eed to find the historical place of a Biblical
writing, and to read it in the light of its relation to the period.

The traditional view of Deuteronomy made it the last of the writings of
Moses, a Farewell Address of the Father of his Country; reciting to the
nation he had founded the story of its deliverance, repeating the laws
established for its welfare, and warning it against the dangers awaiting
it in the future. Such a view was attended with many difficulties, not
insuperable, however, to the critical knowledge of earlier generations.
Its real place in the history of Israel appears to have been found of
late.

The Prophetic Reformation of Religion, begun in the eighth century before
Christ, by the group of noble men of whom Isaiah was the most conspicuous
had, by the latter part of the seventh century before Christ, become ripe
for an organization of the institutions of religion. Jeremiah was the
central figure in this second period of the prophetic movement. Upon the
throne of Judah at that time was the good young king, Josiah--the Edward
the Sixth of Israel--in whom the hopes of the reformers centred. About the
year 625 B.C. occurred an event that decided the future of religion in
Judah; described in the twenty-second chapter of the second book of
Kings. The high-priest sent to the young king, saying:

I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord.

This book of the law of Moses, according to tradition, had been lost; had
been lost so long that its provisions had dropped into disuse, into
oblivion; an oblivion so complete that the nation's religion ignored and
violated the whole system of that law; had been lost so long and so
thoroughly that the very existence of such a law had passed from the
memory of man.

This was the book that Hilkiah claimed to have re-discovered in the temple
archives. It was at once read to the excited king. It made a profound
impression upon him by its revelation of the apostasy in which the nation
was living, and by its solemn threatenings upon such apostasy.

It came to pass that when the king had heard the words of the book of
the law, that he rent his clothes.

For, said he:

Great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our
fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according
unto all that which is written concerning us.

The devout young king threw himself into a thorough reformation of the
prevailing