NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. H7 



sacred books are developed in the earlier stages of civilization, 

 when men explain everything by miracle and nothing by law.* 



As the second of these laws governing the evolution of sacred 

 literature may be mentioned that which we have constantly seen 

 so effective in the growth of theological ideas that to which 

 Comte gave the name of the Law of Wills and Causes. In ac- 

 cordance with this, man attributes to the Supreme Being a phys- 

 ical, intellectual, and moral structure like his own ; hence it is 

 that the votary of each of the great world religions ascribes to 

 its sacred books what he considers absolute perfection ; he im- 

 agines them to be what he himself would give the world were he 

 himself infinitely good, wise, and powerful. 



A very simple analogy might indeed show him that even a lit- 

 erature emanatiug from an all-wise, beneficent, and powerful au- 

 thor might not seem perfect when judged by a human standard ; 

 for he has only to look about him in the world to find that the 

 work which he attributes to an all-wise, all- beneficent, and all- 

 powerful Creator is by no means free from evil and wrong. 



But this analogy long escapes him, and the exponent of each 

 great religion proves, to his own satisfaction and the edification 

 of his fellows, that their own sacred literature is absolutely accu- 

 rate in statement, infinitely profound in meaning, and miracu- 

 lously perfect in form. From these premises also he arrives at 

 the conclusion that his own sacred literature is unique ; that no 

 other sacred book can have emanated from a divine source ; and 

 that all others claiming to be sacred are impostures. 



Still another law governing the evolution of sacred literature 

 in every great world religion is that when the books which com- 

 pose it are once selected and grouped they come to be regarded as 

 a final creation from which nothing can be taken away, and of 

 which even error in form, if sanctioned by tradition, may not be 

 changed. 



The working of this law has recently been seen on a large scale. 



A few years since a body of chosen scholars, universally ac- 

 knowledged to be the most fit for the work, at the call of English- 

 speaking Christendom undertook to revise the authorized Eng- 

 lish version of the Bible. 



* For the legend regarding the Septuagint, especially as developed by the letters of 

 Pseudo-Aristeas, and for quaint citations from the fathers regarding it, see The History of 

 the Seventy-two Interpretators, from the Greek of Aristeas, translated by Mr. Lewis, Lon- 

 don, 1715 ; also, Clement of Alexandria, in the Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Edinburgh, 

 1867, p. 448. For interesting summaries showing the growth of the story, see Drummond, 

 Philo-Judeeus and the Growth of the Alexandrian Philosophy, London, 1888, vol. i, pp. 231 

 et seq. ; also, Renan, Histoire du Peuple Israel, vol. iv, chap, iv ; also, for Philo-Judteus's 

 part in developing the legend, see Rev. Dr. Sanday's Bampton Lectures for 1893, on Inspi- 

 ration, pp. 86, 87. 



