Two Apologies and Dialogue with Trypho

D E D I C A T I O.

What they say concerning the clarity of scripture is, first of all, utterly ridiculous and absurd; and furthermore, it is impious, insofar as they ineptly accuse their adversaries of the very crime of which they are guilty. It is absurd to try to prove that what everyone senses is not clear, is actually clear to everyone. It is impious to assert that what is not manifest as having been done, God has either not done or has not sufficiently provided for human affairs.

Nor is it more difficult to refute what they say about the value and authority of the interpreters. Is there anyone so deranged and mindless who, if he wished to understand some ancient Latin or Greek writer more deeply, would not diligently seek out all the aids of antiquity beforehand? Would he not consider himself blessed if he could obtain an ancient commentator, and value him the more highly the older he is, and—even if he is much later in time than his author and far inferior in talent and learning to many recent interpreters—would he not still prefer him to all others, and attribute more to him alone than to all the rest combined? Can it be that any book written so many centuries ago can be rightly understood by itself, without the help of other ancient books?

Perhaps scripture has something proper and peculiar to itself by which it protects and defends itself from this force of time, and from those shadows which it casts upon other writings?