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    the Epistles /? Mr . Pprson is not the first who , overlooking the circumstances of his author , thus blames him for the want of sense or propriety . Jerome was surrounded with vigilant and jealous rivals ; and it was of importance to him to render prominent

    every advantage which he could give to his Version . Besides , he was now the advocate of the Pope ' s pre-eminence over the authority of the Greek Church ; and it was a stroke of policy to dwell on the superiority of St . Peter , of whom the Roman Pontiff claimed to be the representative . Mr .

    Porson , it seems , was a stranger to these things ; and it would have been well for his reputation , if he had not attempted to speak of them . As to the style , the correction of the Professor is scarcely worthy of a schoolboy . There are in this prologue , the

    same spirit , the same zeal and intrepidity ; and , finally , the same energy , point and pregnant brevity , which characterize his Epistles and other Prefaces . Jerome opposes himself to other translators , who had reversed

    the original order . To mark this opposition the pronoun nos was necessary ; this the Professor excludes , in his amended style , which shews that his head was so filled with forgery and interpolation , that he couLd not enter into the situation of the real writer .

    5 . The Professor proceeds : " It is also observable , that though the main drift v \ as to give currency to his fa ;^ vourite verse of the three Heavenly Witnesses , he is afraid to affirm directly that it was in the Greek MSS ., and

    only insinuates that falsehood in cautious and perplexed language He does not positively affirm that he Las restored the verse upon the authority of Greek MSS ., but in order to possess the reader with that belief , envelopes his meaning in a cloud of

    words . This objection will not seem of little weight to those who know that many persons will insinuate a falsehood , which they dare not assert in explicit terms . " Pp . 298 , 299 . Now , so far from there being any

    truth in this reasoning , the very manner in which the author of the prologue cites the authority of the Greek copies , places it , to my view , beyond the reach of forgery . Before Jerome commenced his great work , he held it out in explicit terms , that he was to

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    correct the Seventy interpreters by the original Hebrew , and the Latin Ver * sion of the New Testament by th £ Greek MSS . This was universally known to be his object ; and hence , in his book concerning the

    Ecclesiastical Writers , he says , V . Testameutum juxta Hebraeicum transtuli , Novum Graeeae fitlei reddidi . Now , let us look to his preface , addressed to Damasus in the beginning of the Gospels , as well as to the prolog \ ie before

    us , and what are we to expect ? An explicit declaration that he proceeded on the authority of Greek MSS ., or an implication that he did so , without directly asserting it ? Undoubtedly the latter : and a comparison of the two will shew that the address to

    Damasus and the prologue stand precisely on the same ground , and claim alike Jerome for their common author . On the other hand , if an interpolator inserted the text in Jerome ' s Version at some succeeding period , he would not have been , content merely to insinuate it , but must have directly asserted that he restored the verse on

    the faith of the Greek copies . Otherwise he would have had the audacity to commit a forgery without alleging , as common sense required , some direct show of authority to impose it as genuine on the world . 6 . " But if Jerome had told us that

    his Greek MSS . contained the three Heavenly Witnesses , he would have told a notorious falsehood . " P . 301 . This is coming to the question : and to this bold assertion I shall be content to oppose one fact which has been already developed . We have reason to believe that in the Council

    at Nice were assembled not fewer than two thousand and forty-eight bishops . These discussed the meaning of the text without calling its authenticity in question . The distance of this period from the death of John did not

    exceed 250 years ; and if not tl > e autograph of that Apostle , Greek MSS contemporary with all the Apostles , and certified with some or with all their ' signatures , must have been in the possession of the persons who

    subscribed the Nicene Cre ^ d . All these MSS ., a century afterwards , passed through the hands of Jerome , who perfectly knew the history and fate of the verse , which Grie&bacn and Person did not .

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    Ben David on 1 John v * 7- 217

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1826, page 217, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2547/page/29/