nor

ed to say, This law is expunged from the statute book: would it be necessary to examine, whether the law was print ed in Roman, or Italic, or black letter, or enclosed in brackets. So far as credit was due to the publishing committee, the law would be just as much expunged, in the authorized use of that word, as if it had been omitted altogether. In the case before me, the editors of the Improved Version have just as really expunged the passages in question, as if they had left them out of the book. They printed them in Italics; the American publisher printed the first in brackets; but whether the matter of the brackets troubled his conscience, or not, when he came to Luke neither Italics nor brackets were used. The American publish er is certainly entitled to all the praise of having printed these passages in a different letter from that used by his trans-atlantic friends; but from this praise there must be a drawback, I fear, on the score of a want of liberality, it being probably rather more liberal to print the passages in Italics, than otherwise. It may be a curious question of typography, whether Italics, or brackets, are the most powerful engines; but it is a question with which I intend not to intermeddle. For myself, I shall always feel authorized to say, that any man has expunged a passage from the Scriptures, so far as he is able to do it, when he has declared, directly or indirect ly, that the passage is spurious, Were it not for fear of being tedious, I would make a few observations on the note of the editors upon the first verse of

Matthew. I will now only quote the concluding words. "If," say they, "the genealogy be genuine," (as they allow it to be) this narrative" [of the miraculous conception] "MUST BE SPURI, ous."

But what is to become of the acccuracy of the Reviewers; men who are perpetually boasting of their own candor and caution, and speaking in the most contemptuous terms of the characters and attainments of their opponents? These Reviewers have said, as quoted above, that the passages in question "are not decidedly condemned as spurious;" and that "all that appears from these notes is, that the editors considered these passages as probably interpolated.", True, as they say, the editors begin by declaring the passages. to be of doubtful authority. But why do not the Reviewers tell their readers how the editors proceed, as well as how they begin? Or rather, why have the Reviewers stated the fact as be ing directly the reverse of what it is? This is not only a palpable egregious error, an error which palms upon the reader a flagrant misrepresentation, (whether intentionally, or not, the Reviewers must say,) but it is also an error of fundamental consequence to the subject under discussion. The writer of Plain Scripture Readings was charged with having asserted, that the editors of the Improved Ver sion had expunged the passages in Matthew and Luke; whereas, say the Reviewers, these passa- · ges "are not decidedly condemn,

ed

as spurious." And that there might be no apparent want of deliberation or solemni,

ty, the Reviewers add with the most perfect explicitness; "All that appears from these notes is, that the editors considered these passages as PROBABLY interpolated." Now it does appear from these very notes, that the editors have formed no less than four positive conclusions, in which they evidently wish their readers to concur, all amounting in substance to this, that the account of the miraculous conceptions cannot be true; and in another note, on the page next preceding that, which contains the note alluded to in Matthew, they say; "The eighteenth verse" of chap. i,]"begins a new story, which continues to the end of the second chapter. This could not have been written by the author of the genealogy, for it contradicts his design, &c." And they close this note by concluding that "this narrative MUST BE SPURIOUS." Now if a more charitable construction can be put upon the conduct of the Reviewers, than that they either never read the notes, concerning which they make so unqualified an assertion, or never understood them, or cared not for the accuracy of their assertion, or designedly imposed a very important misrepresentation upon their readers, I desire to know what that construction is, that I may adopt it. This charitable construction, (if such a one there be,) they are bound to furnish; and in order to do so, they must prove, unless I am mistaken, that to invalidate a whole story means no more than to say it is probably interpolated; that to say an account CANNOT be true, is no more than to say it probably is not true; and to affirm that a

narrative must be spurious, is the same thing as to say, that the passage which contains it is of doubtful authority. To this task I leave them.

I should not have spent so much time on the above-quoted assertion of the Reviewers, had it not been of prime importance in the critique before me; had it not beer a palpable error in a clear case, and a fair specimen of the gross blunders, which the same class of reviewers have been accustomed to commit, whenever they have entered at any length upon questions of criticism and religious controversy.

Another specimen of the accuracy of the Reviewers is to be found in the following sentence: "And in another place he" [the writer of Plain Scripture Readings] "quotes, as applicable to them," [the editors of the Improved Version,] "the curse recorded at the close of the Apocalypse, against those who should take away from the words of that book; a curse which by no very uncommon mistake among the illiterate, he seems to understand as having had direct reference to all the books which compose the Christian Scriptures."*

I certainly did understand the curse at the close of the Apocalypse, as having cuthoritative reference to all the parts of the Bible; and I so understand it still. As to the fact of my being illiterate, it is a fact of very small moment in itself, though, to be sure, a fact which is beyond all question to be taken for granted, as it comes within the sweep of a certain position, which has

p. 197.

a

been of late years uttered thousand times by the wisest men in the world, and to doubt of the truth of which would be extreme folly and downright contumacy; which position, though expressed in a great variety of forms, is substantially as follows: Thut all who oppose the views, designs, and conclusions, of the liberal party in Boston and the vicinity, are to be thenceforward taken and adjudged to be not only illiterate, but in the highest degree ignorant, perverse, and stupid. As for myself, therefore, I cannot gainsay the charge of being illiterate; but I have looked into about ten commentators, not one of whom, probably, ever heard of the said liberal party, and not one of whom can with propriety be called illiterate. With a single exception, they understand the curse, as I represented it. Should I be favored with leisure for the purpose, I intend to make further search as to the meaning of the passage in question; and as the subject is important, the result of my inquiries may possibly be worthy of being perused by the readers of the Panoplist. However that may be, I dismiss this topic for the pres

ent.

The Reviewers inform us, that the Eclectic Review is a work decidedly Calvinistic. It is to be regretted, that they did not tell us on what authority this assertion is made. I have read many articles in that work, and have never found a single passage, that warrants such an assertion; though I have found several passages, which expressly deny that the work is Calvinistic, and expressly announce,

that it is to be neutral in regard to the Calvinistic and Arminian controversy. Till the Reviewers shall produce some passages to justify their opinion, they must pardon me for believing, that they are little acquainted with a work which they so promptly characterize.

The assertion* that the writer of the article on the Improved Version, in the Eclectic Review, is a Calvinist, stands equally unsupported. It appears that the Reviewers mean to rely on the article itself for the proof of this assertion. I would thank them to point out the passage in that article from which it appears that the writer was a Calvinist. Not that this matter has much importance attached to it, except as it indicates the degree of credit, which is due to the random declarations of the Reviewers.

But it seems I have grievously offended by saying, that the passages in Matthew and Luke, were rejected totally without evidence. The Reviewers have produced no evidence for the rejection of these passages. The opinion of Michaelis will not surely be brought forward as evidence; nor are certain difficulties in the minds of the Eclectic Reviewers entitled to that character. The state of the case, as to the disputed passage in Matthew, (and the authenticity of that in Luke is not less clearly established,) is admirably stated by Dr. Magee, in his great work on the Atonement, as follows:

"How then stands the evidence upon the whole? The Syriac Version, which is

* Gen. Repos. p. 199.

one of Apostolical antiquity, and the Old Italic, both contain the two chapters. Ignatius, the only Apostolical Father, who had occasion to make reference to them, does so. The Sibylline oracles do the same. Justin Martyr does the same. Celsus, the bitter enemy of the Christian faith, does the same. Hegesippus, a Hebrew Christian, does the same. Irenæus, and all the fathers who succeed him, it is admitted on all hands, do the same. And the chapters are at this day found in every manuscript and every version of the Gospel of St. Matthew which is extant throughout the world. Thus we have one continued and unbroken series of testimony from the days of the Apostles to the present time; and, in opposition to this, we find only a vague report of the state of a Hebrew copy, of St. Matthew's Gospel, said to be received amongst an obscure and unrecognized description of Hebrew Christians, who are admitted, even by the very writers who claim the support of their authenticity, to have mutilated the copy which they possessed, by removing the genealogy-I should not have dwelt so long upon a subject, which is at this day so fully ascertained as the authenticity of the first two chapters of St. Matthew's Gospel, did it not furnish a fair opportunity of exhibiting the species

of evidence, which Unitarian critics are capable of resisting; and the sort of arguments, with which they do not scruple to resist it." pp. 501, 502.

This summary of the evidence is made by Dr. Magee after a careful and elaborate examination of all the testimony in the case; and let it be remembered that Dr. Magee is a scholar, whose profound learning, patient research, and strong reasoning powers, will not suffer by a comparison with the attainments of any man living. In his hands Mr. Belsham, and the whole Unitarian school, appear like children, scarcely a yard high, in the grasp of a giant. Whether the vague report, so justly described by such a writer, is to be considered as evidence, in opposition to the unanimous consent of manuscripts, versions, and an apostolical father, the reader may easily determine.

The Reviewers have instituted a comparison between the Improved Version of the second chapter of Matthew and our common version. I see no occasion to change the opinion before expressed, in relation to that chapter.* All that has been urged by the Reviewers, with any plausibility, had been considered before I expressed that opinion. They are greatly mistaken in supposing, that I should be ready to bring forward all the plausible objections against what I deemed erroneous translations in the Improved Version of that chapter. Nothing could be further from my design. Such a

course would have prolonged the discussion to an extent, which would have excluded my communication from the Panoplist. For the same reason, as well as for others, I shall not now enter upon such a course.

On the whole, though I have omitted noticing many topics, which merit animadversion, it is with the most perfect satisfaction that I leave the public to judge between the Reviewers and myself.

EDITORIAL REMARKS.

AFTER concluding the discussion, to which Philalethes has replied in the preceding paragraphs, the Reviewers condescend to notice the Editorial remarks in the Panoplist for April. A brief reply is all that will be necessary.

Early in this part of their discussion, the Reviewers say, "Whether the editor prove his point or not, is to us a matter

*Pan. for Feb. p. 394.

of utter indifference."* The point here intended is justly described to have been, 'to support the correspondent of the Panoplist in the assertion, that the liberal party in Boston and the vicinity have obtruded the Improved Version on the world, and exerted themselves much to procure its circulation.' From the temper discovered by the Reviewers, we should apprehend it to be far from a matter of indifference, with them, whether a point were proved, which, if proved, would justify, as we think, every thing which was said of the liberal party by our correspondent. If the Reviewers have insinuated a charge of falsehood against us without the slightest foundation for it, as we shall presently show that they have, one would think it could hardly be a matter of indifference to them, whether the pages of the Panoplist were completely vindicated from a charge of slander vehemently urged, or were still obnoxious to the charge. In short, the bitter and hostile spirit discoverable in almost every page of their communication looks like any thing else, rather than like that indifference, which they take much pains to affect, and with so little success.

SO

The facts which were stated, in our number for April, with a view to prove the point, concerning which the Reviewers are so perfectly indifferent, are sneeringly called by them "silly, gossiping stories," and the person from whom they suppose the facts to have been derived, is described as one, "who went about

Gen. Repos. p. 217. † p. 207,

to collect the stories," and "the collector of these stories." Our readers will call to mind on what occasion the facts, here contemptuously denominated stories, were stated. A charge of slander was made against the Panoplist, by certain members of the Boston Association, on account of the patronage alleged, by a writer in our pages, to have been extended by the liberal party to the Improved Version. This allegation was strenuously denied; and the charge of slander was directed, as it is proper now to state, to a gentleman present, a known friend of the Panoplist. When that gentleman declined the responsibility which seemed to be implied by directing the charge to him, and at the same time, gave strong assurances of his conviction, that no injury had been intentionally done to any man, or body of men, in the Panoplist, and that if any thing had been inadvertently published in that work calculated to make an injurious impression on the minds of readers, the error would be rectified, he was referred to Mr. Wells for information on the subject by the very persons who made the charge. When thus referred to Mr. W. common politeness, and more especially a regard to the interests of truth, required that he should make use of the reference. At a convenient time, therefore, he did inquire of Mr. W.; and the latter gentleman has given some account of the interview in a letter, which is published by the Reviewers, as a part of their communication. No human being would have im

+ pp. 218, 221.