294 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



placable. Although unable to suppress all of Simon's works, he 

 was able to drive him from the Oratory, and to bring him into 

 disrepute among the very men who ought to have been proud of 

 him as Frenchmen and thankful to him as Christians. 



But other scholars of eminence were now working in this 

 field, and, chief among them, Le Clerc. Virtually driven out of 

 Geneva, he took refuge at Amsterdam, and there published a 

 series of works upon the Hebrew language, the interpretation of 

 Scripture, and the like. In these he combated the prevalent idea 

 that Hebrew was the primitive tongue, expressed the opinion that 

 in the plural form of the word used in Genesis for God," Elohiin," 

 there is a trace of Chaldean polytheism, and, in his discussion on 

 the serpent who tempted Eve, curiously anticipated modern geo- 

 logical and zoological ideas by quietly confessing his inability to 

 see how depriving the seryjent of feet and compelling him to go 

 on his belly could be punishment since all this was natural to 

 the animal. He also ventured semi-scientific explanations of the 

 confusion of tongues at Babel, the destruction of Sodom, the con- 

 version of Lot's wife into a pillar of salt, and the dividing of the 

 Red Sea. As to the Pentateuch in general, he completely rejected 

 the idea that it was written by Moses. But his most permanent 

 gift to the thinking world was his answer to those who insisted 

 upon the reference by Christ and his apostles to Moses as the 

 author of the Pentateuch. This answer became a formula which 

 has proved effective from his day to ours : " Our Lord and his 

 apostles did not come into this world to teach criticism to the 

 Jews, and hence spoke according to the common opinion." 



Against all these scholars came a theological storm, but it 

 raged most pitilessly against Le Clerc. Such renowned theo- 

 logians as Carpzov in Germany, Witsius in Holland, and Huet in 

 France berated him unmercifully and overwhelmed him with 

 assertions which still fill us with wonder. That of Huet, attrib- 

 uting the origin of pagan as well as Christian theology to Moses, 

 we have already seen ; but Carpzov showed that Protestantism 

 could not be outdone by Catholicism when he declared in the face 

 of all modern knowledge that not only the matter, but the exact 

 form and words of the Bible, had been divinely transmitted to the 

 modern world free from all error. 



At this Le Clerc stood aghast, and finally stammered out a 

 sort of half recantation.* 



For Carlstadt, and Luther's dealings with hirn on various accounts, see Meyer, Geschichte 

 der Exegese, vol. ii, pp. 373 and 397. As to the value of Maes's work in general, see 

 Meyer, ii, 125 ; and, as to the sort of work in question, ibid., iii, 245, note. For Carlstadt, 

 see also Farrar, History of Interpretation, and Moore's introduction as above. For Hobbes's 

 new that the Pentateuch was written long after Moses' day, see the Leviathan, iii, 33. 



