omitted by Westcott and Hort, and is placed in the margin by the
Revisers and included in brackets by Tregelles as if the words were of
doubtful authority, solely because some scribe omitted a line and was
followed by B, a few cursives, the Sahidic, Curetonian, Lewis, and
Jerusalem Versions].

When indeed the omission dates from an exceedingly remote period; took
place, I mean, in the third, or more likely still in the second century;
then the fate of such omitted words may be predicted with certainty.
Their doom is sealed. Every copy made from that defective original of
necessity reproduced the defects of its prototype: and if (as often
happens) some of those copies have descended to our times, they become
quoted henceforward as if they were independent witnesses[335]. Nor is
this all. Let the taint have been communicated to certain copies of the
Old Latin, and we find ourselves confronted with formidable because very
venerable foes. And according to the recently approved method of editing
the New Testament, the clause is allowed no quarter. It is declared
without hesitation to be a spurious accretion to the Text. Take, as an
instance of this, the following passage in St. Luke xii. 39. 'If' (says
our Lord) 'the master of the house had known in what hour

[Greek: OKLEPTES]
[Greek: ERCHETAI] [[Greek: EGREGOR]
[Greek: ESENKAI]] [Greek: OUKANA]
[Greek: PHEKEN]

his house to be broken through.' Here, the clause within brackets, which
has fallen out for an obvious reason, does not appear in Codd. [Symbol:
Aleph] and D. But the omission did not begin with [Symbol: Aleph]. Two
copies of the Old Latin are also without the words [Greek: egregoresen
kai],--which are wanting besides in Cureton's Syriac. Tischendorf
accordingly omits them. And yet, who sees not that such an amount of
evidence as this is wholly insufficient to warrant the ejection of the
clause as spurious? What is the 'Science' worth which cannot preserve to
the body a healthy limb like this?

[The instances of omission which have now been examined at some length
must by no means be regarded as the only specimens of this class of
corrupt passages[336]. Many more will occur to the minds of the readers
of the present volume and of the earlier volume of this work. In fact,
omissions are much more common than Additions, or Transpositions, or
Substitutions: and this fact, that omissions, or what seem to be
omissions, are apparently so common,--to say nothi