Bible studies, contributions chiefly from papyri and ... - Predestination

6 BIBLE STUDIES. [192, 193
of human naivete—beautiful or trivial, but, in any case,
true.^
2. The letter is older than literature. As conversation
between two persons is older than the dialogue, the song
older than the poem, so also does the history of the letter
reach back to that Golden Age when there was neither
author nor publisher, nor any reviewer. Literature is that
species of writing which is designed for pubhcity :
the
maker of Hterature desires that others will take heed to
his work. He desires to be read. He does not appeal to
his friend, nor does he write to his mother ; he entrusts
his sheets to the winds, and knows not whither they will
be borne ; he only knows that they will be picked up and examined
by some one or other unknown to him and unabashed
before him. Literature, in the truest essence of it, differs in
no way from a public speech ; equally with the latter it
falls short in the matter of intimacy, and the more it attains
to the character of universality, the more literary, that is
to say, the more interesting it is. All the difference between
them is in the mode of delivery. Should one desire to address,
not the assembled clan or congregation, but the great foolish
pubhc, then he takes care that what he has to say may be
carried home in v^riting by any one who wishes to have it
so : the book is substituted for oral communication. And
even if the book be dedicated to a friend or friends, still its
dedication does not divest it of its literary character,—it
does not thereby become a private piece of writing. The
form and external appearance of the book are immaterial
for the true understanding of its special character as a
book : even its contents, whatever they be, do not matter.
Whether the author sends forth poems, tragedies or his-
tories, sermons or wearisome scientific lucubrations, poUti-
cal matter or anything else in the world ; whether his book
is multiplied by the slaves of an Alexandrian bookseller, by
patient monk or impatient compositor ; whether it is pre-
served in hbraries as sheet, or roll, or folio : all these are as
1 Demetr., clc clocuL, 227 (Hercher, p. 13). Greg. Naz., ad Nicobiilum
(Hercher, p. 16).