Chapter VI: Holy Books, or Bibles

Vast, and even immeasurable, as the influence has been which has been exercised on the course of human development by the great men of whom we have spoken, it has been equaled, if not surpassed, by the influence of the peculiar class of writings which we have grouped together under the designation of Holy Books. Of this, the last manifestation of the Religious Idea, it will be necessary to speak in considerable detail; both on account of its intrinsic importance, and because it is a branch of the subject which has not hitherto received the attention it deserves.

We have been far too much accustomed in Europe to treat the Bible as a book standing altogether by itself; to be admired, reverenced and loved, or, it may be, to be criticised, objected to and rejected, not as one of a class, but as something altogether peculiar and unparalleled in the literary history of the world. And, undoubtedly, if we compare it with ordinary literature of whatever description, whatever age, and whatever nation, this opinion is just. Neither in the poetry, the history, or the philosophy of any other nation do we find any work that at all resembles it. Nevertheless it would be a very rash conclusion to arrive at, that because in the whole field of Greek or Roman, Italian or French, Teutonic or Celtic literature, there is nothing that admits of being put in the same category with the Bible, therefore the Bible cannot be placed in any category at all. It is one of a numerous class; a class marked by certain distinct characteristics; a class of which some specimen is held in honor from the furthest East of Asia, to the extreme West of America, or, in other words, throughout every portion of the surface of the earth which is inhabited by any race with the smallest pretense to civilization and to culture. Wherever there is literature at all, there are Sacred Books. If in some isolated cases it is not so, these cases are exceptions too trifling in extent to invalidate the rule. Speaking generally we may say, that every people which has risen above the conditions of savage life; every nation which possesses an organized administration, a settled domestic life, a religion with developed and complex dogmas, possesses also its Sacred Books. If this truth has been too generally forgotten; if the Bible has been too commonly treated as something exceptional and peculiar which it was the glory of Christianity to possess, this omission is probably in great part due to the fact that the attention of scholars has been too much confined to the literature, the religion, and the general culture of the Greeks and Romans. From special circumstances these nations had no Sacred writings among them. Their religion was independent of any such authorities; and our notions of pagan religion have been largely drawn from the religions of Greece and Rome. But the Greeks and Romans were only an insignificant fraction of the Aryan race; and other far more numerous branches of that race had their recognized and authoritative Scriptures, containing in some portions those most ancient traditions of the original stock which entered into the intellectual property of the Hellenic family, in the form of mythological tales and current stories of their gods. We must not therefore be led by the example of classical antiquity to ignore the existence of these writings, or to overlook their importance.[34]

We may classify the Sacred Books to which reference will be made in this chapter as follows, proceeding (as in the case of prophets) from East to West:—

1. THE THIRTEEN KING, or Canon of the Confucians. 2. The TAÒ-TĔ-KĪNG, or Canon of the Taò-sè. 3. The VEDA, or Canon of the Hindus. 4. The TRIPITAKA, or Canon of the Buddhists. 5. The ZEND AVESTA, or Canon of the Parsees. 6. The KORAN, or Canon of the Moslems. 7. The OLD TESTAMENT, or Canon of the Jews. 8. The NEW TESTAMENT, or Canon of the Christians.

The works included in the above list,—which are more numerous than might at first appear, owing to the vast collections comprised under the titles "Vedas," and "Tripitaka,"—are distinguished, as has been already stated, by certain common characteristics. It would be an exaggeration to say that all of these characteristics apply to each one of the writings accepted by any portion of mankind as canonical. This cannot be so, any more than the peculiar qualities which may happen to distinguish any given race of men can ever belong in equal measure to all its members. Hence there will necessarily be some exceptions to our rules, but on the whole I believe we may say with confidence that canonical or sacred books have the following distinctive marks:—

A. There are certain external marks, the presence of which is essential to constitute them sacred at all.

1. They must be accepted by the sectaries of the religion to which they belong as being either inspired, or, if the nature of the faith precludes this idea, as containing the highest wisdom to which it is possible for man to attain, and indeed a much higher wisdom than can be reached by ordinary men. Nor do those who accept these books ever expect to attain it. They regard the authors, or supposed authors, as enlightened to a degree which is beyond the reach of their disciples, and receive their words as utterances of an unquestionable authority. But wherever a divine being is acknowledged, these books are regarded as emanating from him. Either they have fallen direct from heaven and been merely "seen" by their human editors, as was the case with the Vedic hymns; or their contents have been communicated in colloquies to holy men by the Deity himself, as happened with the Avesta; or an angel has revealed them to the prophet while in a fit or a state of ecstacy, as Mahomet was made acquainted with the Suras of the Koran; or lastly, as is held to have been the case with the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, the mind of the writer has been at least so guided and informed by the Spirit of God, that in the words traced by his pen it was impossible he should err.

Such a conviction is expressly stated in the Second Epistle to Timothy, where it is said that "all Scripture is given by inspiration of God." And a claim to even more than inspiration is put forward in the Apocalypse, whose author first calls his work "the Revelation of Jesus Christ," which he says God sent to him by an angel deputed for the purpose, and then proceeds to describe voices heard, and visions perceived; thus resting his prophetic knowledge not on supernatural information communicated to the mind, but on the direct testimony of his senses.

2. With this theory of inspiration, or of a more than human knowledge and wisdom, is closely connected an idea of _merit_ to be obtained by reading such books, or hearing them read. With tedious iteration is this notion asserted in the later works of the Buddhist Canon. These indeed represent the degeneracy of the idea. One of them is so filled with the panegyrics pronounced upon itself by the Buddha or his hearers, and with the recital of the advantages to be obtained by him who reads it, that the student searches in vain under this mass of laudations for the substance of the book itself (H. B. I., p. 536). A Sûtra translated by Schlagintweit from the Thibetan, and bearing the marks (according to its translator) of having been written at a period of "mystic modification of Buddhism," promises that, at a future period of intense and general distress this Sûtra "will be an ablution for every kind of sin which has been committed in the meantime: all animated beings shall read it, and on account of it all sins shall be wiped away" (B. T., p. 139). In another Sûtra, termed the Karanda vyuha, a great saint is introduced as exhorting his hearers to study this treatise, the efficaciousness of which he highly exalts (H. B. I., p. 222). Another speaker recites in several stanzas the advantages which will accrue to him who either reads the Karanda vyuha or hears it read (Ibid., p. 226). Such was the force of the idea that the mere mechanical reading or copying of the sacred texts was in itself meritorious, that, by a still further separation of the outward action from its rational signification, the purely unintelligent process of turning a cylinder on which sentences of Scripture were printed came to be regarded as equally efficacious. An author who has given an interesting account of these cylinders observes that, as few men in Thibet knew how to read, and those who did had not time to exercise their powers, "the Lamas cast about for an expedient to enable the ignorant and the much-occupied man also to obtain the spiritual advantages" (namely, purification from sin and exemption from metempsychosis) "attached to an observance of the practice mentioned; they taught that the mere turning of a rolled manuscript might be considered an efficacious substitute for reading it." So completely does the one process take the place of the other that "each revolution of the cylinder is considered to be equal to the reading of as many sacred sentences or treatises as are enclosed in it, provided that the turning of the cylinder is done slowly and from right to left;" the slowness being a sign of a devout mind, and the direction of turning being a curious remnant of the original practice of reading, in which, as the letters run from left to right, the eye must move over them in that direction (B. T., pp. 230, 231). Similar sentiments, though not pushed to the same extravagance, prevail among the Hindus. One of the Brâhmanas, or treatises appended to the metrical portion of the Vedas, lays down the principle that "of all the modes of exertion, which are known between heaven and earth, study of the Veda occupies the highest rank (in the case of him) who, knowing this, studies it" (O. S. T., vol. iii. p. 22). Manu, one of the highest of Indian authorities, observes that "a Brahman who should destroy these three worlds, and eat food received from any quarter whatever, would incur no guilt if he retained in his memory the Rig Veda. Repeating thrice with intent mind the Sanhitâ of the Rik, or the Yajush, or the Sâman, with the Upanishads, he is freed from all his sins. Just as a clod thrown into a great lake is dissolved when it touches the water, so does all sin sink in the triple Veda" (Ibid., vol. iii. p. 25). Reading the Holy Scriptures is with the Parsees a positive duty. And these works, read in the proper spirit, are thought to exert upon earth an influence somewhat similar to that of the primeval Word at the origin of created beings (Z. A. Q., p. 595). It is needless to speak of the importance attached among Jews and Christians to the reading and re-reading of their Bibles, or of the spiritual benefits supposed to result therefrom. It is worth remarking, however, that this constant perusal of Holy Writ is altogether a different operation from that of studying it for the sake of knowing its contents. People read continually what they are already perfectly familiar with, and they neither gain, nor expect to gain, any fresh information from the performance. And this is a species of reading to which among Christian nations the Bible alone is subjected.

The genesis of this notion is not difficult to follow. Once let a given work be accepted as containing information on religious questions which man's unaided faculties could not have attained, and it is evident that there is no better way of qualifying himself for the performance of his obligations towards heaven than by studying that work. Its perusal and re-perusal will increase his knowledge of divine things, and render him more and more fit, the oftener he repeats it, to put that knowledge into practice. But if it is thus advantageous to the devout man to be familiar with the sacred writings of his faith, it is plain that the attention he gives to them must be in the highest degree agreeable to the divinity from whom they emanate. For, to put it on the lowest ground, it is a sign of respect. It renders it evident that he is not indifferent to the communication which his God has been pleased to make. It evinces a pious and reverential disposition. Hence not only is the reader benefited by such a study, but the Deity is pleased by it. Or if the books are not conceived as inspired by any deity, yet a careful attention to them shows a desire for wisdom, and a humble regard for the instructions of more highly-gifted men who in these religions stand in the place of gods. Thus the action of reading these works, and becoming thoroughly familiar with their contents, is for natural reasons regarded as meritorious. But this is not all. An act which at first is meritorious as a means, tends inevitably to become meritorious as an end. Moreover, actions frequently repeated for some definite reason come to be repeated when that reason is absent. Thus, the reading of Sacred Books, originally a profitable exercise to the mind of the reader, is soon undertaken for its own sake, whether the mind of the reader be concerned in it or not. And the action, having become habitual, is stereotyped as a religious custom, and therefore a religious obligation. The words of the holy books are read aloud to a congregation, without effort or intelligence on their part, perhaps in a tongue which they do not comprehend. Even if the vernacular be employed, there is not the pretence of an effort to penetrate the sense of difficult passages. Holy Writ has become a charm, to be mechanically read and as mechanically heard, and the notion of merit—arising in the first instance from the high importance of understanding its meaning with a view to practicing its precepts—now attaches to the mere repetition of the consecrated words.

3. The exact converse of this unintelligent reverence for the sacred writings is the excessive and over-subtle exercise of intelligence upon them. It is the common fate of such works to be made the subject of the most minute, most careful, and most constant scrutiny to which any of the productions of the human mind can be subjected. The pious and the learned alike submit them to an unceasing study. No phrase, no word, no letter, passes unobserved. The result of this devout investigation naturally is, that much which in reality belongs to the mind of the reader is attributed to that of the writer. Approached with the fixed prepossession that they contain vast stores of superhuman wisdom, that which is so eagerly sought from them is certain to be found. Hence the natural and simple meaning of the words is set aside, or is relegated to a secondary place. All sorts of forced interpretations are put upon them with a view of compelling them to harmonize with that which it is supposed they ought to mean. Statements, doctrines, and allusions are discovered in them which not only have no existence in their pages, but which are absolutely foreign to the epoch at which they were written. This process of false interpretation is greatly favored by distance of time. When an ancient book is approached by those who know but little of the external circumstances, or of the intellectual and spiritual atmosphere, of the age in which it was composed, much that was simple and plain enough to the contemporaries of the writer will be dubious and obscure to them. And when they are determined to find in the venerable classic nothing but perfect truth, the result of such conditions is an inevitable confusion. Their own actual notions of truth must at all hazards be discovered in the sacred pages. The assumption cannot be surrendered; all that does not agree with it must therefore be suitably explained.

Are proceedings or actions which shock the improved morality of a later age spoken of with approbation in the canonical books? Some evasion must be discovered which will reconcile ethics with belief. Are doctrines which the religion of a later age rejects plainly enunciated, or statements of facts, which later investigation has shown to be impossible, unequivocally made? The inconvenient passages must be shown to bear another construction. Are there portions whose character appears too trivial or too mundane to be consistent with the dignity of works given for the instruction of mankind? These portions must be shown to possess a mystical significance; a spirit hidden beneath the letter; profound instruction veiled under ordinary phrases. Are the dogmas cherished as of supreme importance by subsequent generations unhappily not to be found in the text of Revelation? These dogmas must be read out of them by putting a strain upon words which apparently refer to some other subject. Perhaps, if they are not contained in them _totidem verbis_, they may be _totidem syllabis_: or if not even _totidem syllabis_, at least _totidem literis_. And the absence of a letter (like the k in shoulder-knots) can always be got over somehow. Lastly, are there palpable contradictions? At whatever cost they must be explained away, for Holy Writ, being inspired, can never contradict itself.

Let us consider a few of the most striking examples of these methods of treatment. China, usually so matter of fact, has manifested in this field a subtlety of interpretation not altogether unworthy of the more mystical India. The Ch'un Ts'ëw, one of the books of the Chinese Canon, is a historical compilation attributed to Confucius himself, and is therefore of more than ordinary authority even for a Sacred Book. Concerning one of the years of which it contains a record, the following statements are made:—

"In the ninth month, on Kang-seuk, the first day of the moon, the sun was eclipsed.

"In winter, in the tenth month, on Kang-shin, the first day of the moon, the sun was eclipsed" (C. C., vol. v. p. 489.—Ch'un Ts'ëw, b. 9, ch. xxi. p. 5, 6).

Two eclipses in such close proximity were of course an impossibility. Chinese scholars were fully aware of this, and knew, moreover, that the second eclipse mentioned did not take place. A similar mistake occurred in another chapter, so that there were two unquestionable blunders to be got over. No wonder then that "the critics," as Dr. Legge says, "have vexed themselves with the question in vain." But one of them proposes an explanation. "In this year," he remarks, "and in the twenty-fourth year, we have the record of eclipses in successive months. According to modern chronologists such a thing could not be; but _perhaps it did occur in ancient times_!" (Ibid., vol. v. p. 491). Dr. Legge has italicized the concluding words, and put an exclamation after them, as if they embodied a surprising absurdity. But his experience of Biblical criticism must have presented him with abundant instances of similar interpretations of the glaring contradictions to modern science found in Scripture. Is it more ridiculous to suppose that the two eclipses might have occurred in two months than to believe that the sun stood still, in other words, that the revolution of the earth on its axis ceased for a space of time? or that an ass could be endowed with human speech? or that a man, instead of dying, could rise from earth to heaven? And if these and similar strange occurrences be explained as miracles, then such miracles "did occur in ancient times," and do not now. Or if it be attempted, as it is by interpreters of the rationalistic school to get over the difficulty by supposing a natural event as the foundation of the story—as one writer suggests that the descent of the Holy Ghost at Pentecost was a strong blast of wind—then European critics, like those of China, "vex themselves in vain."

No country, however, has done more than India, possibly none has done so much, in the peculiar exercise of ingenuity by which all sorts of senses are deduced from sacred texts. The Veda formed in that highly religious land the common basis on which each variety of philosophy was founded, and by which each was thought to be justified. Dr. Muir has collected a number of facts in proof of the diverse interpretations that found defenders among the champions of the several schools. In these facts, according to him, "we find another illustration (1) of the tendency common to all dogmatic theologians to interpret in strict conformity to their own opinions the unsystematic and not always consistent texts of an earlier age which have been handed down by tradition as sacred and infallible, and to represent them as containing, or as necessarily implying, fixed and consistent systems of doctrine; as well as (2) of the diversity of view which so generally prevails in regard to the sense of such texts among writers of different schools, who adduce them with equal positiveness of assertion as establishing tenets and principles which are mutually contradictory or inconsistent" (O. S. T., vol. iii. p. xx).

Exactly the same methods were applied to the sacred books of Buddhism. "It is in general," says Burnouf, "the same texts that serve as a foundation for all doctrines; only the explanation of these texts marks the naturalistic, theistic, moral or intellectual tendency" (H. B. I., p. 444). To meet the case of contradictions occurring in the Buddhistic Sûtras a theory of a double meaning has been invented. The various schools that had arisen in the course of time did not venture to reject the Sûtras that failed to harmonize with their own opinions, as not having emanated from Buddha, but maintained he had not expressed them in the form of absolute truth. He had often, they thought, adapted himself to the conceptions of his hearers, and uttered what was directly contradictory to his veritable ideas. Hence his words must be taken in two senses; the palpable and the hidden sense (Wassiljew, pp. 105, 329). As it has been with the Chinese Classics, with the Veda, and with the Tripitaka, so it has been with the Zend Avesta. Speaking of the progress of scholarship in deciphering the sense of that ancient work, Professor Max Müller justly observes that "greater violence is done by successive interpreters to sacred writings than to any other relics of ancient literature. Ideas grow and change, yet each generation tries to find its own ideas reflected in the sacred pages of their early prophets, and in addition to the ordinary influences which blur and obscure the sharp features of old words, artificial influences are here at work distorting the natural expression of words which have been invested with a sacred authority. Passages in the Veda or Zend Avesta which do not bear on religious or philosophical doctrines, are generally explained simply and naturally, even by the latest of native commentators. But as soon as any word or sentence can be so turned as to support a doctrine, however modern, or a precept, however irrational, the simplest phrases are tortured and mangled till at last they are made to yield their assent to ideas the most foreign to the minds of the authors of the Veda and Zend Avesta" (Chips, vol. i. p. 134).

It is remarkable that almost identical expressions are employed by a Roman Catholic writer in reference to the efforts that have been made by theologians to discover the doctrine of the Trinity in the pages of the Hebrew Bible. I am glad to be able to quote an authority so unexceptionable as that of M. Didron for the proposition, that the poverty of the Old Testament in texts relating to the Trinity has caused the commentators to torture the sense of the words and the signification of facts. He adds the interesting information that artists, pushed on by the commentators, have represented the signs of the Trinity in scenes which did not admit of them. Thus, commentators and artists have united to find a revelation of the three persons of the Godhead in the three angels whom Abraham met in the plain of Mamre; in the three companions of Daniel who were thrown into the fiery furnace, and in other passages of equal relevance. No wonder, when such are the texts relied upon to prove the presence of this cardinal dogma, that M. Didron should observe that the Old Testament contains very few texts that are clear and precise upon the subject, and that in this portion of the Sacred Books we do not see a sufficient number of real and unquestionable manifestations of the Holy Trinity (Ic. Ch., pp. 514-517).

Perhaps, however, the most conspicuous instance of the power of preconceptions in deciding the sense of Holy Writ is the traditional interpretation of the Song of Solomon. In this little book, which is altogether secular in its subject and its nature, the love of a young damsel to her swain is described in peculiarly plain and sensuous language. But precisely because it was so plain was it necessary to find allegorical allusions under its rather glowing phrases. Hence such expressions as "let him kiss me with a kiss of his mouth; thy caresses are softer than wine," are held to refer to "the Church's love unto Christ," and an enthusiastic encomium passed by the Shulamite upon the physical perfections of her lover is called "a description of Christ by his graces." So, when another speaker, in this case a man, flatters a woman by enumerating the beauties of her form, the feet, the joints of her thighs, the navel, the belly, the two breasts so passionately praised by her admirer, are thought in some mystic way to signify the graces of the Church. A passage referring to a young girl not yet fully developed is made out to be a foreshadowing of "the calling of the Gentiles," and the natural and simple appeal to a lover to make haste to come is "the Church praying for Christ's coming."

Equal, or nearly equal, absurdities are found in the Chinese interpretations of certain Odes contained in their classics. These Odes are, like the Song of Songs, mere expressions of human love. But the critics find in them profound historical allusions; history being the staple of the Chinese sacred books, as theology is of the Hebrew ones. Now it happened in China, as it has happened in Europe, that there was a traditional meaning attached to this portion of the sacred books; and the traditional meaning was embodied in a Preface which was generally supposed to have descended from very ancient times, which came to be incorporated with the Odes, and thus appeared to rest on the same authority as the text itself. But a Chinese scholar, named Choo He, who examined the preface in a freer spirit than was usual among the commentators, formed a very different opinion as to its age and its authority. He believed it to be of much more recent date that was commonly supposed, and by no means to form an integral portion of the Odes. The prevailing theory was that the Preface had existed as a separate document in the time of a scholar named Maou, "and that he broke it up, prefixing to each Ode the portion belonging to it. The natural conclusion," observes Choo He, "is that the Preface had come down from a remote period, and Hwang" (a scholar who, in one account, is said to have written the Preface) "merely added to it and rounded it off. In accordance with this, scholars generally hold that the first sentences in the introductory notices formed the original Preface which Maou distributed, and that the following portions were subsequently added. This view may appear reasonable, but when we examine those first sentences themselves we find some of them which do not agree with the obvious meaning of the Odes to which they are prefixed, and give merely the rash and baseless expositions of the writers." Choo He adds, that after the prefatory notices were published as a portion of the text, "they appeared as if they were the production of the poets themselves and the Odes seemed to be made from them as so many themes. Scholars handed down a faith in them from one to another, and no one ventured to express a doubt of their authority. The text was twisted and chiseled to bring it into accordance with them, and nobody would undertake to say plainly that they were the work of the scholars of the Han dynasty" (C. C., vol. iv. Proleg., p. 33).

Ample confirmation of the justice of Choo He's opinion will be found on turning to the Odes and comparing them with the notices in the Preface, which bear a family likeness to the headings of the chapters in the Song of Songs. Here, for example, is an Ode:—

"If you, Sir, think kindly of me,
I will hold up my lower garments, and cross the Tsin.
If you do not think of me,
Is there no other person [to do so?]
You foolish, foolish fellow!"[35]

The second stanza is identical, with this exception, that the name of the river is changed. Now this young lady's coquettish appeal to her lover is said in the Preface to be an expression "of the desire of the people of Ch'ing to have the condition of the State rectified" (C. C., vol. iv. Proleg., p. 51). Another Ode runs thus:—

1. "The sun is in the east,
And that lovely girl
Is in my chamber.
She is in my chamber;
She treads in my footsteps, and comes to me.

2. "The moon is in the east,
And that lovely girl
Is inside my door.
She is inside my door;
She treads in my footsteps, and hastens away."[36]

This simple poem is supposed by the Preface to be "directed against the decay [of the times]." Observe the theory that anything appearing in a sacred book must have a moral purpose. "The relation of ruler and minister was neglected. Men and women sought each other in lewd fashion; and there was no ability to alter the customs by the rules of propriety" (C. C., vol. iv. Proleg., p. 52). A commentator, studious to discover the hidden moral, urges that the incongruous fact of the young woman's coming at sunrise and going at moonrise "should satisfy us that, under the figuration of these lovers, is intended a representation of Ts'e, with bright or with gloomy relations between its ruler and officers" (C. C., vol. iv. p. 153, note). In another Ode a lady laments her husband's absence, pathetically saying that while she does not see him, her heart cannot forget its grief:

"How is it, how is it,
That he forgets me so very much?"

is the burden of every stanza. This piece, according to the Preface, was directed against a duke, "who slighted the men of worth whom his father had collected around him, leaving the State without those who were its ornament and strength" (C. C., vol. iv. p. 200, and the note.—She King, pt. i. b. 11, ode 7).

With such methods as these there is no marvel which may not be accomplished. And when, by the lapse of many centuries, the very language of the sacred records has been forgotten—as the Sanscrit of the Vedas was forgotten by the Hindus, the Zend by the Parsees, and the Hebrew by the Jews—the process of perversion is still further favored. The original works are then accessible but to a few; and when these few undertake to explain them in the ordinary tongue, they will do so with a gloss suggested by their own imperfect comprehension of the thoughts and language of the past.

These, then, may be accepted as the external marks of Sacred Books: 1. The unusual veneration accorded to them by the adherents of each religion, on the ground that they contain truths beyond the reach of human intelligence when not specially enlightened; or in other words, the theory of their _inspiration_. 2. The notion of _religious merit_ attached to reading them. 3. The application to them of _forced interpretation_, in order to bring them into accordance with the assumptions made regarding them.

B. Passing now to the internal marks by which writings of this class are distinguished, we shall find several which, taken together, constitute them altogether a peculiar branch of literature.

1. Their subjects are generally confined within a certain definite range, but in the limits of that range there is a considerable portion which has the peculiarity that their investigation transcends the unaided powers of the human intellect. Almost the whole of the vast field of theological dogma comes under this head. The sublimer subjects usually dealt with, and not only dealt with, but emphatically dwelt upon, in the Sacred Books are, the nature of the Deity and his mode of action towards mankind; the creation of the world and its various constituent parts, including man himself; the motives of the Deity in these exercises of his power; the dogmas to be believed in reference to the Deity himself and in reference to other superhuman powers or agencies, whether good or bad; and the condition of the soul after death with the rewards and the punishments of vicious conduct. Coming down to matters of a less purely celestial character, but still beyond the reach of the uninspired faculties of ordinary minds, they treat of the primitive condition of mankind when first placed upon the earth; of his earliest history; of the rites by which the divine being is to be worshiped; of the sacrifices which are to be offered to him; of the ceremonies by which his favor is to be won. Here we move in a region which is at least intelligible and free from mysteries, though it is plain that we could not arrive at any certain conclusions on such things as these without divine assistance and superhuman illumination.

Lastly, the Sacred Books of all nations profess to give information on a subject the nature of which is altogether mundane, and with regard to which truth is accessible to all, inspired or uninspired;—the rules of moral conduct. These are, I believe, the main subjects which will be found treated of in the various books that lay claim to the title of Sacred. These subjects may be briefly classified as, 1. Metaphysical speculations as to the nature of the Deity. 2. Doctrines as to the past or future existence of the soul. 3. Accounts of the creation. 4. Lives of prophets or collections of their sayings. 5. Theories as to the origin of evil. 6. Prescriptions as to ritual. 7. Ethics. That this does not pretend to be an exhaustive classification, I need hardly say; other topics are treated in some of them to which no allusion is made, and all of these topics themselves are not treated at all. But they are those with which the Sacred Books are principally concerned; and more than this, they are those in the treatment of which these books are especially peculiar. One important feature both of the Chinese and the Jewish Canon is passed over, namely, their historical records. If these records were not exceptional appearances in sacred works, or if, though exceptional, they presented some essential singularity marking them off from all ordinary history, they should be included in the list of subjects. But as the Chinese Shoo King are perfectly commonplace annals of matters of fact; and as the Books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles are not otherwise distinguished from secular history than by their theological theories—in respect of which they are included under the previous heads—I see no reason to include history among the matters generally treated in Sacred Books. It is right, however, to note in passing that in these two instances it is found in them.

2. Since, however, it will be obvious to all that these great topics are discussed in many other works which have no pretension to be thought sacred, we must seek for some further and more definite criterion by which to separate them from general literature. And we shall find it in the _manner_ in which the above-named subjects are treated. The great distinction between sacred and non-sacred writings in their manner of dealing with these great questions is the tone of authority, and if the expression may be used, of finality, assumed by the former. There is no appeal beyond them to a higher authority than their own. Having God as their author and inspirer, or being the product of the supreme elevation of reason, they take for granted that human beings will not question or cavil at their statements. While other writers, when seeking to enforce the doctrines of any positive religion, invariably rest their contentions, implicitly or explicitly, on some superior authority, referring their readers or hearers either to the Vedas, the Koran, the Bible, the Church, or some other recognized standard of belief and would think it in the last degree presumptuous to claim assent except to what can be found in or deduced from that standard; while those teachers who are not the exponents of any positive, revealed religion, endeavor to prove their conclusions from the common intuitions or the common reasoning faculties of mankind; the writers of these books do neither. They seem to speak with a full confidence that their words need no confirmation either from authority or from reason. If they tell us the story of the creation of the world, they do not think it needful to inform us from what sources the narrative is derived. If they reveal the character of God, it is without explaining the means by which their insight has been obtained. If they lay down the rules of religious or moral conduct, it is not done with the modesty of fallible teachers, but with the voice of unqualified command emanating from the plentitude of power. Of their decisions there can be no discussion; from their sentences there is no appeal.

3. It corresponds with this character that Sacred Books should very generally be anonymous; or more strictly speaking, impersonal; that is, that they should not be put forward in the name of an individual, and that no individual should take credit for their authorship. Understanding the expression in this somewhat wider sense, we may say that anonymity is a general characteristic of this class of writings. Their authors do not desire to invite attention to their own personality, or to claim assent on the ground of respect or consideration towards themselves. On the contrary, they withdraw entirely from observation; they appear to be thoroughly engrossed in the greatness of the subject; and to write not from any deliberate design or with any artistic plan, but simply from the fullness of the inspiration by which they are controlled. Hence not only are the names of the authors in most cases completely lost to us, but they have left us not a hint or an indication by which we could discover what manner of men they were. Even where the name of a writer has been preserved to us, it is often rather by some accident altogether independent of the book, and which in no way alters its anonymous character. We happen to know, on what seems to be good authority, that Laò-tsé composed the Taò-tĕ-Kīng, but assuredly there is not a syllable in the work itself which indicates its author. We happen to know beyond a doubt that Mahomet composed the Koran; but the theory of the book is that it had no human author at all, and it was put forth, not as the prophet's composition, but as the literal reproduction of revelations made to him from heaven. The most noteworthy exceptions are the prophets of the Old Testament and the Pauline, Petrine and Johannine Epistles of the New. But of the prophets, though their names are indeed given, the great majority are little more than a mere name to us; while large portions of the prophecies, attributed in the Jewish Canon to some celebrated prophet, are in reality the work of unknown writers. This is notoriously the case with the whole of the latter part of our Isaiah; it is the case with parts of Jeremiah; it is the case with Malachi (whose real name is not preserved); it is the case with Daniel.

The Pauline Epistles offer indeed a marked exception to the rule; and some of them are of doubtful authenticity. The Epistles of Peter, of John, of James and Jude, even if their authorship be correctly assigned, are of too limited extent to constitute an exception of any importance. The rest of the Christian Bible follows the rule. Like the Vedic hymns, like the Sûtras of Buddhism, like the records of the life and doctrines of Khung-tsé, like the Avesta, all the larger books of the Bible—except the prophets—are anonymous. The whole of the historical portion of the Old Testament, the four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistle to the Hebrews, are—whatever names tradition may have associated with them—strictly the production of unknown authors. This characteristic is one of very high importance, because it indicates—along with another which I am about to mention—the spirit in which these works were written. They were written as it were unconsciously and undesignedly; not of course without a knowledge on the writer's part of what he was about, but without that conscious and distinct intention of composing a literary work with which ordinary men sit down to write a book. Flowing from the depths of religious feeling, they were the reflection of the age that brought them forth. Generations past and present, nations, communities, brotherhoods of believers, spoke in them and through them. They were not only the work of him who first uttered them or wrote them; others worked with him, thought with him, spoke with him; they were not merely the voice of an individual, but the voice of an epoch and of a people. Hence the utter absence of any apparent and palpable authorship, the disappearance of the individual in the grandeur of the subject. This phenomenon is not indeed quite peculiar to Sacred Books. It belongs also to those great national epics which likewise express the feelings of whole races and communities of men; to the Mahâbhârata, to the Râmâyana, to the Iliad and the Odyssey, to the Volsungen and Nibelungen Sagas, to the Eddas, to the legends of King Arthur and his knights. These poems, or these poetical tales, are anonymous, and they occupy in the veneration of the people a rank which is second only to that of books actually sacred. In some other respects they bear a resemblance to Sacred Books, but these books differ from them in one important particular, which of itself suffices to place them in a different category. What that particular is must now be explained.

4. If I were to describe it by a single word, I should call it their _formlessness_. The term is an awkward one, but I know of no other which so exactly describes this most peculiar feature of Sacred Books. Like the earth in its chaotic condition before creation, they are "without form." That artistic finish, that construction, combination of parts into a well-defined edifice, that arrangement of the whole work upon an apparent plan, subservient to a distinct object, which marks every other class of the productions of the human mind, is entirely wanting to them. They read not unfrequently as if they had been carelessly jotted down without the smallest regard to order, or the least attention to the effect to be produced on the mind of the reader. Sometimes they may even be said to have neither beginning, middle, nor end. We might open them anywhere and close them anywhere without material difference. Sometimes there is a distinct progress in the narrative, but it is nevertheless wholly without methodical combination of the separate parts into a well-ordered whole. Herein they differ also from those poetical Epics which we have found agreeing with them in being virtually anonymous. Nothing can exceed the grace, the finish, the perfection of style, of those immortal poems which are known as Homeric. The northern Epics are indeed simpler, ruder, far more destitute of literary merit. The first part, for instance, of the Edda Saemundar (which perhaps ought not to be called an Epic at all) is to the last degree uncouth and barbarous. But then the subject-matter of this portion of the Edda is such as belongs properly to Sacred Books, and had it ever been actually current among the Scandinavians as a canonical work—of which we have no evidence—it would be entitled to a place among them. When we come to the second or heroic portion of this Edda, the case is different. The mode of treatment is still rude and unattractive, but if, unrepelled by the outward form, we study the longest of the narratives which this division contains—the Saga of the Volsungs—we shall discover in it a tale, which for the exquisite pathos of its sentiments, for the deep and tragic interest which centres round the principal characters, for the vivid delineation by a few brief touches of the intensest suffering, is scarcely surpassed even by the far more finished productions of Hellenic genius. No doubt the foundation of the story is mythological, and this throws over many of its incidents a grotesqueness which goes far in modern eyes to mar the effect. But the mythological incidents of the Iliad and the Odyssey are grotesque also, and it requires all the genius of the poet to render them tolerable. Apart from this groundwork, the Volsunga-Saga treats its personages as human, and claims from its readers a purely human interest in their various adventures. It relates these adventures in a connected form, it depicts the feelings of the several actors with all the sympathy of the dramatist, and draws no moral, teaches no lesson. In the whole range of sacred literature I recollect nothing like this. Stories are doubtless told in it, but we are made to feel that they are subservient to an ulterior purpose. In the Old Testament and in the New, they serve to enforce the theological doctrines of the writers; in the works of the Buddhists they generally impress on the hearers some useful lesson as to the reward of merit, and the punishment of demerit, in a future existence. Of the genuine and simple relation of a rather elaborate romance, terminating in itself, there is probably no instance. Such stories as are related are moral tales, and not romances; and they are generally too short to absorb, in any considerable degree, the interest of the reader.

While this is the difference between secular and Sacred Books in respect of their narrative portions, the sacred are as a whole even more decidedly below the secular in all that belongs to style and composition. The dullest historian generally contrives to render his chronicle more lucid, and therefore more readable, than the authors of canonical books. In these last there is the most absolute disregard of artistic or literary excellence. Hence they are, with scarcely an exception, very tedious reading. M. Renan observes of the Koran that its continuous perusal is almost intolerable. Burnouf hesitates to inflict upon his readers the tedium he himself has suffered from the study of certain Tantras. The inconceivable tediousness of the Buddhistic Sûtras—excepting the earlier and simpler ones—is well known to those who have read or attempted to read such works, as, for instance, the Saddharma Pundarika. The Chinese Classics are less repulsive, but few readers would care to study them for long together. The Vedic hymns, though full of mythological interest, are yet difficult and unpleasant reading, both from their monotony and the looseness of the connection between each verse and sentence. The Brâhmanas are barely readable. The Avesta is far from attractive. The Bible, though vastly superior in this respect to all the rest of its class, is yet not easy to read for any length of time without fatigue. Doubtless, if taken as a special study, with a view to something which we desire to ascertain from it, we may without difficulty read large portions at a time; yet we see that Christians, who read it for edification, invariably choose in their public assemblies to confine themselves to very moderate sections of it indeed, while they will listen to sermons of many times the length. There can be little doubt that a similar practice is pursued in private devotion. Single chapters, or at most a few chapters, are selected; these are perused, and perhaps made the object of meditation; but even the most fervent admirers of the Bible would probably find it difficult to read through its longer books without pausing. They do not, so to speak, "carry us on." It was essential to dwell on this tediousness of Sacred Books, because it forms one of their most marked characteristics. Nor does it arise, as is often the case, from indifference or aversion on the part of the reader. Other books repel us because we have no interest in the subjects with which they deal. In these, the keenest interest in the subjects with which they deal will not suffice to render their presentation tolerable.