momentary curiosity prompts us to put the question, we are satisfied with the first name which is mentioned, because in a matter so trifling we care not whether we are right or wrong. The truth would be of no advantage to us, and a mistake would do us no harm. But the books of which we are speaking, claimed to be received as authoritative, professed to prescribe the terms of salvation, and called upon men to make a total change in their religious sentiments and practice; a change which was opposed not only by the power of prejudice and habit, but by a regard to personal safety; for it was quite évident that it would both subject them to the charge of singularity, and draw upon them the hatred and the violence of those who, retaining their old opinions, would look upon them as guilty of impiety and apostacy. We cannot suppose that men in their senses could have run this hazard upon slight grounds, upon vague reports. "It was a matter of importance only to a few, or rather of no real moment to any body, whether Thucydides wrote the history, and Plato the dialogues, which pass under their names; but the present peace and the eternal salvation of thousands and millions, the decision of innumerable controversies, and the regulation of the faith and practice of the church in all ages and nations, depended upon the certain knowledge that the writers of the New Testament were the immediate followers and ambassadors of Christ." If the books were received by persons thus circumstanced, we may believe that they knew them to be genuine productions.

This reasoning is confirmed by certain proofs of genuineness which are furnished by the books themselves. They contain internal marks, from which it appears that they were written in the age to which they referred, and by the persons to whom they are ascribed.

The first is the style.-The books profess to have been written by Jews, who lived in Judea, a short time before the destruction of Jerusalem. Luke indeed is supposed to have been a native of Antioch, but he is understood to have descended from Jewish parents; and Paul was a native of Tarsus in Cilicia, but he was "a Hebrew of the Hebrews," and received his education under Gamaliel, a doctor of the Jews. The books are all written in Greek, for it is not worth while to except the gospel of Matthew, since so many learned men have called in question the opinion of the ancients that it was originally published in Hebrew. Greek was the fittest language for a revelation intended for mankind at large, because it was generally understood; but the native tongue of the writers was Hebrew, as it is called in the New Testament, although it was a mixed dialect, and has been more correctly denominated Syro-Chaldaic. Now, this language had not only its peculiar words, but also its peculiar idioms, which a person who had been accustomed to them from his infancy would retain, after he had laid aside the use of the words; for we find, in modern times, that when a man attempts to compose in a foreign language, although he may use none but words of that language, he often employs combinations of terms, and modes of expression, which are contrary to its laws, and are borrowed from his own. When Englishmen write French, or Frenchmen write English, they frequently fall into this error. It may be avoided, by accurate study and long practice; but they are very few who are able to express themselves in an acquired language with perfect purity; and this excellence was not to be expected in the apostles and evangelists, who were men without education. Luke and Paul, indeed, may be excepted; but their education, being Jewish, was not calculated to remedy this fault. Knowing, then, to what nation the writers belonged, what might we have presumed a priori would be the nature of their style? We might have presumed, that the words would be Greek, but that the idiom would be Hebrew; or that the composition would be that of persons who thought in one language and wrote in another and this is exactly the character of the gospels and epistles. On

this subject, indeed, learned men have differed in opinion. Blackwall, in his Sacred Classics, has undertaken to vindicate the New Testament from the charge of solecism and barbarism; and in executing this task, has displayed great learning and ingenuity. It must be acknowledged, that in not a few instances, he has succeeded in showing that certain modes of expression and construction, which had been objected to, are not inconsistent with purity, by producing similar examples from the most approved authors; but after all his labour, it is admitted by every scholar, that the Greek of the New Testament bears the marks of a Jewish origin. It is such Greek as would have been written by the persons to whom the books are ascribed; that is, by Jews, who had not enjoyed the advantage of attending the schools of grammarians

and rhetoricians.

This, then, is an internal proof of the genuineness of the books. Their composition accords with the character and circumstances of the reputed authors. Had the language been classical, there would have been some ground of suspicion; and the style would have been produced as a proof that they were not the works of the apostles and evangelists. To this objection, if Christians had replied, that the superiority of the style might be accounted for by the inspiration of the writers, infidels would have told them, that this argument was of no weight, because it rested upon an assumption of which there was no proof. It was therefore wisely ordered, that the writers, although, as we believe, under divine superintendence, were permitted to set down their thoughts in a style which was natural to them, and thus to furnish internal evidence that the works which bear their names are really their own. It has been observed, that the books could not have been written as they are written, later than the first century, and no person aissgns to them an earlier date. There were no Christians in Judea, in the second century but the Ebionites and Nazarenes, who will not be suspected of having forged Greek gospels, because it is known that they used only one, which was in Hebrew. The composition of Christians in other countries would have approached nearer to the classical purity. The New Testament would have been free, at least, from Jewish idioms.

The second internal evidence of the genuineness of the books, is simplicity, by which I mean, the absence of all appearance of art. It must strike every reader of the gospels, I should think, that there is in them nothing like contrivance, nothing like the exercise of policy or ingenuity to accomplish a particular end. The manifest purpose of the gospels, is to give a narrative of the birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension of Christ, of the works which he performed, and the doctrines which he taught. Now there is evidence on the face of them that they were drawn up as the events took place, or as they occurred to the recollection of the writers, without any studied design to combine them into a well-digested history, or to produce a particular effect. It was their obvious intention to exalt the character of their Master, but they do not resort to the usual method of panegyric and elaborate description. They content themselves with a naked relation of facts; and although many of them are of an extraordinary nature, they give no comment upon them, affix no note of admiration, employ no method to arrest the attention of their readers, and to excite corresponding emotions. In all this a candid mind will perceive the signature of truth, and recognise a manner totally different from that of an artful man, whose aim it was to palm a forgery upon the world. The evangelists are evidently men, who, believing what they relate to be true, leave the facts to speak for themselves, being convinced that they did not stand in need of any assistance from them to make a proper impression. The calmness of their manner seems to indicate, that they were familiarized to such events as they record; for how could they have spoken of stupendous

miracles in dispassionate terms, if they had not frequently witnessed them? These observations go to establish not only the genuineness but the truth of the narratives: but the latter is not at present the subject of inquiry; and I intend merely to show, that they are such as we might have expected from the persons to whom they are ascribed. Their story is the story of eye and ear-witnesses. It bears no resemblance to a fabricated tale to which the contriver was anxious to gain credit. In the epistles, there is the same simplicity or artlessness. It is impossible not to consider them as letters which were actually sent to the persons addressed. There are so many allusions to facts, so many incidental notices, so many references to existing circumstances, as to leave no suspicion of forgery. They are such letters as we should conceive the apostles to have sent to different Christian societies soon after their formation, while the Jews still subsisted in a national capacity, and the controversy was carrying on between the law of Moses and the religion of Christ. That controversy lost much of its interest after the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple: and had the epistles been composed in the second century, they would have rarely, if ever, referred to it.

The third internal evidence of the genuineness of the books, is their particularity. You will perceive that I chiefly refer to the historical books; but in the epistles also, there is such a specification of names, places, and facts, as affords sufficient ground for concluding that they were written by the apostles. When a man sits down to compose a fictitious narrative, with an intention to pass it upon the world as a true one, he finds it necessary to confine himself to general statements. It would be dangerous to descend to particulars, because the more he abounded in them, it would be the more impossible to avoid detection. The circumstantiality of the gospels, the specification of times and places, of the persons concerned in events, and of the persons who witnessed them, furnishes an argument in favour of their truth, if they were published at the period to which they are assigned: but my sole purpose is to use it as a proof of their genuineness. When a person composes a fictitious narrative of transactions, and lays the scene in an age and country different from his own, it would require greater skill and circumspection than fall perhaps to the lot of any individual, effectually to conceal his design. He would be apt to err in his descriptions of the country, in his representations of manners and customs, in his statements of civil institutions, and of religious opinions and practices. He would be apt to fall into anachronisms, by introducing modes of thinking and acting which belonged to a different period. Blunders of this kind have often furnished the means of discovering forgeries. The Sibylline oracles, which were so much circulated in the early ages, and professed to have been uttered by certain prophetesses of the heathen world, who lived before the coming of Christ, are so clumsily fabricated that we cannot but feel surprise, that any person should have supposed them to be genuine. The predictions are clearer than those of the Old Testament; and they could have been written only by a person who lived after the events. In the same way other forgeries have been detected, although by no means so gross. Minute circumstances are apt to escape an impostor, which unveil his design to a scrutinizing eye. It is extremely difficult to give falsehood the exact resemblance of truth, when it extends to a system having many ramifications. "The accuracy of the writers of the New Testament," it has been remarked by Dr. Cook in his Inquiry into the books of the New Testament, "has been proved by the strictest examination and comparison of their works with those of the best historians nearest to their own times, who mention any of the same facts, and by the admirable consistency which the narratives and allusions to fact made by the writers of the New Testament have with one another. It is an accuracy which embraces the topography, the vegetable

F

productions, the agriculture, the climate of Palestine; the habitations, dress, manners, character of its inhabitants, the civil and religious institutions, customs, opinions, philosophical sects, and political parties, whether of the Jews or Romans, and the various distinguished individuals, and offices, and actions occasionally introduced into the narrative. It is accuracy_pervading not only what Lardner has called the principal facts of the New Testament, relating directly to the life, ministry, and death of Jesus Christ, but the occasional facts connected with all those various collateral, and some of them transient subjects just enumerated. It is accuracy equally conspicuous in the more formal direct narratives of events, and in the incidental allusions to them; so that there is no clashing of the one with the other, no false movement indicating the manufacture of fraud. Now, this harmony and consistency, it is well known, from the extreme difficulty of giving even to a short narrative connected with known events, the semblance when it has not the foundation of truth, cannot be accomplished where that foundation is wanting; and where they exist, decidedly proclaim the most intimate acquaintance with the facts thus faithfully described."* Hence we infer, that the books of the New Testament were written by persons who were present at the scenes and witnessed the events which they describe; and minute circumstances have been pointed out in the course of the narratives which an impostor would not have noticed, and which would have occurred to no person who was not upon the ispot.

The fourth internal evidence is furnished by the discrepancies between the gospels. If they were not written by the apostles and immediate followers of Christ, they were fabricated at a later period by some persons who acted in concert, with a view to impose the account contained in them upon the world, as true. Now, let us think for a moment in what manner persons having this design would proceed. If they agreed, in order to give their respective accounts a greater appearance of truth, not always to relate the same events, and to use the same words, they would agree to avoid any thing like contradiction, because, being conscious of their own design to deceive, they would be in continual apprehension lest others should suspect it, and would guard against any circumstance calculated to excite or to strengthen this suspicion. Whatever other mistakes in their narratives might have betrayed them, we should have expected, that, in relating the same facts, they would have studied to render their statements perfectly harmonious. This is the plan which false witnesses always adopt. We find, however, if we judge by this rule, that the writers of the New Testament did not act in concert, and that they came forward in the character of independent witnesses to the facts which they relate. There are differences in their accounts, which have been considered by some as amounting to express contradictions. How these may be reconciled, is not our present business to inquire. The fact is certain; and it serves to prove the genuineness of their writings, because it shows, that each of them set down events as they appeared to him at the time, or afterwards occurred to his recollection, without having consulted with any others regarding the best form of the narrative. We discover nothing which has the character of forgery. If they agree or disagree, it is without design; there is an artlessness, and to speak of them merely as human authors, an unguardedness, which is the most distant imaginable from a fraudulent contrivance.

The last proof which I shall produce, is founded on the undesigned coincidence or correspondence between certain parts of the New Testament. The argument from this source has been applied to the Acts, and the epistles of Paul, with great industry and ability by Dr. Paley, in his work entitled Horæ

• Cook's Inquiry, p. 137.

Paulinæ. He observes, that "agreement or conformity between letters, bearing the name of an ancient author, and a received history of that author's life, does not necessarily establish the credit of either." The history may "have been wholly, or in part, compiled from the letters; in which case, it is manifest that the history adds nothing to the evidence already afforded by the letters." "The letters may have been fabricated out of the history; a species of imposture which is certainly practicable and which, without any accession of proof or authority, would necessarily produce the appearance of consistency and agreement." Once more," the history and letters may have been founded upon some authority common to both; as upon reports and traditions which prevailed in the age in which they were composed, or upon some ancient record now lost,, which both writers consulted; in which case also, the letters, without being genuine, may exhibit marks of conformity with the history; and the history, without being true, may agree with the letters." He goes on to state, that in "examining the agreement between ancient writings, the character of truth and originality is undesignedness," by which we understand, that the allusions in one writing to another must appear to have been made without any intention to corroborate or verify what the other had said, and to have been suggested solely by the author's familiar acquaintance with the facts. They occurred to him without an effort, as things which he witnessed or experienced. "With respect to those writings of the New Testament, which are to be the subject of our present consideration," Dr. Paley adds, "I think, that, as to the authenticity of the epistles, this argument, where it is sufficiently sustained by instances, is nearly conclusive; for, I cannot assign a supposition of forgery, in which coincidences of the kind we inquire after are likely to appear. As to the history, it extends to these points; it proves the general reality of the circumstances; it proves the historian's knowledge of these circumstances. In the present instance, it confirms his pretensions of having been a contemporary; and in the latter part of his history, a companion of St. Paul." "In a great plurality of examples, I trust the reader will be perfectly convinced, that no design or contrivance whatever, has been exercised; and if some of the coincidences alleged appear to be minute, circuitous or oblique, let him reflect, that this very indirectness and subtilty is that which gives force and propriety to the example." He mentions some references in which the argument will not hold, because it might be said that they were intended for the purpose of giving the appearance of agreement between the epistles and the history; but he produces the following as a case in point: "When I read in the Acts of the Apostles, that, when Paul came to Derbe and Lystra, behold a certain disciple was there, named Timotheus, the son of a certain woman, which was a Jewess;' and when, in an epistle addressed to Timothy, I find him reminded of his having known the Holy Scriptures from a child,' which implies, that he must, on one side or both, have been brought up by Jewish parents, I conceive, that I remark a coincidence which shows, by its very obliquity, that scheme was not employed in its formation."* I have stated this argument almost entirely in his own words; but it is impossible to do justice to it within such narrow limits, and I therefore refer you to the work itself.

* Paley's Hora Paulinæ, chap. i.