Page:The spirit of the Hebrew poetry 1861.djvu/13



HE title of this volume is the same as that of a course of lectures which I delivered at Edinburgh, and afterwards at Glasgow, in the winter of 1852. At the time I was asked to publish these lectures; but as in the preparation of them I had not been able to command much leisure, I felt no inclination to bring them forward, such as they were when delivered.

But in looking at the notes of those lectures, once and again in the course of these ten years, they seemed to contain some germs of thought which might be brought to bear upon the great biblical argument that has lately awakened the attention of the religious community. This biblical argument which, as to its substance, is still in progress, gives a new meaning, or an enhanced importance, to most of the questions that come within the range of Christian belief, or of biblical criticism; and it follows therefore that what might