destructive criticism in which modern scholars have so much delighted. It is not merely that many historical facts which have thus been brought to light are found to harmonise with and confirm statements of Scripture which the critics have impugned. The discoveries prove that the critics themselves have had no sympathetic insight into the spirit of the times which formed the subject of their study. How utterly out of touch with the educational condition of the Jews in the time of Josiah must they be, for instance, who can suppose it possible that the priests of that epoch should have forged the Sermons attributed to Moses in the book of Deuteronomy, and have been able to convince both King and people that they were the original work of their ancient lawgiver, accidentally found by them in clearing away the rubbish in the Lord's house.

I cannot for one moment doubt that the book of Daniel, notwithstanding the difficulty which even Professor Sayce and Major Conder find in reconciling some of its statements with the Babylonian records, will, with fuller information, be found to be authentic. The seeming discrepancies are insignificant, compared with the immense weight of evidence for the authenticity of the book, presented by Pusey in his Lectures on Daniel, evidence which cannot be refuted, which indeed no one has ever attempted to refute. But over and above the evidence, it is simply incredible that a historical romance written in the second century B.C. should within 200 years have come to be generally regarded as the genuine production of a great official who served at the court of Babylon in the sixth century B.C. The idea in fact refutes itself. An age that is capable of producing a work of wondrous brilliancy, like Daniel, is not an age when a spurious writing will readily be accepted as genuine.

A

Chapter II

CAUSE OF THE PREVAILING MIS

CONCEPTION

LTHOUGH it is only within quite recent years that such an immense flood of light has been thrown upon the civilizations of antiquity, there was not at any time sufficient justification for the low views which prevailed, and for that matter even still very largely prevail, on that subject. It should always have been obvious that the great empires could never have established and maintained their power, or reached the high level of material grandeur which they were known to have attained, if writing had not been in extensive use among the people. It may be well therefore to pause and enquire how it is that, even among men of learning, men who had made the literature of ancient times the study of their lives, so inadequate an estimate could have been formed concerning the educational conditions of the times referred to.

The Intervening Gloom

A chief cause of these mistaken notions is the difficulty of piercing through the gloom of intervening ages so as to see clearly the state of the world as it was in those distant times.

It sometimes falls to the lot of miners, following a formation in the earth's crust, to find that formation, hitherto regular and well defined, together with the strata in which it is embedded, suddenly and completely cut off and brought to a termination by some geological disturbance or intrusion of foreign material. With almost equal suddenness and completeness three great

historical disturbances cut off and ended the civilizations of the ancient world.

The first of these was the desolation of Judea, begun by the invasion under Vespasian and Titus, and completed seventy years after with the final destruction of Jerusalem in the time of Hadrian. The glory which had shone forth rom Zion over the heathenism and corruption of surrounding peoples came to a termination with the burning of the Temple. The old Jewish polity which had survived the fierce cruelty of Antiochus and the crafty tyranny of Herod was totally destroyed; the children of Israel were scattered among the nations; and the land of their fathers became the possession of strangers.

The next great disturbance was the overthrow of the Roman Empire in the 5th century, which brought to a close the brilliant day of Latin civilization, to be followed by a long night of ignorance, superstition and social debasement. During that time reading and writing might almost have been reckoned amongst the lost arts. As Voltaire remarks, "Nothing more clearly proves the low state of brutal ignorance to which the peoples of Europe had sunk, than the famous 'benefit of clergy' by which a criminal condemned to death obtained his pardon if he was able to read.”

Lastly the rise and spread of the Mohammedan power overwhelmed and extinguished the culture and learning of the nations of the East. The effects of this catastrophe were more widespread and prolonged than even those that followed the breaking up of the Roman Empire. It is true that for a time embers of the old Oriental civilization struggled here and there to keep alight, and it has even been sometimes supposed that the world is indebted to Mohammedanism for the labours of men who rose above its withering influence to work in the cause of science and literature. But the fact cannot be gainsaid that, for several hundred years past, nothing whatever of value has been added by the people of any Mohammedan country to the knowledge or advancement of the world.

Dense ignorance, stubborn prejudice, and gross superstition are the characteristics of the great mass of the people wherever the False Prophet holds his sway.

The dark ages in Europe lasted for more than half a millennium. The first grey streaks of dawn appeared about the tenth or eleventh century; but it was not until after the invention of printing in the fifteenth century that light began to be generally diffused. Even then the spread of daylight was slow, and it is only within the memory of the present generation that education in the Western countries of Europe has become universal. Therefore, although in our land every child is now taught to read and write, and knowledge of every kind is accessible to the poorest person, it is not forgotten that this state of things is new, and confined to a section of the race. It is patent to every one, and ever present in their thought, when they look back upon the past, that even a century ago the number who could read and write was but a small minority. And when they turn to Eastern lands they think of vast populations even now sunk in still denser ignorWith these impressions vaguely hovering in the mind, it is difficult to realize how high a level as regards culture and education was occupied by the great civilizations prior to the historical events referred to.

ance.

Just as viewing from an eminence a distant tract of country the features of the foreground are present to the eye, and blend with outlines many miles away, so the mind, in throwing itself back to those remote times, insensibly gathers up and carries with it, from the long intervening period, ideas and impressions which mingle with its perception of the epoch on which it directs its gaze.

One illustration of this may suffice. In the middle ages many fraudulent documents were produced of no literary merit, but which, owing to the then prevailing ignorance, were successfully imposed upon the public credulity. Of these, one of the most notable instances is the forged Decretals of Isidore, published in the ninth century. Now,

because such deceptions were possible in those times, it is often imagined that similar deceptions could be perpetrated in the earlier centuries of the Christian era, whereas the period before the Fall of Rome bore no resemblance to the dark ages which followed that event.

That the earliest Christian believers were not liable to be easily imposed on in literary matters is proved by the discrimination they displayed in their treatment of the writings which claimed apostolic or inspired authority. Many such writings were rejected as spurious or excluded from the Canon as the work of good but uninspired men. Of the books which the New Testament includes the greater number were from the first recognised as genuine and inspired; but a few were always regarded as of doubtful authorship, though generally accepted as possessing divine authority. And now, after a century of unsparing and often hostile criticism, the results which have been arrived at are precisely the same as those that were reached in the second, third and fourth centuries. The books that were then acknowledged to be the genuine works of the men under whose name they stand in our New Testament are by common consent admitted to be so. The books whose authorship was then thought doubtful are similarly regarded still, though now as then they are generally accepted as canonical. Nor has it been discovered that any books were improperly omitted from the Canon. It is no slight testimony to the acumen and learning of those times that the ancient Church did not include within the covers of the New Testament a single book which her successors have seen reason to eliminate; or reject any which it has since been thought proper to include. It proves that immediately after the time of Christ, and therefore in the time of Christ itself, there was no lack of intelligence, and gives us reason to conclude that men in the circumstances of the Apostles would not neglect taking such means to record the acts and sayings of their Master as we should expect from men in similar cir

cumstances now.