NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 299 



happy refuge at Weimar in the society of Goethe, Wieland, and 

 Jean Paul, and thence he exercised a powerful influence in liber- 

 ating human thought. 



It would hardly be possible to imagine a man more different 

 from Herder than was the other of the two who most influenced 

 biblical interpretation at the end of the eighteenth century. This 

 was Alexander Geddes, a Roman Catholic priest and a Scotchman. 

 Having at an early period attracted much attention by his scholar- 

 ship, and having received the very rare distinction, for a Catholic, 

 of a doctorate from the University of Aberdeen, he began publish- 

 ing in 1792 a new translation of the Old Testament, and followed 

 this in 1800 with a volume of critical remarks. In these he sup- 

 ported mainly three views: first, that the Pentateuch in its 

 present form could not have been written by Moses; secondly, 

 that it was the work of various hands ; and, thirdly, that it could 

 not have been written before the time of David. Although there 

 was a fringe of doubtful theories about them, these main conclu- 

 sions, supported as they were by deep research and cogent reason- 

 ing, are now recognized as of great value. But such was not the 

 orthodox opinion then. Though a man of sincere piety, who 

 throughout his entire life remained firm in the faith of his fathers, 

 he and his work were at once condemned ; he was suspended by 

 the Catholic authorities as a misbeliever, denounced by Protest- 

 ants as an infidel, and taunted by both as " a would-be corrector 

 of the Holy Ghost." Of course, by this taunt was meant nothing 

 more than that he dissented from sundry ideas inherited from less 

 enlightened times by the men who just then happened to wield 

 ecclesiastical power. But not all the opposition to him could 

 check the evolution of his thought. 



A line of great men followed in these paths opened by Astruc 

 and Eichhorn, and broadened by Herder and Geddes. Of these 

 was De Wette, who, early in the nineteenth century, showed to the 

 world how largely poetical myths and legends had entered into the 

 formation of the Hebrew sacred books, and whose Introduction to 

 the Old Testament gave a new impulse to fruitful thought through- 

 out Christendom. He had, indeed, to pay a penalty for thus 

 aiding the world in its march toward more truth ; he was driven 

 out of Germany, obliged to take refuge in a Swiss professorship ; 

 and Theodore Parker, who published an English translation of his 

 work, was, for this and similar sins, virtually rejected by what 

 claimed to be the most liberal of all Christian bodies in the United 

 States. 



But contributions to the new thought continued from quarters 

 whence least was to be expected. Gesenius, by his Hebrew Gram- 

 mar, and Ewald, by his historical studies, greatly advanced it. 



To them and to all like them during the middle years of the 



