* The German of Mendelssohn's translation was written in Hebrew letters. In the very year in which Mendelssohn's work appeared we notice among the younger generation a general revival of interest in the Hebrew, the mother-tongue of their race. Two students of the University of Konigsberg began the issue of a periodical devoted to the culture of the Hebrew, which was widely read and attracted great attention. Poems, original essays, Hebrew versions of modern writings, appeared in its columns; the style of the Prophets and of the Psalmists was emulated, the works of the ancient masters of the language served as models, and in the aspect of the noble forms employed in the diction of the biblical authors the aesthetic sense of the modern Jews revived. We are inclined to doubt whether the Hebrew Bible, considered merely with a view to its aesthetic value, is even yet fully appreciated. The extravagance of religious credulity and the violent extreme of scepticism have alike tended to obscure its proper merits. The one accustomed to behold in the "holy book" a message from the Creator to his creatures shrinks, as a rule, from applying to the work of a Divine author the critical standard of human composition. The sceptics on the other hand, impatient of the exorbitant claims which are urged for the sacred writings of the Jews, and resenting the sway which they still exercise over the human reason, are hardly in a proper frame of mind to estimate justly its intrinsic and imperishable excellences. And yet, setting aside all questions of the supernatural origin of the Bible, and regarding only the style in which its thoughts are conveyed, how incomparably valuable does it still remain! It would be difficult to calculate the extent to which many of our standard authors are indebted for the grandest passages of their works to their early familiarity with the biblical style. Those who are able to read the text in the original become aware of even subtler beauties that escape in the process of translation. Purity of diction, power of striking antithesis, simple and yet sublime imagery, a marvellous facility in the expression of complex states of feeling, and those the deepest of which the human soul is capable, are but a few of the obvious features that distinguish the golden age of Hebrew literature. Never perhaps has the symbolism of nature been used with such supreme effect to express the unspeakable emotions that are deep down in the heart of man. Such music as that which swells through the pages of Isaiah's prophecies cannot be forgotten; such ringing, rhythmic periods, in which the eloquence of conviction bursts forth into the rounded fulness of perfect oratory, can never fail to touch and to inspire. We know of no nobler pattern on which the modern orator could mould his style. And thus, too, the exquisite poetry of the Song of Songs, the idyl of the Book of Ruth, the weird pathos of Jeremiah's