neither of these narratives is contemporary with the events related. But two considerations prevent a dispassionate judgment on this matter; and the considerations deserve our respect, though we believe the apprehensions which accompany them to be wrong. First, it is felt that if these books be not contemporaneous history, they are not to be accounted history at all. They cannot be regarded like those earlier Scriptural narratives where the authors committed to writing what they had heard with their ears, and their fathers had declared unto 'them, the noble works which God had done in their days, and in the old times before them;' and in which the action of the imagination, either on the writer's part, or such as had been incidental to the transmission of the story, was wholly or almost wholly an unconscious one. In the Books of Daniel and Esther, if they be not exact and authentic history, imagination must have played a mere deliberate part. And this is a conclusion from which good men naturally shrink with alarm. Again, is not the authority of Christ himself pledged to the genuineness and the veracity of these books, to that of Daniel expressly, to that of Esther by implication with the other Scriptures? and ought not this to be abundantly conclusive against all the doubts of critics? Now, with regard to this latter consideration, we cannot admit that in any case the citation by our Lord of a Scriptural book for its moral, its doctrinal, or its prophetic teaching, can justly be understood as a general voucher for its historical accuracy or its reputed authorship. And furthermore in the present case (and this is our answer to the first objection also) it is most important for us to observe that the books in question belong to that part of the Jewish Scriptures known as the Cetubim or Hagiographa—a portion definitely distinguished, not only from the Prophets properly so called, but also from the historical books (including those of Kings) which by the same classification were ranked among the prophetical writings.

We have no wish to revive or to advocate the old Rabbinical theory that a lower degree of inspiration must be assigned to the Hagiographa; nor do we forget that in this division are comprised the eminently prophetic Psalms, and the simple authentic narratives of Ezra and Nehemiah. But we strongly assert nevertheless the peculiar liability of books in this division to challenge and discussion; and the fact that the Book of Daniel was placed in it, while Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi are placed among the Prophets, is indisputably a most significant distinction. Why are narratives to be set down as history which perhaps were never intended, and never at first taken for

such? Why are we to suppose, as Mr. Plumptre well asks (art. 'Ecclesiastes'), 'that the inspired writers were debarred from 'forms of composition which were open without blame to 'others? Why are we to regard as abhorrent from Canonical Scripture all exemplification of that tendency which Lord A. Hervey himself (art. 'Kings') points out as a characteristic of the Jewish mind?

It is one of the weak points of the ordinary Protestant system, that, throwing as it does such enormous weight upon the received Canon of Scripture, it yet gives so little heed, and allows so little interest, to the question of the composition of the Canon, and to the phenomena there presented. Mr. Westcott is doing eminent service to the Church in England by the attention he is drawing to the subject. We ourselves cannot but regard the ordinary Protestant view of the Old Testament as an exaggerated one. But all recognition of the Jewish Scriptures as exceptionally sacred implies a peculiar deference to the judgment of those who formed the Jewish Canon. The more therefore the object and result of that judgment are exalted, the more should it be considered and respected in its minor details also.

Now, surely, in this aspect, the distinction established from the first between the three divisions of the Hebrew Scriptures, and confirmed by Apostolic usage, becomes of the very greatest importance to us; and the loss or deliberate disturbance of that distinction in the Bibles of Protestant Christendom is a serious evil. We are in danger of mistaking the very nature of the books we revere; and this, by our own neglect or removal of the ancient landmarks. Nothing is more easily misapprehended or forgotten than the object of a writer in composing a book, or the views taken of it by those who put it into our hands. A parable, an apologue, an allegory, may readily be stiffened into matter of fact by the mistaken apprehension of over-reverence, till we are in danger of exposing to the charge of forgery one whom we have misunderstood through our very eagerness to pay him honour.

Nor is it only the separation of the Hagiographa from the Law and the Prophets, which shows the thoughtful spirit which presided over the settlement of the Canon, whether that were the work of one or of many generations. The alterations and adaptations of the sacred text which were then made, or then at least confirmed as valid, indicate an estimate of that text very different from the superstitious notions which subsequently prevailed. We feel what delicate ground we are touching on here, and we forbear to go farther. But this, at

And

least, we may say, that every proof of discrimination and discretion, exercised by those earlier Doctors of the Jewish Church, is of peculiar importance as a justification and encouragement of the exercise of sound reason now; it assists the emancipation of theology from hurtful trammels, under sanction of that very respect which is due to sacred antiquity. There is one book of the Hagiographa to which these considerations give peculiar importance, a book of which the ancient (and as it seems the original) estimate has been wellnigh lost by later generations. We speak of the Book of Psalms. Few of the laity are probably aware, and even of our clerical instructors few care to remember, that this familiar and dearly-prized part of Scripture was originally divided into five portions or books. Still fewer know what significant results are deducible from this division. It is a division wholly lost sight of in the vernacular versions and ecclesiastical arrangements of the Psalter; lost sight of too, apparently (for all popular purposes at least), before the Christian era. yet we are justified in speaking of it as the original division. Its antiquity is unquestionable and unquestioned, far more than that of the titles prefixed to the Psalms. It is not only recognised by Christian Fathers and Jewish Doctors, not only (like the superscriptions) traceable still in all existing versions, the Hebrew and the LXX, as well as all subsequent translations, but it is indelibly impressed on the most ancient text at once by the established order of the Psalms, and by the doxologies with which the five books are severally concludedthose doxologies, namely, which occur at the end of the 41st, 72nd, 89th, and 106th Psalms, the points which we know from independent sources to have been really the points of division. Now were this all that could be said, we might merely regard these lines of distribution as conventional or convenient breaks, like those in the Anglican Prayer-book, or in the ancient Ferial uses of the Latin Church; and adapted, perhaps (as has been suggested), to the fivefold division of the Pentateuch. But here is the importance of the phenomenon. Of the books thus marked off, the first (reputed to be wholly the work of David) is characterised by the almost exclusive use of the word Jehovah as the name of God; the second (even in the Psalms which are ascribed to David) by an almost equally preponderating use of the name Elohim; the third is composed of two portions, between which the very same distinction exists as between the two preceding books, only in a reverse order, and in a somewhat modified degree; while in the two last books, both professedly of more miscellaneous authorship, and both

of them exclusively Jehovistic in their phraseology, the fourth begins with a reputed Psalm of Moses, and ends with one evidently written during the Captivity, while the fifth still more evidently consists in great measure of Psalms composed after the return from Babylon, and exhibits other marks besides of a late place in Hebrew literature. It is true that when we come to interpret these phenomena, so many complications present themselves, that it is impossible to be satisfied with what at first sight promises to be an easy solution. But the phenomena are in themselves so remarkable, that they cannot have been accidental. Are these divisions due to the arrangers of the Canon, sorting the Psalms on some systematic plan? or do they rather betray the previous existence of separate collections ultimately combined? And, on either hypothesis, are we to seek the key of the arrangement in chronological order, in diversity of authorship, in diversity of purpose, in local differences, or in differences of theological opinion? All these theories, or modifications and combinations of them, have been suggested; the question in debate being still further complicated by the doubt what authority, or whether any authority at all, is to be conceded to the superscriptions of the Psalms. Mr. Thrupp, who has treated the subject in Dr. Smith's Dictionary, maintains with Hengstenberg the entire trustworthiness of the superscriptions, but with this singular, and (as we think) quite untenable proviso, that a psalm may be understood to be the production of the descendant and representative of the author designated: so that as a Psalm of Asaph' may be really the composition of the Levites of Asaph's family, so a Psalm of David' may be taken (when requisite) to mean a Psalm of the heir and representative of David for the time beingHezekiah, for instance, or Josiah, or even Zerubbabel! Allowing himself this license, Mr. Thrupp takes chronological order as his guide throughout in his survey of the Psalter, regarding the first book as David's own collection-the original book of Psalms-provided by him for the service of the tabernacle; and the other books as compiled under Hezekiah and Josiah, during the Captivity, and after the Return. On almost all of these points we are entirely at issue with Mr. Thrupp, whose brief running commentary also on the whole series of Psalms is far more ingenious than satisfactory. But we rejoice to see such indications of the attention which this portion of Scripture is attracting to itself.

The writings of the Prophets, if they do not open such a field for venturous and reconstructive criticism, yield still ampler materials for solid historical conclusions; as Ewald

above all other writers has shown. Even German analysis has here found little to destroy, though much to set in a new light, and illustrate by suggestive combinations. Breathing the atmosphere of a higher spiritual level than in the earlier books of Scripture, we find ourselves also moving here in the element of unquestioned and unquestionable contemporaneous evidence. A doubt may sometimes be raised whether the usual and received date of some prophetical book be indeed the right one, or the position assigned to its author be indeed what he really occupied; but there is seldom a doubt in any case that the words which we read came straight from the personal experience of the writer, and were addressed to his own generation amidst dangers or under chastisements which actually drew forth the inspired message. Even in the case of Isaiah and Zechariah, the discussions which are raised concerning the integrity of the books do not challenge their prophetical character, but rather seek to recover the true standing point of the writer by pointing out the signs which indicate his epoch and his circumstances. With regard to the Book of Zechariah, the difficulties about which are really great, and have been well stated by Mr. Perowne, the consequences depending on the alternative are of smaller amount. But in that of Isaiah we cannot but think that the theory which assigns the chapters from the fortieth onwards to a prophet of the Captivity is not only borne out by the strongest internal evidence, but adds double beauty and force to those sublime and pathetic strains, giving them an appropriateness which on the popular hypothesis is palpably wanting, and bringing them into harmony with the known laws of prophecy, while it in no way detracts from the Evangelical tone or the Messianic import of the whole. Mr. Huxtable's article on this subject in the Dictionary seems to us singularly undiscerning and inconclusive, while it is far too lengthy and rhetorical in its summary of the contents of the book. The rest of the series on the Prophets, of which Mr. Wright's contributions are the most learned, and Mr. Farrar's article on Ezekiel (though palpably defective) is perhaps the most interesting, are more or less useful and instructive, but call for no special notice. Here again, as in the historical books, we feel the want of a uniform treatment by a single hand, to trace out and compare the pervading elements, and to follow the varying exigencies of the prophetic office-now in alliance, now at issue, with the Levitical priesthood-now urging resistance now submission to the Assyrians and Chaldees-while under their touch the conscience of Israel expands and developes, and clearer views open out before the chosen race of their high vocation in the