There are two lines of proof of the reliability of the scriptures, the external and the internal. These different kinds of evidences may be put down, without separation, somewhat as follows: 1. The Formation and Unity of the Bible. There are sixty-six books written by nearly forty men, who lived at various times, and yet these books agree in making a perfect whole. These writers were of different classes and occupations. They possessed different degrees of training and lived in widely different places and ages of the world. The perfect agreement of their writings could not, therefore, be the result of any collusion between them. The only conclusion that can explain such unity is that one great and infinite mind dictated the scripture. 2. The Preservation of the Bible. That the Bible is a divine book is proven in that it has survived the wreck of empires and kingdoms and the destruction of costly and carefully gathered libraries and that, too, when there was no special human effort to save it. At times all the constituted powers of earth were arrayed against it, but it has made its way against the tide of fierce opposition and persecution.