Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1883-07-27
Tho Biegraphist OF the old Testament.

| MRS. Oliphant, in tho Contemporary Review.
| There is kind of heroic candor and i'm
partiality belonging to the early ages of his.
tory which cannot well be emulatcd in our
more intricate condition of society. The hi.
Ography of the Old Testament is model of
this primitive method. AS soon as the pri-
meval age, in which we see darkly men as
trees walking, gigantic figures family percep.
lble, in dim largeness of existence un-
like ours, is over, how clearly and with what
complete human oonsistence does the Won
derful history of Israel, the wandering nation,
begin in the great figure of Abraham setting
out upon his journey in nomadic freedom, not
knowing where he going. his flocks and herds
trudging behind his beautiful wife wrapped in
her veil,yc not so closely but that King Abb
meech sees her ; and the patriarch belrays a
weakness, which, had he been modern, would
have been either concealed or excused, or
brought against him, with u babble If con-
tending tongues. Neither this divergence nor
any other does the ancient Scripture leave
out. There Is no explanation, no softening
down. The man was the Father Of the
Faithful Il good man, the best man OF his
Time, the friend of God, a most noble human
parsonage and yet there was momen.
when his courage and integrity failed him.
The primitive writer does not separate this
event from the context, or apologize for ii,
or represent it as the object of lifelong re-
pentancc. He records it precisely as the
records the arrival of the three wonderful
guests, whom Abraham, standing in the
cool evening at his tent door, perceives tc
be more than men. The one scene and the
other are set before us with equal brcvity,
without hesitation in the one case or
vain-glorv in the other, In the clear setting OF
those Oriental skies and desert scenes. The
ariarch had his faults they stand there as
they happened like his virtues, no one ask
ing pardon or attempting to account for them
Moses, too, the great prophet, the chosen
guide and law.giver, he who talked with
God and brought the shining tables of the
law out OF heaven, aud rejecting in his owr
dazzling countenance the glories he had
seen, neither of him is there any picture
of perfection. Sometimes his heart fails
him, sometimes he is presumptuous and
arrogant, though the most patient of men
His sudden passion, his brag of that powcl
the rest, plainly, without shrinking and with
out eXaggeration. David is made up of faults
a man out of date, belonging rather to tht
Middle Ages than to that primitive time
full of generosities and chivalrous traits, bu
also full of guile when necessity or inclina
tion moves HIM, of hot and undscipineC
passions, of love and self-indulgencc, re
deemed only by that opcnness to conviction
that self abasement and impassioned peni
tence, which are "aftcr Gods own heart
Not one word of excuse for all these evi
deeds says the primitive impartial record
His crime, his grief, his punishment. are al
before us to speak for themselves There i
no moralist to say, 'these were the manner
of his time" All is set down as it happened
for our judgment. We see til
man OF impulse moved by touch
! with all his senses keen and unbrdled
: loving, SHINING repenting, yet with some
/ thing gracious about HIM that wins a
hearts; letting his enemy go with hig
> generosity, scOrning to take advar
tage of sleep and WEAKNESS pouring out bt
fore the Lord, In an outburst of noble an
grateful emotion, that pitcher of water frol
the well of Bethlehem, which had bee
bought at the peril of mems lives, and WI
too precious draught for him. The stor
is absolutely impartial, nothing hid, nothin
unduly dwelt upon, the one part balancir
with the other Such mpartiality is incon
patibe with modern manners. Had such q
episode as that of Uriah the Hittite occurre
d in the life of any modern general how sedu
IL ously would one class of historians have col
cealed or slurred it over, how bitterly al
n other dragged 1t forth, and put it the front
/ every other Incident OF his life.