all the
cursives but one (I). Will it be believed that Lachmann, Tregelles,
Tischendorf, Alford, Westcott and Hort, on such slender evidence as that
are prepared to reconstruct the text of St. Matthew's Gospel?

It sounds so like trifling with a reader's patience to invite his
attention to an elaborate discussion of most of the changes introduced
into the text by Tischendorf and his colleagues, that I knowingly pass
over many hundreds of instances where I am nevertheless perfectly well
aware of my own strength,--my opponent's weakness. Such discussions in
fact become unbearable when the points in dispute are confessedly
trivial. No one however will deny that when three consecutive words of
our Lord are challenged they are worth contending for. We are invited
then to believe (St. Luke xxii. 67-8) that He did not utter the
bracketed words in the following sentence,--'If I tell you, ye will not
believe; and if I ask you, ye will not answer (Me, nor let Me go).' Now,
I invite the reader to inquire for the grounds of this assertion.
Fifteen of the uncials (including AD), and every known cursive, besides
all the Latin and all the Syriac copies recognize the bracketed words.
They are only missing in [Symbol: Aleph]BLT and their ally the Bohairic.
Are we nevertheless to be assured that the words are to be regarded as
spurious? Let the reader then be informed that Marcion left out seven
words more (viz. all from, 'And if I ask you' to the end), and will he
doubt either that the words are genuine or that their disappearance from
four copies of bad character, as proved by their constant evidence, and
from one version is sufficiently explained?

FOOTNOTES:

[441] [Greek: pseudonymou gnoseos] 1 Tim. vi. 20.

[442] 1 Tim. iv. 1-3.

[443] ii. 17.

[444] Acts xx. 29.

[445] Rev. ii. 6.

[446] Rev. ii. 15.

[447] Rev. ii. 13.

[448] Chiefly the Low Latin amongst them. Tradit. Text. chap. vii. p.
137.

[449] 'Ausus fuit et Basilides scribere Evangelium, et suo illud nomine
titulare.'--Orig. Opp. iii. 933 c: Iren. i. 23: Clem. Al. 409, 426, 506,
509, 540, 545: Tertull. c. 46: Epiph. 24: Theodor. i. 4.

[450] 'Evangelium habet etiam suum, praeter haec nostra' (De
Praescript., ad calcem).

[451] Origen (commenting on St. Luke x. 25-28) says,--[Greek: tauta de
eiretai pros tois apo Oualentinou, kai Basilidou, kai tous apo
Markionos. echousi gar kai autoi tas lexeis en toi kath' heautous
euangelioi]. Opp. iii. 981 A.

[4