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292 while they surpass those of profane history, differ among themselves not only in literary merit, but in the value of the doctrines they inculcate. As to the authorship of the Pentateuch, he arrived at the conclusion that it was written long after Moses, but that Moses may have written some books from which it was compiled—as, for example, those which are mentioned in the Scriptures, the Book of the Wars of God, the Book of the Covenant, and the like—and that the many repetitions and contradictions in the various books show a lack of careful editing as well as a variety of original sources. Spinoza then went on to throw light into some other books of the Old and New Testaments, and added two general statements which have proved exceedingly serviceable; for they contain the germs of all modern broad churchmanship, and the first of them gave the formula which was destined in our own time to save to the Anglican Church a large number of her noblest sons. This was that "sacred Scripture contains the Word of God, and in so far as it contains it is incorruptible"; the second was that "error in speculative doctrine is not impious."

Though published in various editions, the book seemed to produce little effect upon the world at that time, but its result to Spinoza himself was none the less serious. Though one of the most religious of men—his theory of the universe led Novalis to speak of him as "a God-intoxicated man" and Schleiermacher to call him a "saint"—he was, for this work, and for the earlier expression of some of the opinions it contained, abhorred as a heretic both by Jews and Christians: from the synagogue he was cut off by a public curse, and in the Church he was regarded as in some sort a forerunner of Antichrist. For all this, he showed no resentment, but devoted himself quietly to his studies, and to the simple manual labor by which he supported himself, declined all proffered honors—among them a professorship at Heidelberg found pleasure only in the society of a few friends as gentle and affectionate as himself, and died contentedly without seeing any widespread effect of his doctrine, other than the prevailing abhorrence of himself. Down to a very recent period hatred for him has continued. When, about 1880, it was proposed to erect a monument to him at Amsterdam, discourses were given in churches and synagogues prophesying the wrath of Heaven upon the city for such a profanation; and, when the monument was finished, the police were obliged to exert themselves to prevent injury to the statue and to the eminent scholars who unveiled it.

But the ideas of Spinoza at last secured recognition. They had sunk deeply into the hearts and minds of various leaders of thought, and, most important of all, into the heart and mind of Lessing; he brought them to bear in his treatise on the