it
is difficult to class them separately. One step above the sublime makes
the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous makes the sublime
again; the account, however, abstracted from the poetical fancy, shews
the ignorance of Joshua, for he should have commanded the earth to have
stood still.--Author.] the passage says: "And there was no day like
that, before it, nor after it, that the Lord hearkened to the voice of a
man."

The time implied by the expression after it, that is, after that day,
being put in comparison with all the time that passed before it, must,
in order to give any expressive signification to the passage, mean a
great length of time:--for example, it would have been ridiculous to
have said so the next day, or the next week, or the next month, or the
next year; to give therefore meaning to the passage, comparative with
the wonder it relates, and the prior time it alludes to, it must mean
centuries of years; less however than one would be trifling, and less
than two would be barely admissible.

A distant, but general time is also expressed in chapter viii.; where,
after giving an account of the taking the city of Ai, it is said, ver.
28th, "And Joshua burned Ai, and made it an heap for ever, a desolation
unto this day;" and again, ver. 29, where speaking of the king of Ai,
whom Joshua had hanged, and buried at the entering of the gate, it is
said, "And he raised thereon a great heap of stones, which remaineth
unto this day," that is, unto the day or time in which the writer of the
book of Joshua lived. And again, in chapter x. where, after speaking of
the five kings whom Joshua had hanged on five trees, and then thrown in
a cave, it is said, "And he laid great stones on the cave's mouth, which
remain unto this very day."

In enumerating the several exploits of Joshua, and of the tribes, and
of the places which they conquered or attempted, it is said, xv. 63, "As
for the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the children of Judah
could not drive them out; but the Jebusites dwell with the children of
Judah AT JERUSALEM unto this day." The question upon this passage is, At
what time did the Jebusites and the children of Judah dwell together at
Jerusalem? As this matter occurs again in judges i. I shall reserve my
observations till I come to that part.

Having thus shewn from the book of Joshua itself, without any auxiliary
evidence whatever, that Joshua is not the author of that book, and
tha