faith; especially since—­as already it has been often proved by us—­that these things were not written by Christ, nor his Apostles, but a long while after their assumption, by I know not what sort of half Jews, not even agreeing with themselves, who made up their tale out of report and opinions merely; and yet, fathering the whole upon the names of the Apostles of the Lord, or on those who were supposed to have followed the Apostles; they mendaciously pretended that they had written their lies and conceits according to them” (Lib. 33, ch. 3, as quoted and translated in “Diegesis,” pp. 61, 62).

The truth is, that in those days, when books were only written, the widest door was opened to alterations, additions, and omissions; incidents or remarks written, perhaps, in the margin of the text by one transcriber, were transferred into the text itself by the next copyist, and were thereafter indistinguishable from the original matter.  In this way the celebrated text of the three witnesses (1 John, v. 7) is supposed to have crept into the text.  Dealing with this, in reference to the New Testament, Eichhorn points out that it was easy to alter a manuscript in transcribing it, and that, as manuscripts were written for individual use, such alterations were considered allowable, and that the altered manuscript, being copied in its turn, such changes passed into circulation unnoticed.  Owners of manuscripts added to them incidents of the life of Christ, or any of his sayings, which they had heard of, and which were not recorded in their own copies, and thus the story grew and grew, and additional legends were incorporated with it, until the historical basis became overlaid with myth.  The vast number of readings in the New Testament, no less—­according to Dr. Angus, one of the present Revision Committee—­than 100,000, prove the facility with which variations were introduced into MSS. by those who had charge of them.  In heated and angry controversy between different schools of monks appeals were naturally made to the authority of the Scriptures, and what more likely—­indeed more certain—­than that these monks should introduce variations into their MS. copies favouring the positions for which they were severally contending?

The most likely way in which the Gospels grew into their present forms is, that the various traditions relating to Christ were written down in different places for the instruction of catechumens, and that these, passing from hand to hand, and mouth to mouth, grew into a large mass of disjointed stories, common to many churches.  This mass was gradually sifted, arranged, moulded into historical shape, which should fit into the preconceived notions of the Messiah, and thus the four Gospels gradually grew into their present form, and were accepted on all hands as the legacy of the apostolic age.  No careful reader can avoid noticing the many coincidences of expression between the three synoptics, and deducing from these