the texts in which these are mentioned are given. The articles on Natural History give accounts of the animals, plants, and minerals noticed in the Bible; correct mistakes arising from mistranslation or misconception; and, as respects the more important, show either the estimation in which they have been held, or the uses to which they have been applied, or the modifications they have undergone, down to modern times. These topics are treated apart from scientific nomenclature, and in language adapted to popular reading. The articles not included in the previous works—such as those on scientific subjects, arts, implements, armour, antiquities, customs, rites, terms, and other subjects required to complete the cyclopædia circle-are diversified in treatment, and comprise a large amount of information, presented with novelty and fulness. Many are short; a few run to the length of essays or treatises; all avoid direct dogmatic discussion; all study to be simply illustrative of the Bible. Those on Architecture, Astronomy, Botany, Geology, Husbandry, Mineralogy, Music, and others, contain information not ordinarily found in Bible Cyclopædias. Those on Bible, Canon, Exode, Pentateuch, Septuagint, and others, are especially fitted to meet the tactics of the opponents of revelation. Most of those on the arts and sciences, some on other topics, and some of the additions to the geographical articles, also contain portions of matter similarly suited.

"The Cyclopædia of General Biblical Knowledge" aims to embody all the good qualities, and to avoid all the bad ones, of works of its class. It uses no phraseology or quotation intelligible only to the learned. It addresses itself to all classes of readers; to the most intellectual as well as the most unlearned. It gives digests from all sources, on all subjects connected with the illustration of the Bible. It retains the treasures of the old cyclopædias separated from their dross. It presents the results of freshest research and discovery, It takes facts from every quarter, and applies them to the explanation of the Bible as it stands, without reference to new-born theories. It gives them, in their several classes, somewhat proportionate in space to the corresponding subjects in the Scriptures. It preserves throughout a reverence for the letter and spirit of Scripture; an adherence to the great doctrines of the Christian faith. It deals no further with Scripture terms than to define and illustrate general theological ideas. It has no party tenets, sectarian bias, or controversial articles.

Information on Biblical subjects is extensively dispersed, through multitudes of books, many of them rare or costly, and cannot be gathered by any individual for himself except by half a lifetime of leisure, within reach of great public libraries. A cyclopædia is therefore a contrivance for collecting all this information, for distributing it into portions under the names and titles which occur in the Bible, and for arranging these in alphabetical order. The humblest reader can go direct to any portion of it—on a country, a town, a person, an animal, a plant, or a custom-and

he will find there the substance of all that travellers or learned men have discovered respecting it; while a reader previously acquainted with works of oriental explorers and Biblical scholars, will generally obtain an epitome of all he has read on the subject, along with either facts which are new to him, or with new light thrown upon old facts.

A good cyclopædia should contain not only a summary of what the best old writers have said, divested of the errors into which they fell, and enriched with the additions made since they wrote; but also a digest of the newest information on all other Biblical subjects, down to the present day. The amount of that information is great and various. Within the last few years more light has been thrown upon Biblical geography, than was formerly done in as many centuries. Much also has been thrown upon biography, natural history, antiquities, customs, arts, and scientific allusions. Old critical illustrations have been exploded, and new ones obtained. lical cyclopædia which would have been eminently good a few years ago, could be eminently good now only by undergoing enlargement and revision.

A Bib

Dictionaries explaining the common words of the Bible, discussing dogmatic or controverted terms, and containing little antiquarian or scientific matter, are of inferior value. Much of what they do is as well done by ordinary lexicons; much again is better done by commentaries and treatises; while the things they omit, or slightly touch upon, are often those most wanted. Cyclopædias embracing philological researches, with criticisms on the dead languages, and in which words and phrases of these languages are interspersed, may possess great excellence, and are useful to scholars; but to scholars only. A cyclopædia aiming to harmonize the findings of modern science with the expressions of the Bible, and written so as to be level with the capacity of ordinary readers, might seem to be not a little desirable; but if it assumed science as now understood to be the key to the Bible's notices of natural phenomena, it would all proceed on fundamental error; whilst if it treated science only, it would exclude antiquities, customs, and other kinds of subjects of equal or higher moment. Scripture is infallible and unchanging. Science is liable to mistake, and is always progressive. If Scripture had been construed twenty years ago into exact accordance with science, it would not be in exact accordance with it now; if construed into exact accordance with it now, it might not be in twenty or even in two years hence. The passages in Genesis respecting creation and the flood are those which scientific theory chiefly seeks to work upon; and these involve heights of thought loftier than science has yet reached; while they continue, as from the beginning, to teach their main or moral lessons apart from questions of mere physics.

A Biblical cyclopædia may be all right in facts and diction, may be free from every kind of blemish we have hinted at, may be full of every kind of information we think

desirable, and yet be wrong in spirit. If constructed on the basis of the new or negative theology, it would not be Christian; if on that of Romanism, it would not be Protestant; if on that of Socinianism, it would not be evangelical; and if on that of any one sect or party, it would not be liberal. Some portions treat expressly of the Redeemer, or of his offices or works; many touch or exhibit vital points in the scheme of salvation; most involve truths or tendencies of high moral bearing on man's eternal interests; and all must be free from tinge of either heterodoxy or bigotry. The Godman mediator and love to the brethren ought to be the watch-words of the whole. A cyclopædia framed with hostility or indifference to the inspiration of the Scriptures, to the oneness of the mediatorship, to the divinity of Christ, or to the vicariousness of the atonement, would betray the Saviour; while one framed with design to inculcate the peculiar tenets of one party, at the expense of repudiating those of others, would throw firebrands among the flock of the great Shepherd of the sheep.

The Cyclopædia of Biblical Knowledge is enriched with numerous page illustrations and separate engravings or maps. The page illustrations have been under the exclusive charge of one of the most eminent artists of the age, who has done them every justice in point of authenticity and art. The steel engravings are original and appropriate, and are subjects of sacred scenery after the first modern masters. The maps are unique in execution, and some of them unique in character. Besides showing the physical features of the land of Palestine, its successive territorial divisions and topographical nomenclature, with a distinctness and accuracy heretofore unattainable, they present the routes and journeys of our Saviour, and of other persons celebrated in Holy Writ, in further explanation and illustration of its Text.

LIST OF BOOKS.

THE following list serves both to show the authorities and aids for this CYCLOPÆDIA, and to point out where further information on the subjects of any of its articles may be found. Commentaries, Expositions, Exegetical works, Periodicals, Encylopædias, Dictionaries, and the Transactions or Reports of public bodies have been extensively used, and would form a very long list; but none of them are here named. Dogmatic and Polemical works also would form a long list; but only such as treat of the evidences of the Bible, or bear considerably on its facts, are here inserted. Many of other kinds also, not having been noted down at the time when they were used or referred to, are omitted. The earlier works on Biblical Geography, Biography, and Natural History, likewise, as they have lost much of their value, are not included. Most foreign, Latin, or ancient works which contain any thing of material value for Bible illustration have been translated into English; and not the originals of such works, but the English versions of them, are here noted. The list is for the use of English readers; and notwithstanding its curtailed state, it cannot fail to show them how very rich a store of Biblical information exists in the English language, and is within their reach. In order to comprise it within small space, only the leading titles of the books, or the shortest recognisable ones, are given.

AINSWORTH (William)—Researches in Assyria, Baby-
lonia, and Chaldea. 8vo. London.
AITKEN (Thomas J., M.D.)-Elements of Physiology.
12mo. London, 1838.

ALDIS (William) The Book of the Prophet Enoch,
&c. 8vo. Edinburgh, 1830.

ALEXANDER (W. L., D.D.)-The Connexion of the
Old and New Testaments. 8vo. London, 1841.
ALFORD (Walter, M.A.)-The Old and New Testa-
ments compared. 12mo. London, 1858.
ALLEN (Captain William)-The Dead Sea, a New
Route to India. 2 vols. 12mo. London, 1855.
ALLIOTT (Richard, LL.D.)-Psychology and Theology.
8vo. London, 1855.

ANDERSON (Rev. Christopher)-The Annals of the
English Bible. 2 vols. 8vo. London, 1845.
ANSTEAD (D. L., M.A., F.R.S.)-Geological Gossip.
London, 1860.

The Ancient World. 8vo. London, 1847.
APOCRYPHA Controversy, Pamphlets on, 1828-32.
ARNOLD (Dr. J. M.)—A Natural History of Islamism.
8vo. London, 1859.

ARUNDELL (Rev. F. V. J.)-A Visit to the Seven
Churches of Asia. 8vo. London, 1828.

Discoveries in Asia Minor. 2 vols. 8vo.
London, 1834.

AVELING (Rev. T. W.)-Travels in the Lands of the
Tiber, the Jordan, &c. 8vo. London, 1855.

BALFOUR (Professor J. H.)-Phyto-Theology. 18mo.
Edinburgh, 1851.

Plants of the Bible. 8vo. Edinburgh.
(Thomas A. G.)-God's Two Books. Lon-
don, 1861.
BARCLAY (J. T., M.D.)-The City of the Great King.
Philadelphia, 1857.

BARRY (Alfred, M.A.)-Introduction to the Study of the Old Testament. Part I., 8vo. London, 1856. BARTLETT (W. H.)-Walks about Jerusalem. Royal 8vo. London, 1846.

The Nile-Boat. Roval 8vo. London, 1850.

BEKE (Charles S., Ph.D., F.A.S., F. R. G.S.)-Origines
Biblica. 1 vol. 8vo. 1834.

A Few Words with Bishop Colenso.
phlet. London, 1862.

Pam

BELL (Sir Charles) The Hand, its Mechanism, and
Vital Endowments. 8vo. London, 1833-6.

The Anatomy of Expression. Royal 8vo.
London, 1844.

BELOE (Rev. William)-Translation of Herodotus.
4 vols. 8vo. London, 1791.

BELZONI (G.)-Operations and Recent Discoveries in
Egypt and Nubia, &c. 4to. 1820.
BELZONI (John Baptist)-Researches in Egypt and
Nubia. 2 vols. 8vo. London, 1822.
BENGEL (John Albert)-Gnomon of the New Testa-
ment. 5 vols. Edinburgh, 1857-8.
BENISCH (Dr. A.)-Bishop Colenso's Objections Criti-
cally Examined. London, 1863.

Translation of Travels of Rabbi Petachia of
Ratisbon. 12mo. London, 1856.

BENSON (Rev. Christopher, M. A.)-Hulsean Lectures for 1820. 8vo. London, 1826.

Hulsean Lectures for 1822. 8vo. London.
BIBLE-Pamphlets relating to a New Translation of.
Various Years.

BINGHAM (Rev. Joseph)-The Antiquities of the Chris-
tian Church, &c. 10 vols. 8vo. London, 1710.
BIRCH (Samuel)-History of Ancient Pottery. 2 vols.
London, 1858.

BIRKS (Rev. T. R., M. A.)—The Exodus of Israel. 8vo.
London, 1863.

BLAIR (Rev. Robert, M.D.)-On the Canon and the
Septuagint. 4to. London, 1785.

BLUNT (Rev. J. J., B.D.)—Undesigned Coincidences