e lawyers, the
historians, the men of science, the statesmen think; and these are for
the most part silent, or confess themselves modestly uncertain. The
professional theologians alone are loud and confident; but they speak in
the old angry tone which rarely accompanies deep and wise convictions.
They do not meet the real difficulties; they mistake them, misrepresent
them, claim victories over adversaries with whom they have never even
crossed swords, and leap to conclusions with a precipitancy at which we
can only smile. It has been the unhappy manner of their class from
immemorial time; they call it zeal for the Lord, as if it were beyond
all doubt that they were on God's side--as if serious enquiry after
truth was something which they were entitled to resent. They treat
intellectual difficulties as if they deserved rather to be condemned and
punished than considered and weighed, and rather stop their ears and run
with one accord upon anyone who disagrees with them than listen
patiently to what he has to say.

We do not propose to enter in detail upon the particular points which
demand re-discussion. It is enough that the more exact habit of thought
which science has engendered, and the closer knowledge of the value and
nature of evidence, has notoriously made it necessary that the grounds
should be reconsidered on which we are to believe that one country and
one people was governed for sixteen centuries on principles different
from those which we now find to prevail universally. One of many
questions, however, shall be briefly glanced at, on which the real issue
seems habitually to be evaded.

Much has been lately said and written on the authenticity of the
Pentateuch and the other historical books of the Old Testament. The
Bishop of Natal has thrown out in a crude form the critical results of
the enquiries of the Germans, coupled with certain arithmetical
calculations, for which he has a special aptitude. He supposes himself
to have proved that the first five books of the Bible are a compilation
of uncertain date, full of inconsistencies and impossibilities. The
apologists have replied that the objections are not absolutely
conclusive, that the events described in the Book of Exodus might
possibly, under certain combinations of circumstances, have actually
taken place; and they then pass to the assumption that because a story
is not necessarily false, therefore it is necessarily true. We have no
intention of vindi