their erudition and abilities be it spoken) being comparatively modern, cannot be considered as ultimate judges on a question depending entirely on an ancient use, whereof all the evidences that were remaining in their time, remain still, and are as open to our examination, as they were to theirs. In other points where there may happen to be in Scripture an allusion to customs or ceremonies, retained by the Jews, but unknown to us, the case is different. But nothing of this kind is pretended here. It is therefore needless to enter further into particulars.— What has been produced above will serve for a specimen of the evidence, brought by Father Simon, of the obscurity of the Hebrew Scriptures. And I imagine that, by the like arguments, I might undertake to prove any writing, ancient or modern, to be vague, ambiguous, and obscure.

10. THAT some things, however, in the sacred history, not of great consequence, are ambiguous, and some things obscure, it was never my intention to question. But such things are to be found, in every composition, in every language. Indeed, as the word perspicuous is a relative term (for that may be perspicuous to one which is obscure to another), it must be allowed also that the dead languages have, in this respect, a disadvantage, which is always the greater, the less the language is known. As to the multiplicity of meanings sometimes affixed to single words, one would be at a loss to say what tongue, ancient or modern, is most chargeable with this ble

mish. Any person accustomed to consult lexicons will readily assent to what I say. In regard to English (in which we know that it is not impossible to write both unambiguously and perspicuously), if we recur to Johnson's valuable Dictionary for the signification of the most common terms, both nouns and verbs, and overlook, for a moment, our acquaintance with the tongue, confirmed by long and uninterrupted habit, we shall be surprised that people can write intelligibly in it, and be apt to imagine that, in every period, nay, in every line, a reader will be perplexed in selecting the proper, out of such an immense variety of meanings as are given to the different words ". In this view of things the explanation of a simple sentence will appear like the solution of a riddle.

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11. But no sooner do we return to practice, than these imaginations, founded merely on a theoretical and partial view of the subject, totally disappear. Nothing can be more pertinent, or better founded, than the remark of Mr. Le Clerc, "That a word "which is equivocal by itself, is often so clearly li"mited to a particular signification by the strain of

54 Thus to the noun word Johnson assigns 12 significations -to power 13, and to foot 16. The verb to make has, according to him, 66 meanings, to put 80, and to take, which is both neuter and active, has 134. This is but a small specimen in nouns and verbs; the observation may be as amply illustrated in the other parts of speech.

"the discourse, as to leave no room for doubt." Nor has Simon paid a due regard to this most evident truth, though he pretends, in answering that writer, to have been aware of it "5. He could not otherwise have run into such exaggerations as these: "The signification of the greater part of the Hebrew "words is entirely uncertain ;" and "a translator "cannot say absolutely, that his interpretation expresses truly what is contained in the original, "there being always ground to doubt, because there "are other meanings which are equally probable ;" absurdities, which it were easy to confute from his own work, were this the proper place.

§ 12. Ir may be asked in reply, But is not the poverty of the Hebrew tongue, of which the obscurity and the ambiguity seem to be the natural consequences, acknowledged by all impartial critics? In some sense it is, and I have acknowledged it very amply but it deserves our notice, that much more has been inferred from this than there is foundation for. The language of a people little advanced in civilization, amongst whom knowledge of any kind has made but inconsiderable progress, and the arts of life are yet rude and imperfect, can hardly be supposed copious. But it is not sufficiently weighed, on the other hand, that, if their words be few, their ideas are few in proportion. Words multiply with the oc

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xvi.

Reponse aux Sentimens de quelques Theol. de Holl. ch

casions for employing them. And if, in modern languages, we have thousands of names, to which we can find none in Hebrew corresponding, we shall discover, upon inquiry, that the Hebrews were ignorant of the things to which those names are affixed by us as the signs.

Knowledge precedes, language follows. No people have names for things unknown and unimagined, about which they can have no conversation. If they be well supplied in signs for expressing those things with which they are, either in reality, or in imagination, acquainted, their language, considered relatively to the needs of the people who use it, may be termed copious; though, compared with the languages of more intelligent and civilized nations, it be accounted scanty. This is a scantiness, which might occasion difficulty to a stranger attempting to translate into it the writings of a more polished and improved people, who have more ideas as well as words, but would never be felt by the natives; nor would it hurt, in the least, the clearness of their narratives, concerning those matters which fall within the sphere of their knowledge. There is no defect of signs for all the things which they can speak or write about, and it can never affect the perspicuity of what they do say, that they have no signs for those things whereof they have nothing to say, because they know nothing about them.

Nay, it may be reasonably inferred that, in what is called a scanty language, where the signs are few, because the things to be signified are few, there is a

greater probability of precision than in a copious language, where the requisite signs are much more numerous, by reason of the multiplicity of things to be represented by them. The least deviation from order will be observed in a small company, which would be overlooked in a crowd. The source of much false reasoning on this head, is the tendency people have to imagine that, with the same extent of subject which might have employed the pen of an ancient Greek, the Hebrews had perhaps not one fourth part of their number of words. Had this been the case, the words must indeed have been used very indefinitely. But as the case really stood, it is not so easy to decide, whether the terms (those especially for which there is most occasion in narrative) be more vague in their signification in Hebrew, than in other languages.

§ 13. BUT, to descend from abstract reasoning to matters of fact, which in subjects of this kind, are more convincing, "It is false," says Le Clerc, "that "there is always ground to doubt whether the sense "which one gives to the Hebrew words be the true

sense; for, in spite of all the ambiguities of the “Hebrew tongue, all the interpreters of Scripture, "ancient and modern, agree with regard to the "greater part of the history, and of the Jewish re

ligion." Le Clerc is rather modest in his assertions: but in fact he was too much of Simon's opi

nion on this article, as appears particularly from his