An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures

cæcos sequeris, ad easdem salebras offendisse. Est enim Græcum exemplar antiquissimum in Bibliotheca Vaticana, in quo diligentissime et accuratissime litteris majusculis conscriptum utrumque Testamentum continetur longe diversum a vulgatis exemplaribus. Mihi enim cum ab Stunica fuissem admonitus, rem perspicere, et libros conferre curæ fuit. Hoc autem exemplar omnium esse emendatissimum, cum ejus antiquitas declarat, et librarii diligentia, tum quod multum convenit cum vetere nostra translatione, quæ dubitari non debet, quin ex emendatissimo quoque exemplari conversa, et tradita nobis sit a majoribus. Cum igitur ad illius exemplaris fidem et quasi normam ceteri libri sint emendandi ac dirigendi, quid opus facto sit, ipse considerabis: sic enim habeto, raro vulgatam Græcorum editionem a veteri translatione nostra discrepare, discrepat autem, ut nosti sæpissime, ut a Vaticano illo exemplari non dissentiat. Ac ne teneam, trecentis sexaginta quinque locis scripturæ diversitatem adnotavimus." The list of the 365 places is not given in the printed letter.

To this letter Erasmus replied by one dated February 17. 1534, in which he says: "Quod scribis de Codice Græco, quem nactus es in Bibliotheca Pontificia tantopere cum Vulgata editione consentiente, vide ne inanem operam sumas. Constat enim, cum Græci fœdus inirent cum Ecclesia Romana, quemadmodum testatur Bulla, quæ dicitur Aurea, hoc quoque fuisse comprehensum in articulis, ut Græcorum codices, præsertim Evangelici, ad Romanam lectionem emendarentur, et in similes codices ipse incideram, cum primum ederem Novum Testamentum. Quare ex isto codice nihil est, quod possis judicare. Sed Græcorum lectio petenda est ex Græcis auctoribus, Athanasio, Basilio, Origene, Chrysostomo, Nazianzeno, Cyrillo."

It is part of the reply of Sepulveda to this letter which I have given in p. 108. 1, in which he shows that the Bulla Aura had contained no such clause, and that no decree of the Florentine Council could apply to an ancient MS. like the Codex Vaticanus.

In Erasmus's answer to Sepulveda, "V. Non. Jun. 1534," he says "Quod adducis Pontificia Bibliothecæ auctoritatem, acciperem; nisi exemplar, quod secutus est Franciscus Ximenius Hispan. Card. missum esset ex Pontificis Bibliotheca tamquam germanum. Atqui hoc fere convenit cum exemplaribus meis. Bullam auream nec ipse vidi. Cutbertus Episcopus Dulmensis vir apprime doctus mihi narravit cui credidi. De correctione codicum non dixit esse in bulla, sed aiebat idem mutationem Græcorum Codicum esse factam. Vidi et ipse codicem Evangeliorum ex Bibliotheca Capnionis [1 Evangeliorum, &c.], qui per omnia consentiebat nostræ editioni Latinæ, verum is erat recentior."

This information which Erasmus received must have been when he

But there are some verbal variations between that in Erasmus's works and that in

Sepulveda. Thus, nam quomodo poterant" in Erasmus, is "quomodo enim poterant in Sepulveda; "a sciolis scholia sæpe cum scripturis confundentibus” in one, is “ parum doctis scholia sæpe cum scriptura confundentibus;" and the date in Sepulveda is according to the Roman Calendar, "X, Kal. Jan." Thus easily did various readings arise.

wrote his annotations for his third edition. Thus, then, originated the notion of the Fœdus cum Græcis in an incorrect casual remark of Cuthbert Tonstall, Bishop of Durham; and this hint thus thrown out has haunted the domain of criticism like a phantom, so that after three hundred thirty and three years it still seems to possess a vitality which would not have been possible if the correspondence between Sepulveda and Erasmus had been rightly attended to.

P. 138. line 28. read, "The first and third of these editions have at the end tables of the variations;" for it seems that this table is not rightly added to the second: the titles and contents of them, however, are much confused.

P. 160. foot-note. It should be mentioned that the writer has now ascertained that it was not from beneath the Mosque of Omar at Jerusalem that the fragment of the Pentateuch came, but from beneath the Mosque of Amrou at Cairo. The error arose from a confusion of the two names.

P. 296, &c. To the Thebaic fragments mentioned, there should be added that in Zoega's "Catalogus Codicum Copticorum Manuscriptorum qui in Museo Borgiano Velitris adservantur," some fragments of the Apocalypse are printed; also there are Thebaic fragments introduced into the Egyptian Grammar of Tukius.

The work of Zoega also shows that there exists another fragment of T. of the Gospels, not edited or collated, containing part of St. Luke's Gospel in Greek and Thebaic; and that this or some other Thebaic copy does contain Luke xxii. 42, 43. commonly said to be absent from that version.

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