NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 163 



Strange to say, on the development of Scripture interpretation, 

 largely in accordance with the old methods, wrought, about the 

 beginning of the eighteenth century, Sir Isaac Newton. 



It is hard to believe that from the mind which produced the 

 Principia, and which broke through the many time-honored be- 

 liefs regarding the dates and formation of scriptural books, could 

 have come his discussions regarding the prophecies ; still, at vari- 

 ous points even in this work, his power appears. From internal 

 evidence he not only discarded the text of the Three Witnesses, 

 but he decided that the Pentateuch must have been made up 

 from several books ; that Genesis was not written until the reign 

 of Saul ; that the books of Kings and Chronicles were probably 

 collected by Ezra ; and, in a curious anticipation of modern criti- 

 cism, that the book] of Psalms and the prophecies of Isaiah and 

 Daniel were each written by various authors at various dates. 

 But the old belief in prophecy as prediction was too strong for 

 him, and we find him applying his great powers to the elucida- 

 tion of the details given by the prophets and in the Apocalypse 

 to the history of mankind since unrolled, and tracing from every 

 statement in prophetic literature its exact fulfillment even in the 

 most minute particulars. 



By the beginning of the eighteenth century the structure of 

 scriptural interpretation had become enormous. It seemed des- 

 tined to hide forever the real character of our sacred literature 

 and to obscure the great light which Christianity had brought 

 into the world. The Church, Eastern and Western, Catholic and 

 Protestant, was content to sit in its shadow, and the great divines 

 of all branches of the Church reared every sort of fantastic but- 

 tress to strengthen or adorn it. It seemed to be founded for 

 eternity ; and yet, at this very time when it appeared the strong- 

 est, a current of thought was rapidly dissolving away its founda- 

 tions, and preparing that wreck and ruin of the whole fabric 

 which is now, at the close of the nineteenth century, going on so 

 rapidly. 



The account of the movement thus begun is next to be given.* 



Hydrogen has at last been liquefied in quantities susceptible of exami- 

 nation, by Prof. Olzewski, of Cracow, who finds that its critical point the 

 temperature at which it passes from a liquid to a vapor is 233 C, and 

 its boiling point at normal pressure 343 C. Thus the last gas that has 

 resisted liquefaction has yielded. 



* For Newton's boldness in textual criticism, compared with his credulity as to the 

 literal fulfillment of prophecy, see his Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel and 

 the Apocalypse of St. John, in his works, edited by Horsley, London, 1785, vol. v, pp. 

 297-491. 



