to introduce
something which comes after. Without any sort of doubt, it is St. John's
account of what occurred at the close of the debate between certain
members of the Sanhedrin which terminates his history of the last day of
the Feast of Tabernacles. The verse in question marks the conclusion of
the Feast,--implies in short that all is already finished. Remove it,
and the antecedent narrative ends abruptly. Retain it, and all proceeds
methodically; while an affecting contrast is established, which is
recognized to be strictly in the manner of Scripture[576]. Each one had
gone to his home: but the homeless One had repaired to the Mount of
Olives. In other words, the paragraph under discussion is found to be an
integral part of the immediately antecedent narrative: proves to be a
fragment of what is universally admitted to be genuine Scripture. By
consequence, itself must needs be genuine also[577].

It is vain for any one to remind us that these two verses are in the
same predicament as those which follow: are as ill supported by MS.
evidence as the other ten: and must therefore share the same fate as the
rest. The statement is incorrect, to begin with; as shall presently be
shewn. But, what is even better deserving of attention, since
confessedly these twelve verses are either to stand or else to fall
together, it must be candidly admitted that whatever begets a suspicion
that certain of them, at all events, must needs be genuine, throws real
doubt on the justice of the sentence of condemnation which has been
passed in a lump upon all the rest.

I proceed to call attention to another inconvenient circumstance which
some Critics in their eagerness have overlooked.

The reader will bear in mind that--contending, as I do, that the entire
Pericope under discussion is genuine Scripture which has been forcibly
wrenched away from its lawful context,--I began by examining the upper
extremity, with a view to ascertaining whether it bore any traces of
being a fractured edge. The result is just what might have been
anticipated. The first two of the verses which it is the fashion to
brand with ignominy were found to carry on their front clear evidence
that they are genuine Scripture. How then about the other extremity?

Note, that in the oracular Codexes B and [Symbol: Aleph] immediate
transition is made from the words 'out of Galilee ariseth no prophet,'
in ch. vii. 5a, to the words 'Again therefore Jesus spake unto them,
s