of the Jesus of the fourth Gospel, and of his teaching, that even apologists are obliged to admit that the peculiarities of the author have coloured the portrait, and introduced an element of subjectivity into the discourses. It was impossible, they confess, that the Apostle could remember verbally such long orations for half a century, and at best that they can only be accepted as substantially correct reports of the teaching of Jesus.(1) "Above all," says Ewald, "the discourses of Christ and of others in this Gospel are clothed as by an entirely new colour: on this account also scepticism has desired to conclude that the Apostle cannot have composed the Gospel; and yet no conclusion is more unfounded. When the Apostle at so late a period determined to compose the work, it was certainly impossible for him to reproduce all the words exactly as they were spoken, if he did not perhaps desire not merely to recall a few memorable sentences but, in longer discussions of more weighty subjects, to charm back all the animation with which they were once given. So he availed himself of that freedom in their revivification which is both quite intelligible in itself, and sufficiently warranted by the precedent of so many great examples of antiquity: and where the discourses extend to greater length, there entered involuntarily into the structure much of that fundamental conception and language regarding the {468} manifestation of Christ, which had long become deeply rooted in the Apostle's soul. But as certainly as these discourses bear upon them the colouring of the Apostle's mind, so certainly do they agree in their substantial contents with his best recollections--because the Spruchsammlung proves that the discourses of Christ in certain moments really could rise to the full elevation, which in John only surprises us throughout more than in Matthew. To deny the apostolical authorship of the Gospel for such reasons, therefore, were pure folly, and in the highest degree unjust. Moreover, the circumstance that, in the drawing up of such discourses, we sometimes see him reproduce or further develop sayings which had already been recorded in the older Gospels, can prove nothing against the apostolical origin of the Gospel, as he was indeed at perfect liberty, if he pleased, to make use of the contents of such older writings when he considered it desirable, and when they came to the help of his own memory of those long passed days: for he certainly retained many or all of such expressions also in his own memory."(1) Elsewhere, he describes the work as "glorified Gospel history," composed out of "glorified recollection."(2)