PREFACE. XV 



tiquities. M. Eenan belongs to those reli- 

 gious thinkers who are known as the 

 "advanced school." Hence the public, 

 generally, in France, heard with something 

 like astonishment of his appointment to the 

 chair of the Hebrew, Chaldaic, and Syriac 

 Languages in the College of France, as 

 the successor of M. Quatremere. They 

 were partly prepared, also, for the result 

 of his inaugural lecture — the suspension of 

 further lectures. This proceeding is one of 

 much importance in the literary history of 

 Europe, and that importance has been the 

 sole inducement to add an English version 

 of the lecture to the present volume. M. 

 Eenan is compiling a life of Christ, and 

 the history of the origin of Christianity, 

 a great portion of which was written amidst 

 the scenes to which it has immediate refer- 

 ence. His peculiar views are as well known 



