But Julian's testimony does something more than represent the
judgment of the Christian church in his time. It discovers also his own.
He himself expressly states the early date of these records; he calls
them by the names which they now bear. He all along supposes, he nowhere
attempts to question, their genuineness.
The argument in favour of the books of the New Testament, drawn from the
notice taken of their contents by the early writers against the
religion, is very considerable. It proves that the accounts which
Christians had then were the accounts which we have now; that our
present Scriptures were theirs. It proves, moreover, that neither Celsus
in the second, Porphyry in the third, nor Julian in the fourth century,
suspected the authenticity of these books, or ever insinuated that
Christians were mistaken in the authors to whom they ascribed them. Not
one of them expressed an opinion upon this subject different from that
which was holden by Christians. And when we consider how much it would
have availed them to have cast a doubt upon this point, if they could;
and how ready they showed themselves to be to take every advantage in
their power; and that they were all men of learning and inquiry: their
concession, or rather their suffrage, upon the subject is extremely
valuable.
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