passage might be relied upon as an important proof that it is the few MSS. and not the many which accord with ancient testimony.' Availing himself of Dr. Scrivener's admission of 'the possibility that the disputed words in the great bulk of the MSS. were inserted from the Septuagint of Isaiah xxix. 13[285],' Dr. Tregelles insists 'that on every true principle of textual criticism, the words must be regarded as an amplification borrowed from the Prophet. This naturally explains their introduction,' (he adds); 'and when once they had gained a footing in the text, it is certain that they would be multiplied by copyists, who almost always preferred to make passages as full and complete as possible' (p. 139). Dr. Tregelles therefore relies upon this one passage,--not so much as a 'proof that it is the few MSS. and not the many which accord with ancient testimony';--for one instance cannot possibly prove that; and that is after all beside the real question;--but, as a proof that we are to regard the text of Codd. B[Symbol: Aleph] in this place as genuine, and the text of all the other Codexes in the world as corrupt. The reader has now the hypothesis fully before him by which from the days of Griesbach it has been proposed to account for the discrepancy between 'the few copies' on the one hand, and the whole torrent of manuscript evidence on the other. Now, as I am writing a book on the principles of Textual Criticism, I must be allowed to set my reader on his guard against all such unsupported dicta as the preceding, though enforced with emphasis and recommended by a deservedly respected name. I venture to think that the exact reverse will be found to be a vast deal nearer the truth: viz. that undoubtedly spurious readings, although they may at one time or other have succeeded in obtaining a footing in MSS., and to some extent may be observed even to have propagated themselves, are yet discovered to die out speedily; seldom indeed to leave any considerable number of descendants. There has always in fact been a process of elimination going on, as well as of self-propagation: a corrective force at work, as well as one of deterioration. How else are we to account for the utter disappearance of the many _monstra potius quam variae lectiones_ which the ancients nevertheless insist were prevalent in their times? It is enough to appeal to a single place in Jerome, in illustration of what I have been saying[286]. To return however from this digression. We are invited then to believe,--for it is well to know at the outset exactly what is required of us,--that from the fifth century downwards every _extant copy of the Gospels except five_ (DLT^{c}, 33, 124) exhibits a text arbitrarily interpolated in order to bring it into conformity with the Greek version of Isa. xxix. 13. On this wild hypothesis I have the following observations to make:--