246 Oriental Liferature, [Chap. XIV. 



supposed that lie had revived the knowledge of 

 the true versification of this language, and that 

 he was in possession of principles by which it might 

 be scanned, like any other poetry, and its rhythm 

 discovered with the utmost precision. He sup- 

 posed that in Hebrew poetry all the feet consist of 

 two syllables ; that no regard is to be paid to the 

 quantity of the syllables ; tliat when the number of 

 syllables is even, the verse is Trochaic, and the ac- 

 cent to be placed on the first; but that when 

 the number is odd, the verse is to be accounted 

 Iambic, and the accent to be placed on the second 

 syllable ; that the periods generally consist of two 

 verses, often of three or four, and sometimes of a 

 greater number; that verses of the same period, 

 with few exceptions, are of the same kind ; that 

 the Trochaic verses, for the most part, agree in 

 the number of feet, but that to this rule there are 

 a few exceptions ; that in the Iambic verses the 

 feet are in general unequal, though in some in- 

 stances it is found to be otherwise. To accom- 

 modate the sacred text to these doctrines he in- 

 dulged in many conjectures and fancied emen- 

 dations, which wTre altogetlier capricious and 

 unwarrantable*. This hypothesis was generally 

 considered, by the most judicious critics, as afan- 



Crltices Subsidii.'i, turn praxipue IShtriccs npc, multis in locis infcgri- 

 iafi sua reatitutus. Edidit Franciscus Hare, S.T. P. Episcopus 

 Cic^strensis. Tom. 2, 8vo, 17'iO'. 



* Gomams, a learned Hebraist of Holland, in the seventeenth 

 century, invented and taught an hypothesis concerning Hebrew 

 MetrCy somewhat resembling that of bishop Hare, but not attend- 

 ed with so many arbitrary and conjectural emendations of the- 

 sacred text. 



