Collated with parallel Passages of the Hebrew Scriptures. 63 



■Jtt0> samac ; a word of which Hebrew criticism might fairly predicate what a 

 classical critic has of one of its equivalents^ above alluded to, the Homeric a/A0i- 

 fiaivco, that it is peculiarly appropriate to the expression of tutelary influence.* 

 And as the word Elohim is used both of the true God of Israel and of the false 

 Heathen gods, so samac ("^joD) is used in Scripture to express the exertion of 

 tutelary influence — both real on the part of the true tutelary God of Israel, and 

 prete7ided on that of the false gods of the Heathen — hoped for on solid grounds 

 by the true Israelites, and vainly expected by those who were only so outwardly, 

 "calling themselves of the holy city, and therefore staying (samaching) themselves 

 on the Alohim of Israel." As in the participial form, as a noun, signifying 

 upholder, tutelary patron, somech, it is said : " Jehovah is amongst my somechim," 

 (Psalm, liv. 4) ; so it is said of the false tutelary gods of the Heathen : "The 

 somechim of Egypt shall fall." — Ezek. xxx. 6. That is, as explained in Pole's 

 Synopsis, as the Philistine tutelary Dagon fell before Jehovah.f 



• " Vis verbi, a/Kptjiaivuv, eximia inest in Tutela exprimenda." — Kennedy's notes on Homer in 

 loco. 



1 1 shall here take the Hberty of adding the following remarks ; first, on some points of interpre- 

 tation in which Gesenius follows Bochart ; and afterwards on some of those for which we are 

 indebted to his own ingenuity : addressing myself to the task with unfeigned respect for that 

 distinguished professor's learning and labours. 



In the third, fifth, and tenth lines, Bochart proposes and Gesenius seconds three different amend- 

 ments of the Punic, each of them by the interpolation or substitution of the same letter, r. Through 

 its intervention in the third line, our Hebrew-Punic word caneth (equivalent to the repperire of the 

 Plautine Latin) had, by Bochart, been, with the preceding li and pho, made lipkorcaneih, contrary 

 to the text in all manuscripts and editions. For Gesenius was reserved the adjustment, in this 

 case, of the conflicting claims of the emendation and the text, which he effects thus. Having, on the 

 ground of Bochart's critical conjecture, and to make the reading meet the interpretation, admitted 

 the r, and taken, as it were, his etymological turn out of it, he then, to meet and obviate objections 

 against thus tampering with the integrity of the text, dismisses the r, on the grounds of a critical 

 conjecture of his own, of rather an original kind, viz. a supposed agreement, if I understand his 

 meaning, between the Carthaginian orthoepy and the English. Gesenius' words are, " Cum 

 Bocharto scribo liphorcaneth, jn33"lD7, quanquam retineri posse censeo liphocaneth sine r quod 

 Poeni, in pronunciando subinde omisisse videntur ut Angli in horse" In the fifth line again, by the 

 help of the r power, our Punic hyth-li-m' -mo-thyn is transformed, to meet the interpretation, into 

 heterem muth, &c., but this emendation, being contrary to all authority, and leaving the original 

 word scarcely recognizable, the authorized reading, hyth-li-mmo-thin, &c., is like the vuIgate lipho 

 caneth allowed to keep its place to the eye and the ear, though not backed like it by the same high 



