An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament (Classic Reprint)

This would have been impossible within the limits at the writers disposal, as well as tedious. The method pursued has thus often been to assume (on grounds not fully stated, but which have satisfied the author) the conclusion to be established, and to point to particular salient facts, which exemplify it or presuppose its truth. The argument in the majority of cases is cumulative a species of argument which is both the strongest and also the one which it is most frequently impossible to exhaust within reasonable compass. In the critical study of the Old Testament, there is an important distinction, which should be kept in mind. It is that of degrees of probability. The probability of a conclusion depends upon the nature of the grounds on which it rests; and some conclusions reached by critics of the Old Testament are for this reason more probable than others :the facts at our disposal being in the former case more numerous and decisive than in the latter. It is necessary to call attention to this difference, because writers who seek to maintain the traditional view of the structure of the Old Testament sometimes point to conclusions which, from the nature of the case, are uncertain, or are propounded avowedly as provisional, with the view of discrediting all, as though they rested upon a similar foundation. But this is very far from being the case. It has been no part of my object to represent conclusions as more certain than is authorized by the facts upon which they depend; and I have striven (as I hope successfully) to convey to the reader the differences in this respect of which I am sensible myself. Where the premises satisfy me, I have expressed myself without hesitation or doubt; where the data do not justify (so far as I can judge) a confident conclusion, I have indicated this by some qualifying phrase. I desire what I have just said to be applied in
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)