the Desolation with the Consolation, and the Consolation with the Desolation."

From Jesus the Son of Sirach, xlv.-xlix., scarcely any thing can be derived to favor the present arrangement of the biblical books. Something is rather to be gained from Luke xxiv. 44, and Matt. xxiii. 35; whence it appears the Psalms held the first, and Chronicles the last place in the Hagiographa."

[The order, says Eichhorn, in which the writings of the Old Testament follow one another, seems to be very old; for Sirach the Elder mentions the famous men of the Old Testament in the same order, they succeed one another in our editions. He makes one book of the twelve minor Prophets, and places it after Ezekiel. According to the New Testament, in the manuscripts used at Christ's time, the Psalms began the series of the Hagiographa, and the Chronicles finished the entire collection; for Jesus (Luke xxiv. 44) calls the Hagiographa the Psalms, which was the first book of that collection; and when he wished to select the first and the last instances of the shedding of innocent blood, mentioned in the Old Testament, he selects the case of Abel from Genesis, as the first book of the Old Testament, and that of Zacharias from the book of Chronicles, as the last of all. (Matt. xxiii. 35.)]

• Elias Levita, Præf. iii. ad Masor. Hammas, p. 46, of Semler's version. Buxtorf, Tib. c. 11. Hottinger, Thes. Phil. p. 454. Comp. § 110. See Carpzov, l. c. pt. iii. p. 88. Eichhorn, vol. i. § 7, p. 50, 4th ed., and Bertholdt, vol. i p. 74, note 5. [The latter thinks the Talmudic order of the Prophets above given is the oldest.]

According to Hävernik, (1. c. p. 78,) Luke called the whole Hagiographa by the name Psalms, not because the Psalms occupied the first place in the collection, but on account of the poetical character of several parts of the Hagiographa, just as Philo (De Vita cont. § 13) and Josephus (cont. Ap. §23) call it the Hymns.

The apocryphal books were at first only an addition to the Alexandrian version. The Protestants were the first to regard them as a whole by themselves. In the Vatican Codex they succeed in the following order :The books of Tobit and Judith are between Nehemiah and Esther; the Book of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus follow the Song of Songs; Baruch and the Lamentations of Jeremiah succeed the prophecies of Jeremiah; and the four books of Maccabees close the canon.

In the Alexandrian Codex, Tobit, Judith, the two books of Esdras, and the four books of Maccabees, follow immediately after the book of Esther; and the Book of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus follow after the Song of Songs. Luther's arrangement is peculiar to himself.

§ 11.

ORDER AND DIVISION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.

From the manner in which the books of the New Testament were collected arose the division into the Gospels (τὸ εὐαγγέλιον) and the Epistles, ὁ ἀπόστο Log,) to which the Acts of the Apostles and the Apocalypse were added. By this means the books which would be properly divided into historical, epistolary and didactic, and prophetic books, are united together. The apostolic Epistles were subsequently divided into the Pauline and the Catholic; whilst earlier, the First Epistle of Peter and the First of John were united in the same collection with the Epistles of Paul.

With respect to their acknowledgment by the church, they are divided into ὁμολογούμενα (the acknowledged) and avtikeybμeva, (the contested.) See § 24.

In reference to their authors, they are divided into the writings of the apostles, and of their assistants. The arrangement of particular books is various in various manuscripts; but the present order is established by ancient witnesses."

* See Marcion's arrangement of the Pauline Epistles, in Epiphanius, Hæres. xlii. 9, Opp. i. p. 310. Schmidt, Einleit. in N. T. vol. i. p. 215. Pritii, Introductio, p. 17. Rumpai, Com. crit. p. 96, sqq. Sixtus Senensis, Bibliotheca sac. lib. i. p. 44. He divides the N. T. into Libros legales, historiales, sapientiales, and prophetales. Rumpai, p. 97.

BOOK II.

HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE COLLECTION OF SCRIPTURE; OR, HISTORY OF THE CANON.

CHAPTER I.

HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE OLD TESTAMENT COLLECTION; OR, HISTORY OF THE JEWISH CANON.

[§ 12, a.

IMPORTANCE AND VALUE OF THE HEBREW LITERATURE.

He who would despise these relics of the Hebrews because they proceed from a nation which had not reached a high degree of culture, and had made but a onesided use of their powers of mind, must either be ungrateful for their great merit, or so unjust as to demand the full light of high noon from the first faint glimmerings of morn. Much rather would every free, impartial reader, who, in general, has a taste for the writings of such early times, and of a country so foreign to us as Asia, be powerfully attracted to them by their contents and their old and original spirit; and he will never lay them down without reverence and gratitude for the fortunate destiny which has preserved them. Even if we do not contemplate them as ancient memorials of the most rational religion of antiquity, in which we can trace the gradual

ascent of the human understanding to the sublime doctrine of one God, and its struggle against polytheism for so many centuries, there are yet various points of view from which the writings of the Jews appear as works of the greatest value.

In them we find a rich collection of genuine poesies of nature, which every lover of the poetic art will hold in high esteem; and amongst them we discover kinds of poetry of which nothing of similar excellence has survived amid the far richer relics of Greek lit

erature.

At a certain stage of spiritual culture all nations have had oracles; and who had more of them than the oldest Greeks? Yet only inconsiderable fragments survive of their wealth; while, on the contrary, a great number of perfect prophecies from the Hebrew oracles still remain.

Who would not exchange a part of Pindar's hymns of victory for his lost religious odes, since almost all of the Grecian songs of this character have perished?

From the Hebrews we have primitive, old templesongs, in a solemn, devout, and highly-original tone. These and other kinds of Hebrew poetry no man has ever read) with poetic feelings, and with the power of recalling old times, without falling in love with the ancient Oriental spirit which they breathe, and rejoicing, at the same time, that we have specimens of at least one Oriental nation, although they are so very imperfect.

Besides, the Hebrew histories and poems, considered as primitive works of the human mind in Asia, are the most valuable documents for the history of human progress; for, if we follow tradition and other evidence, the human race originated in the regions of Asia, and long developed itself there.