ds of the clergy only."[463:2]

Concerning the _time_ when the canon of the New Testament was settled,
Mosheim says:

"The opinions, or rather the _conjectures_, of the learned
concerning the _time_ when the books of the New Testament were
collected into one volume; as also about the authors of that
collection, are extremely different. This important question
is attended with great and almost insuperable difficulties to
us in these later times."[463:3]

The Rev. B. F. Westcott says:

"It is impossible to point to any period as marking the date
at which our present canon was determined. When it first
appears, it is presented not as a novelty, but as an ancient
tradition."[463:4]

Dr. Lardner says:

"Even so late as the middle of the _sixth century_, the canon
of the New Testament had not been settled by any authority
that was decisive and universally acknowledged, but Christian
people were at liberty to judge for themselves concerning the
genuineness of writings proposed to them as apostolical, and
to determine according to evidence."[464:1]

The learned Michaelis says:

"No manuscript of the New Testament now extant is prior to the
_sixth century_, and what is to be lamented, various readings
which, as appears from the quotations of the Fathers, were in
the text of the Greek Testament, are to be found in none of
the manuscripts which are at present remaining."[464:2]

And Bishop Marsh says:

"It is a certain fact, that several readings in our common
printed text are nothing more than _alterations_ made by
Origen, whose authority was so great in the Christian Church
(A. D. 230) that emendations which he proposed, though, as he
himself acknowledged, they were supported by the evidence of
no manuscript, were very generally received."[464:3]

In his Ecclesiastical History, Eusebius gives us a list of what books at
that time (A. D. 315) were considered canonical. They are as follows:

"The four-fold writings of the Evangelists," "The Acts of the
Apostles," "The Epistles of Peter," "after these the _first_
of John, and that of Peter," "_All these are received for
undoubted._" "The Revelation of St. John, _some disavow_."

"The books which are _gainsaid_, though well known unto many,
are these: the Epistle of James, the Epistle of Jude, the
_