“I hold,” says Dr. Smeaton, “that the doctrine of inspiration and Professor Smith’s views are irreconcilable, and that this will be evident if, for example, we take account of his theory of Deuteronomy or of his conception of the Song of Solomon. The view which he propounds as to the origin of Deuteronomy is that it is a fictitious personation of Moses by another man, in the unspeakably solemn position of professing to receive and communicate a divine revelation, and that the book was not composed until many centuries after Moses’ death. The point at issue is not alone the age and Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy, but whether this book of Scripture is supposititious, and whether it was after a great interval of time composed and put into the mouth of Moses by another. This fraudulent personation-theory is the lowest depth of criticism; for, as has often been said, the mythical criticism had still this redeeming point, that it did not impute to the writers conscious fabrication. The supposititious or personation-theory, on the contrary, is not in keeping with the character of an honest man, and wholly inconsistent with that of an ambassador from God; and the attempt to exculpate the writer who is said to have put his words into the mouth of Moses, on the supposition that it was well known at the time, only widens the sphere of the fraudulent deception, and makes the receivers of the book act in collusion with the writer in his crime. This theory, which I never expected to encounter in Scotland, overlooks the important fact that, in the very book to which such an origin is ascribed, we find the repeated condemnation of false prophets, of false testimony, and of adding to, or diminishing from, the Word of God; and we must therefore suppose the writer practising deception while exposing falsehood in every form. Professor Smith must make his choice between the reception of the book as an inspired revelation, with all that it purports to be, as written in the time of Moses, and as the work of Moses, or reject it altogether as a fraud and entitled to no respect. There is no middle way. He cannot maintain its fictitious origin, and yet assert its inspiration. However convenient it may be for a speculative theologian to oscillate between the two ideas, as the necessities of a daring criticism may suggest, the notion of a fabricated prophetic programme or of an inspired forgery will be regarded by the general community, as it has always been regarded by me, as no better than the very quintessence of absurdity. The robust common sense of mankind scouts the possibility of the combination. For my part, I could not stultify myself before the church and the world by allowing such an incoherent and self-contradictory juxtaposition of terms.