The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels | Page 2

days are not aware of the pedigree and use of the phrase,
employed it even for good purposes, is only an instance of a strange
phenomenon. We must not be led only by first impressions as to what
is to be taken for the genuine words of the Gospels. Even if phrases or
passages make for orthodoxy, to accept them if condemned by evidence
and history is to alight upon the quicksands of conjecture.
A curious instance of a fate like this has been supplied by a critic in the
Athenaeum, who, when contrasting Dean Burgon's style of writing with
mine to my discredit, quotes a passage of some length as the Dean's
which was really written by me. Surely the principle upheld by our
opponents, that much more importance than we allow should be
attributed to the 'Internal evidence of Readings and Documents,' might
have saved him from error upon a piece of composition which
characteristically proclaimed its own origin. At all events, after this
undesigned support, I am the less inclined to retire from our vantage
ground.
But it is gratifying on all accounts to say now, that such interpolations
as in the companion volume I was obliged frequently to supply in order
to fill up gaps in the several MSS. and in integral portions of the
treatise, which through their very frequency would have there made
square brackets unpleasant to our readers, are not required so often in
this part of the work. Accordingly, except in instances of pure editing
or in simple bringing up to date, my own additions or insertions have
been so marked off. It will doubtless afford great satisfaction to others
as well as the admirers of the Dean to know what was really his own

writing: and though some of the MSS., especially towards the end of
the volume, were not left as he would have prepared them for the press
if his life had been prolonged, yet much of the book will afford, on
what he regarded as the chief study of his life, excellent examples of
his style, so vigorously fresh and so happy in idiomatic and lucid
expression.
But the Introduction, and Appendix II on 'Conflation' and the 'Neutral
Text,' have been necessarily contributed by me. I am anxious to invite
attention particularly to the latter essay, because it has been composed
upon request, and also because--unless it contains some extraordinary
mistake--it exhibits to a degree which has amazed me the baselessness
of Dr. Hort's theory.
The manner in which the Dean prepared piecemeal for his book, and
the large number of fragments in which he left his materials, as has
been detailed in the Preface to the former volume, have necessarily
produced an amount of repetition which I deplore. To have avoided it
entirely, some of the MSS. must have been rewritten. But in one
instance I discovered when it was too late that after searching for, and
finding with difficulty and treating, an example which had not been
supplied, I had forestalled a subsequent examination of the same
passage from his abler hand. However I hope that in nearly all, if not all
cases, each treatment involves some new contribution to the question
discussed; and that our readers will kindly make allowance for the
perplexity which such an assemblage of separate papers could not but
entail.
My thanks are again due to the Rev. G. H. Gwilliam, B.D., Fellow of
Hertford College, for much advice and suggestion, which he is so
capable of giving, and for his valuable care in looking through all the
first proofs of this volume; to 'M. W.,' Dean Burgon's indefatigable
secretary, who in a pure labour of love copied out the text of the MSS.
before and after his death; also to the zealous printers at the Clarendon
Press, for help in unravelling intricacies still remaining in them.
This treatise is now commended to the fair and candid consideration of
readers and reviewers. The latter body of men should remember that

there was perhaps never a time when reviewers were themselves
reviewed by many intelligent readers more than they are at present. I
cannot hope that all that we have advanced will be finally adopted,
though my opinion is unfaltering as resting in my belief upon the Rock;
still less do I imagine that errors may not be discovered in our work.
But I trust that under Divine Blessing some not unimportant
contribution has been made towards the establishment upon sound
principles of the reverent criticism of the Text of the New Testament.
And I am sure that, as to the Dean's part in it, this trust will be
ultimately justified.
EDWARD MILLER.
9 Bradmore Road, Oxford:
Sept. 2, 1896.

CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
The Traditional Text--established by evidence--especially before St.
Chrysostom--corruption--early rise of it--Galilee