appears, its history, its contents, and its meaning. Every one must be desirous of knowing what are the true grounds of his respect for that book, and what the real value of the instructions, which he receives from it. There are some misconceptions respecting it, I apprehend, which may be traced to our early impressions, and the manner in which it is put into our hands in our childhood. It is first presented to us, as a single volume, and we read it as the single work of a single author. There is indeed one point of view, in which it may not be very incorrect thus to consider it. As containing a revelation from God, and giving a complete account of the divine dispensations in their connexion and harmony, it is to be read as a single book. Though delivered in parcels, at sundry times, in succession, through a long period, it reveals one system of doctrine, one rule of life, one object of hope, and is professedly communicated to the world by the direction and influence of one and the same spirit.

But it is also to be regarded in another light, as consisting wholly of human compositions, like other writings of equal antiquity, the fair subjects of criticism, to be studied and examined with diligence and care, and subjected to the same laws of interpretation, which are applied to them under similar circumstances. They are to be traced up, each of them separately to their respective authors, and to the age in which they were severally written. By doing this, we may find our view of their divine authority, as well as of the sense in which they are to be understood, materially affected.

For thus the case stands. Those writings are attributed to different persons, whose names have been annexed to them respectively. It is then of great importance to find them exhibiting such characteristic differences of style, as corresponds to that supposition. They purport also to be the production of periods of time far distant from each other. It is highly satisfactory then, and confirms us in the belief, that we have not attributed to them an authority, that does not belong to them, when we discover in them internal marks of the age to which each of them is respectively assigned. And besides this, no inconsiderable aid to their interpretation is derived from this confirmation of their authority. In order to understand fully their meaning, it is often extremely material to know when they were written, and under what circumstances:

Especially is this true of the prophetic parts of the Old Testament, and the epistolary of the New. For the instructions. which they contain, and the exhortations and denunciations with which they abound, are all connected with the history of the people to which they are addressed, and are drawn from circumstances of time, place, character, and prevalent customs, of which we must have some previous knowledge, in order to understand fully their meaning.

With the writings of the Old Testament we are concerned in the present inquiries only so far as they are connected with those of the New. They were certainly in being before the time of our Saviour, and were held in reverence by the Jewish nation, as being the sacred deposit of their history, religion, and law. This we know by the manner in which they are constantly quoted and referred to by our Saviour and his apostles; and the same quotations and references, by their general agreement with the copies, which are now extant, assure us, that the writings which have come down to us are substantially the same, that they had at that time. They then constituted, as they do now, a constant part of the worship of the synagogue. They had been collected into a single volume ever since the return from the Babylonian captivity. This was the work of Ezra; and we learn that the volume thus formed, and which has ever since been regarded as a complete collection of their sacred writings, was perfected about a hundred years afterward, by Simon the Just, by the addition of the last of the prophets, who flourished after the captivity, and were contemporary with Ezra, or succeeded him.

These writings, beginning with the Pentateuch, or five books of Moses, and ending with Malachi, appeared in succession, some of them at distant intervals, during a period of about nine hundred years; the last of them not much short of four hundred and fifty years before the Christian era. During the whole of this last period, no person appeared to assume the prophetic character-no addition was made to the sacred books, and though the Jewish nation remained in the land of their fathers, observing the rites of the Mosaic law, and the worship of the temple; and though the age was not destitute of writers, whose works have come down to posterity, none of them laid claim to divine authority, and the volume of Scripture

remained unchanged till the introduction of a new dispensation at the publication of the gospel. This is an important fact, to prove the care of the Jews in distinguishing those writings, which were to have a peculiar religious authority. That, during so long a period, while they were lamenting the loss of the prophetic spirit, and expecting its return, no false claims were ventured to be made, or if the claim was made, it was not acknowledged, shows that the reception of books into the Jewish Canon* was a matter of evidence, and not of accident or caprice, and that imposition by a false claim was not easily effected.

The Canon of the Old Testament we see was thus fixed, and the number and names of the books composing it determined, by one of the last of the sacred writers himself. The New Testament took its present form, as a single book, containing a complete collection of the Christian scriptures, in a different manner; yet in one that is not less satisfactory. These writings were not collected together, and formed into a single volume, with a mark of authority, by any one of the sacred writers, nor until many years after the last of them. It was probably never done in a formal manner by any individual, or any body of men. Had there been any such early act, some record of it would have remained.

The first recognition we meet with of the New Testament, as a collection of books, consisting of all those, which were acknowledged by Christians as of canonical authority, is in Eusebius of Cesarea, the ecclesiastical historian. This was in the beginning of the fourth century. His catalogue contains all those writings, which now constitute the volume of

* The term Canon is used by theological writers, to designate those books, which are received by Jews and Christians as of divine authority, and are understood to contain their rule of faith. The Jewish Canon contains those books, and those only, which constitute the Old Testament. The Christian Canon is properly limited to those writings of the evangelists and apostles, which have received the title of the New Testament. Though in a looser sense we may speak of it as comprehending both the old and new; since Christians admit, in common with Jews, the authority of their sacred writings as well as their own.

When the Canon of Scripture is spoken of, this catalogue of sacred books is meant; and when a book is spoken of as canonical, the meaning is, that it belongs to this Catalogue. The term was chosen to be thus used, as denoting, that this collection of books is to be regarded as containing the complete and entire rule for the faith and practice of Christians; a rule being the original meaning of the word canon.

the New Testament. No intimation is given of any public act, by which their authority was established; but they appear, on the contrary, to have been received by common consent, each individual book on its own particular evidence, from the time in which they were respectively published. The same books, we have satisfactory reasons for believing, were acknowledged by Origen in the middle of the preceding century, though no formal catalogue of them was made out by him.*

That the books of the New Testament should not have been collected into a single volume, and their number and authority settled, at an earlier period, may be accounted for in a satisfactory manner.

The historical books were written at different times, and were probably designed, by their respective authors, for the particular use of different societies of Christians, not improbably far distant from each other. Each of the gospels was alone a competent history for the use of those, for whom it was intended. They did not need either the additional evidence or instruction to be drawn from the others. When, therefore, we consider the labour and expense of multiplying copies, by the tedious process of writing, and the want of those facilities of communication between distant places, which are now enjoyed, a considerable length of time may be well supposed to have elapsed, before any one society of Christians would be in possession of copies of all the authentic writings of the apostles; those designed for the special use of other churches, as well as those particularly intended for their own, or for the use of Christians generally. And if such were the case in respect to the historical books, still more so must it have been true of the epistles, several of which were not only addressed to particular churches, but were manifestly occasioned wholly by some peculiar circumstances in those churches, and adapted to them. It would be long before writings, thus local and occasional, would be generally received by other societies, where the same special interest in them did not exist.

*The authorities of Eusebius and Origen, in this case, are of great weight. They were among the most learned men of the age in which they lived, and had both of them directed their inquiries particularly to the history and the authenticity of the Christian scriptures.

Further. We are to take into consideration the design of the Christian religion, and to recollect who were the persons that were to read its books. Not literary men only had an interest in the doctrine of the New Testament, as was the case with the writings of the philosophers. What the Saviour taught, and the apostles preached, was equally interesting to all; and in order that the purposes and design of heaven might be accomplished, it was to be communicated to the poor as well as to the rich, to the unlearned as well as to the philosopher. In order to this, some method of communication, more prompt and effectual than that by writing, was requisite at first. It was accordingly not by books, but by the personal preaching of the apostles, that Christianity was at first propagated, converts were made to the Christian faith, and churches were established. The witnesses of the miracles and resurrection of Jesus did not at first send their writings abroad, but went forth themselves, testifying, wherever they went, the things which they had seen and heard, confirming the truth of their testimony by miracles, and publishing every where the momentous doctrines which they had in charge.

Thus actively employed in personal labours, several years may have elapsed before the original witnesses felt the necessity of committing to writing what was the subject of their preaching, and of leaving permanent records, for the use of succeeding generations, of the life and preaching of the author of their faith. And after this work was accomplished, we are not to suppose, that in an age and country, where few probably were readers, their written testimony would be in great demand, or be eagerly sought for, so long as the original witnesses were alive, and it was in the power of Christians to receive the truths of the Gospel immediately from the lips of its primitive teachers. Now the last of the apostles lived till the close of the first century, and some of their immediate disciples till the middle of the second. Until this time, therefore, Christians had the opportunity of receiving the testimony of Christ from unexceptionable living witnesses; and many, probably, of being eyewitnesses themselves of miracles wrought in confirmation of the testimony.

There was then little occasion, as yet, for recurring to written documents, or for being anxious to possess them.