And another from the Curetonian Syriac (St. Matt. xx. 28), which occurs under a worse form in D.

'But seek ye from little to become greater, and not from greater to become less. When ye are invited to supper in a house, sit not down in the best place, lest some one come who is more honourable than thou, and the lord of the supper say to thee, "Go down below," and thou be ashamed in the presence of them that have sat down. But if thou sit down in the lower place, and one who is inferior to thee come in, the lord also of the supper will say to thee, "Come near, and come up, and sit down," and thou shalt have greater honour in the presence of them that have sat down.'

Who does not see that there is in these two passages no real 'ring of genuineness'?

Take next some instances of lesser insertions.]

§ 6.

Conspicuous beyond all things in the Centurion of Capernaum (St. Matt. viii. 13) was his faith. It occasioned wonder even in the Son of Man. Do we not, in the significant statement, that when they who had been sent returned to the house, 'they found the servant whole that had been sick[349],' recognize by implication the assurance that the Centurion, because he needed no such confirmation of his belief, went not with them; but enjoyed the twofold blessedness of remaining with Christ, and of believing without seeing? I think so. Be this however as it may, [Symbol: Aleph]CEMUX besides about fifty cursives, append to St. Matt. viii. 13 the clearly apocryphal statement, 'And the Centurion returning to his house in that same hour found the servant whole.' It does not improve the matter to find that Eusebius[350], besides the Harkleian and the Ethiopic versions, recognize the same appendix. We are thankful, that no one yet has been found to advocate the adoption of this patent accretion to the inspired text. Its origin is not far to seek. I presume it was inserted in order to give a kind of finish to the story[351].

[Another and that a most remarkable Addition may be found in St. Matt. xxiv. 36, into which the words ουδε 'ο 'υιος, 'neither the Son' have been transferred from St. Mark xiii. 32 in compliance with a wholly insufficient body of authorities. Lachmann was the leader in this proceeding, and he has been followed by Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, and the Revisers. The latter body add in their margin, 'Many authorities, some ancient, omit neither the Son.' How inadequate to the facts of the case this description is, will be seen when the authorities are enumerated. But first of those who have been regarded by the majority of the Revisers as the disposers of their decision, according to the information supplied by Tischendorf.

They are (a) of Uncials [Symbol: Aleph] (in the first reading and as re-corrected in the seventh century) BD; (b) five Cursives (for a present of 346 may be freely made to Tischendorf); (c) ten Old Latin copies also the Aureus (Words.), some of the Vulgate (four according to Wordsworth), the Palestinian, Ethiopic, Armenian; (d) Origen (Lat. iii. 874), Hilary (733a), Cyril Alex. (Mai Nova Pp. Bibliotheca, 481), Ambrose (i. 1478f). But Irenaeus (Lat. i. 386), Cyril (Zach. 800), Chrysostom (ad locum) seem to quote from St. Mark. So too, as Tischendorf admits, Amphilochius.

On the other hand we have, (a) the chief corrector of [Symbol: Aleph](ca)ΦΣ with thirteen other Uncials and the Greek MSS. of Adamantius and Pierius mentioned by Jerome[352]; (b) all the Cursives, as far as is known (except the aforenamed); (c) the Vulgate, with the Peshitto, Harkletan, Lewis, Bohairic, and the Sahidic; (d) Jerome (in the place just now quoted), St. Basil who contrasts the text of St. Matthew with that of St. Mark, Didymus, who is also express in declaring that the three words in dispute are not found in St. Matthew (Trin. 195), St. John Damascene (ii. 346), Apollonius Philosophus (Galland. ix. 247), Euthymius Zigabenus (in loc), Paulinus (iii. 12), St. Ambrose (ii. 656a), and Anastasius Sinaita (Migne, lxxxix. 941).