts the Codex Alexandrinus, The Codex Vaticanus, and the Codex Bezz or Cantabrigienfis have atacted most of their attention, To this these codices are indeed well entitled; for they are certainly the moft antient manufcripts which are now known to exift; and two of them comprehend, each, the whole Bible. Both Michaelis and Mr. Marth confider the Codex Alexandrinus as the leaft antient of the three; but we are far from being converted to their opinion. Whether it be more or less valuable than the Codex Vaticanus, as we have not collated them, we have no right to fay; but taking for granted the facts hère ftated, or data on which critics form their judgment of the antiquity of manufcripts, we should conclude the Alexandrinus to be of at least equal antiquity with the Codex Beze, which both critics admit to be more antient than the Codex Vaticanus. If the extracts which Mr. Marth gives in page 898, from an infcription on a monument erected in the time of the Peloponnefian war, and in page 899, from the antient farcophagus preferved at Florence, be fac-fimilies, we must conclude the

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