ning and end, is attributed to the Bishop Apringius. However, it plainly appears that the work is interpolated. In one place, John is said to have written the Apocalypse during the reign of Claudius ; in another place, during that of Domitian. The number 666 (DCLXVi) is reduced to the word diclux, of which device Ambrose Ansbert professed himself the inventor, two or three centuries after Apringius. The Commentary of Apringius himself, in his own name, in one or two places is so intermingled with that of the rest, that the preceding parts must be assigned for that very reason to other authors. I am not at present concerned to say anything as to the character of that commentary : Moshemius, in accordance with the object which he then had in view, in most instances wrrote out the text, interwoven with the commentary, in such a manner, that he expressed only the first and last wrords of the paragraphs ; but still the readings of many passages are brought to light, which here and there show the integrity of the Vulgate translator, and everywhere confirm my own opinions, formed before I had any knowledge of Apringius. Where I quote Apringius bv name, the reader will remember that the readings of the Copenhagen copy are those meant by me, although the identical readings of Apringius can scarcely be distinguished from the rest : nor is it of great con- sequence, since the interpolations themselves are of sufficient an- tiquity, and some of them are taken from authors perhaps more ancient than Apringius, and agree either with the text of Apringius himself, or with that of other Latin copies of the New Testament. We can undoubtedly collect here and there the Spanish reading of the Latin Apocalypse, which is scarcely to be met with elsewhere.
4) Moreover, my edition of the New Testament with critical apparatus came into the hands of John Christopher Wolf, of pious memory, before he published his fourth volume of Curse on the New Test. : therefore he especially paid attention to my annotations in the Apocalypse.
He would sometimes, as I believe, have arrived at a different judgment, if the haste, of which his excellent work bears traces at the close, had allowed more accurate consideration. He has indeed frequently confirmed my opinion by his own suffrage : and this agreement of a man most highly praised, ought to cause many to lay aside the prejudices which are so common in cases of this kind. In other places, he has expressed his disagreement with my opinions, or at any rate his doubt ; at the same time mentioning his reasons, with the courtesy of a theologian. I have thought that such things