'Here we obtain a fact that bears with great force upon our present argument. The writer of the Book of Joshua quotes an earlier work, to which he refers his readers, for a more full account of the miracle which he records--namely, the arresting the sun and moon in their flight that the Israelites might be avenged on their enemies. It is impossible to conceive that Joshua himself, who wrought that miracle, could have referred his readers to another book, in which a better account of it was to be found. It is far more likely that a compiler in a later age finding this miraculous event well described in a book still popular in his time, called the Book of Jasher, should have referred his readers to that book for further information. 'But this is not the only observation elicited by the mention made of the Book of Jasher in this place. The same work is quoted in 2 Sam. i., 17, 18:-- '"And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan, his son. Also he bade them teach the children of Judah the use of the bow; behold it is written in the Book of Jasher." 'Here we learn that the Book of Jasher contains the narrative of King David teaching his subjects the use of archery in war. The Book of Jasher was, therefore, written in or after the reign of David; and the Book of Joshua, which quotes the Book of Jasher, must have been written later still.' Whether these verses were written by Joshua, or Jasher, or by some other equally reliable personage, nothing can save them from condemnation as being absurd in the extreme. Paine observes:-- 'This tale of the sun standing still upon Mount Gibeon, and the moon in the valley of Ajalon, is one of those fables that detects itself. Such a circumstance could not have happened without being known all over the world. One half would have wondered why the sun did {101} not rise, and the other why it did not set, and the tradition of it would be universal, whereas there is not a nation in the world that knows anything about it. But why must the moon stand still? What occasion could there be for moonlight in the day time, and that, too, whilst the sun shined? As a poetical figure the whole is well enough; it is akin to that in the song of Deborah and Barah. _The stars in their courses, fought against Sisera_; but it is inferior to the figurative declaration of Mahomet to the person who came to expostulate with him on his goings on:--_Wert thou_, said he, _to come to me with the sun in thy right hand and the moon in thy left, it should not alter my career_. For Joshua to have exceeded Mahomet, he should have put the sun and moon one in each pocket, and carried them as Guy Fawkes carried his dark lanthorn, and taken them out to shine as he might happen to want them.