NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 595 



But theologians themselves were the first to show the inade- 

 quacy of these explanations. The more rationalistic pointed out 

 the fact that they were contrary to the sacred text : Von Bohlen, 

 an eminent professor at Konigsberg, in his sturdy German hon- 

 esty, declared that the salt pillar gave rise to the story, and com- 

 pared the pillar of salt causing this transformation legend to the 

 rock in Greek mythology which gave rise to the transformation 

 legend of Niobe. 



On the other hand, the more severely orthodox protested against 

 such attempts to explain away the clear statements of Holy Writ. 

 Dom Calmet, while presenting many of these explanations made 

 as early as his time, gives us to understand that nearly all theolo- 

 gians adhered to the idea that Lot's wife was instantly and really 

 changed into salt ; and in our own time, as we shall presently see, 

 have come some very vigorous protests. 



Similar attempts were made to explain the other ancient le- 

 gends regarding the Dead Sea. One of the most recent of these 

 is that the cities of the plain, having been built with blocks of 

 bituminous rock, were set on fire by lightning, a contemporary 

 earthquake helping on the work. Still another is that accumula- 

 tions of petroleum and inflammable gas escaped through a fissure, 

 took fire, and so produced the catastrophe.* 



Against this sort of rationalism perhaps the most vigorous of 

 recent protests appeared in 1876, in an edition of Monseigneur 

 Mislin's work on " The Holy Places." In order to give weight to 

 the book, he spread his qualities at great length on the title-page. 

 Among other things, he was prelate of the papal household, apos- 

 tolic prothonotary, a doctor of theology and of philosophy, and 

 his work is prefaced by letters from Pope Pius IX and sundry 

 high ecclesiastics and from Alexandre Dumas. His hatred of 

 Protestant missionaries in the East is phenomenal ; he calls them 

 " bagmen," ascribing all mischief and infamy to them ; and his 

 hatred is only exceeded by his credulity. He cites all the argu- 

 ments in favor of the salt statue at Usdum as the identical one 

 into which Lot's wife was changed, adds some of his own, and pre- 

 sents her as " a type of doubt and heresy." With the proverbial 

 facility of theologians in translating any word of a dead language 

 into anything that suits their purpose, he says that the word in 

 the nineteenth chapter of Genesis, which is translated " statue " or 

 " pillar," may be translated " eternal monument " ; he is especially 



* For Kranzel, see his " Reise nach Jerusalem," etc. ; for Schegg, his " Gedenkbuch 

 einer Pilgerreise," etc., 186V, chapter xxiv. For Palmer, see his "Desert of the Exodus," 

 vol. ii, pp. 478, 479. For the various compromises, see works already cited, passim. For 

 Von Bohlen, see his "Genesis," Konigsberg, 1835, pp. 200-213. For Calmet, see his 

 " Dictionarium," etc., Venet., 1766. For very recent compromises, see J. W. Dawson and 

 Dr. Cunningham Geikie in works cited. 



