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Heyne's Virgil, it will become the general book of scholars, masters and literati. Previously to his publication of his edition of the Greek Testament, Griesbach published his Synopsis. It was printed in 8vo. in 1774, under the title, Libri Historici Novi Testamenti. In the year following the copies, then remaining unsold of the very same work, were given the title Synopsis Evangeliorum Matthæi, Marci, et Lucæ. A second and improved edition of it was printed in 1796, at Halle, in 8vo. Dr. Griesbach has likewise undertaken to publish an edition in 8vo. and another in 4to. (the letter of the quarto edition in Didot's types), of the New Testament, with a selection from the larger work, of such various readings as are considered in that work to be better than, or at least equal to, the received text.

The last critical edition of the Gospels in Greek was printed at Oxford, in 1798, by Professor White. It is a small 8vo. very elegantly and correctly printed. The editor abstains from all alterations whatever of the commonly received text ; but at the same time, following the example of Origen, in his Hexaplar edition of the LXX, contrives to exhibit very distinctly to the reader's eye, all those variations found in ancient MSS. which Dr. Griesbach considers of authority either superior or equal to the common text.

In 1786, Professor Alter published at Vienna, in two volumes 8vo, Codex Lambecii, 1, in the

Imperial library, and thence styled by him the Codex Vindobonensis. He has corrected it occasionally from the edition published by Robert Stephens in 1546, subjoining, at the end of each volume, a list of these corrections, under the title of Vitia Codicis Vindobonensis: he has added various readings from many Greek manuscripts, from the Cophtic and Slavonian versions, and from two Latin versions in the Imperial library.

To the foregoing editions must be added the Quatuor Evangelia Græca, cum variantibus lectionibus a textu Codd. MSS. Bibliotheca Vaticana, Barberina, Laurentianæ, Vindobonensis, Escurialensis, Hauniensis regiæ, quibus accedunt lectiones versionum Syrarum, Veteris, Philoxenianæ, et Hierosolymitana, jussu et sumptibus regiis, edidit Andreas Birch. Hauniæ, 1788, fol. et 4to. This is a noble fruit of royal munificence. Professors Birch, Alter and Moldenhawer, were employed, and their expences defrayed, by the present king of Denmark, to travel into Germany, Italy, France, and Spain, to collate the manuscripts of the sacred text. The work now under consideration is the result of their united labours. The text is that of Mill: the edition is particularly valuable, for the large extracts from the Codex Vaticanus. Professor Birch has since published at Copenhagen, a collection of various readings to the Acts, Epistles and Evangelists, from several manuscripts, particularly the Vatican; but they are not accompanied I

VOL. I.

with the Greek text, as his various readings to the Gospels are. For the manuscripts used by Blanchini, see Semler's Appendix to Wetstein, 635 -638.

It remains only to take notice of the edition of the Greek Testament, published by Matthæi, formerly Professor in Moscow, now in Wittemberg, with various readings from the Moscow manuscripts, the Latin Vulgate from a Demedovian manuscript, many remarks, Greek scholia, and copper-plates representing the characters of his Greek manuscripts. Michaelis says, the author was an age behind the rest of Germany in sacred criticism, but pronounces his work absolutely necessary for every Biblical critic.

There are many other respectable editions of the Greek Testament; but those we have mentioned are confessedly the principal. The fifth of Erasmus's editions, with a slight mixture of the edition in the Complutensian Polyglott, is the principal edition from which almost all the subsequent editions have been taken. This, Dr. Griesbach, in his excellent prolegomena, has placed beyond controversy. "All the modern editions," he says, "follow that of the Elzevirs; that was taken "from the edition of Beza, and the third of "Robert Stephens; Beza copied the third of "Robert Stephens, except in some places, where "he varied from it arbitrarily, and without suffi"cient authority. The third of Stephens imme2

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diately follows the fifth of Erasmus's editions, "except in a very few places in the Apocalypse, "where he preferred to it the Complutensian edi"tion. Erasmus formed the text as well as he could "from a small number of manuscripts, and those “of a recent date, and without further aid than

an interpolated edition of the Vulgate, and bad "editions of a few of the fathers." The principal editions, in which Erasmus and the Complutensians have not been followed, are those of Colinæus, Mr. Bowyer, Dr. Harwood, Professor Alter and Griesbach. It were greatly to be wished, that some person would collect together, and publish with such observations and illustrations as the subjects occasionally require, the various prolegomena of Walton, Mill, Wetstein, and Griesbach; the controversy between Erasmus and the Spanish divines, and Lee, and the Prefaces of Kennicott, Kipling, and Woide; with a succinct, but complete, account of the chief manuscripts and printed editions of the sacred text.-Such a manual would be of the greatest use.

XII.

It seems necessary to take some notice of THE VERSIONS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT INTO THE MODERN GREEK. As the circumstances respecting the separation of the Greek Church from the Church of Rome, and the present state of the Greek Church, are interesting and not generally

known, it may not be unacceptable to the reader, to be presented with a detail of them.

It

XII. 1. The progress of the Church of Constantinople, from a very humble station to the eminent rank she afterwards obtained in the Christian hierarchy, is a curious and important event in ecclesiastical history. Before the seat of the Roman empire was transferred to Constantinople, the Church had the three Patriarchs of Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria. Three dioceses were independent of them, and were subject, each, to its primate: that of Asia, to the primate of Ephesus; that of Thrace, to the primate of Heraclea ; and that of Pontus, to the primate of Cesarea. is not clear, that the Church of Constantinople had her peculiar bishop; at most, the bishoprick was inconsiderable, and the bishop subject to the metropolitan of Heraclea. After the translation of the seat of empire to Constantinople, the bishops of Constantinople acquired importance; by degrees, they obtained ecclesiastical jurisdiction over Thrace, Asia and Pontus, and were elevated to the rank of patriarch. The same rank was conferred on the bishop of Jerusalem. Thus, for a considerable period of time, the five patriarchs of the Christian world, were those of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Jerusalem. In the course of time, the patriarch of Constantinople raised himself above the other oriental patriarchs, and finally assumed the title of Oecumenical

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