Apollo and Daphne, can turn to lasciviousness even the Song of Solomon; and where shall we find a check, if there be no inspiration in its composition?

Inspiration, at least our belief of inspiration, is the only thing that can fix our views to one point, by presenting to us one, and only one, leading idea through the whole. What this leading idea is, we are not to gather implicitly from the authority of former expositors, but to search for it diligently in the structure and expression of the piece itself. I am sensible what may be said against all this; and the only shelter, which I shall seek, is in the regard and reverence which we all profess for inspiration, and which consequently ought to be paid by such professors to it, in preference to all, even the most sublime of human compositions. It is in this view that I behold this admirable Song, as no way depending upon, or connected with, any carnal transaction of courtship or marriage, or the like, but as decyphering something grand, spiritual, and mysterious, in proper and expressive language, not by bold metaphors and eastern allusions, as the phrase runs, but in words of either emblematical meaning, or of significant and descriptive interpretation. This, I think, may be taken for granted, that inspiration, like what is said of Nature, nil agit frustra,' does nothing in vain, and never interferes but where there is necessity. And if this maxim be admitted as to the Song in question, we

must

must renounce the old story of Solomon's marriage, either with Pharaoh's daughter, the most unlikely of all, or Naamah, the Ammonitess, or any thing of that kind, and seek for some other subject of such a nature as that Solomon could have known nothing of it, nor sung so copiously upon it, without the direction of that inspiration which we are willing to attribute to it. It has been long complained of, that people come to the scriptures with antecedent prejudices; and, instead of seeking knowledge from scripture, endeavour to accommodate, even to wrest scripture to their own preconceived opinions; and in no part of scripture is there more cause for this complaint than in the part before us. We have been long accustomed, in compliance with great authorities, to look upon it in the debasing light, which I am alluding to, and would wish removed. The plan complained of has, we see, produced nothing but uncertainty and confusion, and the wild absurd necessity of bringing in the ridiculous nonsense of either heathen ignorance or Mahometan perversion, to explain and account for the inspiration of the wise Solomon. And what has christianity gained by all this? The poem of itself very soon opens up to us the main design. We immediately discover two principal personages in it: the one in character of a woman, and with feminine appellations, all humility and dependence, desirous to please and afraid to offend, happy in her connexion, yet disclaiming all merit, taking nothing to herself, but attributing all to her be

loved. The other, a man, a King, a great One, talking indeed in most affectionate strains of love, but still with an air of superior dignity; inwardly conscious of, and outwardly expressing his own excellencies, his power, his glories, his condescension, and displaying, in every stage of his appearance, a port and grandeur not very usual, nor thought quite becoming in such cases. I need not stay to prove this: I have the concurrent acknowledgement of all commentators, and the sense of all readers, on my side. Now what is the meaning of all this? Is this consistent with our present ideas of these matters, or indeed with what accounts we have of the manners of any polite age or nation whatever? Is it likely, on the one hand, that a daughter of Pharaoh, the child of a mighty monarch, whose predecessors once had the Jewish people in bondage, and were still rivals to, and thought themselves at least equal with, the Jewish princes, would put on such an abject demeanour, and fall so low to a Jewish lover? Or, on the other hand, that the well-bred Solomon, the Augustus, as he has been in compliment called, of these times, for the politeness, as well as splendour of his court, would assume, and that in the very prime of his love and gallantry, such an apparently ungenteel and discouraging mode of address? Are any of the admired love-songs of antiquity, the Idyllia of Theocritus, the Eclogues of Virgil, or Ovid's ' De Arte Amandi,' of this form, or constructed upon this plan? No, surely; and if not, we have no need

of

of them, nor of any such like, to illustrate what we may think strange or difficult here.

a

of the mutual love of To this idea, all the

The Song of Songs adopts no extraneous customs, follows no known pattern, talks in no random strain. It is upon a particular and extraordinary model, not even of Solomon's invention, but of heavenly original; it speaks the language not of foolish flattery, or servile courtship among mortal equals, but of becoming propriety between a superior and an inferior, between a king and a subject, between a God and a creature. No wonder that believers of all ages, (and none but believers have any title to meddle with it), have seen this peculiarity of style, and thence have been induced to believe it to be description,' as the contents of our bibles call it, • Christ and his church.' parts of it most harmoniously correspond; and by this they may all be explained. What necessity is there to force in any other? The friends of the scheme of Pharaoh's daughter must, and do acknowledge, that there are sundry expressions in the poem which cannot be easily adjusted to their favourite plan, and they would therefore, boldly enough one should think, be passing all such over as fiction or superfluous ornament. Why then should we be hampered with such a needless and troublesome plan any longer? Why not take this beautiful poem as it stands, without the burden of prior notions to darken it, or the labour of foreign assis

tance

tance to clear it up? No doubt there will be found some obscurities in it on a first reading; but it will bear a second: and, if that should not answer, let us, for decency's sake, at least pay Solomon the same regard that we do to a Pindar or a Sophocles. The productions of inspiration have this advantage, that they carry their own key along with them, and present a sure method of interpretation to every unprejudiced enquirer, that seeks no more than what they offer.

6

I foresee here what I shall meet with, and what a volley of ridicule I expose myself to, from the witty gentlemen with the plaything which they have drest up to themselves, on which to throw out their merriment, of the Self-interpreting Bible.' But raillery is not reasoning. And when there have. been so many learned men, who have got a name by under-rating the Bible, let some pity at least be shewn to the few fools that venture upon the other extreme, and would go the length, if it were possible, of over-rating it. Give what we call the Bible justice, and I ask no more. Treat it only as we do other collections of ancient pieces, and the sneer against it, for it is but a sneer, will fall of course. It is certainly a collection from various pens indeed, but, which is its distinguishing excellency, all of the same AUTHOR. This particularity deserves consideration, as, though universally acknowledged, I fear it is not attended to, as it ought to be, by many who profess to believe that God