The passage quoted (Isaiah xl. 3) belongs to that part of the book which our critic and his fellow critics have decided was predicted by some stray prophet, unknown to the world, to the Jewish people or the church. We prefer the statement of John the Baptist, and its indorsement by John the Apostle. The reader will now recall that we have already heard Matthew's corroboration of the testimony of John the Baptist concerning Isaiah's claim to this prophecy. (See Matt iii. 3.) In the gospel of the Apostle John he puts on record his personal testimony concerning the author of the book bearing Isaiah's name. Explaining the amazing unbelief of the Jews, he says (xii. 37, 38): "But though he (Jesus) did so many signs before them, yet they believed not on him: _that the word of Isaiah the prophet_ might be fulfilled, which he spake: "Lord, who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?" (R.V.) The reader will see that this inspired writer of the fourth gospel is quoting from Isaiah liii. 1, thus testifying to Isaiah's authorship. Our literary critics have decided that this chapter was forbidden ground to Isaiah, that, if we are to believe them, he had no connection with this prophecy. We are asked to believe that the author of this fifty-third chapter, the most minute and tender prophecy concerning the Messiah's sufferings for his people, and rejection by them, has dropped out of sight! We are asked to believe that the name of the prophet who gave this dramatic picture of what was to take place on Calvary seven hundred years later, has been lost in the fog of the passing centuries! We are asked to believe that the name of the author of the first thirty-nine chapters, the less important part of the book, has been preserved, but oblivion has overtaken the author of the book from the fortieth chapter to the end. The assumption is an affront to the intelligence of the ordinary reader of the Bible. It is an impeachment of the honesty of the authors of the gospels, which the unshaken faith of God's people can never concede. The reader can now sum up the testimony of Matthew, Mark (see i. 3, R.V.), Luke, John, and John the Baptist, all of whom with one voice contradicts the critics. We also prefer, with these witnesses, to discredit the men who are picking out clauses, verses and chapters here and there, and guessing them off to authors of their own invention, who have never been known or heard of. It is not sufficient for the critics to say that these New Testament authors knew better, but deferred to popular sentiment, based on tradition. That can not satisfy our estimate of them as God's divinely appointed teachers, chosen to make record of the momentous truth on which the salvation of a lost world hangs. Men, ready to lay down their lives for the truth, were not the men to play fast and loose with the Word of God, in deference to a supposed popular sentiment.