It is hardly surprising to find that this Prophetical literature was in turn liable to redaction, though in a different degree and for a different reason, since it has been preserved to us under peculiar conditions. This at first may seem terribly confusing to the bewildered student, and it is here that tired men reject criticism and all its works. To such the reminder cannot be spared that in any branch of Science the same conditions have to be overcome, and if he would understand the Old Testament and reap the magnificent reward that its earnest study gives, he must be prepared to face the facts and labour at their solution. First of all then, it must be noted that the Books of the Prophets are not so much literature, in the ordinary sense of the word, as reported rhetoric, with the qualification that the reporter and the speaker may be usually assumed to be the same. In most cases the speeches were written out by the Prophet himself soon after they were delivered, although sometimes this was done by others long after, and expanded or altered, as is actually reported to have been the case with the prophecies of Jeremiah (Jer. xxxvi.). In the second place, the literature reveals the fact that there does not seem to have been in that age any conception of literary property; ideas are borrowed directly from one Prophet by another, and sometimes direct quotation is made without any acknowledgment or indication of the source. The Prophet's scribe, his school or followers, could amend or paraphrase; later generations could evidently insert a qualifying phrase, temper a threat with a qualifying condition, or to the doom of exile add a promise of restoration. When it is noticed that messages like those of Amos or Hosea end unexpectedly in hopeful words, and when it is recollected that these Prophets have been used as Service Books in the Synagogue and may have been therefore altered to suit the purpose, then we shall understand the problem that faces us and why a shadow of suspicion should rest on promises of restoration that are to be found in pre-exilic writings. Let it be remembered however that it is no true critical canon to assume that prediction cannot be made; but what are we to do when such a prediction fits ill with the context, breaks the sense, is foreign to the outlook of the speaker, and is in later style?