I think it material to have this well noticed. The New Testament
contains a great number of distinct writings, the genuineness of any one
of which is almost sufficient to prove the truth of the religion: it
contains, however, four distinct histories, the genuineness of any one
of which is perfectly sufficient.
If, therefore, we must be considered as encountering the risk of error
in assigning the authors of our books, we are entitled to the advantage
of so many separate probabilities. And although it should appear that
some of the evangelists had seen and used each other's works, this
discovery, whist it subtracts indeed from their characters as
testimonies strictly independent, diminishes, I conceive, little either
their separate authority, (by which I mean the authority of any one that
is genuine,) or their mutual confirmation. For, let the most
disadvantageous supposition possible be made concerning them; let it be
allowed, what I should have no great difficulty in admitting, that Mark
compiled his history almost entirely from those of Matthew and Luke; and
let it also for a moment be supposed that were not, in fact, written by
Matthew and Luke; yet, if it be true that Mark, a contemporary of the
apostles, living, in habits of society with the apostles, a
fellow-traveller and fellow-labourer with some of them; if, I say, it be
true, that this person made the compilation, it follows, that the
writings from which he made it existed in the time of the apostles, and
not only so, but that they were then in such esteem and credit, that a
companion of the apostles formed a history out of them.
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