Page:The battle of the books - Guthkelch - 1908.djvu/163



who takes up these Epistles will derive less benefit from an enquiry into their authorship than satisfaction from the discovery that they are worthy his perusal. For their authorship he must consult the conflicting opinions of the learned, perhaps without result; for their value he may with greater profit consult his own. Yet, not to disappoint the curious, even though the importance of the controversy is not such as to justify an eager partisanship, I will set forth in a few words what seem to me to be the probabilities on both sides of the question.