* * * * *
Minor Notes.
_The Formation of the Woman_, Gen. ii. 21, 22.--The terms of Matthew Henry
on this subject, in his learned _Commentary_, have become quite commonplace
with divines, when speaking of the ordinance of marriage:
"The woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam: not made out of
his head, to top him; nor out of his feet, to be trampled upon by him;
but out of his side, to be equal with him; under his arm, to be
protected; and near his heart, to be beloved."
Like many other things in his Exposition, this is not original with Henry.
It is here traced to the _Speculum Humanae Salvationis_ of the earliest and
rarest printed works. Some of your readers can probably trace it to the
Fathers. The verses which follow are engraven in block characters in the
first edition of the work named, and are copied from the fifth plate of
specimens of early typography in Meerman's _Origines Typographicae_: Hague,
MDCCLXV.:
"Mulier autem in paradiso est formata
De costis viri dormientis est parata
Deus autem ipsam super virum honestavit
Quoniam Evam in loco voluptatis plasmavit,
Non facit eam sicut virum de limo terrae
Sed de osse nobilis viri Adae et de ejus carne.
Non est facta de pede, ne a viro despiceretur
Non de capite ne supra virum dominaretur.
Sed est facta de latere maritali
Et data est viro pro gloria et socia collaterali.
Quae si sibi in honorem collata humiliter praestitisset
Nunquam molestiam a viro unquam sustinuisset."