348 INTEGRITY AND PURITY OF THE HEBREW AND GREEK TEXT.
tlie certainty of divine truth, as continued unto us, tlirough the provi- dence of God, in the originals of the Scripture.
What use hath been made, and is as yet made, in the world, of this supposition, that corruptions have befallen the originals of the Scrip- ture, which those various lections at first view seem to intimate, I need not declare. It is, in brief, the foundation of Mohammedanism (Alcor. Azoar. 5), the chiefest and principal prop of Popery, the only pretence of fanatical anti-scripturists, and the root of much hid- den atheism in the world.^ At present there is sent unto me by a very learned person, upon our discourse on this subject, a treatise in English, with the Latin title of " Fides Divina," wherein its nameless author, on this very foundation, labours to evert and utterly render useless the whole Scripture. How far such as he may be strength- ened in their infidelity by the consideration of these things time will manifest.
Had there not been, then, a necessity incumbent on me either utterly to desist from pursuing any thoughts of publishing the fore- going treatise, or else of giving an account of some things contained in the Prolegomena and Appendix, I should, for many reasons, have abstained from this employment. But the truth is, not only what I had written in the first chapter about the providence of God in the preservation of the Scripture, but also the main of the arguments afterward insisted on by me concerning the self-evidencing power and light of the Scripture, receiving, in my apprehension, a great weaken- ing by the things I shall now speak unto, if owned and received as they are proposed unto us, I could not excuse myself from running the hazard of giving my thoughts upon them.
The wise man tells us that he considered " all travail, and every right work, and that for this a man is envied of his neighbour;" which, saith he, is " vanity and vexation of spirit," Eccles. iv. 4. It cannot be denied but that this often falls out, through the corrup- tion of the hearts of men, that when works, right works, are with most sore travail brought forth in the world, their authors are repaid with envy for their labour ; which mixes all the issues of the best en- deavours of men with vanity and vexation of spirit. Jerome of old and Erasmus of late are the usual instances in this kind. That I have any of that guilt in a peculiar manner upon me in reference to this work of publishing the Biblia Polyglotta, which I much esteem, or the authors and contrivers of it, whom I know not,^ I can with due consideration, and do, utterly deny. The Searcher of all hearts
" Whitak. Cham. Rivet, de S. S. Molin. nov. Pap. Mestrezat. Cont. Jesuit. Regourd. Vid. Card. Perron. Respou. ad Reg. mag. Bullen. 1. 5, c. 6.
2 Since my writing of this, some of the chief OYcrseers of the work, persons of singu- lar worth, are known to me.
THE OCCASION OF THIS DISCOUKSE. 849
knows I lie not. And what should possibly infect me witli that leaven? I neither profess any deep skill in the learning used in that work, nor am ever like to be engaged in any thing that should be set up in competition with it, nor did I ever know that there was such a person in the world as the chief author of this edition of the Bible but by it. I shall, then, never fail, on all just occasions, to commend the usefulness of this work, and the learnincf, dilisence, and pains, of the worthy persons that have brought it forth; nor would be wanting to their full praise in this place, but that an en- trance into this discourse with their due commendations misfht be liable to misrepresentations. But whereas we have not only the Bible published, but also private opinions of men, and collections of various readings (really or pretendedly so we shall see afterward), tending some of them, as I apprehend, to the disadvantage of the great and important truth that I have been pleading for, tendered unto us, I hope it will not be grievous to any, nor matter of offence, if, using the same liberty that they or any of them whose hands have been most eminent in this work have done, I do, with, I hope, Christian candour and moderation of spirit, briefly discover my thoughts upon some things proposed by them.
The renownedly learned prefacer to the Arabic translation in this edition of it tells us that the work of translating the Pentateuch into that language was performed by a Jew, wlio took care to give countenance to his own private opinions, and so render them authen- tic by bringing them into the text of his translation.
It is not of any such attempt that I have any cause to complain, or shall so do in reference to these Prolegomena and Appendix; only I could have wished (with submission to better judgments be it spoken) that, in the publishing of the Bible, the sacred text, with the translations, and such naked historical accounts of their originals and preservation as were necessary to have laid them fair and open to the judgment of the reader, had not been clogged with disputes and pleas for particular private opinions, imposed thereby with too much advantage on the minds of men by their constant neighbourhood unto canonical truth.