PROCEMIUM. HÆC non ingrati tandem monumenta laboris Mystica multa insunt, nova, forte nec obvia, quædam Nulla Ægyptiaci, quantumvis pulchra, tyranni Filio divino carmine digna nitet: Quem sponsæ CHRISTUS, quem CHRISTO spondet amorem At bene si feci, tu, lector amice, faveto : I HAVE read over the Song of Solomon para' phrased',' which you were so good as to send me, and find myself unable to form any thing like a favourable opinion of it. Had the critical talents of the author been employed upon an Idyllium of Theocritus, or an Eclogue of Virgil, I should have readily fallen down the stream of applause, and been as forward as others to give him all the praise due to the neatness of his performance. But alas ! a poem written in the age of Solomon, if this one be such a poem, is of a date by far too ancient to be explained or commented upon according to the I Published at Edinburgh, without the author's name, in the year 1775, and dedicated to Dr Lowth, then Bishop of Oxford. the novel customs of Pagan folly, or Talmudic apostacy. Yet is it now the prevailing fashion to call in the Talmud and Alcoran for the purpose of illustrating, and, as it were, giving sanction to, the writings of Moses and the prophets; and this being the plan on which our present author has conducted his work, I feel no hesitation in thus stating my sentiments to you, that I think his ground-work in general is wrong laid, and consequently all his additional aids and embellishments are of no use. I know he has the current of commentators on his side, in supposing the occasion of this, even by their own confession, DIVINE Song, to have been the affair of king Solomon's marriage with Pharaoh's daughter. And from this common, but illfounded hypothesis, come all the fancies and follies of laboured description, which we have seen produced upon this subject. For, to such as you and me, who view the Bible, through all its parts, in a just and proper light, it will appear not a little uncouth, to find a bridal-ballad, even from a roy al pen, inserted into the body of that sacred code, as forming by its position some sort of connection between the law and the prophets, and there left to the mercy of either spiritualizer or prophaner. The author of this Song, if conversing now among us, may warrantably enough say to the most of modern expositors, in the words of an old and authentic writer, there is a great mystery here, but I speak speak concerning Christ and the church And if, for form's sake, we must fall in with the fashion, and allow a wife of the earthly Solomon to be the typical spouse, as the phrase is, of the Canticles, I cannot discover what title Pharaoh's daughter has to that character. There is nothing in the scripture-history to countenance the supposition. Solomon's making affinity with Pharaoh, and marrying his daughter, is spoken of in terms that may imply censure rather than approbation; and there are many other passages of holy writ that condemn any intercourse with Egypt; and represent the trusting in the shadow of Egypt,' as tending only to 'confusion.' It is not therefore very likely that one of such a hated nation, à daughter of that revolting interdicted race, would have been adorned by a sacred writer with such high encomiums, as the spouse in the poem is clothed with. Besides, we do not read of any children that Pharaoh's daughter had to Solomon. And it does not look well that such a celebrated type of the church should appear childless, especially when we remember the description given with a like view, and in a song also of the same import- Instead of 'thy fathers thou shalt have children. We are sure that Solomon's son Rehoboam, through whom, foolish as he was, the promise of the seed was carried on, was not the son of this woman: And we read of one long before Solomon's time, and who VOL. II. I Ephes. v. 32. S 2 Psalm xlv. 16. cer |