Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Discourse volume 1.djvu/207

160 for the sake of the argument, we have their evidence, and the books in our hands come really from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and that they bore the relation to Jesus which they claim; the question comes:—Are they competent to testify in the case? Can we trust them to give us the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Admitting they were honest, yet if they were but men, there must be limitations to the accuracy of their testimony. They must omit many things that Jesus said and did, perhaps both actions and words important in estimating his doctrines. They can express only so much of their teacher's opinions as they know; to do this they might perhaps modify, at least colour, the doctrine in their own mind. They might sometimes misunderstand what they heard; mistake a general for a particular statement, and the reverse; a new doctrine of the teacher might accidentally coincide in part with an old doctrine, and he be supposed to teach what he did not teach; a parable or an action might be misunderstood; a quotation misapplied or forgotten, and another put in its place; a general prediction, wish, or hope referred to a specific time, or event, when it had no such reference. He may have merely allowed things which he was afterwards supposed to have commanded. The writers might unconsciously exaggerate or diminish the fact; they might get intelligence at second-hand, from hearsay, and popular rumour. Their national, sectarian, personal prejudices must colour their narrative. They might confound their own notions with his, and represent them as teaching what he did not teach. They might not separate fact from fancy. Their love of the marvellous might lead them astray. If they believed in miracles they would easily incline to ascribe prodigious things to their teacher. Had they a faith in ghosts and devils, they would naturally interpret his words in favour of their own notions, rather than in opposition thereto. If the writers were ignorant men; if they wrote in one language and he spoke in another; yet more, if they wrote at some distance of time from the events, and were not skilled in sifting rumours and separating fact from fiction, the difficulty becomes still greater.

These defects are common, more or less, to all historical testimony. In the case of the Evangelists, they constitute