re important will be noticed in the
following chapter.

The _cursive_ manuscripts of the Now Testament are numbered by
hundreds. In general their authority is less than that of the
more ancient uncials. But a cursive manuscript may give
indirectly a very ancient text. There are some cursives which,
from their characteristic readings, were manifestly executed
from codices of high antiquity, and are for this reason very
valuable. As such Tregelles specifies those numbered 1 and 33.
For further notices of these, as also of the _lectionaries_,
containing selections for church readings, the reader may
consult the works devoted to biblical criticism.

II. THE PRINTED TEXT.

6. The _primary editions_ of the Greek New Testament, whence is derived
what is called _the received text_ (_Textus receptus_) are the
following: (1) the _Complutensian_; (2) the _Erasmian_; (3) those of
_Robert Stephens_; (4) those of _Beza_ and _Elzevir_. Their authority in
textual criticism depends wholly upon that of the manuscripts from which
their text was formed. As no stream can rise higher than its fountains,
so no printed text can obtain a just weight of influence above that of
its manuscript sources. It becomes, then, a matter of interest to
inquire what was the basis of these early printed editions.

(1.) The entire New Testament was printed for the first time in
Greek in the fifth volume of the _Complutensian Polyglott_ (so
called from _Complutum_, that is _Alcala_ in Spain, where it was
printed under the patronage of Cardinal Ximenes). It bears the
date of 1514, but was not published until 1522, when Erasmus had
already printed three editions of his Greek Testament. Its
editors professed to have formed their text from manuscripts
sent to them from the papal library at Rome. What these
manuscripts were cannot now be ascertained; but that they were
very ancient and correct, as alleged by these editors, is
contradicted by the character of the text, which agrees with the
modern in opposition to the most ancient manuscripts.

(2.) At the request of Froben, a celebrated printer and
publisher of Basle, _Erasmus_, who was then in England, where he
had devoted some time to a revised Latin translation of the New
Testament with annotations, went to Basle in 1515, and began the
work of editing a Greek New Testament. "By the beginning of