May 1, 1886.] 



KNO^A^LEE)GK ♦ 



215 



Holy Scripture I Either Jude's epistle is tiod's inspired word 

 or it is not. If it is, then so is the Book of Enoch, which 

 lie quotes as autlioritative, saying that so Enoch "pro- 

 phesied ; " if it is not, then this epistle has no proper place 

 in the canon of scripture. The Armenian Church alone, by 

 boldly accepting the Book of Enoch, escapes this difficulty. 



Such is the record of the canon of the Old Tesfciment 

 from the time when Moses received the ten commandments 

 (written — as he says he actually witnessed ! — by the finger of 

 tlod, on stone), and wrote special injunctions, according to 

 God's command, for the destruction of non-Jewish nations, 

 to the time of Hilkiah the priest and Huldah the sibyl, 

 thence to the time of Xehemiah and Ezra (whose testimony, 

 however, cuts rather inconveniently both waj's, supporting 

 some books and opposing others), and onwards to the time 

 of Judas Maccabajus, so far as Protestant Bibles are con- 

 cerned, while we pass on a few centuries farther for portions 

 of the Roman, Greek, and Armenian Bibles. 



Surely a collection of books thus formed must be full of 

 intei-est to all thinking minds. The student of science finds 

 in these books an account of very ancient ideas about many 

 of the subjects with which he deals ; tlie student of history 

 has here most valuable records ; the student of literature 

 and even the student of ai-t have here a fund of valuable 

 mateiials. To the reverent mind the thought of calling 

 this rather incongruous collection the word of (tOD may 

 seem somewhat startling. Such a mind may even feel 

 pained at the suggestion, and may shudder at the callous 

 ease with which the less reverent assume tliat not only 

 what is good and true and beautiful, but also what is cruel 

 or crude, absurd or trivial, indecent or erroneous, nay, 

 even what is obviously self-contradictory, in this collection 

 of all that remains of Jewish literature before the capture 

 of Jerusalem, came from the Being that they describe in the 

 same breath as All-wise, All-merciful, All-pure, All-perfect. 

 But the very incongruity of their ideas should prevent us 

 from regarding such men as irreverent, still less as iire- 

 ligious or \vicked. Nor need we fear that a nation among 

 wliom are many of these unconscious, and therefore inno- 

 cent blasphemers, must needs arouse the anger of Yahveh- 

 Eluhim. All things work according to law, and the Power 

 from which all things proceed will not turn from uniform 

 procedure according to law to acts of violence and injustice 

 — as if that Power were " some angry man in the next 

 street ". — mei'ely because the unwise proclaim their folly 

 loudly. Theii- offence, in any case, is only against the prin- 

 ciples of logic ; and though, were their minds clearer, it 

 would be profane and hideous blasphem\', we need not fear 

 lest 



fSome hysteric sense 

 Of wrong or insult, should offend the throne 

 AV'here Wisdom reigns supreme. 



The books of the later covenant with which we have next 

 to deal present a problem of another sort. We have here 

 nothing like the range in time, nothing like the variety of 

 subject, and nothing like the incongruity of method and of 

 treatment which we find in the ancient Jewish collection. 



This portion of our subject must be left, however, to 

 another occasion. 



{To be concluded.) 



After formulating a dozen inconsistent explanations of some 

 manifest and perfectly natural mistakes in ancient religious 

 records, the weaker theologians proclaim that the difficulty has 

 been long since met. One recalls a scene in Punch many years 

 since where a defender of American honour, speaking of Pennsylvania 

 bonds, says : — 



This debt we have repudiated long ago, — 

 'Tis therefore stitled, — yet thisyer Britkher 

 Keeps for repayment worriting us still. 



PRIZE-PIG HONOURS FOR SCIENCE. 



By Richard A. Proctor. 



^R. RANYARD found himself a long way in 

 advance of his time when he brought be- 

 fore the Astronomical Society a proposal 

 for doing away with the award of medals 

 in recognition of scientific work. He was 

 told that the idea was revolutionary, and 

 that a niedal, though not inappropriate for a 

 prize pig, is also a graceful recognition of researches supposed 

 to be pursued with the object of increasing knowledge. 



I was formerly outspoken for Mr. Ranyard's side of the 

 question, but events which happened in 1872-73 rendered 

 my advocacy of the more dignified -s-iew of the matter less 

 easy to me than before. For in 1872 Sir Edmund Beckett 

 (whom I then barely knew by sight, but later reckoned 

 among my most esteemed friends) thought fit to put for- 

 ward my own name for the prize-pig form of recognition I 

 had objected to ; and as the award was not confirmed a sort 

 of sour-gi-apes tone might be suspected in any comments 

 I might thereafter make upon the medal subject in my 

 former manner. Yet, as the subject has been raised again 

 by another, who is as certainly free from any such suspicion 

 as my friends know me to be, I shall venture to make such 

 remarks upon it here as experience and judgment alike 

 suggest. 



To outsiders it seems a very simple matter. Certain 

 men are at work in various ways in astronomical research ; 

 a society of students of astronomy recognise special in- 

 terest or value in certain of their results, and, selecting 

 what they consider best, the society awards the only form of 

 recognition which it can think of. 



In actual practice, however, the matter is not so simple. 

 This particular form of recognition, like others — as election 

 to various offices in the societ}', and so forth — very readily 

 lends itself to jobbery. Two men may agree to support 

 each other alternately for — let us sjiy — the presidentship of 

 a learned society, an office which may be merely complimen- 

 tary, or may be used as a stepping-stone to salaried posts. 

 The presidentship of the Astronomiciil Society, for example, 

 is not an office of emolument ; yet it might conceivably be 

 worked to transfer the master of a suburban school into a 

 University professor, or in other ways to advance one who 

 had little power to advance himself. So with the award 

 of a medal. Directly of no value, such an award may be 

 indirectly made very profitable. One often finds, indeed, 

 the same persons who job in regard to office engaged to- 

 gether in regard to even so seemingly innocent a matter as 

 the award of a medal. 



But apart from jobbery, the award of a medal may be 

 made — unfortunately often is made — a subject for quite 

 other than scientific considerations. In the case, for in- 

 stance, of the suggestion made in regard to myself, I fancy 

 that more than one of those who supported me were partly, 

 though perhaps unconsciously, moved by the thought that, 

 if the medal were given to me (my work over the transit 

 of Venus being included with stellar researches, then in- 

 complete), it woidd be unplea.sant for the man whose 

 transit investigations I had unfortunately found unsatisfac- 

 tory. This, of course, was an altogether wrong reason for 

 voting in favour of the award. But of course the same 

 consideration afibrded an equally wrong reason for voting 

 against it — though definitely urged in that direction, and, 

 indeed, the considei-ation by which the five unfavourable 

 votes were secured. This, however, was a mild case com- 

 pared with some which have occurred. Indeed, remember- 

 ing that the original object of medal-giving was to do some- 

 thing plea.sant and graceful — not necessarily scientific — I can 



