n
of such reasoning sound! The Victorian era is certainly one of the
most "brilliant and prosperous of" English "history"; hence no one can
ever speak now of "the good old times." Such language is simply
impossible; we never hear it! So if some astute reasoner of the future
comes across such allusion in any writings, it will be clear proof that
the author was _post-Victorian_! Far more so if, as here, such writer
_rebukes_ this tendency!

"Altogether unkingly sound the complaints in chap. iii. 17 ('I said in
my heart God shall judge the righteous and the wicked; for there is a
time there for every purpose and for every work'); iv.; x. 5-7 (let my
reader refer for himself to these), concerning unjust judges," etc.
"These are all lamentations and complaints natural enough in a
suffering and oppressed subject; but not in a monarch called and
authorized to abolish evil." It is most difficult to deal seriously
with what, if the writer were not so very learned, we should call
nonsense unworthy of a child. Look at the verse to which he refers,
and which I have quoted in full; and extract from it, if your "biased"
judgment will permit, an "unkingly complaint" in any word of it! And
it is at such formidable arguments as this that some of us have been
trembling, fearing lest the very foundations must give way under the
attack! A little familiarity is all that is needed to beget a
wholesome contempt.

Here is one more interesting illustration of the "unbiased,"
"scientific" reasoning of rationalism. The object is, you know, to
"determine exactly the epoch and writer of the book;" and this is how
it must be done. "According to chaps, v. 1, and ix. 2, the temple
worship was assiduously practised, but without a living piety of heart,
and in a hypocritical and self-justifying manner; the complaints in
this regard remind us vividly of similar ones of the prophet
Malachi--chap. i. 6, etc." What then is the basis for all this
verbiage about the temple worship? Here it is: "Keep thy foot when
thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear than to give
the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil." This
sentence shows that it is impossible that Solomon wrote the book: there
were no "fools" in _his_ time, who were more ready to give a careless
sacrifice than to hearken: all fools only come into existence _after
the exile_, in the days of Malachi! And this is "higher criticism"!

Enough as to