4. A copious fund of quotations is contained in some ancient treatises on particular subjects, in which all the authors who have handled the same topic are mentioned in the order of time.
5. Controversies, whether literary, political, or religious, have usually occasioned extensive quotations to be made from works of all classes; and, on the spur of an acrimonious disputation, many obscure facts have been adduced, which, by some circuitous connexion with other facts, have served to determine questions of literary history.
6. Among all the means for ascertaining the antiquity and genuineness of ancient books, none are more satisfactory or more complete than those afforded by the existence of early translations. Indeed, if such translations can be proved to have been made near to the time at which the author of the original work is believed to have lived, and if they correspond, in the main, with the existing text—and if they have descended to modern times through channels altogether independent of those which have conveyed the original work—and if, moreover, ancient translations of the same work, in several languages, are in existence, no kind of proof can be more perfect, or more trustworthy. In such cases every other evidence might safely be dispensed with. Ancient translations serve also the important purpose of furnishing a criterion by which to judge of the comparative merits of manuscripts, and by which also to determine questions of suspected interpolation.
Although the genuineness of by far the greater part of ancient literature is established by a redundancy of testimonies, such as those here described, there will of course be some few instances of works which, though probably genuine, are so destitute of external proof that they must remain under doubt; and there are also some few which, though probably spurious, possess just so much plausible proof of genuineness as serves to maintain a place for them on the ground of controversy. The two together, therefore, will yield some number of disputable cases. The controversies that have actually been carried on relative to such doubtful works have served to show the exceedingly small chance which any actually spurious work can have of escaping suspicion and detection. And thus these discussions furnish, implicitly, the strongest grounds for relying upon the genuineness of those works against which even a captious and whimsical scepticism can maintain no plausible objection.
CHAPTER IV.
THE ANTIQUITY AND GENUINENESS OF ANCIENT BOOKS MAY BE INFERRED FROM THE HISTORY OF THE LANGUAGES IN WHICH THEY ARE EXTANT.
A language is at once the most complete, and it is the least fallible of all historical records. A poem or a history may have been forged; but a language is an unquestionable reality. The bare circumstance of its existence, though it may long have ceased to be colloquially extant, proves, in substance, what it is which history has to communicate. If we did but possess a complete vocabulary of an ancient language, and if we were to digest the mass in accordance with an exact principle of synthesis, we should frame a model of the people that once used it—a model more perfect than any other monuments can furnish: and on this ground we need fear no falsifications, no concealments, no flatteries, no exaggerations. The precise extent of knowledge and of civilisation to which a people attained—nothing more and nothing less, is marked out in the mass of words of which they were accustomed to make use.
A language, if the comparison may be admitted, might be called a cast of the people who spoke it—a cast, taken from the very life; and it is one which represents the world of mind, as well as the world of matter. The common objects of nature—the peculiarities of climate—the works of art—the details of domestic life—political institutions—religious opinions and observances—philosophy, poetry, and art—every form and hue of the external world, and every modification of thought, find their representatives in the language of the people.
In any case, therefore, if we have a complete knowledge of a language—that is to say, of the words of which it consists—we possess a mass of facts by aid of which to judge of the claims to authenticity of every work in which that language is embodied. And if, in addition to a knowledge of its vocabulary, the laws of its construction also, and the nicest proprieties of its syntax and style are known; and if, moreover, the changes that have taken place from age to age in the sense of words, and in modes of expression, are understood, we then possess ample and exact data with which to compare any book that pretends to antiquity. A writer who employs his native language must be expected to conform himself to its usages; and we should find him adhering, more or less strictly, to the peculiarities of the age in which he writes: his vocabulary, moreover, will include that compass of words which his subject demands, and which the language affords.
It is true that such a degree of skill in a dead language may be acquired as may enable a writer to use it with so exact a propriety as shall deceive, or at least perplex, even the most accomplished scholars. But the difficulty of avoiding every phrase of later origin, and all modern senses of those words which are continually passing from a literal to a metaphorical meaning, is so great, as to leave the chances of escaping detection extremely small. Yet, as such a chance still remains within the range of possibility, this line of evidence cannot be reckoned absolutely conclusive, but must only be employed as subsidiary to those other evidences that bear upon questions of authenticity.
The minute changes which are continually taking place in most languages, and the history of which, when known, serves often to ascertain the date of ancient books, are of two kinds; namely, those which result necessarily from actual changes in the objects represented by words, and those which are mere changes in the use and proprieties of language itself.