the right interpretation of this paffage of Ezekiel.--Alfo, in judging of this book, we cannot with propriety fay any thing of its numerous grammatical errors, fince our prefent text is extremely defective. And to this fubject I will now proceed.

SECT. IV.

Of our common text of the Revelation.

OF this book, when compared with the other fcriptures of the New Teftament, very few manufcripts and ancient verfions, and a very fmall number of extracts in the works of the ancient teachers, are come down to us. About four manufcripts only have any value; the reft are new and worthlefs. Of these four there are but two complete. Until the time of Wetstein, three manufcripts alone had been collated; and fince him very few, collated with accuracy,

6

ber.

curacy, have been added to the numErafmus, who could make use of one Greek manufcript only, tranflated the greater part of it from the Vulgate; he even made many alterations purely conjectural. From this edition of Erafmus, our common text of the: Revelation of St. John is for the moft part a copy. Deftitute therefore of credible manufcripts, verfions, and other writings of high antiquity, amidft a multitude of omiffions, tranfpofitions, additions, and alterations, we cannot fettle the genuine reading. The text of this book is confequently uncertain, even in the best editions".

See the Editions of the New Teftament by Wet ftein and Griesbach; and Semler's Theologische Her. meneutik; IV. 264.

SECT. V.

The Opinion of Ancient Writers on: this Book.

THE fcarcity of critical aid, and, a neceffary confequence, the uncertainty of the text, will not aftonish us, if we revert to antiquity, and inquire what opinion the ancients had of the Revelation. In the two first centuries this book was rejected by Christian teachers of great refpectability. Papias", even if he had not been, as Irenæus has afferted, a difciple of St. John himself, was certainly a contem-' porary of this Apoftle, and indeed Bishop of Hierapolis, a town in the vicinity of Ephefus, the place of refidence of the Apoftle, and of the feven Afiatic communities to which the Apocalypfe contains epiftles. Now

See above, p. 84.

this Father, whofe evidence would be of fuch great importance in the prefent inquiry, has not mentioned the Revelation for Eufebius quotes nothing from him, which he certainly would not have omitted, had he been able, he himself being perfectly in doubt as to its authenticity. Indeed Papias overlooks in his works fome other books of the New Teftament. But he had not fo much reason to notice other books as this, fince he was the father of the doctrine of the Millennium (the opinion that Chrift would reign upon earth a thousand years after the refurrection of the righteous), which doctrine has always been grounded by all its fupporters on the Apocalypfe. Eufebius even fays", "That Papias was deluded into the opinion of a Millennium from an uncertain tradition, and by misunderstanding the apof

See above, p. 85.

P 2

y Hift. Eccl. iii. 39. tolical

tolical narrations," (dinynces, consequently not apoftolical writings). Therefore he either did not know of the Apocalypfe,- -or did not receive it as an apoftolical and divine fcripture 2.

Caius, an orthodox and very learned prefbyter of the church of Rome, in the fecond century, afferted even that Cerinthus, in order to eftablish the coarse doctrine of the Millennium, had falfely attributed it to the Apostle St, John. "Caius in his Difputation fays," (these are the words of Eufebius, E. H. III. 28, for of the writings of Caius none are now extant) "Cerinthus, by the help of revelations which he in

z This is acknowledged by Dr. Storr, a very learned and acute defender of the authenticity and divinity of this book, in his New Apology for the Revelation of St. John,' p. 176 of the Original.-The testimony of Andrew, Bishop of Cæfarea, in the fixth century, of whom we know little or nothing, cannot be produced as a proof in oppofition to Eufebius: it is moreover obfcure. See Dr. Storr, p. 175.

a See above, p. 150.

finuated