Page:The battle of the books - Guthkelch - 1908.djvu/265

Rh he), "because I thought a MS. good for nothing, unless it were collated." Wonderful remark! and worthy of such eaves-droppers, that are prolling after that which does not concern them, and catch at little scraps of other men's discourses. 'Tis true. Sir, a MS. not collated is upon that account worth nothing to the rest of the world; but to the owner, 'tis the better for it, if a price was to be set on't. And I think, with submission, that a fresh MS. newly brought out of Greece, and never yet printed, would sell for more, ceteris paribus, than another already printed. Do you think the Alexandrian MS. of as great a value now, since the edition of the English Polyglot, as when Cyril the Greek Patriarch first presented it to King Charles the First? But what do I talk to him of MSS. who has so little relish and sense of such things as to declare deliberately that he does not believe the various readings of any book are so much worth, as that Mr Boyle should be used so scurvily to obtain them. And this he says when he is giving evidence; where all declaimings and rhetorical aggravations above the naked and strict truth are unlawful, and border near upon perjury. But we must not expect from the Doctor