C4 



discussion, and cnquiry,Avitli which ingenuity, erudition, or pa- 

 radox, may have elucidated or obscured the annals of mankind, 

 no single subject can be selected, that unites in so striking an 

 assemblage all the various qualifications which criticism could 

 desiderate, zeal supply, ingenuity present, or literature unfold, 

 upon the decision of a speculative point. The zeal of the po- 

 lemic, the copiousness of the commentator, the erudition of the 

 scholar, the harsh recrimination of theological bitterness, and 

 the happy temerity of critical correction, have been alternately 

 exercised and exhausted. The passions of the human heart 

 have been lamentably united with, and embittered, the pre- 

 judices of the religious education.* The pretensions of an 

 infallible church will not admit many, to recognize even the 

 possibility of error; while the assumptions of a rational dissent 

 which the professors of reformed belief consistently claim, 

 are carried by others, to lengths the most unwarrantable and 

 dangerous. The theory of evidence, has been perverted to 

 support the purposes of system, and the principles of legiti- 

 mate 



• Thus Cenebrai(l,aCatholic writer, condemns the cri'ical correction or rational doubts 

 of Funccius, a Protestant, on a passage in tlie text, in terms the most severe and unqua- 

 lified : — " Ut OS impudentissimum Funccii evomuit," says he, while the great Scaliger 

 defends his fjith and possibly his practice also, by retorting on Genebrard the expressions, 

 (which ill this instance at least he seems to have deserved,) " Pecus maledicentissimuin 

 Genebrardus." But although I may mention this one instance to justify the censure I have 

 bestowed on the conduct and severity of some of the authors I have been obliged to consult; 

 I shall not again offend the taste or the feelings of the reader, by recurring to this disgust- 

 inv )i;ciure of uncharitable recrimination and illiberal animosity. 



