y Polycrates[199] (Bp. of
Ephesus A.D. 196); by Origen[200] and by Ephraim Syrus[201]: by
Epiphanius[202] and by Palladius[203]: by Gregory of Nazianzus[204] and
by his namesake of Nyssa[205]: by pseudo-Eusebius[206], by
pseudo-Caesarius[207], and by pseudo-Chrysostom[208]. The only wonder
is, that in spite of such influences all the MSS. in the world except
about twenty-six have retained the true reading.

Instructive in the meantime it is to note the fate which this word has
experienced at the hands of some Critics. Lachmann, Tischendorf,
Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort, have all in turn bowed to the
authority of Cod. B and Origen. Bishop Lightfoot mistranslates[209] and
contends on the same side. Alford informs us that [Greek: epipeson] has
surreptitiously crept in 'from St. Luke xv. 20': (why should it? how
could it?) '[Greek: anapeson] not seeming appropriate.' Whereas, on the
contrary, [Greek: anapeson] is the invariable and obvious
expression,--[Greek: epipeson] the unusual, and, till it has been
explained, the unintelligible word. Tischendorf,--who had read [Greek:
epipeson] in 1848 and [Greek: anapeson] in 1859,--in 1869 reverts to his
first opinion; advocating with parental partiality what he had since met
with in Cod. [Symbol: Aleph]. Is then the truth of Scripture aptly
represented by that fitful beacon-light somewhere on the French
coast,--now visible, now eclipsed, now visible again,--which benighted
travellers amuse themselves by watching from the deck of the Calais
packet?

It would be time to pass on. But because in this department of study men
are observed never to abandon a position until they are fairly shelled
out and left without a pretext for remaining, I proceed to shew that
[Greek: anapeson] (for [Greek: epipeson]) is only one corrupt reading
out of many others hereabouts. The proof of this statement follows.
Might it not have been expected that the old uncials' ([Symbol:
Aleph]ABCD) would exhibit the entire context of such a passage as the
present with tolerable accuracy? The reader is invited to attend to the
results of collation:--

xiii. 21.-[Greek: o] [Symbol: Aleph]B: [Greek: umin lego] _tr._
B.

xiii. 22.-[Greek: oun] BC: + [Greek: oi Ioudaioi] [Symbol:
Aleph]: [Greek: aporountei] D.

xiii. 23.-[Greek: de] B: + [Greek: ek] [Symbol:
Aleph]ABCD:-[Greek: o] B: + [Greek: kai] D.

xiii. 24. (_for_ [Greek: pythesthai tis an eie] + [Greek: outos]
D)