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and preparing it for use. Hence, it is no easy thing to read this author. If you go with him, you must work your passage. He does not take you up in his arms and carry you gently along over a level surface, pointing out the flowers that bloom here and there by the way-side. He leads you through regions hitherto untrodden; and when, from some high eminence, you survey the magnificent prospect, the pleasure experienced results, in no small degree, from the reflection that it has been procured, in part at least, by your own agency. Thus the mind becomes emulous of the toil so abundantly rewarded. The power of rousing others to vigorous exertion, is one of the greatest proofs of a vigorous mind. None but a Hannibal or a Buonaparte could conduct an army over the horrid precipices and the eternal snows of the Alps; none could go with them without imbibing something of their vigor and decision.

The materials out of which many compositions used in the arts are made, have, by modern discoveries, been concentrated, by the removal of substances naturally existing with them. They are kept in this state for convenience, and prepared for use by admixture and dilution. The author before us seems to have understood the art of concentrating thought, and many writers have availed, and many more will yet avail themselves of his skill. His writings afford an abundant supply for almost any number of religious publications of a certain order. In the empty brain of most modern book-makers they may be expanded indefinitely, like a drop of ether in an exhausted receiver. Out of this lumbering baggage-wagon loaded with gold, as Robert Hall significantly calls these writings, multitudes obtain the material for trinkets and small wares, which they manufacture for the religious world, and which, like the jewels given on one occasion to Aaron, are far more likely to make Calves than Men.

The crowning excellence of this writer is the high tone of moral feeling displayed in his productions. His philosophy is imbued with the principles of the Bible, and in all his plans for improvement he keeps prominent the fact of our dependence upon God. With deserved severity he rebukes those who hope by any merely human means to reform the world, and shows that not only infidels, but Christians even, are too little sensible of their impotence when unaided from above.

The style of the author has been justly censured as harsh, and sometimes obscure, and some of his positions are doubtless stated with less qualification than truth will warrant. His sen

tences are occasionally too long, yet it may fairly be questioned whether, as a general thing, it is possible to express the author's meaning more clearly or in fewer words than he has done. One of the most distinguished living writers remarks, that these faults are justly chargeable, not to the author, but to the language, which is unable better to express his vast conceptions. Allowing him to be guilty of all the faults ascribed to him, it is certain they bear a small proportion to his excellence; and no one can attentively read his works without becoming a better thinker, a better reasoner, and a better man. While the metaphysician admires his luminous depths, and the philosopher is delighted at the soundness of his reasoning, "the Christian," in the words of another, "indulges a benevolent triumph at the accession of powers to the cause of evangelical piety which its most distinguished opposers would be proud to possess."

ARTICLE V.

GENUINENESS OF SEVERAL TEXTS IN THE GOSPELS.

By M. Stuart, Prof. of Sac. Lit. Theol. Sem. Andover.

As I have already intimated, in my review of Mr. Norton's work contained in the preceding numbers of this Miscellany, there are several other passages of the Gospels, besides Matt. I. II., which this writer affirms to be of a suspicious character, or more probably spurious. The length to which my remarks on Mr. Norton have already been extended, will not permit me to exainine these in minute detail. A brief notice of each, with some general remarks on the whole, is all that seems to be requisite and proper at the present time.

In passing to the examination of Matt. 27: 3-10, which Mr. Norton supposes to be an interpolation, he remarks, that "we have but a single authority, the Greek translation, the representative perhaps of but one copy, probably not of many, for determining the text of Matthew." This, he thinks, "is evidence of no great weight against a strong presumption of the spuriousness of a passage." p. lxiii.

It is unnecessary for me to repeat here the considerations, which may well induce us to decide against the probability that our present canonical Matthew is a translation. It bears no marks of such a character; and the conduct of the ancient churches in regard to this whole matter, is decided evidence that it was never practically treated by them as such, whatever a few individuals may have said or conjectured in respect to this subject.

Even if it were a translation, how can any one now tell how many copies of the Hebrew Gospel were compared when it was made, in order to ascertain the best text? Why should we presume that a work so well done as this translation surely is, (if indeed it be one), was so negligently performed as to consult only one or a very few copies of the text? If we do so, we must venture, not upon one, but upon several presumptions, in order to proceed with Mr. Norton in the work of excision.

The passage in question, which is suspected by Mr. Norton, respects the repentance and suicide of Judas, and the manner in which the thirty pieces of silver he had received for his treachery, were disposed of by the chief priests. Mr. Norton tells us, that “at first view this account of Judas has the aspect of an interpolation." The whole story, if true, he asserts to be "out of place." According to him, it refers to "a subsequent period of time." The narration states, that Judas repented, when he saw that Jesus was condemned; and early in the morning "no condemnation had yet been passed upon Jesus by the Roman governor; and Judas could have no new convictions that the Sanhedrim would use all their efforts to procure the death of Jesus." The suspected passage further "represents Judas as having had an interview with the chief priests and elders (i. e. the Sanhedrim) in the temple; which is irreconcilable with the course of events as represented by Matthew in the context of the passage, as well as by the other Evangelists." 'Matthew could not have represented the council as held in the house of Caiaphas, and at the same time as conferring with Judas in the temple.'

To this last remark one may well reply, that Matthew does not so represent it. He does not say where the council was actually held. He merely tells us, that the chief priests and the elders met in council, early in the morning, nooiq; and Mark also says, (which amounts to the same thing), that the whole Sanhedrim (öλov rò ovvéðgiov) were assembled. Where?

No one says, as Mr. Norton assumes, at the house of Caiaphas, on this occasion. Nor is this at all probable. I do not understand, from any thing which we know respecting this subject, that the hall of the high-priest's house was the place for the meeting of the Sanhedrim.

Judas, then, who, no doubt, had passed a night of dreadful horror, appeared before the Council thus assembled, and cast the money down in their presence. Then he went forthwith and hanged himself. That money they dared not put into the sacred treasury. What should be done with it? They decided to purchase with it the Potter's Field, as a burial place for strangers. It is not necessary to suppose that all the particular transactions of actual purchase were gone through with on this very morning. Enough that they directed the money to be so appropriated; and inasmuch as this was done, the Evangelist, naturally enough, mentions the purchase with other particulars of the story in the same connection.

Thus far then there is nothing in any degree improbable. but Mr. Norton tells us that Jesus was not yet condemned, and that there was no new ground of conviction, in the morning, that the Sanhedrim would pursue their bloody persecution.'

Yet the circumstances of this occasion appear to my mind very differently from what he represents them to be. After the apprehension of Jesus, the evening before the crucifixion, he was brought immediately to the house of Caiaphas. On this occasion, no intimation is given by the Evangelists that the whole Sanhedrim were assembled. Plainly they were not. It was the next morning, that ölov to ovvidotov was assembled, and doubtless at the temple, where they usually met, and not at the house of the high-priest. In this council, after the examination of Jesus, which was very short and summary, the highpriest asked his colleagues in council: "What think ye? And they answered and said: "Evoyos vavárov čori,” Matt. 26: 66. Mark makes use here of the very expression employed in Matt. 27: 3, which is regarded as a part of the interpolation by Mr. Norton. He says: Οἱ δὲ πάντες κατέκριναν αὐτὸν εἶναι ἔνοχον Davátov, Mark 14: 64.

Now all this could have been done, and probably was done, very early in the morning, even before the sun had risen. The mock-trial did not require one half-hour. Judas, beyond all doubt, was present. His conscience urged him too much to allow of absence. The condemnation of Jesus, moreover, is

plainly stated in this account of the doings of the Council; and this is enough to gainsay what Mr. Norton alleges, when he avers that there was no new ground of conviction in the morning, that the Sanhedrim would use all their efforts to procure the death of Jesus.' Surely there was new evidence, and that of the highest and most authentic kind, viz., the unanimous sentence of the whole Sanhedrim that he was guilty of death.

What is there then in all this paragraph, which has the aspect of an interpolation?' Luke, moreover, tells the story of Judas's suicide, Acts 1: 18, 19; and also of the purchase of the Field of Blood. Is his account an interpolation?

To say, as Mr. Norton does, that the paragraph in question interrupts the narration of Matthew, is at most only a rhetorical objection, if it be well founded. How many passages of such a nature can be found, in the Old Testament and in the New, every critical reader must well know.

But at all events, if the narration of Luke respecting Judas be admitted, Mr. Norton thinks the narration of Matthew now in question must be rejected. In his apprehension they are inconsistent with each other.

In Acts 1: 18 Peter is represented by Luke as stating, (1) That "Judas purchased a field with the reward of iniquity." At first view this would seem to mean, that Judas himself made the purchase; but the true meaning of the speaker I apprehend to be, that Judas, instead of keeping in possession and enjoying the price of his treachery, by expending it for his own gratification, was obliged to relinquish it; after which, it was bestowed on the purchase of a burying-place for strangers. (2) Luke also says of Judas: "Falling headlong, he burst asunder, and all his bowels gushed out." "This," he adds, "was known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem." The question now before us is, whether this account is inconsistent, as is alleged, with that in Matthew.

A difficulty on this subject is indeed a matter of long standing. I must limit myself, however, on the present occasion, to a few remarks upon it.

In the first place, is it certain that the words in Luke's account, or rather in Peter's address, are to be literally understood? It seems to me more like a figurative description than a literal one. I am inclined to understand Peter as affirming, by the manner in which he speaks of Judas, that he came to a sudden, violent, and dreadful death, such as takes place in the case of

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