Within the coffin of Mentuhotep, a queen of the XIth, the 17th, 18th, and 64th chapters of the Ritual have been found in the same character.1 Bunsen tells us of an hieratic papyrus-leaf discovered in a sarcophagus of the VII. (? XI.) Dynasty.2 But the papyrus Prisse bears away the palm from all. It is a transcript from originals belonging partly to the age of Snefru of the III. and partly to that of Assa of the V.; and in the judgment of palæographists is the oldest manuscript of the world. It need not, therefore, take us by surprise if we find contemporary monuments stating that in the V. and IV. Dynasties, Khutumhotep, and Puhenuka, and Aseskafankh were royal librarians, and that even Khufu himself had a library of such mark as to give name to a royal domain. Indeed, Pharaohs themselves had already turned authors; and we are told of Tosorthros of the III. turning his attention to writing, and of a still earlier king inditing a treatise on anatomy. The Berlin Papyrus IX. speaks of a document traced actually back to the reign of Ousaphais, the fifth king from Menes. So that we are quite prepared for the fact, which a cursory glance will discover, that in the very earliest monuments of the Denkmäler the papyrus-roll had already become the symbol for a book, and that the recognised hieroglyph

for writing was the constantly-recurring combination of reed-pen, water-vase, and palette. The process itself is represented graphically in the rocktomb of Chafra-ankh, a dignitary of the IV. Dynasty.8

1 Birch, Introduction to the Fun. Rit. ut supra, p. 127. 2 Egypt's Place in Univ. Hist. vol. iii. p. 611. Brugsch, Hist. d'Égypte i. pp. 29-32, &c. * De Rougé, Recherches sur les Monuments, &c. pp. 73, 86, 87. 5 Osburn, ib. vol. i. p. 277. Brugsch, ib. p. 34. 7 In the coloured plates of Lepsius, the white papyrus-roll appears, with true official instinct, tied up most artistically with red tape. See Denkm. ii. 20, 22.

8 Denkm. ii. 9.

Since, then, the art of writing was so well understood in Egypt many ages before Moses, and so much in use during his own lifetime, it is an outrage to common sense to suppose that he who had received a courtly education, and was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians (Acts vii. 22), could not so much as write; or that, knowing how to do it, he nevertheless neglected to commit to writing that Law, which he gave his countrymen with such solemnity, which he enjoined them to meditate on day and night, and to engrave on public monuments (Deut. xxvii. 3), and, in true Egyptian spirit, on the very door-posts of their houses (Deut. vi. 9); which, moreover, he wished to be publicly read every seven years (Deut. xxxi. 11), and to be transcribed by every king who should mount the throne (Deut. xvii. 18).

And if the Egyptian character may not seem to be well fitted to express the sounds of Hebrew, it must not be forgotten that Egypt was only one of the nations that brought with them from the plains of Shinar the remains

of an antediluvian civilisation. The Cushite Babylonians had already their cuneiform letters in the year 2200 B.C.,1 and the Semitic-speaking nations, with whom the Hebrews are classed linguistically, had certainly characters of their own at a very early period. The hieratic papyrus Sallier No. 3, bearing date the seventh year of the Great Ramses, and containing the poetic eulogium on the Conqueror by Pentaur (which, by the way, the vain hero had engraved on the walls of the temple of Karnak), mentions as the writer of books among the Kheta in Northern Palestine a personage who is called Khirapsar.2 So that in the age of Moses the royal historiographer seems to have been an already established dignitary in the Canaanite courts. During the battle, moreover, fought between them and Ramses, an ambassador of the Kheta presents to the Pharaoh a written supplication. When the war was over a regular treaty of peace was written out on both sides. The Egyptian copy, though somewhat mutilated, has been transferred to the Denkmäler.3 But its counterpart is there said to have been written out by the Kheta on a tablet of silver, whose square form is represented among the hieroglyphics. In confirmation of this nation's familiarity with writing even before the period in question, it may be noted that in the district of the Hittites-who, notwithstanding Chabas' scepticism, were undoubtedly identical with the Kheta-was situated Kirjath-sepher, meaning Book-town, a name which in Joshua's time had already become antiquated (Jos. xv. 15). Indeed it now appears that the Phoenician character itself came directly from the Egyptian hieratic long before the age of the Papyrus Prisse. When looking over the comparative

1 Rawlinson, Bampton Lectures, p. 273, Note (46).

2 Brugsch, ib. pp. 139-145.

3 Denk. iii. 146.

4 See De Rougé's translation of the text, Rev. Arch., April 1866.

table exhibited by De Rougé or Lenormant, no one can doubt the identity of the two systems. The hieratic, as it was written two centuries before Moses, is so much degenerated from the old type, that a comparison with it does not establish sufficiently the resemblance. That comes out stronger the more we approach the original form, whether of Phoenician or of hieratic. In the Papyrus Prisse we come nearest to it. But even in that, notwithstanding the strong and unmistakable likeness, we miss some points of similarity which, no doubt, existed in an earlier age.1

We need, however, no further proof of the vast antiquity of writing among the Semitic nations than the fact (so conclusive to Ewald's mind 2) that the words an, 190, 1, meaning write, book, ink, are common to them all. The inference is that writing in ink was known among the Semites in prehistoric times, before they broke up into separate nationalities, as Chaldees, Syrians, Hebrews, Phoenicians, Arabs, or Ethiopians. What wonder, then, that in the age of Moses writing among the Hebrews should be so common an accomplishment, that he grounds his law permissive of divorce on its universal and everyday usage in society? (Deut. xxiv. 1).

III. Although Moses reduced the Pentateuch to writing, we are not to suppose that he was the original author of everything in it. Former generations, far back in antiquity, had naturally written down and preserved the records of past events. Joseph, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham had probably contributed their share to patriarchal

1 See the Alphabets in Lenormant, Int. à un Mémoire sur l'alph. Phén. pp. 103, 104.

2 Geschich. des Volkes Israel, vol. i. p. 77, 3rd ed. 1864. He is disposed to think that may have dropped out of the Ethiopic and Southern Arabic.

literature; and Moses was, no doubt, disposed to avail himself of all the aids within his reach, and of all the sources of information at his command. So that, besides personal observation, we might expect him to use, with due caution, the current traditions of his time, popular songs, monuments, registers, genealogies, narratives, biographies, and histories. It would be no matter for astonishment if we found him (as suggested by a learned writer)1 incorporating with his own original materials documents from elsewhere, adapting, curtailing, extending, translating, as Livy does whole pages of Polybius without acknowledgment; or interweaving them with his own narrative, or with each other, as M'Cabe does, with the ancient chroniclers of England. What if in Genesis there really be an Elohistic as well as a Jehovistic element? There would be no occasion for surprise if we fell in with a document as old as Abraham. Such perhaps may be Gen. xiv. Such probably is the geographical account of Canaan (Gen. x. 15-19). For Sodom and Gomorrah are there spoken of as actual boundary cities in the time of the writer. It may be that De Saulcy has discovered their ruins on the borders of the Dead Sea. But even so, they do not seem to have ever been, after the catastrophe, such a landmark as to justify the expression: As thou goest unto Sodom,' &c. Who knows but that it may be reserved for some future age to descend into the vaults of Hebron, to behold the very mummy of Jacob, and in a mouldering papyrus-leaf to trace some document with which we have been familiar in Genesis?

1 Rawlinson, Aids to Faith, p. 251.

2 A Catholic History of England, by W. B. M'Cabe, passim.

3 Narrative of a Journey round the Dead Sea, &c. vol. i. cc. 7, 12, 13; vol. ii. c. 2.