Essays on the work entitled "Supernatural Religion" Part 7

Even in the commoner modes of designating our Lord, a difference is perceptible. Thus the favourite mode of expression with Ignatius is 'Jesus Christ' simply, which occurs nearly a hundred times; whereas in Polycarp it is only found twice (one pa.s.sage being a quotation). On the other hand, the usual expression in Polycarp is 'Our Lord Jesus Christ,'

which apparently occurs only twice in the Ignatian Epistles, and in both instances with various readings. Again the combination 'G.o.d and Christ,'

occurring three times in Polycarp, does not appear once in the Ignatian letters [108:2].

3. The divergence of the two writers as regards Scriptural quotations is still more remarkable. Though the seven Ignatian letters are together at least five times as long as the Epistle of Polycarp, the quotations from the Apostolic Epistles in the latter are many times more numerous, as well as more precise, than in the former. Whole pa.s.sages in Polycarp are made up of such quotations strung together, while in Ignatius they are very rare, being for the most part epigrammatic adaptations and isolated coincidences of language or thought. Nor indeed is their range coextensive. Thus the Epistle of Polycarp, as I pointed out in a former article [109:1], is pervaded with the language of St Peter's First Epistle, but in the Ignatian letters there is no trace of its use [109:2].

4. But this divergence only forms part of a still broader and more decisive contrast. The profuseness of quotation in Polycarp's Epistle arises from a want of originality. The writer reproduces the thoughts and words of others, because his mind is essentially receptive and not creative. He is altogether wanting in independence of thought. On the other hand, the Ignatian letters are remarkable for their individuality.

Of all early Christian writings they are pre-eminent in this respect.

They are full of idiomatic expressions, quaint images, unexpected turns of thought and language. They exhibit their characteristic ideas, which obviously have a high value for the writer, for he recurs to them again and again, but which the reader often finds it extremely difficult to grasp, owing to their singularity. I venture to think that any one who will carefully consider these contrasts--more especially the last, as extending over the whole field--must be struck with the impossibility of the theory which makes this letter part of the a.s.sumed Ignatian forgeries. This hypothesis requires us to believe that a very uncritical age produced a literary fiction, which, for subtlety and naturalness of execution, leaves the most skilful forgeries of the nineteenth century far behind.

And the hypothesis of interpolation is enc.u.mbered with difficulties of the same kind, and hardly less considerable. This hypothesis was shaped and developed by Ritschl [110:1], whose theory has been accepted by some later writers. He supposes that the greater part of the Epistle is the genuine production of the person whose name it bears, written however, not immediately after the death of Ignatius, but in the later years of Polycarp's long life. The three pa.s.sages which relate to Ignatius, together with other parts which he defines, he supposes to have been interpolated by the same forger who amplified the three genuine letters of the martyr of Antioch into the seven of the Vossian collection. But if any one will take the pa.s.sages which Ritschl has struck out as interpolated, he will find that the general style is the same; that individual expressions, more especially theological expressions, are the same; that the quotations are from the same range of books, as in the other parts, extending even to coincidences of expression with the Epistle of Clement of Rome; and that altogether there is nothing to separate one part from another, except the _a priori_ a.s.sumption that the references to Ignatius must be unhistorical. I do not know whether these facts have been pointed out before, and I cannot do more here than hint at lines of investigation which any one may follow up for himself.

But when the phenomena are fully recognized, I venture to think that the difficulties in Ritschl's theory will be felt to be many times greater than those which it is framed to remove.

Of the general character of the Epistle, as affecting the question of its genuineness, the author of _Supernatural Religion_ has said nothing.

But he has reproduced special objections which have been urged by previous writers; and to these I wish to call attention, because they are very good, and not unfavourable, ill.u.s.trations of the style of criticism which is in vogue with the negative school.

1. Our author writes in the first place:--

We have just seen that the martyr-journey of Ignatius to Rome is, for cogent reasons, declared to be wholly fabulous, and the epistles purporting to be written during that journey must be held to be spurious. The Epistle of Polycarp, however, not only refers to the martyr-journey (c. ix), but to the Ignatian Epistles which are inauthentic (c. xiii), and the manifest inference is that it also is spurious.

Of the fabulous character of the martyr-journey I have already disposed in my previous article on the Ignatian letters [111:1]. For the present I reserve what I have to say concerning the a.s.sumed reference to the 'inauthentic' Epistles, as this objection will reappear again.

2. Our author on a later page urges that--

In the Epistle itself, there are many anachronisms. In ch. ix the 'blessed Ignatius' is referred to as already a considerable time dead, and he is held up with Zosimus and Rufus, and also with Paul and the rest of the Apostles, as examples of patience: men who have not run in vain, but are with the Lord; but in ch. xiii he is spoken of as living, and information is requested regarding him, 'and those who are with him.'

To this objection I had already supplied the answer [111:2] which has been given many times before, and which, as it seemed to me, the author ought in fairness to have noticed. I had pointed out that we have only the Latin version here, and that the present tense is obviously due to the translator. The original would naturally be [Greek: ton sun auto], which the translator, being obliged to supply a substantive verb, has carelessly rendered 'his qui c.u.m eo _sunt_.' If any one will consider what has been just said about the general character of the Epistle, he will see that this is the only reasonable explanation of the fact, whether we regard the work as genuine or not. If it is not genuine, the forger has executed his task with consummate skill and appreciation; and yet here he is charged with a piece of bungling which a schoolboy would have avoided. It is not merely an anachronism, but a self-contradiction of the most patent kind. The writer, on this hypothesis, has not made up his mind whether Ignatius is or is not supposed to be dead at the time, and he represents the fact differently in two different parts [112:1].

But our author apparently is quite unaware that [Greek: hoi sun auto]

might mean equally well, 'those who _were_ with him,' and those who _are_ with him.' At least I cannot attach any other meaning to his reply, in which he retorts upon me my own words used elsewhere, and speaks of my argument as being wrecked upon this rock of grammar.'

[112:2] If so, I can only refer him to Thucydides or any Greek historian, where he will find scores of similar instances. I need hardly say that the expression itself is quite neutral as regards time, meaning nothing more than 'his companions,' and that the tense must be supplied according to the context or the known circ.u.mstances of the case. But I am not sorry that our author has fallen into this error, for it has led me to investigate the usage of Polycarp and his translator, and has thus elicited the following facts:--(1) Unless he departed from his ordinary usage, Polycarp would have employed the short expression [Greek: hoi sun auto] or [Greek: hoi met' autou] in such a case. Thus he has [Greek: ou sun auto] in the opening paragraph, and [Greek: tois ex humon] in c. 9, with other similar distances. (2) The translator, if he had the words [Greek: tois sun auto] before him, would almost certainly supply the substantive verb, as he has done in the opening, 'qui c.u.m eo _sunt_ presbyteri;' in c. 3, 'illis qui tunc _erant_ hominibus,' and 'quae _est_ in Deo;' in c. 9, 'qui ex vobis _sunt_;' and probably also in c.

12, 'qui _sunt_ sub coelo' (the Greek is wanting in this last pa.s.sage).

(3) The translator, in supplying the verb, was as likely as not to give the wrong tense. In fact, in the only other pa.s.sage in the Epistle where it was possible to make a mistake, he has gone wrong on this very point; he has translated [Greek: hen kai eidete ... en allois tois ex humon]

mechanically by a present tense, 'quam et vidistis ... in aliis qui ex vobis _sunt_,' though the persons are mentioned in connection with St Ignatius and St Paul, and though it is distinctly stated immediately afterwards that they _all_ were dead, having, as we may infer from the context, ended their life by martyrdom. In fact, he has made the very same blunder which I ascribe to him here.

This objection therefore may be set aside for ever. But the notices which I have been considering suggest another reflection. Is the historical position which the writer of this letter takes up at all like the invention of a forger? Would he have thought of placing himself at the moment of time when Ignatius is supposed to have been martyred, but when the report of the circ.u.mstances had not yet reached Smyrna? If he had chosen this moment, would he not have made it clear, instead of leaving his readers to infer it by piecing together notices which are scattered through the Epistle--notices moreover, which, though entirely consistent with each other, are so far from obvious that his translator has been led astray by them, and that modern critics have woven out of them these entanglements which it has taken me so much time to unravel?

3. But our author proceeds:--

Moreover, although thus spoken of as alive, the writer already knows of his Epistles, and refers, in the plural, to those written by him 'to us, and all the rest which we have by us.' The reference here, it will be observed, is not only to the Epistles to the Smyrnaeans and to Polycarp himself, but to other spurious epistles which are not included in the Syriac version.

I have already shown that Ignatius is not spoken of as alive; but, if he had been alive, I do not see why Polycarp should not have known of his Epistles, seeing that of the seven Vossian letters four claim to have been written from Smyrna, when the saint was in some sense Polycarp's guest, and two to have been written to Smyrna. Therefore of the seven Epistles, supposing them to be genuine, Polycarp would almost necessarily have been acquainted with six.

By the 'other spurious Epistles,' which the Epistle of Polycarp is supposed to recognize, I presume that our author means the four of the Vossian collection, which have no place in the Syriac. If so, I would reply that, supposing the three Syriac Epistles to represent the only genuine letters _extant_, these Epistles themselves bear testimony to the fact that Ignatius wrote several others besides; for in one pa.s.sage in these Syriac Epistles (_Rom._ 4) the martyr says, 'I write to _all the Churches_ and charge _all men_.' And again, when Polycarp writes, [Greek: tas epistolas Ignatious tas pemphtheisas hemin hup' autou] it is sufficient to advert to the fact that, like the Latin _epistolae_, the plural [Greek: epistolai] is frequently used convertibly with the singular [Greek: epistole] for a single letter [114:1], and indeed appears to be so used in an earlier pa.s.sage by Polycarp himself of St Paul's Epistle to the Philippians [114:2]; so that the notice is satisfied by the single Epistle to Polycarp which is included in the Syriac letters, and does not necessarily imply also the Epistle to the Smyrnaeans which has no place there. But of this pa.s.sage generally I would say, that though it may be a question whether the language does not favour the genuineness of the Vossian letters, as against the Curetonian, it cannot be taken to impugn the genuineness of the Epistle of Polycarp itself, authenticated, as this Epistle is, by Irenaeus, and exhibiting, as we have seen, every mark of genuineness in itself.

4. Our author then continues:--

Dallaeus pointed out long ago, that ch. xiii abruptly interrupts the conclusion of the Epistle.

In what sense this chapter can be said to interrupt the conclusion it is difficult to say. It occupies exactly the place which would naturally be a.s.signed to such personal matters; for it follows upon the main purport of the letter, while it immediately precedes the recommendation of the bearer and the final salutation. On the same showing the conclusion of the greater number of St Paul's Epistles is 'abruptly interrupted.'

5. The next argument is of another kind:--

The writer vehemently denounces, as already widely spread, the Gnostic heresy and other forms of false doctrine which did not exist until the time of Marcion, to whom and to whose followers he refers in unmistakable terms. An expression is used in ch. vii in speaking of these heretics, which Polycarp is reported by Irenaeus to have actually applied to Marcion in person, during his stay in Rome about A.D. 160. He is said to have called Marcion 'the first-born of Satan,' ([Greek: prototokos tou Satana]), and the same term is employed in this Epistle with regard to every one who holds such false doctrines. The development of these heresies, therefore, implies a date for the composition of the Epistle, at earliest, after the middle of the second century, a date which is further confirmed by other circ.u.mstances.

I will take the latter part of this statement first, correcting however one or two errors of detail. M. Waddington's investigations, to which I have already alluded [115:1], oblige us to place Polycarp's visit to Rome some few years before 160, since his death is fixed at A.D. 155 or 156. Again, Irenaeus does not state that the interview between Polycarp and Marcion took place at Rome. It may have taken place there, but it may have occurred at an earlier date in Asia Minor, of which region Marcion was a native [115:2]. These however are not very important matters. The point of the indictment lies in the fact that about A.D.

140, earlier or later, Polycarp is reported to have applied the expression 'first-born of Satan' to Marcion, while in the Epistle, purporting to have been written many years before, he appears as using this same expression of other Gnostic teachers. This argument is a good ill.u.s.tration of the reasons which satisfy even men like Lipsius and Hilgenfeld. To any ordinary judicial mind, I imagine, this coincidence, so far as it goes, would appear to point to Polycarp as the author of the Epistle; for the two facts come to us on independent authority--the one from oral tradition through Irenaeus, the other in a written doc.u.ment older than Irenaeus. Or, if the one statement arose out of the other, the converse relation of that which this hypothesis a.s.sumes is much more probable. Irenaeus, as he tells us in the context, was acquainted with the Epistle, and it is quite possible that in repeating the story of Polycarp's interview with Marcion he inadvertently imported into it the expression which he had read in the Epistle. But the independence of the two is far more probable. As a fact, men do repeat the same expressions again and again, and this throughout long periods of their lives. Such forms of speech arise out of their idiosyncrasies, and so become part of them. This is a matter of common experience, and in the case of Polycarp we happen to be informed incidentally that he had a habit of repeating favourite expressions. Irenaeus, in a pa.s.sage already quoted, mentions his exclamation, 'O good G.o.d,' as one of these [116:1].

Our author however declares that the pa.s.sage in the Epistle which contains this expression is directly aimed at Marcion and his followers; and, inasmuch as Marcion can hardly have promulgated his heresy before A.D. 130-140 at the earliest, this fact, if it be a fact, condemns as spurious a work which professes to have been written some years before.

But is there anything really characteristic of Marcion in the description? Our author does not explain himself, nor can I find anything which really justifies the statement in the writers to whom I am referred in his footnote. I turn therefore to the words themselves--

For every one who doth not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is antichrist; and whosoever doth not confess the testimony of the cross, is of the devil; and whosoever perverteth the oracles of the Lord to (serve) his own l.u.s.ts, and saith that there is neither resurrection nor judgment, this man is a first-born of Satan [116:2].

To ill.u.s.trate the relation of these denunciations to Marcionite doctrine, I will suppose a parallel. I take up a book written by a Nonconformist, and I find in it an attack (I am not concerned with the truth or falsehood of the opinions attacked) on the doctrines of episcopal succession, of sacramental grace, of baptismal regeneration, and the like. It is wholly silent about claims to Papal domination, about infallibility, about purgatory and indulgences, about the worship of the Virgin or of the Saints. Am I justified in concluding that the writer is 'referring in unmistakable terms' to the Church of Rome, because the Church of Rome, in common with the majority of Churches, holds the doctrines attacked? Would not any reasonable man draw the very opposite inference, and conclude that the writer cannot mean the Church of Rome, because there is absolute silence about the distinctive tenets of that Church?

So it is here. Marcion, in common with almost all Gnostic sects, held some views which are here attacked. But Marcion had also doctrines of his own, sharp, trenchant, and startling. Marcion taught that the G.o.d of the New Testament was a distinct being from the G.o.d of the Old, whom he identified with the G.o.d of Nature; that these two G.o.ds were not only distinct but antagonistic; that there was an irreconcilable, internecine feud between them; and that Jesus Christ came from the good G.o.d to rescue men from the G.o.d of Nature and of the Jews. This was the head and front of his offending; and consequently a common charge against him with orthodox writers is that he 'blasphemes G.o.d.' [117:1] Of this there is not a hint in Polycarp's denunciation. Again, Marcion rejected the authority of the Twelve, denouncing them as false Apostles, and he confined his Canon to St Paul's Epistles and to a Pauline Gospel. Again, Marcion prohibited marriage, and even refused to baptize married persons. On these points also Polycarp is silent.

But indeed the case against this hypothesis is much stronger than would appear from the ill.u.s.tration which I have used. Not only is there nothing specially characteristic of Marcion in the heresy or heresies denounced by Polycarp, not only were the doctrines condemned held by divers other teachers besides, but some of the charges are quite inapplicable to him. The pa.s.sage in question denounces three forms of heretical teaching, which may or may not have been combined in one sect.

Of these the first, 'Whosoever doth not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh,' is capable of many interpretations. It way refer, for instance, to the separationism of Cerinthus, who maintained that the spiritual Being Christ descended on the man Jesus after the baptism, and left Him before the crucifixion, so that, while Jesus suffered, Christ remained impa.s.sible [118:1]; or it may describe the pure docetism, which maintained that our Lord's body was a mere phantom body, so that His birth and life and death alike were only apparent, and not real [118:2]; or it may have some reference different from either. I cannot myself doubt that the expression is borrowed from the First Epistle of St John, and there it seems to refer to Cerinthus, the contemporary of the Apostle [118:3]; but Polycarp may have used it with a much wider reference. Under any circ.u.mstances, though it would no doubt apply to Marcion, who held strong docetic views, it would apply to almost every sect of Gnostics besides. The same may be said of the second position attacked, 'Whosoever doth not confess the testimony of the cross,' which might include not only divers Gnostic sects, but many others as well.

But the case is wholly different with the third, 'Whosoever perverteth the oracles of the Lord to (serve) his own l.u.s.ts, and saith that there is neither resurrection nor judgment.' To this type of error, and this only, the description 'first-born of Satan' is applied in the text, and of this I venture to say that it is altogether inapplicable to Marcion.

No doubt Marcion, like every other heretical teacher of the second century, or indeed of any century, did 'pervert the oracles of the Lord'

by his tortuous interpretations; but he did not pervert them 'to his own l.u.s.ts.' The high moral character of Marcion was unimpeachable, and is recognized by the orthodox writers of the second century; the worst charge which they bring against him is disappointed ambition. He was an ascetic of the most uncompromising and rigorous type. I cannot but regard it as a significant fact that when Scholten wishes to fasten this denunciation on Marcion, he stops short at 'pervert the oracles of the Lord,' and takes no account of the concluding words 'to his own l.u.s.ts,'

though these contain the very sting of the accusation [119:1]. Obviously the allusion here is to that antinomian license which many early Gnostic teachers managed to extract from the spiritual teaching of the Gospel.

We find germs of this immoral doctrine a full half century before the professed date of Polycarp's Epistle, in the incipient Gnosticism which St Paul rebukes at Corinth [119:2]. We have still clearer indications of it in the Pastoral Epistles; and when we reach the epoch of the Apocalypse, which our author himself places somewhere in the year 68 or 69, the evil is almost full blown [119:3]. This interpretation becomes more evident when we consider the expression in the light of the accompanying clause, where the same persons are described as saying that there was 'no resurrection nor judgment.' This can hardly mean anything else than that they denied the doctrine of a future retribution, and so broke loose from the moral restraints imposed by fear of consequences.

Here again, they had their forerunners in those licentious speculators belonging to the Christian community at Corinth who maintained that 'there is no resurrection of the dead,' [120:1] and whose Epicurean lives were a logical consequence of their Epicurean doctrine. And here, too, the Pastoral Epistles supply a pertinent ill.u.s.tration. If we are at a loss to conceive how they could have extracted such a doctrine out of 'the oracles of the Lord,' the difficulty is explained by the parallel case of Hymenaeus and Philetus, who taught that 'the resurrection had already taken place,' [120:2] or in other words, that all such terms must be understood in a metaphorical sense as applying to the spiritual change, the new birth or resuscitation of the believer in the present world'. Thus everything hangs together. But such teaching is altogether foreign to Marcion. He did indeed deny the resurrection of the flesh, and the future body of the redeemed [120:4]. This was a necessary tenet of all Gnostics, who held the inherent malignity of matter. In this sense only he denied a resurrection; and he did not deny a judgment at all. Holding, like the Catholic Christian, that men would be rewarded or punished hereafter according to their deeds in this life, he was obliged to recognize a judgment in some form or other. His Supreme G.o.d indeed, whom he represented as pure beneficence, could not be a judge or an avenger, but he got over the difficulty by a.s.signing the work of judging and punishing to the Demiurge [120:5]. To revert to my ill.u.s.tration, this is as though our Nonconformist writer threw out a charge of Erastianism against the anonymous body of Christians whom he was attacking, and whom nevertheless it was sought to identify with the Church of Rome.

6. The next argument is of a wholly different kind:--

The writer evidently a.s.sumes a position in the Church to which Polycarp could only have attained in the latter part of his life, and of which we first have evidence about A.D. 160, when he was deputed to Rome for the Paschal discussion.

This argument will not appeal to Englishmen with any power, when they remember that the ablest and most powerful Prime Minister whom const.i.tutional England has seen a.s.sumed the reins of government at the early age of twenty-four. But Polycarp was not a young man at this time.

M. Waddington's investigations here again stand us in good stead. If we take the earlier date of the martyrdom of Ignatius, Polycarp was now in his fortieth year at least; if the later date, he was close upon fifty.

He had been a disciple, apparently a favourite disciple, of the aged Apostle St John. He was specially commended by Ignatius, who doubtless had spoken of him to the Philippians. History does not point to any person after the death of Ignatius whose reputation stood nearly so high among his contemporaries. So far as any inference can be drawn from silence, he was now the one prominent man in the Church. What wonder then that the Philippians should have asked him to write to them? To this request, I suppose, our author refers when he speaks of the writer 'a.s.suming a position in the Church;' for there is nothing else to justify it. On his own part Polycarp writes with singular modesty. He a.s.sociates his presbyters with himself in the opening address; he says that he should not have ventured to write as he does, if he had not received a request from the Philippians; he even deprecates any a.s.sumption of superiority [121:1].

7. But our author continues:--

And throughout, the Epistle depicts the developed organization of that period.

This argument must, I think, strike any one who has read the Epistle as surprising. There is, as I have said already, no reference to episcopacy from beginning to end [122:1]; and in this respect it presents the strongest contrast to writings of the age of Irenaeus, to which it is here supposed to belong. Irenaeus and his contemporaries are so familiar with episcopacy as a traditional inst.i.tution, that they are not aware of any period when it was not universal; and more especially when they are dealing with heretics, they appeal to the episcopate as the depositary of the orthodox and Apostolic tradition in matters of doctrine and practice. The absence of all such language in Polycarp's Epistle is a strong testimony to its early date.

8. Lastly, another argument is alleged:--

Hilgenfeld has pointed out another indication of the same date, in the injunction 'Pray for the kings' (Orate pro regibus), which, in 1 Peter ii. 17, is 'Honour the king' ([Greek: ton basilea timate]), which accords with the period after Antoninus Pius had elevated Marcus Aurelius to joint sovereignty (A.D. 147), or better still, with that in which Marcus Aurelius appointed Lucius Verus his colleague, A.D. 161.

Here we have only to ask why _Orate pro regibus_ should be translated 'Pray for _the_ kings,' rather than 'Pray for kings,' and the ghost of a divided sovereignty vanishes before the spell. There is no reason whatever for supposing that the expression has anything more than a general reference. Even if the words had stood in the original [Greek: huper ton basileon] and not [Greek: huper basileon], the presence of the article would not, according to ordinary Greek usage, necessarily limit the reference to any particular sovereigns. But there is very good reason for believing that the definite article had no place in the original. The writer of this Epistle elsewhere shows acquaintance with the First Epistle to Timothy. Thus in one place (-- 4), he combines two pa.s.sages which occur in close proximity in that Epistle; 'The love of money is the source of all troubles (1 Tim. vi. 10): knowing therefore that we brought nothing into the world, neither are we able to carry anything out (1 Tim. vi. 7), let us arm ourselves' etc. Hence it becomes highly probable that he has derived this injunction also from the same Epistle; 'I exhort first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for all men; for kings, and for all that are in authority' (ii. 2) [123:1], where it is [Greek: huper basileon]. After his manner, Polycarp combines this with other expressions that he finds in the Evangelical and Apostolical writings (Ephes. vi. 18, Matt. v. 44, Phil. iii. 18), and gives the widest possible range to his injunction; 'Pray for all the saints; pray also for kings and potentates and princes, and for them that persecute and hate you, and for the enemies of the cross, etc.' We may therefore bid farewell to Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus.

Our author at the outset speaks of 'some critics who affirm the authenticity of the Epistle attributed to him [Polycarp], but who certainly do not justify their conclusion by any arguments nor attempt to refute adverse reasons.' He himself pa.s.ses over in silence all answers which have been given to the objections alleged by him.

Doubtless he considered them unworthy of notice. I have endeavoured to supply this lacuna in his work; and the reader will judge for himself on which side the weight of argument lies.

The author of _Supernatural Religion_ in his Reply, which appeared in the January number of the _Fortnightly Review_, pointed out two inaccuracies in my first article. In adverting to his silence respecting the occurrence of the Logos in the Apocalypse [123:2], I ought to have confined my remark to the portion of his work in which he is contrasting the doctrinal teaching of this book with that of the Apocalypse, where especially some mention of it was to be expected. He has elsewhere alluded, as his references show, to the occurrence of the term in the Apocalypse. The other point relates to the pa.s.sage in which he charges Dr Westcott with insinuating in an underhand way what he knew not to be true respecting Basilides. While commenting on his omission of Dr Westcott's inverted commas in the extract which I gave [124:1], I overlooked the fact that he had just before quoted Dr Westcott's text correctly, as it stands in Dr Westcott's book. Though I find it still more difficult to understand how he could have brought this most unwarrantable charge when the fact of Dr Westcott's inverted commas was distinctly before him, I am not the less bound to plead guilty of an oversight, which I think I can explain to myself but which I shall not attempt to excuse, and to accept the retort of looseness, which he throws back upon me.