dinal; as for you, John Huss, I exhort you to submit yourself to the decision of the council, as you have promised: then do so; your person and credit will

not be the worse for it?"

The emperor himself tried to shake the courage of Huss, and to justify himself; but his very first words betrayed the inward conflict which disturbed his mind. 66 Many assume," he said, "that you were detained a fortnight in prison when you had received a safe conduct from me; nevertheless, it is true, as I own, and as many know, that this safe conduct was sent to you before your departure from Prague. It ensured your liberty, to confess frankly before the council, as you have done, your doctrine and your belief. We thank the cardinals and the bishops for the indulgence with which they have heard you; but as they assure us that it is not permitted to us to defend a man suspected of heresy, we give the same advice to you as the cardinal of Cambray has done. Submit yourself, then, and we will take care that you shall retire in peace, after having undergone a moderate correction. If you refuse, we shall give arms to the council against you, and for my part, be assured that I would rather burn you with my own hands, than endure longer the obstinacy of which you have given too much proof. Our advice, then, is, that you submit, unreservedly, to the authority of the council."

"Noble emperor,' answered John Huss, "I return thanks to your majesty for the safe conduct which you have granted to me."

Distrusting the conclusion of such a preface, John de Chlum interrupted his friend, and said, "Restrain yourself to justifying your character from the obstinacy of which the emperor accuses you." Repeating, then, with mildness, his usual defence, Huss said: "I am not come hither, illustrious prince, intending to support anything by obstinacy, God is my witness; but let something be shown me that is better and more holy than what I have taught, and I am ready to retract."

At these words, the soldiers took him away, and the assembly broke up.

VARIOUS READINGS.

"A body hast thou prepared me," Heb. x. 5. DIFFERENT READINGS IN HOLY

SCRIPTURE.

tentive reader of the Bible, that in the 40th Psalm, from which the passage which contains these words in the Epistle to the Hebrews is quoted, no such expression is to be found, but in its place a sentence entirely different: "Mine ears hast thou opened," or "bored," in allusion, as has been supposed, to the custom mentioned in Exod. xxi. 6, etc. Whence is this diversity? The circumstance has given rise to many conjectures, and to some forced interpretations. But by far the most probable suggestion is that of Dr. Kenniscott's; if it be correct, the difficulty is solved at once. That learned critic supposes, that in transcribing the Hebrew text in this place, three letters, nun, jod, and men,' were written by mistake for three other letters which they most resembled, "gimel, vau, and he.' If the line on which the manuscript was written were blacker than ordinary, we may readily imagine that the letter "he" might have been mistaken for "men;" and between the other letters there is undoubtedly a very great similarity. Only granting such a mistake as this to have occurred, the Hebrew text would read thus: "Then a body hast thou prepared me;" thus constituting, according to the citation of the apostle, a direct prediction of that unquestionable fact on which the whole of Christianity reststhe incarnation of Him in whom should thus dwell "all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." It is likewise worthy of remark, that the Septuagint Greek version, executed some years before the birth of our Lord, which, though not always, is mainly correct, and frequently quoted by the writers of the New Testament, corresponds in this place exactly with the text of the apostle, "A body hast thou prepared me,' and not with the present Hebrew text, as rendered in our version.

having sometimes quoted from the original Hebrew text, and sometimes from the Septuagint, which was in common use at the time, especially amongst Gentile converts, who were unacquainted with Hebrew; or more frequently from their having given the sense of the passage, without adhering literally to the words of either. Still, in these quotations, there are a few of the errors just specified. Thus, in Matt. xxvii. 9, 10, it is supposed that "Jeremiah" has been written for "Zechariah;" for the passage is to be found in the latter prophecy, and not in the former; or what is more likely still, that the word "Jeremiah was inserted by some transcriber, and the original reading was simply "that which was spoken by the prophet;" which accords with the manner in which St. Matthew introduces quotations in other places. The quotation itself, likewise, will more literally correspond with the prophecy, if one small Greek letter be omitted; in which case it would read, "And I took the thirty pieces of silver," instead of, " And they took," etc. So, again, in Acts vii. 16, the name of "Abraham has evidently been introduced by the mistake of a transcriber, who might have confused the transaction there alluded to, with the purchase which Abraham made of a burial-place from the children of Heth. The passage should . read thus: "And were carried over into Sychem, and laid in the sepulchre that he (Jacob) bought for a sum of money, of the sons of Emmen, the father of Sychem," Gen. xxxiii. 19.; Josh. xxiv. 32. Nearly all such interpolations," says the late Rev. T. Scott, speaking of the Scriptures generally, "may be detected and pointed out, by sober and wellinformed critics, in these as well as in other books; and if a few escape detection, it is because they do not so necessarily affect the sense as to make it evident, to the most acute, penetrating, and accurate student, that they deviate from the style and sentiment of the writer in whose writings they are found." The very differences to be met with in

* See Matt. i. 22; ii. 5; xiii. 14; and xxi. 4.

ancient manuscripts, do but tend, in fact, to confirm the authenticity of those sixtysix books which we call the Bible. Not only are the points of difference small, indeed, when compared with those wherein they agree, but the variations themselves tend to correct one another. “In profane authors, as they are called," says another biblical critic, "whereof one manuscript only had the good luck to be preservedas Velleius Paterculus, among the Latins, and Hesychius, among the Greeks-the faults of the scribes are found so numerous, and the defects so beyond all redress, that, notwithstanding the pains of the most learned and acute critics for two whole centuries, those books still are, and are likely to continue, a mere heap of errors. On the contrary, where the copies of any author are numerous, though the various readings always increase in proportion, there the text, by an accurate collation of them by skilful and judicious hands, is ever the more correct, and comes nearer to the true words of the author."

And what is still more important, it is a remarkable fact, that not only all the various readings which are to be met with in ancient manuscripts, but all the different renderings or translations of the sacred text, which have been proposed by scholars competent to such a task, however numerous they may be upon comparatively trivial matters, do not affect one fact or doctrine of any vital importance. "If all the various readings," says Mr. Scott, (and he spent a life in studies of this kind,) which have any respectable authority, were adopted, they would not alter the standard of truth or the rule of duty in one material part." Thus, although the sacred text has been transcribed and criticised by individuals almost innumerable, at different periods and in various countries, and occasionally handed down by the bitterest enemies to religion, still, through the ever watchful providence of Him who inspired it, do we possess it at this moment, as to every material particular, unaltered and unimpaired-the immutable truth of God, "which liveth and abideth for ever." D. W.