The conclusions of those who started with the hypothesis that what we call the miraculous is impossible, would not be difficult to forecast. From the outset, with them, the Old Testament was doomed. In the wonderful incidents related as the experience of the patriarchs, of Moses, Aaron, Joshua and the kings and prophets of Israel, this school of critics could discern a striking parallel to the legends of Rome, of Greece and Egypt; and as readily rejected the one as the other. They rejected also the cosmogony of Genesis, insisting that it was not the history of the creation but poetry, and as such must be regarded, but not as fact. Suspicion once cast upon the historical value of sacred writings, the critics grew bolder and declared that portions of the sacred narrative presented the appearance of being simply myths; and from this by degrees it soon became the fashion to attach a legendary character to the whole of the Old Testament. It was decided by the same class of critics that the whole narrative, in the main, rests upon oral tradition and that that tradition was not written until long after the supposed events occurred. Moreover, when the old traditions were written, the work was done by poets bent rather on glorifying their country than upon recording facts; and it is claimed that at times they did not hesitate to allow imagination to amplify the oral traditions or at need to invent new occurrences, to fill up blanks in their annals. The authorship of the sacred books was held to be a matter of great uncertainty, as well as the date at which they were written; but certainly they were not written until long after the dates usually assigned for their production. This style of criticism not only got rid of the cosmogony of Genesis, but discredited as histories the whole collection of books comprising the Old Testament. The Fall of man, that fact which gives meaning to the atonement of Christ, and without which the scheme of Christian salvation is but an idle fable--was regarded as merely a myth. So, too, were the revelations of God to the patriarchs; his communion with Enoch; his warning to Noah, together with the story of the flood; the building of Babel's tower; the visions of Abraham; the calling of Moses; the splendid display of God's power in the deliverance of Israel from bondage; the law written upon the tables of stone by the finger of God, the ark of the covenant and the visible presence of God with Israel; the visitation of angels to the prophets; their communion with God and the messages of reproof, of warning or of comfort they brought to the people--all, all were myths, distorted legends, uncertain traditions told by ecstatic poets, falsely esteemed prophets! Such was the wreck which this new science of criticism made of the Old Testament.