different words to enforce and express more strongly is perpetual in scripture, and should not be called tautology, as that word denotes an improper repetition. Or Balaam may mean singly the persons who are to come after him, his posterity. For so the word signifies Psalm 109. 13. Dan. 11. 4. Amos 4. 2. And numerous and prosperous descendants were accounted a main ingredient in happiness. Accordingly the Septuagint translate Л here by σπέρμα. The wish of Moses may be that the Israelites would consider the consequences of their conduct to themselves in the latter part of their lives, to their immediate prosperity or to their Commonwealth in future ages: εἰς τὸν ἐπίοντα χρόνον as the Septuagint have באחרית .1 .49 as Jacob saith Genesis באחרית הימים,it here Das the angel saith Dan. 8. 23. though speaking of other persons. Rewards being things which come after actions either necessarily or by the will of some superior, may well mean reward. So it is rightly translated Proverbs 24. 10. where it would be very wrong to put, There shall be no future state for the wicked. And this leads to the same translation of Proverbs 23. 18. and 24. 14. In like manner apy, the heel or hinder or latter part, signifies reward. Ps. 19. 12. And James 5. 11. rò Téλos Kuplov is the reward which God gave in the end to Job's patience. The N Deuter. 8. 16. may be in this life, as was that of Job 42. 12. And the same thing holds concerning the other texts which you cite.-N is certainly a word of greater extent than hell in our common speech; for Ps. 89. 49. Eccl. 9. 10. speak of all men as going thither. And Jacob says his sons will bring down his grey hairs thither, Gen. 44. 29. And the Psalmist saith, his life draws nigh to NPs. 88. 3. 4. And Jonah cried to God from the belly of NW 2. 2. From many other passages of scripture it appears to comprehend the state and place of men after death, in respect of their souls and bodies. It is represented as being under ground even in the case of the good prophet Samuel: and is oftener described by negative ideas, as darkness, silence, inactivity, than by positive; probably because but little had been revealed concerning it. Whence also the punishment of being sent to it prematurely, and so deprived of the blessings of this life, is brought more into view than any thing suffered afterwards. Yet there are intimations both of sufferings and enjoyments; but most of them so highly figurative as to be somewhat obscure. In Deuter. 32. 22. the fire which shall burn into the lowest hell, or the , beneath, is so mixed with temporal judgments that it seems to be one of them, under the image of a flame not only consuming the surface of the ground but piercing deep into its substance. Had it related to punishments after death it would rather have been said to burn in than unto it. Ps. 9. 17. and Prov. 15. 24. may be understood of the longer life usually granted to good men than to bad; according to that of the Psalmist, Thou shalt bring them into the pit of destruction: blood thirsty and deceitful men shall not live out half their days, Ps. 55. 23. 24. 25. Is. 5. 14. seems by the context to express the disappearance of the Jewish Commonwealth at the time of the captivity, as if it had been swallowed down into the heart of the earth. And this extinction of its pomp and glory brings to mind the case of Capernaum; in which as heaven does not mean the blessedness, so neither doth "Ans opposed to it, the sufferings of another world; but the one high privileges, the other low abasement in this. The word DND sometimes means a particular nation, sometimes persons of a gigantic stature, possibly because sprung from, or like to that nation, sometimes the dead perhaps before their time, possibly because that nation had been extirpated and destroyed by the neighbouring ones.. However that be, surely the sense of Ps. 88. 10. is not, "Wilt thou show wonders unto the dead bodies, or shall the departed souls of the damned arise and praise thee " The Psalmist appears to have had himself in view. He was in danger of death as appears particularly from v. 3, 15. and deprecates it from this principle, that in the grave he should not be able to do God the service which he hoped to do by a longer continuance upon earth. Death and the. ' seem synonymous, Prov. 2. 18. and an untimely death to be meant, which v. 21. 22. confirm. I think Prov. 21. 16. means to say, that the wanderings of such a one shall give him no rest, till they bring him into the number of those who have been prematurely cut off before him. The word translated remain is literally rest. The O'ND" Is. 14. 9. &c. are not represented as in a state of torment, but the kings as sitting on their thrones; and they do not say to the king of Babylon, Thou art become miserable, but weak as we: and the worm is not described as gnawing his conscience, but crawling over his carcase: and the circumstance of its being left unburied would be too slight for mention, if he were considered here as under the execution of God's justice on his soul. The whole therefore seems, beginning from v. 4. a most noble and sublime ode, not on the eternal punishment, but the temporal destruction of that monarch. And the triumph of the OND is as poetical as that of the fir trees and cedars of Lebanon, Dr. Lowth's illustration of it, in his treatise of the sacred poesy of the Hebrews, is admirable. In citing Exod. 31. 14. The translation of should not have been changed from for to moreover, without giving notice; indeed I think should not be changed at all, but the latter part of the verse be understood as a repetition of what preceded, by way of confirmation; specifying at the same time more explicitly what was the profanation principally meant. The phrase may be cut off, may everywhere mean, either being excluded from the congre gation, or put to death by the magistrate, or brought to an untime ly end by God; which last is the sense where God saith he will cut off a person. It implies removing or separating a man from the state, place, or company in which he was before; and death without regard to what should follow; cut off a Jew from Israel, from the congregation, from his people, from among his people, from the land or the earth, which are the terms used on this occasion. It is said Joshua 7. 9. the Canaanites shall cut off our name from the earth-and Joshua 11. 21. that Joshua cut off the Anakims from all the mountains of Israel and Judges 21. 6. that one tribe was cut off from Israel and 1 San, 28.9. that Saul cut off the wizards out of the land. These expressions which are in effect the same with the preceding, have no reference to à future life. And it is never said that the offender shall be cut off from God's people; though if it had, no conclusive argument could be drawn from thence. But the words my people cited, are either a false print or a slip of your pen for my presences Nor is any one said to be gathered to God's people but to his own people. And this phrase may possibly signify no more than that their bodies returned to the earth as those of their ancestors had done. See Gen. 3. 19. Eccl. 12. 7. And it favors this sense that the word translated to be gathered, signifies to be buried. Ezek. 29. 5. comp. Jer. 8. 2. And as being unburied is a punishment threatened to a wicked king Jer. 22. 19. so in Job 27. 19. shall lie down and not be gathered, may signify may die and not be buried. At least, it is remarkable that this word is used for the burial of Josiah immediately after it is said, that he should be gathered to his fathers. Still I take the expression of being gathered to their people, to mean being added to the world of spirits. For it is put before dying, Numb, 20. 26, which burial could not so properly. But I do not see that it comprehends a declaration of their happiness in that world. It is used only in the law, and there only of six persons. No wonder that five of them were good: for the death of bad persons, unless remarkably judicial, is not so often mentioned there. But the blessing of Ishmael Gen. 17. 20. expresses only temporal good things, and his character Gen. 16. 12. is a bad one. And Abraham's being gathered to his people seems to be the same thing with bis going to his fathers Gen. 15. 15. And a wicked man is said to go to the generation of his fathers Ps. 49. 19.; and the worst of the Hebrew kings as well as the best to sleep with their fathers: in which general sense it seems to be also that the generation which lived with Joshua were gathered to their fathers 2. 10.; though it must be owned that they were in general a religious generation. Yet after all, I am fully convinced that the Patriarchs and Jews had many successive notices of a life after death and of recompenses in it, from the promise of the seed of the woman downwards. But they were such, from some good reasons undoubtedly, whether assign able or not, as left room for Christ to bring life and immortality, not from absolute but comparative darkness, into light. In this belief I am persuaded, we agree; and we may allow each other to differ about the interpretation of particular phrases and texts. If there be any thing material in my observations on those which you have alleged, it will induce you to re-examine the other Hebrew expressions on which you intend to publish your thoughts, that the world may receive completer satisfaction from them. For that is my intention, and by no means to discourage you, in writing these remarks. Were I to see your treatise in manuscript, I could not proceed to consider it thus minutely; when it comes out I will endeavour, as other occupations allow me time, to learn what I can from it. In the mean time I pray God to bless your very laudable endeavours for promoting the knowledge and esteem of his word and am with much regard, Dec. 17. Your loving Brother and Servt. NOTICE OF SOPHOCLIS quæ extant omnia cum veterum Grammaticorum Scholiis, ex Editione Richardi BRUNCK. Accedunt Varia Lectiones Caroli ERFURDT, et Nota inedita Caroli BURNEY, 3 Vol. 8vo. Priestley. THIS edition is published in a very neat and correct manner. It is chiefly a reprint of Brunck's latest Edition, with the Scholia, Lexicon Sophocleum, &c. The new matter consists of the various readings contained in Erfurdt's Edition, and some hitherto unpublished notes of Dr. Burney on the plays and fragments of Sophocles, on the Lexicon Sophocleum of Brunck, on the Greek Scholia, and on Brunck's notes. In the third volume the metrical Scholia of Demetrius Triclinius, which were though amfit for publication by Brunck, « ut inepta, quippe quæ partim inutilia sunt, res manifestas, cujusvis lectoris in oculos incurrentes, nugatorie enarrantia, partim etiam erroris et inscitiæ plena,” are introduced :: and in the Editor's preface are defended, We are sorry that we have not a greater number of emendations from the pen of that celebrated scholar, Dr. Burney. His anno tations contain little else than references to the emendations of other celebrated critics, to Scholia, &c. Some of his corrections, however, we shall here introduce; judging that any emendations which proceed from him will be thought interesting. C. Burneii Emendationes in Sophoclem. Cd. R. 472. ἀναπλάκητοι. 615. x'äv. [xäv.] 672. ἐλεινόν. 1352. Lege μ' ἔλυσ ̓ ἀπό 1365. κακὸν ἔφυ κακοῦ Ed. C. 664. f. legend, ἔγων Aj. 1445. κακῶν. Antig. 383. καν. 1101. Leg. ήγεν. Phil. 1242. psi ΑΙΑΣ ΛΟΚΡΟΣ. iii. "Ανθρωπός ἐστι. f. ἴσθι. ΑΙΓΕΥΣ. vi. κινήσετ' αὔραις καναχουφιεῖ. ΑΚΡΙΣΙΟΣ. 1. οὐκ ἀκούετ'; In Lexicon Sophocleum. ΑΚΟΥΣΕΤΗΝ. ἀκούσεσθε δὲ]--θον. ΜΟΛΙΒΟΣ. Μολυβδὶς ὥστε]--ος In Scholia Greca. 1 Electr. 62. εἶτα Ερμότιμος] ὁ 236. ΣΥΝοικοιην] ΞΥΝ. We should have seen also with pleasure the notes of Erfurdt, a man, in the opinion of the editor," sane eruditissimus, et quamvis Brunckio acutus atque acer minus ex naturâ, at certe non judicio minus subacto.” But probably these are reserved for a future volume. The Editor has adhered too closely to Brunck's accentuation, Thus we observe καγω, καν, &c. and τοῦ ποτε, φύλλον τι μοι ; διε |