of Lucian, there could be no ground for assigning to him an early date; but, on the contrary, that so far from being an Epicurean, the Celsus attacked by Origen evidently was a Neo-Platonist.  This, and the circumstance that his work indicates a period of persecution against Christians, leads to the conclusion, I point out, that he must be dated about the beginning of the third century.  My argument, in short, scarcely turns upon the passage in Origen at all, and that which renders it incapable of being wrecked is the fact that Celsus never mentions the Gospels, and much less adds anything to our knowledge of their authors, which can entitle them to greater credit as witnesses for the reality of Divine Revelation.

I do not intend to bandy many words with Canon Lightfoot regarding translations.  Nothing is so easy as to find fault with the rendering of passages from another language, or to point out variations in tenses and expressions, not in themselves of the slightest importance to the main issue, in freely transferring the spirit of sentences from their natural context to an isolated position in quotation.  Such a personal matter as Dr. Lightfoot’s general strictures, in this respect, I feel cannot interest the readers of this Review.  I am quite ready to accept correction even from an opponent where I am wrong, but I am quite content to leave to the judgment of all who will examine them in a fair spirit the voluminous quotations in my work.  The ‘higher criticism,’ in which Dr. Lightfoot seems to have indulged in this article, scarcely rises above the correction of an exercise or the conjugation of a verb. [13:1]

I am extremely obliged to Dr. Lightfoot for pointing out two clerical errors which had escaped me, but which have been discovered and magnified by his microscopic criticism, and thrown at my head by his apologetic zeal.  The first is in reference to what he describes as “a highly important question of Biblical criticism.”  In speaking, en passant, of a passage in John v. 3, 4, in connection with the “Age of Miracles,” the words “it is argued that” were accidentally omitted from vol. i. p. 113, line 19, and the sentence should read, “and it is argued that it was probably a later interpolation.” [14:1] In vol. ii. p. 420, after again mentioning the rejection of the passage, I proceed to state my own personal belief that the words must have Originally stood in the text, because v. 7 indicates the existence of such a context.  The second error is in vol. ii. p. 423, line 24, in which “only” has been substituted for “never” in deciphering my MS. Since this is such a common-place of “apologists,” as Dr. Lightfoot points out, surely he might have put a courteous construction upon the error, instead of venting upon me so much righteous indignation.  I can assure him that I do not in the slightest degree grudge him the full benefit of the argument that the fourth Gospel never once distinguishes John the Baptist from the Apostle John by the addition [Greek:  ho Baptistes]. [15:1]