bred. We believe that the Varieties of Foreign Literature have produced nothing equal or second to these. I. "A concise Hebrew Grammar, without points. By the late Rev. W. Romaine, A. M. &c. London. 1803." Our extracts from this pamphlet cannot be very copious; but we believe they will contain a large proportion of the whole; and we certainly intend that they shall contain the marrow-the most amusing part of this most mirthful little book. Romaine loquitur. "There is no occasion for the points; because there is a complete grammar in the Bible without them a specimen of which I here offer to the reader, under these following heads: First-The Letters; Secondly-The PRONOUNS; and, however, plain and simple the rules relating to these three particulars may appear, yet, if they will answer all the purposes of grammar, what need have we then of the points? - They become quite useless, yea, profane; because we have an infallible grammar from the same hand which wrote the Scriptures." p. 3. "These rules are short and plain; and yet, if the Hebrew student will attend carefully to them, he will find no occasion to trouble himself about the points. He will find the grammar not out of the Bible, but in it; not in some little dots and specks, added by ill-designing men to the letters, but in the very letters, given by the inspiration of the Almighty; not in the inventions of men, who have indeed made the word of God of no effect by their traditions, but a fixed regular grammar in the Divine text, as perfect too as the text itself is of which the foregoing is a specimen." p. 9, 10. In these passages, we know not which most to admire the cool dogmatism, which despatches in so few words a system, which has been erected and consolidated by the wisdom and labour of ages; or the hot-headed inconsistency, which thus asserts the entire uselessness of all grammars "out of the Bible," by which, if we understand any thing, we must understand all grammars whatsoever; and which yet presumes, not only to refer to and commend the grammar of Parkhurst, but also to write a grammar- a grammar, of course, "out of the Bible, and not in it," and a grammar, above all, perfect as the text itself is." Mr. R. and the divines of his school, have never had a reputation for modesty-but, in good troth, the tone of bold and fearless egotism, and of impudent dogmatical assertion, which goes for learning and sound divinity among their admirers, when heard in the province of literature, and from the chair as of the grammarian, can go for nothing else but egotism and impu dence. Mr. R. might or might not be an Antinomian divine; but he assuredly was an Antinomian in Hebrew. And through all the risks of being suspected for a Legalist and Arminian, we must protest against both his doctrines and his practice. His practice is as bad as his doctrine. He imposed upon the public his own interpretation of in his reprint of Calasio's Concordance. Calasio would have put him to death: could he have seen the article which was thus sent forth as the interpretation of Calasio's Concordance; he would have choked him with his own pseudo-grammar. In one so haughty and so magisterial, we have a right to look for correctness of statement when a teacher steps forward and proclaims, "Here is my grammar, given by revelation from the Almighty, and published in duodecimo," we naturally look for wholesome truth. Mr. R. is not careful to answer us in this matter. "(Vau) u, after the first radical, is the sign of the participle in the present tense, as 77 speaking; after the second radical, it is the sign of the participle in the past tense, 17 IT WAS SPOKEN." p. 4. "(Yod) i, after the second radical, denotes power to perform whatever the word signifies, as 77 power to speak.” p. 5. And on the same principle— "The second conjugation is HIPHIL, the same with KAL, only inserting after the second radical, and prefixing, as THE HAD POWER TO SPEAK." p. 9. Nothing but inspiration could justify these versions of Hebrew words-17 POWER TO SPEAK! Turn we to another of the Hebricians. II. "Parkhurst's Hebrew Lexicon and Grammar, abridged. By T. A. Teulon. London, 1821." The worthy and modest author of this abridgement, “does not pretend, even to suppose, that its use will render useless such excellent, larger works, as those of Buxtorf, Taylor, Parkhurst, and many others." So far it is well; and those good old-fashioned folks who are in possession of Buxtorf and Taylor, need not as yet to burn their folios, because, " they never can become pocket companions.” How far "the learned" may be likely to find Mr. Teulon, “a convenient assistant," and "a safe refresher of the memory," may, perhaps, become a question, even after the fate of the old Lexicographers shall have been decided. Will it be believed, that the following profundities are in print? designed, too, as "a safe refresher of the memory," for such learned men as cannot make Dr. Taylor's Concordance a pocket companion.. "6. Of SYNTAX. 1. The adjective generally agrees with its substantive in gender and number, as a good man. 2. A verb generally agrees with its nouns in gender, number, and person, as the serpent was. 3. and, prefixed to verbs in the future, denotes succession. 4. and, prefixed to verbs, often supplies the signs of the grammatical inflexions, as and subdue (ye) it. 5. Infinitive verbs have sometimes the particles,,,, prefixed; of which particles, see vii. 2. 6, 7. 8." p. ix. When we have said that these few crude and useless apophthegms are literally the whole which Mr. Teulon has thought needful to print, on the important subject of Hebrew Syntax, our readers will willingly excuse us from the disagreeable necessity of making any farther extracts. We need only add, that, in this abridgement of Parkhurst, the brevity of which seems to be the author's sole aim, there is, nevertheless, a page interpolated of original matter, discussing the doctrine of the Points with equal, or even superior precision. The learned Editor is as unhappy in expressing his own meaning, as in condensing the opinions of Mr. Parkhurst. Condensation, according to the Lexicon, is the essence of darkness—no wonder, therefore, that the grammar should be made to furnish proof. III. « The Book of Psalms, without points; corrected from the edition of Vander Hooght, with a Key, Grammar, Literal English Version, and Lexicon; upon an improved plan. By John Reid, M. D. &c. &c. Glasgow, 1821." "What are all the precepts that can be delivered to the pupil, even during the course of an university education-they are nothing more, if we may be allowed the comparison, than the sign-board upon the highway, which informs the traveller concerning the distance he has still to walk, and points out to him the direction of the right path; but this is all.”—Preface, p. 5. The elegance and appropriateness of this metaphor are unquestionable; and comparisons so happy, Dr. Reid may be allowed to institute ad infinitum. We cannot help pursuing the comparison a little farther:-the best guide-post will be useless in certain circumstances, and, in the dimness of this world's twilight, perspicuity and a good bold type are cardinal virtues of "a sign-board upon the highway." What, then, is the degree of blame belonging to " sign-board" unintelligible, and how depraved must be that painter of guide-posts, who can mock the belated traveller for his pains to spell out the inscription—“ this rode gose no ware.” a To speak without this figure, Dr. Reid's "improved plan" is exceedingly difficult to understand, and not worth the labour when caught. The peculiar character of the book is the notation employed in the literal version-a notation which requires twenty pages of Preface to explain, and when explained and applied to the Book of Psalms, is only what would be called "obscurum per obscurius.” Without a long dissertation, we cannot possibly enlighten our reader as to the dark mysteries of the symbols employed; but the value of the version they may estimate without studying these unprofitable contrivances. "1. Golden for David, Ps. xvi. 1. Literal English Version. 2. Thou hast said to Jekeep, O God, for I have trusted in thee. hovah, my Lord thou my goodness; not to thee. 3. For the-holy who in the earth: they and the-gloricus, all my delight in them," &c. "10 For thou wilt not leave my soul: in hell: and thou wilt not give thy afflicted-to see côrruption," &c. The reader will perceive by this specimen, that the punctuation is employed, not for its usual purposes, but in conformity to the scheme already alluded to, of making the notation of the English version express precisely all the minutia of the original. Edipus could not have devised, that the colon, in the preceding quotation, means nothing more than that the word to which it adheres, is of the common gender in Hebrew. Dr. Reid is happily original in some of his translations. Thus, in Ps. xxii. 17, he has ingeniously united both senses of a controverted word, and put forth a rendering in which both Jews and Christians may agree. "17. For dogs have surrounded me, the assembly of the wicked as a lion-have pierced my hands: and feet:" We fear that his literal version of Ps. cl. 6. will be thought more Judaical than Christian. The Scribes used to write p at the close of a book, as a stimulus to perseverance, in both themselves and their future readers. Dr. Reid has literally connected the pin with the last words of the Psalm !! "6. Every spirit; shall praise Jah, hallelujah, strong." The degree of information, which is implied in such an act, renders it almost probable, that there may be no error of the press in the following verses: "21. That God for us God, for-sálvation; and for Jehovah the Lord for death the-going forth; 22. Even God will wound the head of his enemies, the vortex of the hair of walking himself in-his guilt. 23. The Lord hath said from Bashan, I will bring back, I will bring back, from the depths: of the sea. 24. For the sake thou wilt dip thy foot in the blood and the tongue of thy dogs, from enemies and from him.” Ps. lxviii. Literal English Version. If, however, the Glasgow University Press should bear the blame of that Cartesian heresy, which is so manifestly broached in this passage, the good taste which could write vortex in the translation of a Psalm, can only be matched by the same good taste, in a translation of another Psalm: "9. That-I might do thy will, O my God, I have desired, and thy law; in the middle of MY VISCERA." Ps. xl. Literal English Version. Ohe! jam satis est.-We need not adduce more instances to shew, that the modern systems of Hebrew have proved the occasion-the innocent occasion it may be― of evil. In the same way as the removal of superstition has often led on to the disregard of religion.— The disesteem into which the Points and the Masoretical system have fallen, has operated for evil in two different ways. It has produced smatterers and sciolists among the unlearned; and it has given occasion to all the follies of Hutchinsonianism among the learned.— Men of strong and educated mind, not having the difficulties of the old cumbrous system to contend with, have, in the very exuberance of power, and in the unrestrained activity of their researches, wandered into endless extravagances; exchanging the arcana of punctuation for the unimaginable mysteries of the school of Hutchinson and Parkhurst. And of the two, the sober, staid, demeanour of an old grammarian, whose power and energy and enthusiasm (so far as that degree of feeling is supposable), were expended on the mutation of a Kametz, in the increments of a verb, or the still graver doctrine of accents, kings, ministers, tonics, and euphonics, is greatly preferable to the fantastic orgasms of a modern philosopher, who distorts every feature of the language, and performs legerdemain upon roots and derivatives, discovering more meaning in a text than the author ever dreamt of, and overturning the Principia of Newton, by more demonstrative demonstrations in the Principia Mosis. It is deplorable when men of undoubted learning expend their powers upon such vain pursuits. But it is contemptible only, to behold the multitudes of minor grammarians who endeavour to benefit by the unworthy example of their betters; some of them forsaking or neglecting the honest, but humble duties of their vocation, in the pursuit of a little Hebrew, their services to the body politic being wanting ever since they caught the first glimpses of some via regia Hebraizandi.—If a man would aspire with a true ambition, such as the object ought to excite, after an understanding of the true Hebrew verity; if it were the desire of any reader of these pages, to hearken to the voice of his Maker, as it once spoke in living eloquence from heaven; let him throw away and eschew the trashy pages of a superficial pamphlet, and give his days and nights to Buxtorf, or even to Parkhurst; while he will not swear by the points, let him not be alarmed by the "Magor Missabib" of those who have the Stigmaphobia-" optima quæque, ut ait Plinius, malunt contemnere plerique quam discere."Schroeder's Institutiones are not an antiquated system-Noldius's Concordance is not yet superseded - let not these seem formidable, to him who would aspire to drink at the still, deep, fountain of sacred learning." Meos amicos, in quibus est studium-jubeo ut à FONTIBUS potius hauriant, quam rivulos consectentur." Cic. Acad. i. 2. It is too greatly the fashion of the age, to convert all instruction into amusement; children are cheated into learning; and young men |