(=2=) Those many writings of the Old Testament are found to have been collected into a single volume about four hundred years before the Christian æra; when they were denominated by a common name, ἡ γραφή,--"_The Scripture_[150];" and the supreme authority of the writings so collected together, was axiomatic[151]. One arguing with His Hebrew countrymen was able to appeal to a place in the Psalms, and to remind them parenthetically that "the Scripture _cannot be broken_[152],"--that is, might not be gainsaid, doubted, explained away, or set aside.--Precisely similar phenomena are observable in respect of the writings of the New Testament. (=3=) Although the books of the Old Covenant are scattered at intervals over the long period of upwards of a thousand years, the writers of the later books are observed to quote the earlier ones, as if by a peculiar secret sympathy: now, incorporating long passages,--now, simply adapting one or two sentences,--now, blending allusive references. For some proof of this assertion, (as far as I am able to produce it at a moment's notice,) the reader is referred to the foot of the page[153]. The self-same phenomenon is observable with regard to the New Testament Scriptures. Although all the books were written within so short a space as about fifty years, the later writers quote the earlier ones to a surprising extent. In the Gospels, the Gospels are quoted times without number. In the Epistles, the Gospels are cited, or referred to, upwards of sixty times. The Epistles contain many references to the Epistles.--The phenomenon thus alluded to will also be found insisted upon in a later part of the present volume[154]. "The fact, I believe, on close examination, will be found to stand thus:--The Holy Bible abounds in quotations, even more perhaps than most other books; but they are introduced in a way which is peculiar to Revelation, and its own. When a Prophet or Apostle mentions one of his own holy brethren, as when Ezekiel names Daniel, or Daniel Jeremiah; when St. Peter speaks of St. Paul, or St. Paul of St. Peter, or of St. Luke the Physician; _when they mention them, they do not quote them; and when they quote them, they do not mention them_[155]."