spels just what we might expect: no ingeniously
prepared statements without inconsistencies and without contradictions,
but simple, natural accounts, such as were current from the first to the
third generations in certain circles or localities, and even according to
the attachment of certain families to the personal narrations of one or
another of the apostles. We must not forget that in the first generation
the necessity for a record was not even felt. Children were still brought
up as Jews, for Christianity did not seek to destroy, only to fulfil; and
as all the Scriptures, that is the Old Testament, were derived from God
and were good for instruction, they continued in use for teaching without
further question. But in the second and third generations the breach
between Jews and Christians became wider and wider, and the number of
those who had known Christ and the apostles, less and less; the need of
books especially for the instruction of children consequently became more
urgent, and the four Gospels thus arose by a natural process in answer to
a natural and even irresistible want. The difficulties involved even in
the smallest contradiction between the Gospels on a theory of inspiration
thus disappear of themselves; nay, their discrepancies become welcome,
because they entirely exclude every idea of intentional deviation, and
simply exhibit what the historical conditions would lead us to expect. Of
what harm is it, for instance, that Matthew (viii. 28), in relating the
expulsion of the devils in the land of the Gergesenes, speaks of two
possessed men, while Mark (v. 2) knows only of one among the Gadarenes?
Mark also speaks only of unclean spirits, while Matthew speaks of devils.
Mark and Luke know the name of the sufferer, Legion; Matthew does not
mention the Roman name. These are matters of small import in human
traditions and records; in divine revelations they would be difficult to
explain.

But it becomes still more difficult when we come to expressions which are
really significant and essential for Christianity, for even in these we
find inconsistencies. What can be more important than the passage in which
Christ asks his disciples, "But whom say ye that I am," and Peter answers,
"Thou art the Messiah" (Mark viii. 29). That was a purely Jewish-Christian
answer, and Jesus accepts it as the perfect truth, which, however, should
still remain secret. In (Matthew xvi. 16) Peter says not only, "Thou art
the Messiah,