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The learning and ingenuity of the author of the " Illustrations / ' sometimes appear to lead him to ascribe to the Evangelists a degree of knowledge , which it is not probable they possessed ^ and a meaning to their language . which cannot have been their own . An instance of this kind occurs , page 67 , where Mr . J . supposes , that in the use of the word e ' j dscvf ) bmnediatelu , the
evangelist refers to the silence which Pythagoras imposed upon his disciples , and meant to intimate , that nothing of this kind was practised by the teacher of Christianity . Many passages of a similar kind occur throughout
the work , and Dot un / requem } y the author ascribes to Jesus himself a design and meaning beyond what can be supposed to have entered into his thoughts . We notice this circumstance more particularly , because we think , ' that the exercise of the imagination in the critical examination of the 1
N * i . except under very strict and steady discipline , is rather apt to allure the inquirer from the original and simple meaning of the artless writers , than to direct him to it . We have also
observed , that the ingenuity of this writer sometimes dilates the idea , which occupies his mind , so much
as td make it absurd , particularly in ascribing to Jesus a secondary and extended meaning , which perhaps is not real . In commenting upon the converse * tion of 'Jesus with the woman of
Samaria , John iv . he observes : 46 language of our Lord , from yer . 10 to 16 , is a beautiful instance of the manner in which he rjnade words , used literall y * the ve-Jaicle of a metaphorical ajind more
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important sense . The sight of that well , whose wafers afforded refreshment , and whose banks spread a couch to the exhausted traveller , instantly furnished his imagination with a fit emblem of that grace and love , which flowed in inexhaustible streams from the throne of God , and ensured
eternal life to those who drink of them . —P . 89 . Mr . Jones seems to have forgotten , that Jacob ' s well , was so tuv from an overflowing stream , whose banks spread a couch to the exhausted travel .
ler , ' that the water could only be obtained by drawing ; for " the well was deep / ' n e . from the biink to the surface of the water , ( ver . 1 J ) . J " h making these
observations , our object is not so much to censure , as to induce the learned author to re-consider many parts of this excellent work before itJbe again committed to the press , as we hope it soon will be , in an enlarged and improved state .
But though we sometimes have had to lament , that the author has indulged his imagination so far , we have more frequently been pleased and edified by the happy manner in which he illustrates the obscurity of the Scripture historians , by suggesting the circumstances or events which . dictated the language in which they have expressed themselves . Many elliptical passages ai-e judiciously rilled up , and in some cases the incident , which had been overlooked , or suppressed by the evangelist , and the want of which gives a broken and disjointed appearance to the narrative , is well supplied . It is only justice to the author to quote an instance of this kind , which occurs
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398 Review . * —Jones ' s Illustrations of the Four Gospels ,
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1809, page 398, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1738/page/44/
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