phlets written in its defence; and would strikingly illustrate the sincerity of their desire for evangelical union. But, so far, nothing has been said, nothing done. No remonstrance is uttered against the evil-doer; no step taken to prevent a recurrence of the evil; and, consequently, no limit put to the opportunity afforded us of exercising the charity which suffereth long and is kind.' In the spirit of that charity, let us hope that the tendency of the meetings for Christian union will be to lead the way to some such a practical alliance among themselves, as that which we have respectfully suggested. Let the Evangelical Alliance' accomplish this end only; and it will have existed to glorious purpose.

6

Our opinion of the merit of Mr. Binney's sermons, is apparent from the number and length of our quotations. The second discourse is a very able exposition of certain ecclesiastical principles, lucid in style, forcible in statement, and conclusive in argument; and is enriched by an appendix, partly original, and partly consisting of admirable extracts from his former publications, explanatory of his views of the conditions and obligations of Christian union.

VII.

THE PEOPLE'S DICTIONARY OF THE BIBLE.*

WE have set forth the title of this work in full, in order fairly to exhibit its plan and its pretensions. From the numerous testimonies annexed to the numbers already published, under the name of opinions of the press, we perceive that it has been very favourably noticed in periodicals and newspapers. To these favourable notices have also been added testimonies signed by many ministers, among whom we find H. Montgomery, LL.D. and J. Scott Porter, professor of theology to the non-subscribing Presbyterian Association. It is styled 'one of the most valuable works which has ever issued from the press,' a work invaluable to those who wish for aid in their study of the sacred Scriptures.' The Bristol Mercury asserts that no reader of the Bible should be without such a valuable aid to the study of its contents, and we know of no similar work in our

*The People's Dictionary of the Bible, to be completed in forty parts, each consisting of thirty-two large pages octavo, double columns, price sixpence, with maps and wood engravings, comprising, apart from doctrinal peculiarities and the mere forms of scholarship, the ascertained results of the most advanced state of knowledge on the subject of Biblical Antiquities, illustrative of the contents of the Sacred Scriptures, and corroborating the Divine origin, unspeakable value, and perpetual obligation of the Christian religion. London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.

language.... We welcome its appearance as a most acceptable and important addition to our biblical literature; and we heartily recommend it to every one who wishes to give a satisfactory answer to the question, "Understandest thou what thou readest?" Others declare that it ought to be in the hands of every family and of every Sunday-school teacher.' The Truth Seeker says, 'there is nothing of the sort extant in the language.' We disapprove of these overdone phrases, because of their untruthfulness. We do not deny that this work may, on account of its cheapness, be useful to many who cannot afford the price of other very similar publications which are undoubtedly the sources from which many pages of the People's Dictionary are extracted. It is unaccountable that the writers of literary notices in newspapers should overlook entirely the existence of Kitto's Biblical Cyclopædia. If they had merely looked at the wood-cuts they might have seen that the People's Dictionary of the Bible is an off-shoot of the Biblical Cyclopedia. The group of eight beards, for instance, by which Dr. Beard illustrates the article Beard, are evidently the shavings of Kitto. We will admit that this transfer of beards from the Biblical Cyclopædia may be approved, because it exhibits really a good constellation of beards and demi-beards on the chins of modern oriental dandies, but it is absurd to claim originality, since the group is the same which is given by Kitto.

The article Ass, also, contains three asses, which are manifestly abstracted from the stalls of Kitto, who first exhibited them in the Pictorial Bible. In this importation and appropriation of asses, however, the editor was not guided by the same tact as in the case of the beards. The strained position in which the so-called ass of the wilderness is exhibited, is such as no ass ever assumed, except when forced by a sharp curb and cruel treatment. Let any reader look at the ass pictured on page 97, and say whether he recognises there the onager described by Job, xxxix.—

'Who hath sent forth the wild ass free?

Who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass?
Whose house I have made the wilderness,
And the barren land his dwelling place.

He scorneth the tumult of the city,
And disregards the clamours of the driver.
The range of the mountains is his pasture:
He seeketh after every green thing.'

But, whatever may be the good points of these asses, their footsteps show from whence they come. In other instances the footsteps are not so clear, because the contributors have followed the example of Hercules, who, when he stole cattle, pulled them backwards by their tails, so that their vestiges seemed to lead in an opposite direction. We cannot, however, dismiss the asses of Drs.

Beard and Kitto without remarking that the People's Dictionary adopts the extraordinary, we are almost tempted by the power of association to say the asinine comment on 'the voice of one crying in the wilderness,' which we have already noticed in our review of the Biblical Cyclopædia. (See vol. i. pp. 360, 361.) We are less surprised that anybody should have invented it than that anybody could be found to appropriate it, and to adopt it for his own, without being under the beguiling influence of parental fondness for the little exegetical monster.

On page 89 we are told that→

The Mosaical law put the ass among the unclean animals; following in this what has proved an universal observance, namely, to guard by law, as well as feeling, animals that as beasts of burden are useful to man: to eat the animal that we have ploughed with, or ridden, is repulsive; nor can animals that have done their duty in labour afford salubrious nutriment.'

All attentive readers of the Bible, Sunday-school teachers not excepted, and all attentive observers of nature, will perceive that these few lines form a nest of as many blunders as could well have been huddled together. First, the Mosaic law concerning unclean animals is manifestly not constructed so as to protect beasts of burden useful to man. The earlier Israelites had besides asses only bulls and cows as beasts of labour, and we find an instance in which oxen were actually taken from the plough to be sacrificed directly, and that even the wood of the plough was used to burn the flesh of the oxen as a legitimate sacrifice. Secondly, we find that hyænas and other ferocious animals not useful to man are declared to be unclean, so that whatever may be the true cause of the legislation concerning the cleanness of animals, the desire of guarding by law the beasts of burden cannot be said to have been 'proved a universal observance. Thirdly, it is a fact that animals that have done their duty in moderate labour afford a more 'salubrious nutriment' than the prize oxen in the Smithfield cattle show. Thus we find biblical, historical, and physiological errors in combination.

The People's Dictionary of the Bible seems to be particularly apt to stumble at the side of asses and other beasts of burden. In the article Camel, we are credibly informed that 'it is in the east a widely spread and exceedingly useful animal;' but, it is incorrectly stated at page 241, that camel's flesh was forbidden to the Hebrews, on the ground of its being a ruminant animal. This assertion is the more astounding, as, from the very chapter quoted (Lev. xi.), it is clear that the chewing of the cud, or to be ruminant, was one of the two conditiones sine qua non of a clean and eatable animal. And the camel itself is mentioned there as fulfilling one of the conditions of cleanness, namely, ruminancy, but not the other, namely, that of parting the hoof; while the pig is mentioned as an instance of the opposite kind of unclean animal, because it parts the hoof,

but does not chew the cud. Many an able Sunday-school teacher, to whom the People's Dictionary of the Bible is so particularly recommended, without any amount of that 'labour and erudition' that, according to the Manchester Argus, must have gone to the production of this work,' will spontaneously testify that the cow, sheep, goat, &c., are declared clean, because they are ruminant, and have cloven feet.

On page 242, we are told that--

'The broad-spreading foot of the camel holds to the smooth steep rocks with the greatest tenacity ; . . . . their sure-footedness is of great value. They travel with ease and safety up and down the most rugged mountain passes. . . . . They tread much more surely and safely than the mule and horse, and never either slip or stumble.'

Now, all this is perfectly untrue; the camel is exceedingly well adapted, on account of its broad-spreading foot, to travel upon plains covered with deep, yielding sand, but exceedingly ill-adapted to travel in rugged mountain passes, the stones of which lacerate its feet, and in which, especially if the ground is moist, it constantly slips and stumbles. Hence it is, that camels are never employed in preference and by choice in mountainous regions, except when they afford an easy passage from one sandy plain to the other.

Among the instances of erroneous etymology, we will mention that the English word camp is, on page 244, derived from the German word kampf, combat. Now, camp is not derived from the German kampf, although it is related to it. The German kampf is, itself, derived from the Latin campus, field. Hence the French champ, field, battle-field, and the English camp, meaning that portion of the champ de bataille, which is set apart and fortified for the temporary dwellings of the combatants.

Among the useless verbiage with which this and similar works are swelled, we may mention the article Bag, by which we are taught that

'Sometimes a larger, sometimes a smaller article is intended, but generally a receptacle for objects of greater or less value. It must have been a bag of the larger size in which the Hebrews used to keep their weights, as in Deut. xxv. 13, Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights, a great and a small."'

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We deem it very likely that the majority of bags so used were not very small, but, we do not see how the passage quoted proves it, and the article itself contradicts it, because we are told 'scarcely of less dimensions were the bags for treasuring up gold and silver. Purses were the smallest bags, Prov. i. 14.' This is very credible, but it certainly is not proved by Prov. i. 14, which is quoted in confirmation. On referring to that text, we find, 'Let us all have one

purse. These words rather convey the idea of a purse unusually large and by no means say that purses were the smallest of all bags. If there were any necessity for proving this, we must have a better text. There are many other instances in which texts are quoted to prove things which they do not prove.

The article Advocate states, that this word comes from the Latin, and means a helper. The Greek word, it is said, literally signifies one who has been called to the side of another for the purpose of aiding him by an appeal. This distinction between the Latin and Greek must mislead those who do not know better, as if the literal meaning of the Latin advocatus was different from the literal meaning of the Greek word which it represents, πapákλητos. In the article Bushel, we are told the ancients were accustomed to cover their lamps with a bushel when they wished to do anything secretly.' This statement seems to belong to the antiquities which are fabricated to meet the exigencies of modern expounders. Such fabricated antiquities have two characters. First, they do not advance the inquiry a single step-they explain nothing. Secondly, they are quite vague as to the words the ancients, the rabbis, the fathers.' If there were any proof of the ancients habitually doing what is here ascribed to them, the proof should have been stated. If we were writing a dictionary of the Bible for the people, we should take it for granted that they know what is a bushel; but if we were compelled to say anything about it, and if we should be requested to go so far as to state for what purposes bushels were not used, we might say that the ancients did not employ their bushel measures as extinguishers, and they did not put their candles under their bushels, for which truth we could produce a much more stringent text than those usually adduced; namely, Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.' (Matt. v. 15.) And yet this is the very text which the People's Dictionary of the Bible appeals to in proof of a custom which is there mentioned as an absurdity never practised. Those who appeal to this text in proof that ancients put their candles under bushels, might, with better reason, assert that the ancients made their gateways of the eyes of needles, through which they passed with caravans of loaded camels.

By exposing the above instances of inconsiderate haste in the composition of the articles, we by no means seek to condemn the People's Dictionary; but we wish to show that it ought to be improved before the laudations bestowed upon it can be deemed applicable.

We deem it a very good undertaking to publish a Biblical Cyclopædia for the people, but we hope to see the task executed with greater accuracy than has been exhibited in the earlier numbers of the People's Dictionary of the Bible. We trust that what we have