PRESUMPTUOUS POETKY. 17 



In herds, and wives, and numerous progeny. 

 Their glory is less terrible than theirs 

 That flash and fulmine over Paradise.' 

 To whom the Man of God: Read the command 

 1 Thou shalt none other Gods to me prefer.' 

 Then rolled the thunder louder, and the hill 

 More wrathfully cast out consuming flame, 

 And lightning smote the sinner to the earth." 



In like manner, nine others are catechized and punished, to whom the 

 commandments were unknown. 



Mr. Heraud also supposes the birth of our Saviour in those days. 

 He is represented as the youngest son of Lamech, and his name is 

 Elihu. Our readers will remember that this person is a prominent 

 .character in the book of Job ; but there is no foundation for the 

 idea if idea it can be called, which is the wildest and most visionary 

 conjecture, that this Elihu is intended to typify our Saviour. In the 

 book of Job he is called the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kin- 

 dred of Ram, and his wrath is kindled at the unsatisfactory nature of 

 the arguments urged by the three friends of Job. He, however, re- 

 frains from addressing Job until the latter had spoken, " because they 

 * were elder than he ;" and in justifying his presumption in answering 

 them, he says, " For I know not to give flattering titles ; in so doing 

 my Maker would soon take me away." 



^ Elihu, however, in Mr. Heraud's poem, is represented as the 

 Saviour, and is a conspicuous character in the poem. By him is the 

 brute creation collected together, previous to its entrance into the ark. 

 Mr. Heraud, however, takes advantage of the conjectural identity 

 before alluded to, although rather clumsily ; by causing several of 

 the characters, including Elihu, to appropriate to themselves the 

 language of the book of Job ; we refer particularly to the lamenta- 

 tions of Lamech on the sudden destruction of his whole tribe. 



But if this species of plagiarism is admissible on the supposition of 

 Mr. Heraud, that Elihu was our Saviour, there is, nevertheless, no 

 conceivable reason why Mr. Heraud should resort to the book of Job 

 for his poetry, which he has done in several instances, of which 

 three will, for the present, suffice. 



An archangel appears to Noah, in the first book, and foretells the 

 approaching deluge. He says 



" In the halls of mighty men 

 Leviathan disports ; no morn have they 

 But of his eyelids, neither lamp nor fire 

 But of what wrath-breath, scintillant and fierce, 

 From his volcano nostrils smokes and burns." 



HERAUD. 



" By his sneezing a light doth shine, and his eyes are like the eyelids of 

 the morning. 



"Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out. 



"Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or cauldron." 



JOB. 



In the twelfth book, Mr. Heraud describes the crocodile, which is 

 about to enter the ark. We wish the reader to mark how recklessly 



M.M. No. 103. D 



