sed a
controversial treatise against Marcion without declaring himself
respecting the Apostle of the Gentiles. The few meagre fragments which
have come down to us supply only incidental notices and resemblances,
from which we are left to draw our own inferences; but where we grope in
the twilight, they were walking in the broad noonday.

Eusebius has happily preserved Melito's preface to his _Selections_,
which is of considerable interest. The work itself comprised passages
from the Law and the Prophets relating to the Saviour and to the
Christian faith generally ([Greek: peri tou Soteros kai pases tes
pisteos hemon]), arranged in six books. It seems to have been
accompanied with explanatory comments bringing out the prophetical
import of the several passages, as Melito understood them. In the
preface, addressed to his friend Onesimus, at whose instance the work
had been undertaken, he relates that having made a journey to the East
and visited the actual scenes of the Gospel history, he informed himself
respecting the books of the Old Testament, of which he appends a list.
The language which he uses is significant from its emphasis. He writes
that his friend had 'desired to be accurately informed about the _old_
books' ([Greek: mathein ten ton palaion biblion eboulethes akribeian]).
He adds that he himself during his Eastern tour had 'obtained accurate
information respecting the books of the _Old_ Testament ([Greek: akribos
mathon ta tes palaias diathekes biblia]).' From these expressions Dr
Westcott argues that Melito must have been acquainted with a
corresponding Christian literature, which he regarded as the books of
the New Testament. To any such inference the author of _Supernatural
Religion_ demurs [226:1], and he devotes several pages to proving (what
nobody denies) that the expressions 'Old Testament,' 'New Testament,'
did not originally refer to a written literature at all, and need not so
refer here. All this is beside the purpose, and betrays an entire
misunderstanding of the writer whom he ventures to criticize. The
contention is not that the expression 'Old Testament' here in itself
signifies a collection of books, and therefore implies another
collection called the 'New Testament,' but that the emphatic and
reiterated mention of an _old_ Biblical _literature_ points naturally to
the existence of a _new_. To any one who is accustomed to weigh the
force of Greek sentences, as determined by the order of the w