duty, provides for difficulties and perplexities, suggests the order of churches, and throws up barriers against the wiles of the devil. It shows us tilings to come, the course of the spiritual conflict, the close of this transient scene, the coming of the Lord, the resurrection of the dead, the eternal judgment, the new creation, and the life everlasting. Thus it is furnished for all emergen- cies, and prepared for perpetual use" (Bernard, ut siq). p. 31). — Fairbairn.
II. Early History of the Text. — 1. The Orir/inal Au- tographs. — The early history of the apostolic writings offers no points of distinguishing literary interest. Ex- ternally, as far as it can be traced, it is the same as that of other contemporary books. Paul, like Cicero or Pliny, often employed the services of an amanuensis, to whom he dictated his letters, affixing the salutation '• with his own hand" (1 Cor. xvi, 21 ; 2 Thess. iii, 17 ; Col. iv, 18). In one case the scribe has added a clause in his own name (Rom. xvi, 22). Once, in writing to the Galatians, the apostle appears to apologize for the rudeness of the autograph which he addressed to them, as if from defec- tive sight (Gal. vi, 11). If we pass onwards one step, it does not appear that any special care was taken in the first age to preserve the books of the N. T. from the various injuries of time, or to insure perfect accuracy of transcription. They were given as a heritage to man, and it was some time before men felt the full value of the gift. The original copies seem to have soon perish- ed ; and we may perhaps see in this a providential pro- vision against that spirit of superstition which in ear- lier times converted the symbols of God's redemption into objects of idolatry (2 Kings xviii, 4). It is certain- ly remarkable that in tlie controversies at the close of the 2d century, which often turned upon disputed read- ings of Scripture, no appeal was made to the apostolic originals. The few passages in which it has been sup- posed that they are referred to will not bear examina- tion. Ignatius, so far from appealing to Christian ar- chives, distinctly turns, as the whole context shows, to the examples of the Jewish Church (rd dpxcna — ad Philad. 8). TertuUian again, when he speaks of " the authentic epistles" of the apostles (Z)e Prcescr. Ilcer. xxxvi, " Apud quas ipsa? authenticm littcra; eorum reci- tantur"), uses the term of the pure Greek text as con- trasted with the current Latin version (comp. De Monog. xi, " Sciaraus plane non sic esse in Grajco authentico"). The silence of the sub-apostolic age is made more strik- ing by the legends which were circulated afterwards. It was said that when the grave of Barnabas in Cyprus was opened, in the 5th century, in obedience to a vision, the saint was found holding a (Greek) copy of Matthew written with his own hand. The copy was taken to Constantinople, and used as the standard of the sacred text (Credner, Einl. § 39 ; Assem. Bibl. Or. ii, 81). The autograph copy of John's Gospel (avro to iSioxitpov Tov (vayyiXtarov) was said to be preserved at EjJiesus " by the grace of God, and worshipped (jrpotTicvveXrai) by the faithfid there," in the 4th century (?) (Petr. Alex. p. 518, ed. Migne, quoted from Chron. Pasch. p. 5) ; though according to another account it was found in the ruins of the Temple when Julian attempted to re- build it (Philostorg. vii, 14). A similar belief was cur- rent even in the last century. It was said that parts of the (Latin) autograph of Mark were preserved at Venice and Prague; but on examination tliese were shown to be fragments of a MS. of the Vulgate of the Cth century (Dobrowsky, Fragmentum Pragense Ec. S. Marci, 1778).
In the natural course of things the apostolic auto- graphs would be likely to perish soon. The material which was commonly used for letters, the papyrus-paper to which John incidentally alludes (2 John 12, cud x«|0- Tov Kai fiiXavoc; comp. 3 John 13, Sid fieXavoc Kai KaXai-iov), was singularly fragile, and even the stouter kinds, likely to be used for the historical books, were not fitted to bear constant use. The papyrus fragments which have come down to the present time have been
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preserved under peculiar circumstances, as at Hercula- neum or in K!;y[)tian tombs; and Jerome notices that the library of Famphilus at C;esarea was already in part destroyeil (ex parte corruptam) when, in less than a century after its formation, two presbyters of the Church endeavored to restore the papyrus IMSS. (as the context implies) on parchment ("in membranis," Jerome, Ep. xxxiv (Ml),(iuoted by Tischendorf in llerzog's Encyli. " Bibeltoxt des N.T," p. 159). Parchment (2 Tim. iv, 13, fici-ifSpdj'a), which was more durable, was proportion- ately rarer and more costly. In the tirst age the writ- ten word of the apostles occupied no authoritative posi- tion above tlieir spoken word, and the vivid memory of their personal teaching. When the true value of the apostolic writings was afterwards revealed by the prog- ress of the Church, then collections of "the divine ora- cles" would be chiefly sought for among Christians. On all accounts it seems reasonable to conclude that the autographs perished during that solemn pause which followed the apostolic age, in which the idea of a Chris- tian Canon, parallel and supplementary to the Jewish Canon, was first distinctly realized.