The Modern Reader's Bible New Testament Series St. Matthew St. Mark An Epistle to Hebrews The Wisdom of St. James The General Epistles of St. Peter The General Epistle of St. Jude THE MODERN READER'S BIBLE A SERIES OF WORKS FROM THE SACRED SCRIPTURES PRESENTED ST. MATTHEW AND ST. MARK AND THE GENERAL EPISTLES EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY RICHARD G. MOULTON, M.A. (CAMB.), PH.D. (PENN.) PROFESSOR OF Literature IN ENGLISH IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. All rights reserved COPYRIGHT, 1898, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped. Published January, 1898. General Library System Madison, WI 53706-1494 U.S.A. Norwood Press J. S. Cushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith SEP 23 1926 CBAV CBAV •M/86 M86 STM INTRODUCTION 29 THE series of books which make up the New Testament group themselves into a clear and interesting unity. The Acts and Sayings of Jesus The Acts of the Apostles The Sayings of the Apostles (or Epistles) The Prophetic Vision of the New Testament This last, by its revival of the form and matter of ancient prophecy in application to the Christian dispensation, makes a link binding together the Old Testament and the New. The gospels, moreover, are for their age a sacred history like the historic books of the Old Testament; and the epistles, like portions of The Chronicles, may be regarded as documents illustrative of the history. But such a description of them would obviously be inadequate. Indeed, it is extremely difficult to fit the gospels into any literary classification: from the point of view of literature, |