verty of the lagging and useless epithets; the utter loss of the original personification,the oppressor,' being sunk into a matter-of-fact'empire,' and then say whether this was the man that was likely to catch the spirit of Isaiah. Besides, his knowledge of the prophet's language was far too superficial to qualify him for a safe guide in the grammatical interpretation of the text. And when this, the very foundation, was wanting, what availed all other endowments? But, more than this, the principles of criticism, which he had adopted, were of the most unsound description. Having imbibed the views of Father Houbigant, whose rash conjectural emendations of the text are notorious, he set out with the fixed persuasion that our present text of Isaiah is in a very corrupt state, and that this is the chief cause of the difficulties met with in its explanation. Accordingly, whatever could be derived from MSS. of any age or country, whatever ingenuity could extort from the ancient versions, or fabricate from its own resources, was eagerly brought forward, in order to substitute for what was difficult and idiomatic, something that should be easy for the interpreter, and plain and level to modern tastes and ordinary capacities. If in any instance some favorite doctrine could receive fresh and unexpected support from an ingenious turn given to a passage, this ground was sufficient for the adoption of the new rendering; and the recovery of this lost proof was announced with loud gratulation by those whose love for spiritual truth was greater than their skill in criticism. Thus in ch. liii. ver. 7, the words correctly rendered in our version, He was oppressed and he was afflicted,' were twisted into, It was 'exacted, and he was made answerable;' for the refutation of which we refer our readers to Dr. Henderson's note on the passage. Marked with faults so glaring as these, the bishop's translation turned out to be of very little value indeed to the critical student, except as affording a warning against the tendency to unbridled speculation, of which the Scripture critics of English growth have presented but too many examples. Of a far different character were the labors of the Exegets of Germany; and to none of them, in reference to this book, are our obligations so deep as to the great reformer of Hebrew lexilogy, Gesenius. His thorough and almost matchless acquaintance with the Hebrew idiom, and the extensive investigations in oriental philology, of which his lexicons present us with rare and valuable fruits, pre-eminently qualified him for the interpretation of the chief of the prophetical writings. Yet the results of his toil, disguised in a foreign language, were not available to the mass of biblical students in this country. And it could not be but that his scepticism should leave the traces of its baneful influence upon his mode of expounding many of the most impor tant passages. We might expect that such an expositor would exert all his strength in endeavoring to wrest from the hands of believers those texts to which they had been accustomed to cling, as proofs of the prophet's anticipation of our Saviour's kingdom. Accordingly (not to mention his perversion of ch. vii. 14), we find him, in ch. lii. 15, actually assigning to a Hebrew verb a sense new and destitute of proper authority, in order to remove the appearance of too close a resemblance to the New Testament character of Christ, as our great High Priest, unto the ، sprinkling of whose blood, we are chosen (1 Pet. i. 2. ba bis my p* is correctly rendered in our common version, so shall he sprinkle many nations;' but Gesenius prefers to follow the rendering of the LXX. (whose authority here is not worth a rush), and translates, 'So shall he cause many nations to rejoice (or to admire).' He attaches to the root, in this solitary instance, the idea of 'rejoicing,' and supports his conclusion by comparing with it an Arabic root, to which that signification has been erroneously given by Golius.+ Ample scope was therefore left for one possessed of sufficient learning and true piety, to apply to the elucidation of the text, under the guidance of better principles, the aids accumulated by infidel scholarship. This task has been most creditably accomplished by the laborious and learned author of the present translation. His previous work on Divine Inspiration afforded a sufficient guarantee of the soundness of his doctrinal views; and if any proof were wanting to substantiate his reputation on the score of learning, it is abundantly supplied in the copious and satisfactory notes, by which the text of this volume is illustrated. These we consider to be a most valuable contribution to the cause of biblical exegesis. They contain not only a well digested statement of the opinions of nearly all previous commentators of any note on each contested passage, but also an explanation of each difficult root, with illustrations from the ancient versions and cognate oriental dialects, even to the Ethiopic, and the Coptic. Dr. Henderson has likewise allowed no instance to pass unnoticed, in which it seemed to him that rash expositors had proposed unwarrantable emendations of the text; which of course brings him into pretty frequent contact with Lowth, Secker, and their followers-a tribe to which might well be applied, with a little variation, the lines of the Roman satirist While considering this passage, we were exceedingly struck with the fine musical flow of the original, which is here more easily recognised by an English ear, provided it be read according to the accents, than elsewhere in general. We allude particularly to ver. 13-15. † See Dr. Henderson's work, p. 376. Emendatores, præceps pecus, ut mihi sæpe In reference to the misnamed corrections of such authors, we cite with pleasure the concluding remarks of Dr. H., in his Introductory Dissertation, p. xxiv. 'Gesenius has demonstrated that they are in most instances altogether uncalled for; in others, without any solid foundation; and that had the bishop been more familiar with the comparative philology of the Hebrew text, and the oriental dialects, and more deeply versed in the minutia of the Hebrew syntax, he would have been under no temptation to tax his ingenuity, or to have recourse to the desperate remedy which he has so freely applied in the exercise of therapeutic criticism. * * * It has, I trust, been made apparent to the satisfaction of the reader, that the text is by no means in that corrupt state in which it has been represented; and that, carefully and accurately examined by all the lights which the present improved state of oriental philology and biblical criticism supplies, it justly demands our undiminished confidence and respect. The errors of transcription which have crept into it, are in general of little or no consequence, as affecting the sense, and may easily be rectified by a judicious use of the various readings exhibited in the MSS., by comparing the renderings given in the ancient versions, by consulting the testimonies of Jewish and Christian writers; and by due attention to the context, and to the scope of the writer.' The Introductory Dissertation, from which this is quoted, consists of four sections, containing much useful and some important matter, especially the second and fourth. In the first a clear and succinct account is given of the life and times of the prophet. From this we shall take occasion to say something concerning that order of divine messengers, to which he belonged, and the peculiar circumstances which called forth his ministrations. The situation of the class of ministers, called prophets, in the Hebrew commonwealth, was strikingly different from that of any similar class in the surrounding Gentile nations. They did not form a body of regularly trained sages, like the Chaldeans at the court of the king of Babylon, to whom their royal master could have recourse whenever counsel more than human seemed necessary, or when the visions of his head upon his bed troubled him.' Such evidently was the idea formed of the prophets of Israel by the Syrian king, when he sent Naaman to king Jehoram to be cured of his leprosy; he must have thought of Elisha as an official minister at the court of Samaria.* They Ahab and Jezebel, however, among their other unlawful innovations, maintained bodies of prophets in connexion with their court. Thus we read were not the vewкopot of any shrine,-the guardians of some sacred spot where divine influence was thought especially to diffuse itself; like the prophets of Jupiter at Dodona, or the Pythoness and Vopnrai of the Delphian Apollo, into whose treasury the wealth of the surrounding states and kingdoms was poured, while the oracles of inspiration came forth in accordance with the wishes of the highest bidder. As little did they resemble an incorporated body of diviners, like the College of Augurs, at Rome, -leagued together for the promotion of political ends by means of religious imposture, and themselves sharing in the power and emoluments, as they were allied with the families, of the dominant Patrician order. If we look into the interior of the Hebrew state, we shall see a king, surrounded by the ministers of his court, possessed of limited authority, and bound to govern and judge according to the statutes of his sovereign Jehovah, the Lord of the land, of whom he is but the viceroy. We shall find an hereditary priesthood, discharging the regular services of the temple, in close connexion with the throne, and subject to its authority (1 Kings ii. 27); a consecrated tribe also, scattered throughout the land, to assist and direct the people in the performance of the numerous rites enjoined on their observance. But apart from these, and entirely unconnected with them, the prophets present themselves. We see them in the better times of Hebrew history, assembled in their schools, or in a company 'coming down from the high place, with a psaltery, and a tabret, and a pipe, and a harp before them,' uttering in hymns the praises of Jehovah, or making known, in lofty verse, his Mishpatim, the principles of his government, in their spiritual beauty and extent.* Again, in an age of corruption and idolatry, we behold some individual of this class come forward, charged with an extraordinary commission. Standing forth in the royal presence before the assembled nobles and priests, in his loose garb of hair-cloth bound round him with a leathern girdle, with hair and beard unshorn and shaggy, he denounces to the arch-rebel and his accomplices their treacherous revolt of 450 prophets of Baal, and 400 prophets of Astarte (in our translation of the groves'), who ate at the queen's table; and of 400 false prophets of Jehovah, who prophesied before Ahab and Jehoshaphat, in the gate of Samaria. * This would seem to have been all along the distinguishing function of the prophetic office. Prophecy appears to have been always conveyed in lyric song; for of such a kind are even the predictions of Noah and Jacob. If we are to judge from the example of Elisha (2 Kings iii. 15), the impulse of the Spirit seems regularly to have been bestowed in connexion with the influence of sacred music. It is evident that they also performed the duty of faithful historians of the theocracy. from their lawful sovereign, ready to confirm his threats of divine vengeance with a sign of supernatural power. Nor was this a mission that might be undertaken lightly, from the impulse of enthusiasm or the promptings of ambition. If the sign proposed was not performed, or if the prediction failed of accomplishment, the law of Moses doomed the impostor to death. The prophet held his commission immediately from the Deity: he might not say aught beyond what was suggested to him by direct revelation from God. But, while he confined himself to the announcement of that message, he was to brave undaunted the opposition of all, to defy at once their contempt and their fury; being set 'like a defenced city, as an iron pillar, and as 'brazen walls against the whole land; against the kings of Ju'dah, against the princes thereof, against the priests thereof, 'and against the people of the land.' Entire want of success was not to discourage him. Nay, he was often to regard it as a natural consequence of his message, that it should 'stupify 'the heart, and dull the ears, and close the eyes' of those to whom it was addressed. But, amidst all the contempt to which he was exposed, there was much to sustain his heart, besides that which alone could effectually support him, the consciousness of the presence of the Holy One of Israel.' He belonged to a nobler than any merely royal line; by virtue of his office he was the successor of Abraham, to whom the two-fold promise of an earthly inheritance and a universal spiritual blessing was revealed. Over the maintenance of the covenant connected with the former, he was appointed to watch, and to lead on the brightening development of the glories of the latter. He knew his testimony to be a link in the chain of the divine communications, whose course might be traced from the groves of Mamre to the death-bed of Jacob in Egypt; from the summits of Sinai and the plain of Moab, to the tabernacle in Shiloh; and thence onwards until its last link was fastened to the footstool of the triumphant Messiah, by him who, in the isle of Patmos, heard the voice and saw the form of the alpha and the omega, 'the first and the last.' Among those of his order who have recorded their predictions, the prophet Isaiah not only claims the most distinguished rank by the importance of his subjects, and the beauty of his style, but may also be considered the first in point of time of those who belonged to the kingdom of Judah. Jonah, Hosea, and Amos, had preceded him in the kingdom of Israel; but their predictions were entirely confined to the condition and fortunes of their own state, with the exception of the mission of the first to Nineveh. Micah was indeed his contemporary, but younger, for he did not come into notice till the reign of Jotham. Thus, we may justly assign to Isaiah the leadership of that noble band of |