2.2 "the application of thought to textual criticism" by a.e.  (Page 6/10)

This I cite as a specimen of the things which people may say if they do not think about the meaning of what theyare saying, and especially as an example of the danger of dealing in generalisations. The best way to treat such pretentiousinanities is to transfer them from the sphere of textual criticism, where the difference between truth and falsehood or between senseand nonsense is little regarded and seldom even perceived, into some sphere where men are obliged to use concrete and sensuousterms, which force them, however reluctantly, to think.

I ask this scholar, this critic who knows his business, and who says that the more sincere of two MSS. is andmust be the better—I ask him to tell me which weighs most, a tall man or a fat man. He cannot answer; nobody can; everybodysees in a moment that the question is absurd. Tall and fat are adjectives which transport even a textual critic from the worldof humbug into the world of reality, a world inhabited by comparatively thoughtful people, such as butchers and grocers,who depend on their brains for their bread. There he begins to understand that to such general questions any answer must befalse; that judgment can only be pronounced on individual specimens; that everything depends on the degree of tallness andthe degree of fatness. It may well be that an inch of girth [76]adds more weight than an inch of height, or vice versa; but that altitude is incomparably more ponderous than obesity, orobesity than altitude, and that an inch of one depresses the scale more than a yard of the other, has never been maintained.The way to find out whether this tall man weighs more or less than that fat man is to weigh them; and the way to find outwhether this corrupt MS. is better or worse than that interpolated MS. is to collect and compare their readings; notto ride easily off on the false and ridiculous generalisation that the more sincere MS. is and must be the better.

When you call a MS. sincere you instantly engage on its behalf the moral sympathy of the thoughtless: moral sympathy is a line in which they are verystrong. I do not desire to exclude morality from textual criticism; I wish indeed that some moral qualities were commonerin textual criticism than they are; but let us not indulge our moral emotions out of season. It may be that a scribe whointerpolates, who makes changes deliberately, is guilty of wickedness, while a scribe who makes changes accidentally, becausehe is sleepy or illiterate or drunk, is guilty of none; but that is a question which will be determined by a competent authority atthe Day of Judgment, and is no concern of ours. Our concern is not with the eternal destiny of the scribe, but with the temporalutility of the MS.; and a MS. is useful or the reverse in proportion to the amount of truth which it discloses or conceals,no matter what may be the causes of the disclosure or concealment. It is a mistake to suppose that deliberate change is always ornecessarily more destructive of truth than accidental change; and even if it were, the main question, as I have said already, is oneof degree. A MS. in which 1 per cent. of the words have beenviciously and intentionally altered and 99 per cent. are right is not so bad as a MS. in which only 1 per cent. are right and 99 percent. have been altered virtuously and unintentionally; and if you go to a critic with any such vague inquiry as the question whetherthe"more sincere"or the"more [77] correct"of two MSS. is the better, he will reply,"If I am to answer that question, you must show me the two MSS. first; for aught thatI know at present, from the terms of your query, either may be better than the other, or both may be equal."But that is what the incompetent intruders into criticism can never admit.They must have a better MS., whether it exists or no; because they could never get along without one. IfProvidence permitted two MSS. to be equal, the editor would have to choose between their readings by considerations of intrinsicmerit, and in order to do that he would need to acquire intelligence and impartiality and willingness to take pains, andall sorts of things which he neither has nor wishes for; and he feels sure that God, who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, cannever have meant to lay upon his shoulders such a burden as this.