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146 further revised on like principles, and in that form used by great Antiochian theologians not long after the middle of the fourth century. From that date, and indeed earlier, we find a chaos of varying mixed texts, in which as time advances the elder texts recede, and the Antiochian text now established at Constantinople increasingly prevails. Then even the later types with mixed base disappear, and with the rarest exceptions the Constantinopolitan text alone is copied, often at first with relics of its vanquished rivals included, till at last these too dwindle, and in the copies written shortly before the invention of printing its victory is all but complete. At each stage there are irregularities and obscurities: but we believe the above to be a true sketch of the leading incidents in the history of the text of the New Testament; and, if it be true, its significance as a key to the complexities of documentary evidence is patent without explanation.

SECTION IV.&ensp;RELATIONS OF THE PRINCIPAL EXTANT DOCUMENTS TO THE CHIEF ANCIENT TEXTS

199—223

A.&ensp;199, 200.&ensp;Nature of the process of determination

199. In the preceding pages we have been tracing the history of ancient lines of transmission, divergent and convergent, by means of evidence chiefly furnished by the existing documents. In order to use the knowledge thus obtained for the restoration of the text, we have next to follow the converse process, and ascertain which ancient text or texts are represented by each important document or set of documents. Up to a certain point