Page:04.BCOT.KD.PoeticalBooks.vol.4.Writings.djvu/11

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PREFACE.

on the faithful representation of the text of the Old Testament according to the Masora (Lutherische Zeitschrift, 1863) I inci- dentally gave expression to this feeling. On the 20th of October 1863 Hupfeld wrote to me, “I have only just seen your complaint of my judgment at the close of my work on the Psalms. The complaint is so gentle in its tone, it partakes so little of the bitterness of my verdict, and at the same time strikes chords that are not yet deadened within me, and which have not yet forgotten how to bring back the echo of happier times of common research and to revive the feeling of gratitude for faithful companionship, that it has touched my heart and conscience.” He closes his letter with the hope that he may one day have an opportunity of expressing publicly how that harsh and untempered judgment is now repugnant to his own feelings. Up to the present time I have made no use what- ever of this letter. I regarded it as a private matter between ourselves. Since, however, Riehm has transferred that judg- ment nnaltered to the second edition of the first volume of the Commentary of Hnpfeld, I owe it not to myself alone, but also to him who is since deceased, to explain that this has not been done in accordance with his wish.

Hitzig’s new Commentary has been of the greatest service to me in the revision and re-working of my own. In it I found mine uniformly taken into account from beginning to end, either with or without direct mention, and subjected to severe bnt kindly-disposed criticism ; and here and there not without a ready recognition of the scientific advance which could not but be observed in it. In comparison with such an unmerciful jndgment as that which Hnpfeld pronounced upon me, and which Ewald a few years later with very similar language pro- nonnced upon him, I here met with reasonable criticism of the matter, and, notwithstanding the full consciousness of the thoroughly original inquirer, an appreciation of the toil be- stowed by others upon their work.

I am the more encouraged to hope that all those who do not