of Theophrastus, Bibiana in doμxolania. The objection almost exclusively affects two clauses, in which the embarrassment of the structure bears internal marks of having grown out of a correction; and seems to have originated in an effort to give greater emphasis to the sense, as it occurs in two points, where the author is employed in enforcing the main object which he undertakes to establish. Thus, if we suppose him, with this object in view, to have first declared, "ut primæ sint Petri epistolæ in ordine cæterarum," but on perceiving the necessity of a qualification, to have added quia Petrus primus est in numero Apostolorum;" the two propositions, which are wholly unexceptionable when taken apart, implicated the construction, on being combined in the phrase, "ut quia Petrus primus est numero Apostolorum, primæ sint etiam ejus epistolæ in ordine cæterarum." Again, if we suppose" proprio ordini reddidimus" to have been connected with "Jacobi una, Petri dua, Johannes tres, Judæ una," but the interjected phrase, "est enim prima earum," to have been added, in order to enforce the main purpose of the author, who assigns the precedence to St. Jerome's Epistle; we may form a just idea, how the structure has become embarrassed, in the phrase, "Est enim prima earum una Jacobi, &c."

Having taken so much pains to enable the oppugners of the disputed prologue to understand it, I am exempted from the weary task of entering with equal minuteness into the objections, by which they have laboured to pervert its object and meaning. In proceeding to give them every consideration which they ean be thought to merit, I shall take them, as collected and methodised by Mr. Porson. His professed object, in entering on so beaten a topic, was "to collect what is scattered through many works, to dispose it in a better order, or set it in REMEMBRANCER, No. 42.

a clearer light;" in acquitting him. self of which profession, he is not to be denied the praise of having performed what he undertook, with that accuracy, clearness, and spirit, which will be in vain sought in any other, of the disputants, by whom the question has been agitated.

As a leading objection to the prologue, it is observed, that as "Jerome revised the Latin translation at the command of Pope Damasus, if he replaced the three Heavenly Witnesses at this revisal, why did he not then write his preface to inform the world of his recovered reading?" p. 289. Had the Preface, in which St. Jerome records this request, and states his compli ance with it, been read with but moderate attention, it would have anticipated this objection by the short answer, "hæc præsens Præ. fatiuncula pollicetur quatuor tantum Evangelia." From the correspondence of Jerome (Vide Epp. cii. ad Marcel, xxviii. ad Lucin. lxxxviii. ad Augustin) "written after Damasus was dead," it appears that the first part of the work, containing merely the Gospels, had been given to the world, and that the indifferent reception which it had met, had determined its author to withhold

the remainder.

But the request made by Eusto. chium to Jerome, once more to revise the Catholic Epistles and correct them from the Greek," is "a story that carries its own condemnation upon its forehead." p. 289. As a sufficient cure for the scepticism of the objector on this point, it is merely necessary to prescribe the exercise of reading the Preface to the Psalter, where he will find the request distinctly made; Paula and "Eustochium, after Pope Damasus was dead," requiring him

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once more to revise the translation, and correct it from the Greek," as new errors had grown up, by the culpability of transcribers. It is almost needless to observe, that Eustochium, who is represented as Y y

discrepancy have really nothing similar in sense or application to warrant a comparison, The former merely signifies," are commonly called Catholic," the latter properly means, are solemnly declared canonical;" the former is used by St. Jerome in specifying St. Peter's epistles, in a short sketch of his works, where it would have been absurd to use the term "canonical;" the latter, by the author of the prologue, in enumerating the seven epistles, where it would have been not less so, to have informed the reader, they were formally styled "Catholic." The objection has therefore no force or meaning, if it does not go to the length of asserting, that it was "the perfection of absurdity," or was at least inconsistent with St. Jerome's manner to have informed Eustochium that the seven epistles were solemnly declared canonical." But this will hardly be affirmed, as a grave council, not many years previously, had been at the pains to inform the Christian world, that "uncanonical books axavóniora Bißria ακανόνιστα βίβλια were not to be read, but only the Canonical anna póva rà xavonná,” directly inserting a Canon, which contains "the seven Catholic epistles, one of James, two of Peter, three of John, and one of Jude." As this last piece of information has been transferred, by a literal translation, into the prologue, it at least justifies a suspicion that both the terms, "catholic" and "canonical," which, by so lucky a chance, take their proper places in its title and text, have passed into it from the same source. And as St. Jerome has made some display of his knowledge on this subject, in informing us, that "the book of Tobias and the Pastor of Hermas are not in the Canon," a conjecture which happens to be right; as he has likewise quoted the second epistle of Peter under the simple title of "a canonical epistle," though its claims to this title were long disputed; the possibility at least may be admitted, that his was the

hand which has so skilfully transplanted both terms into their respective places. But nothing more than a bare possibility on this head, and that of the lowest kind, is necessary for the subversion of the objection. "If a prologue," it is continued, I containing such important information, had been constantly known and read, it must have been quoted." p. 296. I would gladly be informed where Jerome's prologues, or indeed any prologues to the Bible, have been quoted, unless in the controversy with Rufinus? But to estimate the value of this remark the objector has only to be heard to the end. With respect to "the important information" which it conveyed, on the main point in dispute, the text of the Heavenly Witnesses, we are first informed, that the author "is afraid to affirm that it was in the Greek MSS." (p. 298.); we are next assured that "it is apparent" from the prologue, "that most of the Latin copies wanted 1 John v. 7.” (p. 303.) and a direct charge is indeed brought in it, against "the unfaithful translators who omitted the witness of the Father, the Word, and the Spirit." Is it on these points, I would ask, that the prologue challenged quotation, while the text might be quoted from the Bible itself, without any impeachment of its authority deduced from the Greek or the Latin? But with a superior knowledge of Bede's predilections, it is enquired, "if universally acknowledged for Jerome's, how could Bede overlook it?" May I again ask, if the slight which is cast in it on the Western Church, in determining "the proper order" of the epistles, against her sentence, by an appeal to the authority of the Eastern,-if this insult, which was so keenly felt and resented by Martianay and Vallarsius, was that which recommended it to the notice of sq stubborn an advocate of the pre-eminence of the former Church as the venerable Bede; who was, it may be added, so impartial and adequate a

judge of her pretensions, as to have believed, for her sake, in "the Recognitions of Clement?" As "the important information" ascribed to the prologue consists neither in the support afforded by the Greek or the Latin to the Heavenly Witnesses, nor in the order ascribed to the epistles, where, may we beg to be informed, is it then to be discovered? But to ascertain what a reception it would have met had it presented itself from any quarter, in the form of a quotation, we have again only to attend to the objector. After having acknowledged, that it is appealed to by the Sorbonne Correcto rium, in the ninth century, upon the only point on which a Latin could find a decent pretext for quoting it, he thus deduces his conclusion: "this author seems to have been overburthened with judgment, for he says here some of the Greek MSS. are corrupted,' as St. Jerome observes."

Again, we are informed, "the style alone would determine this prologue not to be Jerome's," whose language is always spirited and perspicuous." (p. 297.) After receiving the benefit of this conjecture of the professor, let us now take, on the same point, the sense of the author. Having, at the time of writing this prologue, assured us in one place, that "as he has often attested he could not bear the labour of writing with his own hand;" and in another, that he would "endeavour to write by the hand of his notaries, that nothing might be wanting in the sense, though much was wanting in the language;" he thus expresses himself to Eustochium in the prologue to the twelfth book of the Commentary on Isaiah," this short preface I have dictated in confused language, tumultuario sermone dictavi, that what is contained in my papers may be disclosed, but the full emendation left to the reader."

The objector proceeds after the style, "to consider. the reasoning and connection," informing us, that

"the real Jerome could never have indulged himself in so silly a paral lel" as that expressed between cor recting the Gospels, and "such a trifle" as arranging the Epistles, that "he might have said, and ought to have said, ita et has, Deo juvante, Græcæ fidei reddidimus; which would have been a proper subject for his joy and piety." (p. 297.) All * this is worthy of its proposer, whose prerogative as the prince of verbal critics, far be it from a dull divine to question. But as some rebels against the authority of those literary: monarchs are obstinate enough to suppose, that the epithets chosen by the professor are happily suited to the task of collating letters and syllables; and that to consume a life in such labours, is, at best, mapi peixpa ordά; we who may claim a preference for "such a trifle" as that of digesting the doctrine, by adopting a better arrangement of the epistles, are not without authority to justify us in so "silly" a predilection. And whatever may have been Jerome's partialities on this subject, enough has been said elsewhere to evince that had he chosen the present place to express them, he must have imparted a secret of which Eustochium was long possessed, and which every reader might find in the preceding preface.

Of the same stamp with the preceding is the next exception to the reasoning and connexion; "that there is another ridiculous opposition" between the translators in rendering, and the Apostles in di gesting the original: nor could the objector "believe that Jerome would have used such language as Neque sermonum sese varietates impugnarent." (p. 299.) The full value of which objections, as proving the care and perspicacity with which this prologue has been reviewed, in its connection and language, may be easily found, on reverting to what has been already stated on both subjects..

But with some foresight of the result to which all his labour must

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come, he seems resolved in the last stroke to make sure of his man, and without any view to a substitute, levels it direct at the principle: "If ("such a piece of news as is told in the prologue") were false, Jerome would have affirmed it no less boldly, and called God to witness no less solemnly, than when he attested the miracle of his being whipped by angels," (p. 299.) Let it be premised that the text on which we are here presented with a comment, is a description of the consequences of protracted abstemiousness, of the effects of a fever produced by watching and fasting, and ending in mental abstraction. The reader who is thus informed, if he happens to have heard of the habits and propensities of Professor Porson, will not, I believe, dispute, that all this is in character, and that the subject is suited to the derision of the scoffer and drunkard;—who, without the insinuating address, possessed the obtrusive meanness of the parasite, which scarcely any insult could drive from the table, that he failed not to disgust with his low and swinish propensities.

Having gone thus minutely into, the evidence which may be advanced in favour of the disputed prologue, and which has been urged against it, I have only to observe, that the sophisticators of antiquity have performed their work so rudely as to be exposed to immediate detection. Of the compilers and editors of Jerome's works none have possessed the moderate share of skill necessary to dispose them in a proper order. His life is detailed without any regard to the natural succession of events, his correspondence disposed without respect to the chronological arrangement. The fabricator of a piece, professing to come from his hand, inust have consequently found himself destitute of the means of executing even a tolerable imitation. And every thing which presents

itself with such pretensions is answerable to this description, without any internal mark of Jerome's hand, and wholly destitute of manuscript authority. Let us suppose some fortunate sophisticator possessed of

address to surmount the former difficulties, and by what lucky accident can the latter be conceived to be placed in his power? Let us suppose he has succeeded in the composition of the piece; and how are we to account for its general reception in the copies of the author's works? How account for its admission into the copies of the Bible? If this be considered impracticable with a text which favours the par-" tialities of a Church, how is it to be reconciled with a piece which violates its prejudices? For that the disputed prologue has been attended with this consequence is obvious, from its effects on Martianay, Vallarsius, and Vitali, whom it has converted into oppugners, while they possessed the means of vindicating it from every objection. The reluctance which Cassiodorus manifests to enter into its doctrine respecting the arrangement of the epistles, sufficiently proves at how early a period the sense of the Western Church prevailed against it; and how widely this feeling has operated. may be collected from the conduct of Dionysius Exiguus with respect to the Canons of the Council, from which, the doctrine is adopted. In his translation of the acts of that Council, the sixtieth Canon, which is followed by the prologue, is wholly omitted with what other object than in deference to the Latin Church, cannot be imagined. Yet over these prejudices the prologue has triumphed, and while the Canon is omitted in the collection of the Councils, it maintains its place in the Vulgate.

I have the honour to be, &c.
FRED, NOLAN.