Page:God and His Book.djvu/16

6 really are. Not one man in fifty thousand has had the leisure and the learning to con over the ancient MSS. and codices, and to determine for himself which writings are divine and which human. Even if God did give man a written revelation, one thing is certain—we have either never seen that revelation, or, when we do see it, we fail to clearly distinguish it from the mass of ancient writings of a similar character with which it has got inextricably mixed. For our Bible, such as it is, we are indebted to the wranglings of the Fathers and the laborious plodding of subsequent pedants. We are entirely at their mercy, and they are at deadly variance among themselves, not only as to certain books which are altogether rejected, but as to which passages are inspired and which are not in the books that have been accepted.

In finding out what the Ghost actually has written, the difficulty of the task becomes more formidable every attempt we make to undertake it. Certain books of the Bible quote from books and records which no longer exist. Were these books and records also inspired? If not, how can portions of books which are not inspired form any portion of books which are inspired? If the Holy Ghost were to quote from the Secular Review would the Secular Review thereby become inspired? The references of the Holy Ghost to works which seem to have existed before he began to write the Bible for our salvation and bewilderment are more frequent than a superficial reader would suppose. I here give a list of the works the Holy Ghost had before him when he was writing, and from which he has quoted:—

The Book of the Wars of the Lord (Numbers xxi. 14). The Book of the Covenant (Exodus xxiv. 7).

The Book of Jasher, or the Upright (Joshua x. 13, 2 Samuel i. i8).

The Book of the Acts of Solomon (1 Kings xi. 41). The Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel (i Kings; xiv. 19, and eighteen other places in the Books of Kings; also 2 Chron. xx 34 and xxxiii. 18).

The Chronicles of the Kings of Judah (l Kings xiv. 29, and twelve other places in the books of Kings).

The Book of Samuel the Seer (1 Chronicles xxix. 29).