And yet it is perfectly certain that the words are genuine. Those thirty-one letters probably formed three lines in the oldest copies of all. Hence they are observed to exist in the Syriac (Peshitto, Harkleian and Jerusalem), the Vulgate, some copies of the Old Latin, the Armenian, and the Ethiopic, besides at least seventeen uncials (including B[Symbol: Phi][Symbol: Sigma]), and the vast majority of the cursives. So that there can be no question of the genuineness of the clause. A somewhat graver instance of omission resulting from precisely the same cause meets us a little further on in the same Gospel. The threefold recurrence of [Greek: ton] in the expression [Greek: TON psichion TON piptonTON] (St. Luke xvi. 21), has (naturally enough) resulted in the dropping of the words [Greek: psichion ton] out of some copies. Unhappily the sense is not destroyed by the omission. We are not surprised therefore to discover that the words are wanting in--[Symbol: Aleph]BL: or to find that [Symbol: Aleph]BL are supported here by copies of the Old Latin, and (as usual) by the Egyptian versions, nor by Clemens Alex.[50] and the author of the Dialogus[51]. Jerome, on the other hand, condemns the Latin reading, and the Syriac Versions are observed to approve of Jerome's verdict, as well as the Gothic. But what settles the question is the fact that every known Greek MS., except those three, witnesses against the omission: besides Ambrose[52], Jerome[53], Eusebius[54] Alex., Gregory[55] Naz., Asterius[56], Basil[57], Ephraim[58] Syr., Chrysostom[59], and Cyril[60] of Alexandria. Perplexing it is notwithstanding to discover, and distressing to have to record, that all the recent Editors of the Gospels are more or less agreed in abolishing 'the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table.' [The foregoing instances afford specimens of the influence of accidental causes upon the transmission from age to age of the Text of the Gospels. Before the sense of the exact expressions of the Written Word was impressed upon the mind of the Church,--when the Canon was not definitely acknowledged, and the halo of antiquity had not yet gathered round writings which had been recently composed,--severe accuracy was not to be expected. Errors would be sure to arise, especially from accident, and early ancestors would be certain to have a numerous progeny; besides that evil would increase, and slight deviations would give rise in the course of natural development to serious and perplexing corruptions. In the next chapter, other kinds of accidental causes will come under consideration.] FOOTNOTES: [50] P. 232. [51] _Ap._ Orig. i. 827. [52] Ambrose i. 659, 1473, 1491:--places which shew how insecure would be an inference drawn from i. 543 and 665. [53] Hieron. v. 966; vi. 969. [54] _Ap._ Mai ii. 516, 520. [55] i. 370. [56] P. 12. [57] ii. 169. [58] ii. 142. [59] i. 715, 720; ii. 662 (_bis_) 764; vii. 779. [60] v^{2}. 149 (luc. text, 524). CHAPTER IV.