t here, in the antitypical
deliverance, a much greater clearness and distinctness should prevail;
for it stands [Pg 194] in a far closer relation to the idea, so that
form and substance do far less disagree.

It would be inappropriate were we here to take up and refute all
the arguments against the genuineness of the second part, which
rationalistic criticism has brought together. Besides those which we
have already refuted, we shall bring into view only this argument,
which, at first sight indeed, may dazzle and startle even the
well-disposed, viz., the difference between the first and second parts,
as regards language and mode of representation. The chief error of
those who have adduced this argument is, that they judge altogether
without reference to person,--a matter, however, quite legitimate in
this case,--that they simply apply the same rule to the productions of
Isaiah which, in the productions of less richly endowed persons, has
indeed a _certain_ right, _e.g._, on the prophetical territory of
Jeremiah, who, notwithstanding the difference of subject, yet does not
understand so to change his voice, that it should not soon be
recognized by the skilled More than of all the prophets that holds true
of Isaiah, which _Fichte_, in a letter to a _Koenigsberg_ friend, writes
of himself (in his _Life_, by his son, i. S. 196): "I have properly no
style at all, for I have them all." "Just as the subject demands," says
_Ewald_, without assigning to the circumstance any weight in judging of
the second part, "just as the subject demands, every kind of speech,
and every change of style are easily at his command; and it is just
this in which here his greatness, as, in general, one of his most
prominent perfections, consists." The chief peculiarities of style in
the second part stand in close relation to the subject, and the
disposition of mind thereby called forth. The Prophet, as a rule, does
not address the mass of the people, but the election ([Greek: ekloge]);
nor the sinful congregation of the Lord in the present time, but that
of the future, purified by the judgments of the Lord, the seed and germ
of which were the election of the Present. It is to the congregation of
brethren that he addresses _Comfort_. The beginning: "Comfort ye,
Comfort ye, Zion," contains the keynote and principal subject. It is
from this that the gentle, tender, soft character of the style is to be
accounted for, as well as the frequent repetitions;