Of the sittings (including estimates for defective return)--
Established Church furnished 301,897, or 30 per cent.
Nonconformists 692,239, or 70 per cent.
It appears thus, that the Church had provided sittings for only 25 per
cent. of the population, while the Nonconformists had provided sittings
for nearly 59 per cent.
But how about attendance? According to Table B. of the Census of
Religious Worship, the greatest number by very far of attendants at the
services of the Established Church on the Census Sunday was in the
morning. The number was 100,953. If we add one-fourth to this number for
the absentees, we have 126,191, which represents 10·6 per cent., not
quite one in nine of the population.
But these facts, sufficiently remarkable as they are in themselves, give
really but an imperfect impression of the real magnitude of the anomaly
which exists in Wales. An Established Church is presumably a _national_
Church, and rests its claim to being established on the ground of its
being national. Above all, it ought to be _par excellence_ the poor
man's Church, as some of the friends of the English Establishment are
wont to allege, with what truth we pause not now to inquire, that theirs
is. But in Wales the Church is not only not national, but it is
anti-national; and the whole policy of its rulers for at least a hundred
and fifty years has been inspired by a prejudice as stupid as it was
mean against, the Welsh nationality and language. At present, of the
small remnant of the population which still remains within its pale, by
far the larger part are either English immigrants into Wales, or that
portion of the Welsh people which have become Anglified in their
feelings and tastes; and instead of being the poor man's Church, that of
Wales is emphatically and almost exclusively the rich man's Church.
There are scores, we might safely say hundreds of churches, in which, if
the clergyman's family and the squire's family, and their few dependents
and parasites were removed, there would be absolutely no congregation at
all.
Mr. Gladstone lamented, as members of the Welsh Church also sometimes
profess to lament, the want of accurate and trustworthy information as
to the real facts of the case as regards the several religious opinions
in Wales. But whose fault is that? There would be no difficulty
whatever, in a small country like Wales, in obtaining perfectly accurate
information as to the number of adherents to the church, if that body
were to follow the example of the principal Nonconformist denominations
in the Principality, who collect and publish periodically statistical
returns of the members of their churches, and the attendants at public
worship. But the clergy of the establishment, clinging tenaciously in
the face of notorious facts to the fond fancy that theirs is the
national church, however small a fragment of the nation really belongs
to it, decline to give us the number either of their communicants or of
those who habitually frequent their churches. We are driven therefore to
look for such incidental indications of the real state of the case as
may come within our reach. Some of these, however, are very
significant. In the National Society's report for 1866-7 there is a
return given of the number of persons attending Church Sunday Schools in
Wales. They amounted to 49,358, or 4 per cent. of the population. The
number found in Dissenting Sunday Schools, according to the printed year
books of the various denominations on the same year, was 351,128, or 29
per cent. of the population, thus showing the Church Sunday scholars to
be one-eighth of the entire number. These returns are all the more
valuable, because in Wales it is not the children merely that attend the
Sunday schools, but a very large proportion of the adult population
also.
Very striking revelations have been made, likewise, in connection with
Day Schools in Wales, tending to throw much light on the actual and
comparative strength of the church. When the committee of Council on
Education began to make grants for the erection of schools, there was a
great rush of applicants from the friends of the Established Church in
Wales. They had many advantages in their favour for undertaking the work
of establishing Day Schools. They had nearly the whole land and a great
proportion of the wealth of the country in their possession. As they
drew the means for the support of their clergy, the fabrics of the
church, and public worship--which the Dissenters had to provide out of
their own pockets--from the national endowments, they had all their
resources at liberty to devote to the work of education. The
administrators of the national fund were their partial friends, and
dispensed it with a lavish profusion, with little or no inquiry into the
fitness of those who applied, to direct and control the education of
such a population as that of Wales. The National Society, as already
shown, made an appeal, which was liberally responded to, for a special
fund in which the co-operation of England was solicited, to promote 'the
education of our fellow-countrymen throughout Wales in the principles of
our common church.' Our friends of the Establishment, moreover, were
restrained by no scruple whatever from receiving public money to any
extent for teaching their own peculiar tenets in day schools, while the
Dissenters conscientiously refused the proffered grants of Government
aid for religious instruction. This sudden access of educational zeal
sprang avowedly in great part from proselyting motives. The Bishop of
St. David's, in one of his early charges, adverting to the peculiar
condition of the Principality, confessed that the existing generation
was hopelessly alienated from the church, but that the next could and
must be recovered by attending to the education of the young. The result
of this effort was that State-aided Church schools sprang up in all the
larger towns and villages, and in many remote hamlets, and that often in
places where there were not half-a-dozen church children.[167] In these
schools the principles of the National Society were rigidly enforced.
All the children were taught the Church catechism, and obliged to attend
church on Sundays. But State-aided schools were liable to inspection,
and the inspectors had to present their reports to the Committee of
Council, and these were laid before Parliament and the public. It was
not possible, therefore, in reporting on the state of education in
Wales, wholly to conceal the fact, that an enormous majority of the
people held religious views different from those held by the class who
in many places had undertaken to direct their education. This has often
come out in the reports of even Church of England Inspectors. Thus the
Rev. Longueville Jones, who was inspector of Church schools in Wales in
1854, says:--'The number of children in Welsh schools whose parents
belong to the Church is so very small, that it requires great experience
and delicacy of feeling to treat their young minds as they should
be.'[168] As an illustration of the difficulty with which this gentleman
had to contend, it is only necessary to refer to the statistics he gives
of one school under his inspection, in which out of 107 children, only
five were of parents belonging to the Church, whilst in the following
year the same school contained 144 children, of whom two only were of
church-going parents. To come down to a later period in the report of
the Rev. S. Pryce, Inspector of Church of England Schools for Mid-Wales,
for 1868, we find the following admission:--'The number of children
attending the Welsh country schools I visit, is great beyond all
proportion when compared with the number of persons attending
church.'[169]
Among the inspectors of British schools in Wales was and is Mr. J.
Bowstead. We believe that Mr. Bowstead is himself a churchman. But he is
a liberal and candid churchman. When, therefore, in the discharge of his
office, he began to visit the country, some eighteen or twenty years
ago, he was forcibly struck with the singular anomaly he found to exist,
of a large number of Church schools in some cases liberally subsidized
from the public funds, and in others supported by deductions from
workmen's wages, planted among a population of Dissenters, who felt the
strongest repugnance to much of the religious teaching forced on their
children in such schools. He had the courage in his reports to expose
this injustice, for which he has been ever since the _bête noire_ of the
Welsh bishops and clergy, who often assail him with great acrimony and
conspicuous unfairness. But on the other hand, he has the satisfaction
of knowing that he has won the enthusiastic gratitude of a whole nation,
who owe to him, in a main degree, the exposure of a flagrant wrong from
which they had been long suffering, with little hope of deliverance.
Well, Mr. Bowstead, after extensive and careful inquiry, in order to
show the aggravated character of the anomaly of which he complained,
ventured to say that _nine-tenths of the common people_ in Wales were
Nonconformists. A writer in the April number of the _Quarterly Review_
has assailed him very angrily, and has accused him of 'asserting without
a shadow of proof that _nine-tenths of the Welsh people_ are
Nonconformists.' In a pamphlet issued for private circulation, Mr.
Bowstead has with just severity first rebuked his assailant for
perverting his words, and then shown how little foundation there is for
the charge of his having asserted without 'a shadow of proof,' what
alone he did assert, that nine-tenths of the common people of Wales, of
such people as use elementary schools, are Nonconformists. Now for the
proof of this allegation. When Sir John Pakington's committee was
sitting in 1865-6, Mr. Bowstead was one of the witnesses summoned to
give evidence. He had been asked to procure the best information he
could, as to the comparative numbers of children of church people and
children of Dissenters in the schools he visited. He had no difficulty
in getting at this from the school register, because the name of the
Sunday school which each child attends is entered in a column provided
for the purpose, a very satisfactory index of the denomination to which
its parents belong. And what was the result? He received returns from
thirty schools, 'which were the only elementary schools in their
respective localities. These thirty schools had an aggregate of 6,799
children under instruction, and of these 756 were returned as belonging
to the Church. The children of parents attached to the Church formed,
therefore, about 11 per cent. of the whole, and the children of
Nonconformists constituted the remaining 89 per cent. But Mr. Bowstead
supplies us with more recent evidence, which we give in his own words:--
'I have not on this occasion attempted to obtain returns
from so wide an area as in 1866; but I have secured very
complete and reliable returns, upon a considerable scale,
from a locality which embraces some 20,000 inhabitants, all
of whom are brought together by the industrial operations
of one large Company; and all of whose children, so far as
they belong to the working classes, receive their education
in schools promoted by that Company. The locality is
Dowlais, which in the matter of education is the Prussia of
South Wales. It has an admirable system of schools,
embracing not only unsectarian Protestant schools for the
bulk of the community, but also Roman Catholic schools for
the Irish. Nearly one-sixth of the whole population may be
found on the registers of these schools at any moment, and
I should think there is scarcely a child in the place that
does not receive some amount of schooling, whilst those of
them who stay long enough at school secure a very thorough
elementary English education, together with some
instruction in the French language and in drawing. I know
of no place where the schools reproduce so complete a
picture of the population around them, or where the free
play of all the social forces presents so true a type of
the characteristic features of the working men of the
district.'
Mr. Bowstead then subjoins a table showing the number of children
belonging to each denomination, in attendance at the Dowlais schools:
out of a total of 2,933, those belonging to the Established Church are
266. 'The Church children therefore would be almost 7·7 per cent., or
one-thirteenth of the whole, and the Nonconformists would claim the
remaining twelve-thirteenths. This gives a larger proportion to the
Nonconformists than any former return.' Accompanying this return there
is a letter from Mr. G. T. Clark, the manager of the Dowlais works,
containing two or three sentences which are of great significance and
value. In sending the tabular statement just referred to, Mr. Clark
remarks:--'The proportion of the several sects may, I think, be taken as
typical of the manufacturing population of South Wales and
Monmouthshire.' We must quote two or three other sentences from Mr.
Clark's letter:--
'I see a great deal is said about the disposition of the
Welsh Dissenters to allow their children to attend Church
schools. We have both Church and neutral schools in this
district, and I believe the Church schools of my friend and
neighbour the Rector of Gelligaer to be as good as any
semi-rural Schools in Wales, and they are largely attended
by the children of Dissenters. But this is not from love of
the Church, but because they desire education, and the
district has no other schools. The Welsh, in this respect,
like the Scotch, have a craving to get on, and they will
make a sacrifice to educate their children; and if the only
accessible school be a Church school, to it they will
apply. They trust and safely trust to the domestic example,
and to the Sunday teaching in the chapel, and chapel
school, to keep the children in the special faith of their
parents.... Those who say that the South Wales
manufacturing population have a regard for the Church of
England speak in utter ignorance of the matter. Their
dislike to the Church, as an establishment, is very strong,
and is yearly becoming stronger.'
It would be difficult to find a more competent and trustworthy witness.
Mr. Clark is himself an attached member of the Church of England. He is
a gentleman of rare intelligence, who has for many years been at the
head of one of the largest and best conducted of the great iron works of
South Wales. His knowledge of the population of the whole district is
extensive and accurate. His testimony therefore as to the comparative
number of Churchmen and Dissenters, and the feelings of the
Nonconformists towards the Establishment, must be held to be
unimpeachable.
But what is the comparative progress in accommodation for worship made
by the Church and the Nonconformists since the Census of 1851? We have
the materials for an approximate estimate. The Bishop of Llandaff, in
his last charge, delivered in August, 1869, states that since 1849, the
number of new churches erected in his diocese is thirty-nine, not quite
two churches in the year; and the number of churches rebuilt on the same
site, but whether enlarged is not stated, is thirty-six, making a total
of seventy-five. Against this we have to place the following return,
furnished to us in detail, but of which we can here give only a summary,
of what has been done in the same diocese by three Nonconformist bodies
since 1850:--
Number of new chapels built by the Independents 68
Number of ditto rebuilt and enlarged 46
-- 114
Number of new chapels built by the Baptists 66
Number of ditto rebuilt and enlarged 39
-- 105
Number of new chapels built by Calvinistic Methodists 52
Number of ditto rebuilt and enlarged 42
-- 94
---
313
Let it be observed that this showing includes only the three principal
Nonconformist denominations, as we have failed to procure returns of the
different bodies of Wesleyan Methodists and other minor sects, which
would make undoubtedly a considerable addition to the total increase of
dissenting accommodation. And yet how does the comparison stand even
with such incomplete elements as we possess? We find that the
Nonconformists have built 186 new places of worship against thirty-nine
built by the Church, and have rebuilt and enlarged 127 more against
thirty-six rebuilt by the Church.
With regard to the whole of Wales, our information as respects what the
Church has done during the last twenty years, is not so perfect as we
could wish. The number of new churches built in the four dioceses
appears, as nearly as we can calculate from the data within our reach,
to be about 110. But there is more difficulty in getting, at those
rebuilt and enlarged, as in one of the returns (that of St. Asaph) we
find churches 'restored' and 'improved'--words implying merely repairs
of existing fabrics without any additional accommodation--mixed up with
those which have been 'rebuilt and enlarged.' We have the precise number
rebuilt, and we are willing to presume somewhat enlarged, in Llandaff,
which is thirty-six, and in Bangor, which is thirty-one. We think it
would be a liberal allowance from the statistical report before us to
assign thirty-five 'enlarged' churches to St. Asaph, and judging by the
number of new churches built in St. David's, we presume that thirty
'enlarged' churches would cover all that has been done in that diocese,
making a total rebuilt and enlarged of 132. Let us now turn to the
Nonconformists. The following are facts on the substantial accuracy of
which our readers may rely. Since 1850, the Calvinistic Methodists have
built 321 new chapels, and have rebuilt and enlarged 435 more, providing
additional accommodation in all for 123,881 worshippers, at a cost of
£366,000. The Independents, during the same period, have built 118 new
chapels, and have rebuilt and enlarged 200 more, furnishing additional
accommodation for 130,000, at a cost of £294,000. The Baptists have
built 142 new chapels, and rebuilt and enlarged ninety-nine more,
furnishing additional accommodation for 81,800, at a cost of £163,000.
Thus, these three denominations alone have in twenty years built 581 new
chapels, and rebuilt and enlarged 734 more, providing accommodation for
308,681 persons, at a cost of £823,000.
But it must be further observed, that it is not merely in the matter of
religious instruction that the Nonconformists have become almost
exclusively the leaders of the Welsh people. As respects literature and
science, and all important social and political movements, it is the
same. The literature of Wales, and not its religious literature merely,
is almost wholly Nonconformist. There are about thirty periodicals,
quarterly, monthly, and weekly, at present published in the Welsh
language. Of these all but three are owned and edited by Dissenters.
There are nine commentaries on the whole Bible, and nine besides on the
New Testament alone, some original and some translated from English, and
only two of these were done by Churchmen, and even they were Dissenters
when they began their work. There are eight Biblical and Theological
Dictionaries, and as many bodies of divinity or systems of theology, and
no Churchman, we believe, has had a hand in the production of any one of
them. There is a History of the World, a History of Great Britain, a
History of Christianity, a History of the Church, a History of the Welsh
Nation, a History of Religion in Wales, all by Dissenters, besides
elaborate denominational Histories of the Calvinistic Methodists, the
Independents, the Baptists, &c. Indeed, all the ecclesiastical histories
in the language are Nonconformist, and all the general histories except
the History of Wales by the Rev. Thomas Price, and a small work called
the 'Mirror of the Principal Ages.' There is a valuable work illustrated
by many excellent maps and diagrams, entitled 'The History of Heaven and
Earth,' treating of geography and astronomy, by the Rev. J. T. Jones, of
Aberdare, formerly a Nonconformist minister. There is another large
geographical dictionary in course of publication by a dissenting
minister. There are two copious Biographical Dictionaries edited and
principally written by Dissenters. There is now, and has been for
several years, in course of publication an Encyclopædia in the Welsh
language (Encyclopædia Cambrensis), dealing as such works do with the
entire circle of human knowledge. It was described by the late
Archdeacon Williams, who had seen the earlier volumes, as 'a work of
great promise, as sound in doctrine as it is unsectarian in principle.'
It is studiously free from denominational taint, and was intended to be
a great national undertaking, the contributors being indiscriminately
selected from the ablest writers of all denominations, the combined
learning and talent of Wales being thus engaged in its preparation. The
enterprising publisher at the outset addressed a letter to all those
among his countrymen of whatever church or creed who had distinguished
themselves in any way by their literary acquirements and productions,
inviting their co-operation. We have now before us a list of the
contributors amounting to ninety names, and out of these ninety, there
are certainly not more than nine churchmen.
The English public has of late years become partially acquainted with a
remarkable institution existing in Wales, which has come down from very
ancient times, called Yr Eisteddfod, or the Session, meaning in its
primitive signification the Session of the Bards. Its object is to
encourage the cultivation of literature, poetry and music. The English
press has tried to throw great ridicule on this institution, as the
English press is wont to do, upon all institutions that are not English.
And yet surely, as the Bishop of St. David's has said, 'it is a most
remarkable feature in the history of any people, and such as could be
said of no other than the Welsh, that they have centred their national
recreation in literature and musical competitions.' Prizes ranging from
£1 to £100 are offered for the best compositions in poetry, prose, and
music. The highest honour bestowed by the Eisteddfod is the Bardic
chair, and the productions entitling the successful candidates to this
distinction are supposed to possess rare merit. There are now living
nine chaired bards, of whom one is a clergyman, seven are Nonconformist
ministers, and one a Nonconformist layman. In musical compositions, the
proportion would be about the same. And certainly the Welsh clergy of
the present day have not, any more than their predecessors,
distinguished themselves as authors. A catalogue of Welsh books
published within the last twenty years, would show a very beggarly
'account' standing to the credit of the official instructors of the
Welsh people.
Such are the past history and the present condition of the Established
Church in Wales. Surely no legislature with any sense of justice can
long refuse to deal with so anomalous an institution as that we have
described; a Church which has wholly failed, and is still failing, to
accomplish the only object for which it pretends to exist, from
which--and that entirely owing to its own criminal neglect--the great
body of the people are hopelessly alienated, and which has no vital
relation with the religions, political, social, or literary life of the
nation. And it is not merely a theoretical anomaly. It is an intolerable
practical grievance, and is becoming more and more so every day. For its
friends, numbering as they do nearly all the landowners and wealthy
classes, galvanized, of late years, into a sort of spasmodic zeal, which
is far more political than religious, are making frantic efforts to
regain for their Church the ascendancy it has so righteously lost, by a
very unscrupulous use of their wealth, their social position, and their
control over the land. The advocates of the Church, especially in the
English press, are trying to wreak their vengeance on a nation of
Dissenters, by traducing the character of the people, and ridiculing
their language, their literature, and their religious institutions; and
this they are not deterred from doing by their utter ignorance of all
three. Some of the Welsh clergy, also, exasperated by seeing their
pretensions contemned, and their ministrations forsaken, are propagating
the most monstrous calumnies against their successful rivals, the
Dissenting ministers. One Conservative journal in London has especially
distinguished itself by throwing its columns open to these anonymous
slanderers. Here are some of the flowers of speech that have been
plentifully scattered in its pages on the Welsh Nonconformists. 'The
Welsh language is made the instrument of evil by preachers and other
supporters of anarchy and plunder.' 'The people are actively taught to
commit arson and murder; they are regularly drilled into Fenianism.'
'Dissenting ministers are the curse of Wales; there is scarcely a sermon
or lecture they deliver that is not full of sedition.'
And yet the country whose population is thus systematically trained to
sedition and murder, is more free from serious crime than any part of
the United Kingdom; so free, indeed, that in many of the counties the
annual visit of her Majesty's judges is almost a work of supererogation.
Take as an example the county of Cardigan, which was the scene of the
most extensive and cruel political persecutions after the last election,
where about sixty tenants were evicted from their holdings, some of them
under circumstances of a singularly exasperating character. And yet at
the Assizes, that were held immediately after, there was not a single
prisoner to be tried. Mr. Justice Hannen, in charging the grand jury,
said 'that a perfectly clear calendar was a circumstance he had never
before met with since he had been on the bench, and he understood from
his brother judges that only in the Principality of Wales was such a
thing known, and that there it was frequent. Whether it was attributable
to race or to the influence of religious teaching he could not say, but
he felt deeply interested in the matter, and whatever might be the
cause, there was the indisputable fact, one of which the county of
Cardigan might well be proud.'
These insane efforts to drive or to drag the people back into the Church
by coercion and calumny, produce, of course, precisely the opposite
effect. Indeed the Conservatives, in their treatment of Wales, are
triumphantly vindicating their right to the title bestowed upon them by
Mr. Stuart Mill, as 'the stupid party.' Unhappily, however, they do
succeed in embittering the heart of the people, and in introducing
alienation and anger into their relations with the classes who are thus
tempted to tamper with their religious and political rights. And all
this is owing to the existence of an Established Church.
ART. VII. (1.)--_The Greek New Testament, edited from Ancient
Authorities, with the Latin Version of Jerome from the Codex Amiatinus._
By S. P. TREGELLES, LL.D. Matthew to Acts--Catholic Epistles--Romans to
Philemon. S. Bagster and Sons.
(2.) _Fragmenta Evangelica quæ ex antiqua recensione versionis Syriacæ
Novi Testamenti a Gulielmo Curetono vulgata sunt Græce reddita textuique
Syriaco editionis Schaafianæ et Græco Scholzianæ fideliter collata._
Pars Prima. J. R. CROWFOOT, S.T.B. Williams and Norgate.
It is difficult to estimate our unpaid obligations to the students and
scholars who have sacrificed their life to furnish us with the
common-places of our knowledge. The elaborate and prolonged effort, the
perseverance, ingenuity, and scientific skill often concealed in the
foundations of a great building or in the underways of a great city, are
no inapt illustration of the lifelong labours of those students and
votaries of literature who have placed in our hands authentic and
accurate copies of the _chefs-d'oeuvre_ of ancient thinkers. The
learned, patient, and devout men to whom we are indebted for our present
careful approximations to the text of the New Testament, have undergone
a species of toil which it is very difficult for those scholars even to
appreciate, who have never made the attempt to decipher a single MS. or
to gather around them the abundant and often conflicting evidence on
which the judgment of the critic really turns. Whatever be the ultimate
currency or acceptance of the text which Dr. Tregelles has offered to
the world as the result of his life-long effort, and granting that some
of the disadvantages under which he has suffered have left ineffaceable
marks on the greater part of the work, and that his main principles may
still be under judicature, yet we readily endorse the strong language of
Bishop Ellicott: 'The edition of Tregelles will last to the very end of
time as a noble monument of faithful, enduring, and accurate labour in
the cause of truth; it will always be referred to as an uniquely
trustworthy collection of assorted critical materials of the greatest
value, and as such it will probably never be superseded.'[170] The
Bishop does not regard Dr. Tregelles' text as the final one, but does
not hesitate to speak of it as far better than Tischendorf's, and as
furnishing material which no subsequent editor can afford to ignore.
With the exception of the text of the Apocalypse and of the appendices
rendered necessary by the progress of textual criticism since the
earlier portions of the work were published, this long-expected work is
now placed in our hands. The exception to which we have referred is, we
profoundly regret to say, occasioned by the serious indisposition of the
learned, laborious, and devout editor. The regret is to some extent
alleviated from a literary point of view by the circumstance that one of
the first contributions to Biblical science made by this conscientious
and accurate scholar was published in 1844, and entitled 'The Book of
Revelation in Greek, edited from Ancient Authorities, with a new English
Version and various Readings, by Samuel P. Tregelles.' There is this
difference, however, between the evidence alleged by Dr. Tregelles for
the text of the Revelation and that which he has pursued throughout the
elaborate work now before us, that in the former he was either content
or only able at that time to give the evidence of the few Uncial MSS.
and early versions, then known to contain the Apocalypse, with such
confirmation as they received from a large number of the Cursive MSS.
Although his object was to approximate as nearly as possible to the most
ancient text, his _apparatus criticus_ had not then reached the
proportions it has subsequently assumed, and he did not even attempt to
marshal the evidence of patristic quotations, or to give the arguments
_pro_ and _contra_ any reading that he deliberately adopted. The _Codex
Sinaiticus_ had not then been rescued from the Convent of St. Catherine
by the enterprising Dr. Tischendorf, and the system of careful notation
which is adopted in the _magnum opus_ now before us, had not been
elaborated. Since 1844, moreover, the Rev. Bradley Alford has published
a collation of the celebrated Cursive MS. 38, Dr. Delitzch has
discovered the MS. used by Erasmus, and a careful collation is promised
of the Codex Basiliensis, which Dr. Tregelles proposes to call Q,
instead of adopting the old and confusing symbol B, which has led some
to identify it with _the_ Codex Vaticanus. The introduction to the
interesting volume on the text of the Book of Revelation was expanded in
1854 into a goodly octavo entitled 'An Account of the printed text of
the Greek New Testament, with remarks on its revision upon critical
principles, together with a collation of the critical texts of
Griesbach, Scholz, Lachmann, and Tischendorf with that in common use.'
We know no work on biblical criticism more charged with well-digested
information, and none which reveals a more extensive literary
enterprise, than that which is here recorded. Dr. Tregelles tells us in
the preface to his Greek Testament, that this work contains a detailed
exposition of the principles he holds and the studies in which he has
been engaged, and as his editors earnestly request that it be referred
to in explanation of the principle adopted by Dr. Tregelles, it is
almost incumbent upon us to remind our readers of its contents and
spirit. In the appendix to section 13, occurs a brief and modest sketch
of the extensive and continuous labours of this great student of the New
Testament text. It appears that he commenced his research simply for his
own satisfaction. The text of Dr. Scholz, based so largely on the
consensus of later MSS. but revealing the small group of Alexandrian
authorities and most ancient witnesses in opposition to the text adopted
by him, first called Dr. Tregelles to a consideration of the fact that
these most ancient but rejected testimonies were curiously confirmed by
the older versions. He was thus led to conceive of the creation of a
text entirely based on the authority of the most ancient copies. He did
not even know that Lachmann in 1838 had already made his celebrated
though imperfect attempt to produce the text of the first four centuries
in entire or professed independence of the later authorities and of the
received text. When the Codex Amiatinus of Jerome's Latin Version was
collated and published by Fleck in 1840, Tregelles found it confirm, in
opposition to the Clementine Vulgate, the oldest Greek readings. In
preparing his work on the text of the Revelation, he found it necessary
to collate the Uncial MSS. with his own hand. In 1845 he collated the
Codex Augiensis (in Trinity Coll. Camb.). Though he visited Rome for
the purpose of collating the celebrated _Codex Vaticanus_ he was
prevented from copying unless it were surreptitiously on his
thumb-nails, a single reading. We formerly gave to our readers[171] a
full account of the various imperfect collations made by Birch,
Bartolocci, and Cardinal Mai, and also of the edition which has recently
been published under the auspices of Dr. Tischendorf. In the greater
part of Dr. Tregelles' critical labours he has been compelled to trust
to the faulty and otherwise divergent collations which preceded Dr.
Tischendorf's edition; but while he was deprived of the personal
advantage of investigating Codex B for himself, he did collate at Rome,
with his own hand, the Codex Passonei, and at Florence the Codex
Amiatinus of Jerome's Latin; and at Modena, Venice, Munich, and Basle,
other Uncial MSS. of considerable portions of the New Testament. Many of
these were used by Tischendorf in his second Leipsic edition of the
Greek Testament.
Dr. Tregelles became acquainted in 1849 with the remarkable Syriac
fragment which Dr. Cureton found among the MSS. brought from the Nitrian
monasteries and deposited in the British Museum. This mutilated fragment
contains portions of the four Gospels--Matt. i.-viii. 22; x. 31-xxiii.
25; Mark xvi. 17-20; John i. 1-42; iii. 6-vii. 37; xiv. 11-29; Luke ii.
48-iii. 16; vii. 33-xv. 21; xvii. 24-xxiv. 44; but in the opinion of the
best Syriac scholars, it is older than the Peshito, and would seem to
have been collated with the Greek by the translator of the Greek
Testament into Syriac (Peshito). Dr. Cureton supposed that it represents
a first translation from the original Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, but Dr.
Davidson has we think conclusively proved that it is a translation from
the Greek. Dr. Cureton conjectured that sundry curious blunders or
deviations from the canonical Matthew are due to the mistakes made by
the translator of the Hebrew into Syriac. These conjectures are
ingenious but perfectly gratuitous. Dr. Davidson has shown that in a
variety of places the Curetonian Syriac (as it is called) differs from
the early Greek text by the obvious blunder between two _Greek_ words of
similar appearance. We have been rather explicit on the matter of this
valuable witness to a very early text, not only because Dr. Tregelles
and others have made constant reference to it, but because the second
work which we have placed at the head of this article is a translation
into Greek of the first part of these precious fragments, and is,
moreover, a collation of every reading with Scholz's text, and with
Schaaf's edition of the Peshito. This critical effort of Mr. Crowfoot
will be of real service to the student who is not familiar with Syriac,
and who wishes to see for himself the singular deviations of this text
from the Textus Receptus. Take _e.g._ the additions made to the text of
Matthew in chap. xx. 28, where a passage resembling one in Luke vii. is
introduced. The Cur. Syriac here is sustained by the Codex D. Very
frequently, however, it corresponds in its omissions with the most
ancient MSS. and with the old Latin, as in Matt. xx. 22, 23. It is
profoundly interesting, moreover, in that it retains of Mark's Gospel
only a portion of the very closing passage, which is not to be found in
Codex B. or in [Hebrew: Aleph]. Partly in consequence of this testimony
Dr. Tregelles leaves the passage as an authentic appendix to the text of
the Gospel of St. Mark. We see that Mr. Crowfoot and Dr. Tregelles
sometimes differ, as we might expect them to do, as to the Greek
equivalent which they suppose most likely to have been the exemplar of
the Syriac, but they do not seriously differ as to the testimony it
bears to a particular reading. In Matthew xi. 23, the Textus Rec. reads
[Greek: kai sy Kapernaoum hê heôs tou ouranou hypsôtheisa, k.t.l.] Mr.
Crowfoot gives in place of [Greek: hê], [Greek: ouch]. Dr. Tregelles on
the authority of B, C, D, the Vulgate _a, b, c_, and Syr. Cur., gives
[Greek: mê], and makes the clause interrogative.
But to proceed with Dr. Tregelles' labours. The various collations made
by him need not be exhaustively enumerated, though special attention
should be called to the extraordinary effort and patience which was
required by him to form an accurate estimate of the readings of the
Codex Colbertinus, called 33 in the Gospels, and 13 in the Acts and
Catholic Epistles. The leaves of the vellum have been in places sodden
with damp and stuck together. The consequence was that when separated,
'the ink adhered to the _opposite_ page rather than to its own, so that
in many leaves the MS. could only be read by observing how the ink had
_set-off_, and thus reading the Greek words _backwards_.' At Paris,
Leipsic, Berlin, Dresden and Wolfenbüttel, Dr. Tregelles continued his
patient research, and came to such discoveries as that the Codex
Sangallensis ([Delta] of the Gospels), and Codex Boernerianus (G of St.
Paul's Epistles) were the severed portions of the same book. At Dublin,
the difficult palimpsest fragment (Z) was deciphered after submitting
the vellum to a chemical process, and Tregelles was able to restore the
portions which had been left blank in the edition of this fragment
published by Dr. Barrett.
Special reference may be made to the Codex, called Zacynthius and
designated [Xi], the property of the British and Foreign Bible Society.
This is almost an illegible parchment palimpsest, containing
considerable portions of Luke's Gospel. The readings of this old
lectionary have been carefully noted by Tregelles and are cited
throughout his text of the Gospel of Luke. The Codex Leicestrensis, the
property of the Town Council of Leicester, has been also carefully
collated by our author, as well as by Mr. Scrivener. It is cited as 69
in the Gospels, 31 Acts, and by other numbers in remaining portions of
the New Testament.
Dr. Tregelles has not paid _much_ attention to the mass of cursive MSS.
It is not fair to accuse him of utterly neglecting them, when he has
gone through the laborious work of collating specimens of cursive MSS.
in each of the divisions of his subject. He has, however, placed far
more confidence in another class of authority and of evidence. The most
ancient versions have been thoroughly noted by him in their several
codices. The old Latin is carefully studied throughout; the Codex
Amiatinus of Jerome's Latin is published in the volume before us, with
all the deviations from it in the Clementine Vulgate. The Peshito and
Harcleian Syriac versions, the Cureton fragments, the Jerusalem
Lectionary, the Memphitic and Thebaic (sometimes called the Coptic and
Sahidic) versions, the Ethiopic and the Gothic, are used throughout this
edition of the Greek Testament. A considerable number of uncial MSS.,
which have been published in facsimile or in a printed text, Dr.
Tregelles has copied with his own hand, and all the rest of the uncial
MSS. he appears to have also collated with his own hand. Having gone
through this extraordinary labour, he has proceeded to give the text of
the New Testament on the authority of the oldest MSS. and versions, and
with the aid of the earliest citations, so as to present the text of the
fourth century. He does not hesitate to deviate from these ancient
testimonies, when they agree in transcriptural error; and he confers
this great advantage on the student, that he states in every case the
authorities on both sides with reference to any disputed reading.
Now there has often been expressed on the part of the advocates of the
cursive MSS. and the Constantinopolitan group of MSS. and of the later
uncial MSS., the conviction that their consensus ought to outweigh the
strong and clearly expressed testimony of the ancient MSS. on the
plausible supposition that the existing later MS. _may_ be the copies
of an older text than that of any existing MS. whatever. Now if Dr.
Tregelles or Dean Alford or Dr. Tischendorf had been mere slaves of the
few uncial MSS. of great antiquity which are extant, and had no further
or corroborative testimony to add in favour of the readings, or the
additions and omissions they have affirmed, there would be much justice
in the protest sometimes raised; but neither of them can justly be
charged with this, and Dr. Tregelles must certainly be acquitted of such
prejudice. He and Dean Alford do indisputably and notoriously differ in
certain cases where subjective reasons and considerations of the
exercise of personal discretion must assume great importance; and in
some of these doubtful and difficult cases Tregelles has been more
influenced by diplomatic considerations, and has more readily yielded to
authority, than Dean Alford; but Dr. Tregelles has stated very acutely
and powerfully his reasons for trusting the ancient MSS., even in these
difficult readings. Let the following phenomena to which he is able, in
most cases, to add the unexceptionable evidence of his own personal
observation and collation, be considered. (_a_) The uncial MSS. are now
known and have been at length collated with such care that we may be
certain of their testimony. (_b_) The palimpsests which have been
recently found and deciphered confirm the readings of the oldest
codices. (_c_) The great discovery of the Sinaitic Codex throws in its
testimony against the bulk of the cursive MSS. (_d_) The Curetonian
Syriac of the Gospels agrees with the oldest MSS. (_e_) Certain cursive
MSS. (such as Codex Colbertinus of the 12th century) agree with the
ancient text rather than with the bulk of the cursives, thus providing a
class of exception which proves the rule. (_f_) There is agreement of
the ancient versions with this older text; and (_g_) not infrequently
there is the express testimony of early patristic writers to the
existence of such a text in their day. Now the principle that Dr.
Tregelles takes great pains to establish is as follows,--While there are
certain readings sustained by the great majority of recent MSS.,
divergent readings of the same passages can be proved to have been in
existence long before the existence of these MSS., by the evidence of
the earliest MSS. of the old Latin version, by the Syriac and other
translations, and by the deliberate discussion of the very peculiarities
in question by some earlier writer like Origen. Now, even if there were
no uncial MSS. which confirmed such divergence, this would constitute a
presumption in favour of such a divergence, if some adequate
explanation could be found of the commonly received text. But, if in
addition to these testimonies, a considerable number of the most ancient
uncial MSS. confirm such readings, then Tregelles urges the adoption of
them as an approximation to the true text. Thus, take his elaborate
argument in favour of the reading of Matt. xix. 17, [Greek: ti me erôtas
peri tou agathou? heis estin ho agathos]. This alteration was first made
by Griesbach and sustained by Lachmann, and adopted subsequently by
Tischendorf and Alford, though condemned by Mr. Scrivener on the ground
of the numerical poverty of the evidence, and because it evinced
theological zeal for the honour of the Incarnate Son. It is interesting
to find, since the judgment of these recensionists was deliberately
given, that the final recension of the Vatican MS. and the testimony of
the Sinaitic MS. have arisen to defend it. The evidence for the
existence of this text in the fourth century, or indeed before the time
of Origen, and before the existence of _Cureton Syriac_, just proves,
according to Tregelles, that it is safe 'to take the _few_ documents
whose evidence is _proved_ to be trustworthy, and to discard the
eighty-nine ninetieths of the evidence shown thus to be less valuable.'
One result of his comparative criticism is, 'that as certain MSS. are
found by a process of inductive proof to contain an ancient text, their
character as witnesses must be considered to be so established, that in
other places their testimony deserves peculiar weight;' and still
further--'that the ancient MSS. were not exceptional documents, because
they contain readings which we learn elsewhere to have been both ancient
and widespread.'
One great advantage in Dr. Tregelles' New Testament is, that he not
merely states but cites the authority of the patristic writers to whom
he appeals, and by a somewhat elaborate notation enables the reader at a
glance to see how his uncial MSS. and principal versions are serving
him, and where all the _lacunæ_ begin and end.
We proceed to give some further account of the contents and
peculiarities of this great work. Dr. Tregelles and Dr. Alford agree in
the great majority of cases where they differ from the received text,
although in some instances they have not with the same facts before
them, come to the same conclusion. _E.g._, both call attention to the
fact that in John vi. 51, the clause [Greek: hên egô dôsô] is omitted by
B, C, D, L, T, 33, the Latin versions, the Cur. Syriac, Thebaic, and
Æthiopic versions, and by many Fathers, and Alford even mentions a
longer list of such omissions than Tregelles, but Alford allows the
_homoioteleuton_ just above, to be a sufficient explanation of the
original omission in the text, and retains the clause: Tregelles strikes
it out, making the verse read thus, 'and the bread which I will give for
the life of the world is my flesh.' Since their discussion, the Sinaitic
MS. confirms Tregelles, by not only omitting the clause, but altering
the order of the words. This alteration of order may confirm Dean Alford
in his continued insertion of the clause, though we think Tregelles is
in the right. Through whole chapters of the Gospels, Acts, and Epistles,
these two recensionists may be said to agree _verbatim et literatim_,
and to have come precisely to the same conclusions: still a few
specimens of their divergence may explain more fully than a more
elaborate analysis, the character of their work. In John viii. 41,
Alford prefers the less comprehensible form [Greek: gegennêmetha], to
the form [Greek: egennêthêmen], on the ground of the possible alteration
of the tense to the more usual form. We do not think that Tregelles has
acted here on his own principles, for he shows that versions and
citations defend the former rather than the latter reading. In John
viii. 54, they differ again as to the preferable character of the
readings [Greek: hêmôn] or [Greek: humôn], 'our God' or 'your God,' and
here Tregelles defends the reading [Greek: hêmôn] with a great array of
evidence; see also ch. ix. 4, where [Greek: hêmas dei ergazesthai
k.t.l.] is given as preferable to the [Greek: eme dei k.t.l.], and
largely on the ground that Origen must have been acquainted with this
obscure text, and tried to interpret it. In each instance a theological
zeal might have provoked a copyist to the ordinary readings. Throughout
the ninth chapter of the Acts, where the received text has passed
through so fiery an alembic, Alford and Tregelles agree, we believe, in
every word, with one exception, and that is the word [Greek: epeirazen]
is preferred by one to the [Greek: epeirato] of the other in v. 26. Here
strong uncial authority governs Tregelles, and the disposition to prefer
the less usual or less common form has influenced Dr. Alford. In Romans
v. 1, the celebrated reading [Greek: echômen] in place of [Greek:
echomen] is preferred by Tregelles. Alford still has doubts about it,
from the indecision of MSS. in their modes of spelling certain vowel
sounds. The quotations from Origen and Tertullian are decisive of the
existence of such a text in their day, and the array of versions is
strongly confirmatory of the seven uncials and two cursives that are
quoted for it. We need scarcely say, that Tregelles gives his powerful
authority in favour of [Greek: hos], rather than [Greek: theos], in 1
Tim. iii. 16, and rejects the reference to the three heavenly witnesses
in 1 John v. 7; but in spite of the authority of Tischendorf's collation
of B and of [Hebrew: Aleph], and other authorities in favour of the
received text, he gives [Greek: kyriou] instead of [Greek: theou] as the
preferable reading of Acts xx. 28.
Our author is strongly moved by the citations of Origen, and
consequently places in his margin as the alternative reading in Heb. ii.
9, [Greek: chôris theou] by the side of [Greek: chariti theou]. It is
clear, from no fewer than seven citations of Origen, he must have had a
MS. before him with this startling statement, 'that Jesus on the behalf
of all without (or in the absence, or hiding of) God might taste death.'
The only MS. authority for such a reading is the uncial fragment called
M of the tenth century, so that we are surprised to see the high place
given to it in Tregelles' margin. Dr. Tregelles, in the wealth of
material at his disposal, sometimes almost travels into the region of
the exegete, as in the long note upon Rom. ix. 5, where he gives eight
or nine quotations from Greek and Latin Fathers, to show the sense in
which they took the phrase, [Greek: ho ôn epi pantôn theos eulogêtos eis
tous aiônas] as not divided from the [Greek: ho christos] which
precedes. It may be added, that he retains [Greek: en Ephesô] in the
text of Eph. i. 1, thus preserving the traditional character of this
Epistle as one addressed not to Laodiceans or any group of Asiatic
churches, but to the church at Ephesus.
Dr. Tregelles and Dean Alford differ slightly in 1 Cor. iii. In the
fifth verse, [Greek: ti oun estin Apollôs] is preferred to the [Greek:
tis] of the Receptus, by Tregelles, while Alford sustains the latter.
Tregelles has given the adjectives [Greek: chrysion] and [Greek:
argyrion] in v. 12, in place of the [Greek: chryson], [Greek: argyron];
and [Greek: ethêka] to the commoner [Greek: tetheika] and of v. 10. Here
Alford seems to have the weight of evidence in favour of his view,
though doubtless the _aorist_ gives the finer sense, and makes the truer
affirmation 'I laid,' rather than 'I have been laying the foundation.'
He leaves [Greek: Agar] in brackets in his text of Gal. iv. 25. So also
he deals with the [Greek: eikê] of Matt. v. 22. The [Greek: baptisantes]
of Matt. xxviii. 19, given on the authority of the doubtful recensions
of the Vatican MS. is most unsatisfactory. Tischendorf, who gave it in
some of his earlier editions, has returned to [Greek: baptizontes]; and
probably Dr. Tregelles will show us in his appendix that he has done the
same, as [Hebrew: Aleph] agrees with all the uncial MS. here in the more
grammatical reading. We will not further trouble our readers with
details. These will suffice for a specimen. Every page presents at a
glance the presence of the entire group of MS. versions and fragments
collated by the author, and the whole is printed with extreme beauty of
type and arrangement.
In conclusion, we express our profound sense of the obligation under
which the accomplished and persevering editor has laid every student of
the New Testament. There is a fulness and richness of material placed
here by him, at the disposal of those who are utterly precluded from
this kind of investigation. The work is done so conscientiously and
laboriously, that great confidence is inspired in the accuracy and
reliableness of the information thus harvested for general use. The
principles on which Dr. Tregelles has toiled, are so clearly put, and
for the most part so patiently applied, that they command hearty
respect, if not general assent. Such work as this is necessarily
provisional, and cannot be regarded as final. The discovery of the
Sinaitic codex and the recent collated edition of the Vatican MS. since
the commencement of Tregelles' enterprise, is sufficient proof of this;
and until the promised appendices appear we cannot tell to what extent
this circumstance may have modified the text of our author. It is
inexpressibly affecting that the labour of nearly forty years should be
arrested when the patient, true-hearted scholar had just reached, as we
understand, the last chapter of the Revelation, and that he should be
suffering not only from prostration of strength, but be smitten in that
very organ of vision which he had consecrated so lovingly to his
Master's service. We can only deplore and sympathize with such
disappointments as these. We are satisfied that we speak the universal
desire of his collaborateurs, and of his rivals, in this lofty field of
work, when we express the earnest hope that he may yet be spared to
complete his labours, and to see the effect of them in the deeper
reverence paid by his contemporaries to the Word of the living God.