Rough Notes on the controversy against Geologists. 477 



respects imperfectly understood. What can appear more 

 beautiful, perspicuously told, or feelingly expressed, than 

 the episode in them of Jephthah's daughter, and yet a learned 

 controversy, on which volumes have been published, exists, 

 and is undecided to this day, whether she was made a burnt 

 offering, or merely became a nun, turning in a considerable 

 measure upon whether one little Hebrew word in a passage 

 of it signifies ' and' or 'or' ; and whether another is to be 

 taken in its sense of ' talk with,' or 4 lament.' In many 

 places of the Bible, too, the translators of it openly admit 

 their ignorance of the meaning of words, though it is re- 

 markable that this is only in objects of natural history, or 

 in obscure allusions to ancient customs, — things of no conse- 

 quence to the elucidation of its great doctrines. Take, for 

 instance, the original words retained, gopher wood, shit- 

 tim wood, algum or almug trees, &c, a list which might 

 be much enlarged. It is precisely in such passages as those 

 that bear upon the geological controversy that misunder- 

 standings of this kind may be expected. Take for example, 

 the beautiful expression of which Milton has made so much, 

 " The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters ;" 

 and although the poetry of it be destroyed by a change of 

 translation, does it not give us a more dignified idea of the 

 Supreme Being in working his will by secondary causes, 

 rather than by direct intervention, to say there was " a most 

 vehement wind moving," (or a great commotion,) on the sur- 

 face of the elements of the present world. This appears 

 to be the preferable translation ; for though, in the original, 

 the definite article is prefixed to the words rendered hea- 

 vens and earth, and to others, it is not prefixed to the word 

 here translated the Spirit, and the insertion of the " the" is 

 purely gratuitous ; the same word signifies wind or breath 

 as well as Spirit, and the word, literally translated " of 

 God," is also the highest form of the superlative in degree, 

 and has actually been so rendered in Psalm lxxx. 10, where 



