ken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at "7 Then shall the dust return to the earth God who gave it. "8 Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher; all is vanity. Solomon en9 And moreover, because the Preacher was wise, he still forces thé obtaught the people knowledge; yea, he gave good heed, servance of and sought out, and he set in order many proverbs. 10 The these instruePreacher sought to find out acceptable words: and that tions. which was written was upright, even words of truth. 11 The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, which are given from one shepherd. 12 And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh." The foregoing passages exhibit completely the effect of Mr. R.'s division into paragraphs, and the distinction he has made between prose and metre; the other characteristic of this novel edition of the Bible is the divisions into sections. These section's are made cor formably with the natural division of the matter, and have the effect of presenting portions of scripture, whether historical, prophetical, or doctrinal, that contain in themselves a complete whole; they stand at the head of each division in the following manner: "SECTION I-Of the Creation of the visible world, and the orderly formation of the several parts thereof in six days' time: Chap. i. ii. A. C. 4004. "CHAP. 1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. 2 And the earth was without form and void; and dark ess was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters 3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.' So in the prophecy of Isaiah. Of the Creation. The work of the first day. "SECTION III.-Containing such prophecies as were revealed to Isaiah in the reign of Ahaz. Chap. vii,—xii. a. c. 745-730. "CHAP. VII. And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz They are prothe son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that mised deliverRezin the king of Syria, and Pekah the son of Remaliah, ance from the king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to war against forces of Syria it, but could not prevail against it. 2 And it was told the and Israel, and house of David, saying, Syria is confederate with Ephraim. the end of And his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as those kingthe trees of the wood, are moved with the wind. 3 Then doms is foresaid the LORD unto Isaiah, Go forth now to meet Ahaz, told. thou, and Shearjashub thy son, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool of the highway of the fuller's field; 4 And say unto him, "Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be fainthearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah." So in the apostolical writings, as in the epistle to the Hebrews"SECTION II.-He proceeds to prove the excellency of the Christian religion above the Jewish, by shewing the pre-eminence of Christ above Moses. Chap. iii. iv. 1." "SECTION III.-He shews, by the way, the pre-eminence of Jesus above Joshua, who brought the Israelites into the promised land. Chap. iv. 2--13." "SECTION IV. He proceeds to show the pre-eminence of Christ above Aaron, or any other high priest of the Jewish church. Chap. iv. 14viii. 5." The historical books of the Old Testament are divided into sections, that are numbered in regular series from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Esther; this order is interrupted by the necessity there was of notifying, that the book of Esther should, in order of time, be introduced in the middle of Ezra; this is done by numbering the sections of Esther, as if they were really so placed; the series then goes on to the end of Nehemiah, which was the last written of all the historical books, and indeed of all the books of the Old Testament. Another exception to this series of historical sections is the two books of Chronicles, which, containing a repetition of the story already told in other books, particularly those of Samuel and Kings, are divided, very properly, into distinct sections of their own. As these sections coincide with parallel sections in Samuel and Kings, and notice is generally given of such parallelism, they contribute to bring before the reader this part of the scriptural history, in the clearest manner; a part, which, in our common Bibles, has always seemed to us the most involved and perplexing, and greatly to need the disentanglement which is here effected by Mr. R.'s method. After the historical books are brought to form a continued series of history from the creation, to the building of the second temple, the other books, both of the Old and New Testament and also of the Apocrypha, are divided into sections of their own, distinct from one another. Perhaps none of the sacred books have derived more advantage from this sectional division, than the prophecies of Jeremiah. It seems, these writings are agreed by the best critics to be misplaced, but the order, in which they ought to stand, has been tolerably well ascertained. Mr. R. has contrived to reduce them to this order, by means of his sections, without disturb ing the series of chapters. Another part, where the utility of this sectional division is particularly distinguished, is the four Gospels; these seem to be harmonized, in a new manner, by means of the sections, into which each is divided; the sections of each gospel comprehend a period between one passover and another, and thus preserve an exact parallelism in the narratives of the four evangelists. What we say upon this publication is confined wholly to the text of the Bible; it might be added, that the notes, which Mr. R. has compiled on the Old Testament and the New, and subjoined to each volume, conspire with the new form of the text, to make the reading of scripture still more intelligible and easy. Upon the whole, comparing the execution with the design, as set forth by Mr. R in his preface (to which, and the discussions therein contained, we again refer the reader) we have no hesitation to declare our opinion, that he has succeeded in accomplishing what he proposed; namely, to furnish the public with a more convenient, more intelligent, and altogether a more useful ana readable Bible than we have yet had. After this, it can be no longer objected, that the Bible is an anomalous book both in size and fashion; not easily lifted, and still less easy to read; for we may now take a part of it only from the shelf, like a volume of any English, writer, and may pursue the study of any one among the holy penmen, without being incommoded with the remainder of that bulky collection of sacred witings. It can no longer be complained, that there is one undistinguishing sameness in the text of the Bible, and that too a sameness which revolts rather than invites the reader, we mean the division into verses; for the text is now distinguished, according to its true nature, into prose, and metre; this variety strikes the eye, at the first opening of a volume, and the reader is enabled to chuse the style of composition, that suits best with the present temper of his mind: again, when he has made his choice, he can easily collect the complete whole of the subject before him, by means of the sectional heads, and marginal abstracts of the paragraphs. Whether we consider the instruction, or amusement, of the reader, we are bound to say, that the holy scriptures, in all their parts, appear to us to be laid before the public, in this edition of them, with a perspicuity of order, and discrimination of parts, that must attract and detain every person of judgment and taste. We have now a rational and readable Bible; and there is no longer the same excuse that many have hitherto made, for not perusing the sacred writings, with the same attention, readiness, and frequency, that they employ on profane writers. Our translator gave us the Bible in the English language; it remained for Mr. R. to make it an English book, adapted to the perusal of every reader of English; an improvement which cannot fail of making the Bible more read and better understood, and of promoting still more extensively the interests of religion and virtue. ART. III.-Essay on the Stile of Dr. Samuel Johnson. It is hardly possible for an author who writes much to avoid a peculiarity of manner. The recurrence of thoughts, similar in their restrictions and mutual dependance, introduces to the mind, by a natural association, the same arrangement and construction; and the mind, disdaining to bestow upon words that attention which is due only to things, will be too apt, through haste to execute its task, to admit the first expressions as to the best. It despises the humble as well as tedious labour of turning back to re-examine sentences already marked with approbation, and will not easily be persuaded to vary, what considered simply in itself appears to have no fault. Thus from the peculiar turn of each author's thoughts, even though there should be no other cause concurring, there will naturally arise a corresponding peculiarity of stile a peculiarity which the powerful influence of habit makes so predominant, that there are very few pages, even of our best writers, which to those who are at all acquainted with their stile, do not readily betray their author. Such favourite forms or ornaments of expression, such peculiar modes of arranging, combining and connecting, lie within the easy reach of imitation; and as every writer of eminence will have many who rely on their success in copying him for the foundation of their fame, and many who from admiration of his general excellence are led at last involuntarily to resemble him, criticism can never be more usefully employed than in examining these peculiarities of authors of acknowledged merit, and determining how far they are deserving of praise or censure, how far they are to be imitated or avoided. As there are no modern writings higher in public estimation than Doctor Johnson's, and as there are none which abound more in appropriate marks of stile, there are none which can with more advantage be made the subject of critical enquiry. On their ob vions and distinguishing characteristic, the too frequent use of Latin derivatives, I have already discoursed at large. I shall in this essay consider such other peculiarities of Johnson's stile, as, though less apt to be taken notice of, will it is presumed when noticed be readily recognized. And of all these the merit or demerit must rest with full force on Johnson: for, however the stile of his compositions may correspond with his stile of conversation, and however extraordinary and perhaps authentic the stories his biographers tell of his fluen cy may be, yet nothing in his works can fairly be ascribed to carelessness. His stile in writing, which he had formed early, became familiar by abundant practice and in the course of a long continued life of dissertation became also his stile of speaking. His authoritative decisions on the merit of all our English authors demand, and his constant employment in critical disquision should have enabled him to grant it without injury to his literary character, that his own stile should be fairly subjected to animadversion: nor should negligence, which will never be insisted on in diminution of his merit, be admitted as a sufficient plea in extenuating his faults. As his peculiarities cannot be ascribed to carelessness, so neither are they the effect of necessity. Few of them would have appeared, had Johnson, intent only on communicating his ideas, despised all aids of embellishment. But that this did not suit his ideas of literary perfection, we are sufficiently informed in his remarks on the stile of Swift; an author who has at least this merit, that he has escaped all those faults which the critic has fallen into. The easy and safe conveyance of meaning Johnson there declares to be "not the highest praise: against that inattention with "which known truths are received, it makes," he says, "no pro ❝vision; it instructs, but it does not persuade." Our author seems therefore to have thought it necessary, in conformity with his own principle, to introduce into his stile certain ornaments, which, in his opinion, would prove the effectual means of captivating attention; and these ornaments, too laboriously sought for, and used without sufficient variety, have become the peculiarities of his stile. I shall comprise the principal of them under two heads, as arising either from his endeavours after splendor and VOL. XII. 5 |