Page:The spirit of the Hebrew poetry 1861.djvu/79

 truth. They spoke and wrote with a consciousness of their obligation to absolute Truth, and with a stern fixedness of purpose as toward an authority above them: among no other writers do we find a parallel instance of determinate purpose. But whether distinctly conscious of their mission, or not so; or only imperfectly conscious of it, yet they spoke as they were moved by Him who is the —the "truthful God." Solemnly regardful were these "holy men of God" of the sovereignty of Truth—Truth dogmatic or theological—Truth ethical, and Truth historical. Utterly averse, therefore, were they—abhorrent, let us say—not merely as toward falsification, but as toward fabrication, or any approach toward that sort of commingling of the real with the unreal which might engender falseness; or might give rise to a dangerous confounding of the two. The Hebrew Scriptures, as compared with any other national literature, are pre-eminently—they are characteristically—they, and they alone, are throughout truthful in tone, style, and structure. Need we ask, then, why they contain neither the Drama nor an Epic? Not from the want of fitting subjects—not from poverty of materials; but as ministers of Heaven to whom a task had been assigned, did these men of genius—and they were such—fail to display their skill in the creation of romances; it was not because they could not do it, that they have not attempted to immortalize themselves, and the heroes of their national history, in producing