But what I observe in the
comparison of these several accounts is, that, although actions and
discourses are ascribed to Christ by Saint John in general different
from what are given to him by the other evangelists, yet, under this
diversity, there is a similitude of manner, which indicates that the
actions and discourses proceeded from the same person. I should have
laid little stress upon the repetition of actions substantially alike,
or of discourses containing many of the same expressions, because that
is a species of resemblance which would either belong to a true history,
or might easily be imitate in a false one. Nor do I deny that a dramatic
writer is able to sustain propriety and distinction of character through
a great variety of separate incidents and situations. But the
evangelists were not dramatic writers; nor possessed the talents of
dramatic writers; nor will it, I believe, be suspected that they studied
uniformity of character, or ever thought of any such thing in the person
who was the subject of their histories. Such uniformity, if it exist,
is on their part casual; and if there be, as I contend there is, a
perceptible resemblance of manner, in passages, and between discourses,
which are in themselves extremely distinct, and are delivered by
historians writing without any imitation of, or reference to, one
another, it affords a just presumption that these are what they profess
to be, the actions and the discourses of the same real person; that the
evangelists wrote from fact, and not from imagination.
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