and the expression of doubt wherever doubt is really felt is owing to the paramount necessity for fidelity as to the exact words of Scripture.
364. But it will be seen from the preceding pages that we possess evidence much more precisely certified than by the simple and general titles of antiquity, excellence, and variety. Two or three of our best documents might have been lost, and yet those titles might still be justly claimed; while without those documents both the history of the text and its application would be so imperfectly understood that the results in that case would be both different and more uncertain. It is the minute study of the whole evidence in relation to the best documents which brings out their absolute and not merely their relative excellence. The external evidence is therefore such that on the one hand perfect purity is not a priori improbable, and a singularly high degree of purity is highly probable; and yet the conditions are not such—it is difficult to see how they could ever be such—as to exclude the possibility of textual errors.
365. These general probabilities however are but preparatory to the definite question,—Are there as a matter of fact places in which we are constrained by overwhelming evidence to recognise the existence of textual error in all extant documents? To this question we have no hesitation in replying in the affirmative. For instance in 2 Pet. iii 10 אBK2P2 with three of the best cursives and two Versions read στοιχεῖα δὲ καυσούμενα λυθήσεται καὶ γῆ καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ ἔργα εὑρεθήσεται. Before εὑρεθήσεται two other Versions insert a negative. C replaces εὑρεθήσεται by ἀφανισθήσονται, for which we find κατακαήσεται in AL2 and most cursives and
