Page:A General Survey of the History of the Canon of the New Testament (7th edition, 1896).djvu/72

 4  from an examination of the records of the ante-Nicene Church, as long as they are compared with what might be expected at present, appear meagre and inadequate ; but in relation to their proper sources they are singularly fertile. This will be seen more clearly from the examination of one or two particulars, which bear directly upon the formation and proof of the Canon.

I. It cannot be denied that the Canon was fixed gradually. The condition of society and the internal relations of the Church presented obstacles to the immediate and absolute determination of the question, which are disregarded now, only because they have ceased to exist. The tradition which represents St John as fixing the contents of the New Testament betrays the spirit of a later age.

1. It is almost impossible for any one whose ideas of communication are suggested by the railway and the printing-press to understand how far mere material hinderances must have prevented a speedy and unanimous settlement of the Canon. The means of intercourse were slow and precarious. The multiplication of manuscripts in remote provinces was tedious and costly. The common meeting-point of Christians was destroyed by the fall of Jerusalem, and from that time national Churches