398 
“ Yet having accepted, on other grounds , the fact of revelation, and that 
the Pentateuch is an integral part of the divinely-inspired W ord, I come, 
assuming that being of God, it is true ; I will yield one iota of it only when 
absolutely compelled to do so. I require the objector to give absolute proof 
of the non. }> 
Of course it is very well for a man in Mr. Gosse’s position to say that ; but 
suppose I proposed to the Hindoo whom we had here a short time since, as 
a sine qua non of believing in Christianity, that he must believe in every 
historical difficulty in the Old Testament, I am sure, as Dr. Miller said, 
on a recent occasion, that it would be both unchristian and entirely unwarrant- 
able to pursue that course. That is what I feel so strongly to be the danger of 
this paper. Although Mr. Gosse’s paper is written upon the Exodus, Dr. 
Thornton’s paper does not deal with the Exodus largely, or even chiefly — in 
only one case does he deal with it. I never understood Dr. Thornton as 
pinning himself to the truth of any one individual statement which he made 
in his paper, but as simply pointing out that there are several historical 
difficulties in point of numbers in the Old Testament, and putting them 
all together he comes to this point, that we must admit that error of 
some kind has got into the sacred text. The Christian Church has to deal 
with a very large unbelieving world, and we must consider the way in which, 
we are to deal with infidels. How are we to deal with them ? Not by 
putting forth difficulties in our fore-front as necessary to be accepted before 
a man can accept revelation. Surely that is not the course which our Lord 
and His Apostles pursued. That is why I feel the dangerous nature of this 
paper, and there are several other points in it on which I feel considerable 
difficulty. For example, both the papers before us assume the shorter chro- 
nology of the time during which the Israelites were in Egypt, but Professor 
Eawlinson asserts the contrary. Here is a point on which learned men hold 
diverse opinions, and we cannot come to a strong conclusion upon it ; but 
Mr. Moule’s paper does contain an ambiguity which I do not think he meant 
to imply, for he says, in his 28 th paragraph : — 
“ Now, the use of Hebrew letters on the Maccabean coins is a fact. But 
their use in the original manuscripts of the Old Testament is not by any 
means an established fact. On the contrary, the oldest Hebrew manuscripts 
known invariably express numbers in words.” 
Supposing I did not know to the contrary, if I had read that passage, the 
impression made on my mind would have been that we have manuscripts 
in existence which are as old as the time of the Maccabees. 
Mr. Moule. — That is not so. 
Mr. Bow. — I believe the oldest Hebrew manuscript does not exceed eight 
centuries in age. 
Mr. Moule. — Yes, but it does not maintain your assertion. We have 
no proof whatever of the Maccabean letters being used earlier than that 
period. 
