the relative date of the more important of the Old Testament books, and particularly of the Pentateuch. He examines the view, which has been traditional among Jews and Christians for two thousand years or so, that the books containing the Law of Moses are the oldest part of all the sacred writings, and belong to the time of Moses himself; pointing out that on this hypothesis we may reasonably expect to find many references to it in the historical and prophetic books, which would show that its ordinances were well known and were obeyed at least by the loyal worshipers of Jehovah, even if neglected by a large part of the nation during its frequent lapses into idolatrous worship. And he remarks with great truth that, considering not only the importance of ritual in early times, but the great prominence given to ceremonial in the Levitical system, the way in which "the feasts, the sacrificial ritual, the ordinances of ceremonial purity are always in the foreground, as the necessary forms in which alone the inner side of religion, love to God and man, can find acceptable expression," the observance of these forms and rites must have been a matter of the highest consequence, a matter in which the devotion of good kings and priests would appear, and on which the prophets would frequently insist in their exhortations to the people. The Law purporting to be, as we read it, a complete revelation of God's will for Israel's life, a rule of absolute validity, the keeping of which is the whole of Israel's religion, "the religious history of Israel can be nothing else than the history of Israel's obedience or disobedience to the law." Moreover, the position "that the whole legal system was revealed to Israel at the very beginning of its national existence, strictly limits our conception of the function and significance of subsequent revelation. The prophets had no power to abrogate any part of the law, to dispense with Mosaic ordinances, or institute new means of grace, other methods of approach to God in lieu of the hierarchical sacraments." The theory, the usual orthodox theory of modern times, that the prophets were "exponents of the spiritual elements of the law, who showed the people that its precepts were not mere forms, but veiled declarations of the spiritual truths of a future dispensation which was the true substance of the shadows of the old ritual, implies that the prophets were constantly intent on enforcing the observance of the ceremonial as well as the moral precepts of the Pentateuch. Neglect of the ritual law was all the more culpable when the spiritual meaning of its precepts was made plain."
To give this brief summary of Professor Robertson Smith's conclusions conveys a very imperfect idea of the admirable skill with which he applies his critical method. It sets familiar facts and expressiors in a perfectly new light, illumining for us the whole religious and political history of Israel, and making that history more intelligible, more self-consistent, more instructive, than it had ever appeared upon the traditional view.—Abridged from the Pall Mall Gazette.
Trance and Trancoidal States in the Lower Animals. By George M, Beard, A. M., M. D. New York. Pp. 17.
Trance is defined by Dr. Beard as "a concentration of nervous activity in some one direction, with corresponding suspension of nervous activity in other directions." It can be induced in all animals that have the rudiments of a nervous system, and is essentially the same in all, the differences that may be observed being in degree rather than in kind. The methods of inducing it are infinite, and no one of those that are best known can be said to have any special or preëminent virtue over any other, except of convenience and degree. Induced trance, by whatever way it is brought about, trance resulting from functional derangements, and spontaneous trance, are all parts of and obedient to the same law, and should be studied under that view. Hence special terms, like hypnotism, Braidism, somnambulism, catalepsy, etc., are misleading, and ought not to be used. Among the examples of trance in animals. Dr. Beard cites the various methods of subduing them by fear, lion-taming, the horse-taming operations of Rarey and Home, affecting them with music, all the phenomena that pass under the name of fascination, and stupefaction in the presence of fire.
