acksmith
could tell him the foundry which manufactured Tubal Cain's hammer and
anvil. Lot's wife, the witch of Endor, Jonah's whale, the sundial of
Ahaz, and the population of Nineveh, were all duly discussed, together
with the bodies in which the angels dined with Abraham. Did the loaves
and fishes miraculously multiply in numbers, or increase in size? Where
did the angel get the flour to bake the cake for Elijah? Did our Lord
catch the fish by net, or by miracle, which he used in the Lord's Dinner
on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. But _the_ question--which we marvel
beyond measure that the bishop overlooks--always was, Where did Cain
get his wife? This is the fundamental question for such critics. The
difficulty, it will be perceived, lies across the very threshold of the
history. How did he stumble over it without record of his misadventure?
It recurs, however, on every page. If the bishop will only answer that
question, and introduce us politely to Cain's wife, I will engage that
she will answer most of these other difficult questions. Had Seth a
wife? How could Noah and his three sons build a ship larger than the
Great Eastern? We can imagine the roars of laughter with which the
bigger school-boys will greet the serious exhibition of their old tests
of dullness, in a printed book, and by a learned bishop, as objections
to the inspiration of the Bible. But the bishop does actually devote
Chapter V. to the impossibility of Moses addressing all Israel; Chapter
VI. to the extent of the camp compared with the priest's duties; Chapter
XX. to the grave difficulty of the three priestly families consuming the
offerings of some millions of people; which surely to a bishop of the
Church of England should not be an unparalleled feat. Such chapters
enable us to appreciate the mental caliber of our critic, and excuse us
from argument with a man incapable of interpreting popular phrases. He
would prove the associated press dispatches all a myth, because it is
impossible for the House of Commons to appear at the bar of the House of
Lords--six hundred men to stand on four square yards of floor; for
McClellan to address the Army of the Potomac, which extended along a
line of thirty miles; for Grant and Sherman--two men--to capture
Vicksburg and thirty thousand prisoners! Manifestly impossible.

The most specious of all the sophistry spread over the volume is that
contained in the Seventeenth Chapter, regarding the increase of Jacob