2.  In another passage, Celsus accuses the Christians of altering the Gospel. (Lardner, Jewish and Heathen Test.  Vol. ii. p. 275.) The accusation refers to some variations in the readings of particular passages:  for Celsus goes on to object, that when they are pressed hard, and one reading has been confuted, they disown that, and fly to another.  We cannot perceive from Origen, that Celsus specified any particular instances, and without such specification the charge is of no value.  But the true conclusion to be drawn from it is, that there were in the hands of the Christians histories which were even then of some standing:  for various readings and corruptions do not take place in recent productions.

The former quotation, the reader will remember, proves that these books were composed by the disciples of Jesus, strictly so called; the present quotation shows, that though objections were taken by the adversaries of the religion to the integrity of these books, none were made to their genuineness.

3.  In a third passage, the Jew whom Celsus introduces shuts up an argument in this manner:—­“these things then we have alleged to you out of your own writings, not needing any other weapons.” (Lardner, vol. ii. p. 276.) It is manifest that this boast proceeds upon the supposition that the books over which the writer affects to triumph possessed an authority by which Christians confessed themselves to be bound.

4.  That the books to which Celsus refers were no other than our present Gospels, is made out by his allusions to various passages still found in these Gospels.  Celsus takes notice of the genealogies, which fixes two of these Gospels; of the precepts, Resist not him that injures you, and if a man strike thee on the one cheek, offer to him the other also; of the woes denounced by Christ; of his predictions; of his saying, That it is impossible to serve two masters; ( Lardner, vol. ii. pp. 276-277.) Of the purple robe, the crown of thorns, and the reed in his hand; of the blood that flowed from the body of Jesus upon the cross, which circumstance is recorded by John alone; and (what is instar omnium for the purpose for which we produce it) of the difference in the accounts given of the resurrection by the evangelists, some mentioning two angels at the sepulchre, ethers only one. (Lardner, vol. ii. pp. 280, 281, & 283.)

It is extremely material to remark, that Celsus not only perpetually referred to the accounts of Christ contained in the four Gospels, but that he referred to no other accounts; that he founded none of his objections to Christianity upon any thing delivered in spurious Gospels.  (The particulars, of which the above are only a few, are well collected by Mr. Bryant, p. 140.)