Another very original suggestion of Dr. Briggs’ which would be helpful if we could accept it, is that we are not tied down to the chronological order of the Gospel as we have it, but that this too is due to the later editor, who has arranged the sections of his narrative rather according to subject than to sequence in time. I am prepared to allow that the narrative may not be always strictly in the order in which the events occurred; and it is true that there are some difficulties which the hypothesis would meet. At the same time we cannot but notice that the order is by no means accidental, but that attention is expressly drawn to it in the Gospel itself; see (e. g. ii. 11, iv. 54, xxi. 14). And some incidents seem clearly to hang together which Dr. Briggs has divided[12] (e. g. i. 29, 35, 43, where the connexion is natural historically, as well as expressly noted by the Evangelist). I fear that the learned Professor is seeking in a wrong direction for a solution of the problem of the Gospel. But I would be the last to undervalue the vigorous independence and the fearlessness and fertility in experiment that are conspicuous in all his writings. Perhaps I should be right in saying a few words at this point about Professor B. W. Bacon of Yale. His view is not as yet (I believe) quite sufficiently developed in print for me to be clear how much he would refer to oral transmission and how much to a written source. He distinguishes three hands in the Gospel. I gather that the first would be that of the Apostle, but he as yet stands dimly in the background. Then comes the main body of the Gospel, without the Appendix. This is ascribed to John the Presbyter, whom—rather by a paradox—Professor Bacon would seek in Palestine and not in Asia Minor. Lastly there is the editor who works over the whole. The two articles lately contributed to the _Hibbert Journal_ (i. 511 ff., ii. 323 ff.)[13] are highly original, very incisive, and exceedingly clever. My objection to them would be that they are too clever. Professor Bacon has been to Germany, and learnt his lesson there too well. At least I find myself differing profoundly from his whole method of argument. The broad simple arguments that seem to me really of importance (Irenaeus, Heracleon, Polycrates, Tatian, Clement of Alexandria) he puts aside, and then he spends his strength in making bricks with a minimum of straw, and even with no straw at all (the argument from silence). 4. Uncompromising Rejection. I began by saying that the tendency towards _rapprochement_ which was characteristic of the eighties and nineties, gave way towards the end of the century, and has been succeeded in recent years by conspicuous instances of uncompromising denial, at once of the apostolic authorship of the Gospel and of its historical character. The names of Jülicher, Schmiedel, Wrede, Wernle, Jean Réville and Loisy are sufficient evidence of this.