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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Liftrnry Memoir of Dr . Percy , late Bishop of Dromore . 6
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latioRs shew , as the translator observer * ' that the poetry of the Scalds chiefly displays itself in images of terror / ' In a note to the Dvzng ^ Ode of Regnar Lodbrogy attributed to th <» gth century , the translatoi , in the expression of * ' a mrtss of weapons , " detects Ci a surer on the Christian religion / ' which they considered as the religion of cowards , because it would have corrected their savage manners , ' * or rather because they had not witnessed the Crusades into the East , or the wars for " religion and social order" Christian Europe . In 1764 , was published , in one small volume , I 2 mo , The Song
of Solomon , newly translated from tke original Hebrew , with a Commentary and Annotations . This translation has been long ascribed to Mr . Percy , and we apprehend , may be now confidently regarded as the production of his pen . The translator describes his work as * ' an afttempt to rescue one of the most beautiful pastorals in the world , as well as the most ancient , frt » m that obscurity and confusion , in which it has b ( en involved by the injudicious practic ^ ojTfofnibr commentators . The generality of these / ' he complains , * have been so busily employed ih opening and' unfolding its
aJIfgorical meaning , as wholly to neglect that literal sense , which ought to be tut basis of the it discoveries . " On the contrary , it is his 4 < sole design to-establish and illustrate the literal sense ; " proposing , < fc in a future attempt , to enquire , what sublime trmbs are concealed under it . ' * The translator ' s reasons for expecting to discover 4 * sublime truths / ' concealed in the Song of bolomon , are
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the , following , the last of them , especially , not very \ cogei > t ;— - 4 * That this fine eastern pastoral was designed for a vehicle of religious truths , is an opinion handed down from the earliest antiquity . That it may be so , has been clearly proved bygone of the best critics of the age ( Dr . Lovvth ) : and that it is so , may bestrongly presumed , not only from that ancient and universal opinion , but from its being preserved in a book , all whose other contents are of a divine religious nature . " While the New Translation was in the press , ci appeared a new edition of the
Prcelectioneswith notes , by jHchaclisf who , according to our translator ' s postscript , ( p . 103 ) differs from Lowth , as to the Song of Solomon being a sacred allegory , and is inclined to look no further than the literal meaning . Yet allows it to be a production not unworthy the celestial muse , and thinks it was inserted in the great code of sacred and moral truths , to shew
that wedded love has the express approbation of the Deity - '' It is surprising that the learned professor could discover any recommendation of marriage , in the story of an amorous prince , possessed ^ already of u threescore queens and fourscore concubines , " yet inclined , like a modern grand seignior , to add another bride to his seraglio . It is yet more to be admired that our translator could conjecture ( p * 103 ) , that this elegant description of conjugal love is , after all , only a veil to shadow that divine and tender regard which subsists between the Redeemer and the souls of men ; a subject / ' he adds , " of so much importance as to deserve
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1812, page 5, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1744/page/5/
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