sort of pulse; in the Septuagint φακὸς, and Vulgate _lens_. The lentils
of Egypt were very much esteemed among the ancients. St. Austin says,
they grow abundantly in Egypt, are much used as a food there, and those
of Alexandria are considered particularly valuable. Dr. Shaw says,
beans, lentils, kidney beans, and garvancos are the chief of their pulse
kind. Beans, when boiled and stewed with oil and garlic, are the
principal food of persons of all distinctions. Lentils are dressed in
the same manner as beans, dissolving easily into a mass, and making a
pottage of a chocolate colour. This, we find, was the red pottage” which
Esau, from thence called Edom, exchanged for his birthright.
LEOPARD, נמר, Cant. iv, 8; Isaiah xi, 6; Jer. v, 6; xiii, 23; Hosea
xiii, 7; Hab. i, 8; Dan. vii, 6; ϖάρδαλις, Rev. xiii, 2; Ecclus. xxviii,
23. There can be no doubt that the pard or leopard is the animal
mentioned. Bochart shows that the name is similar in the Chaldee,
Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic. The LXX uniformly render it by ϖάρδαλις;
and Jerom, _pardus_. Probably, these animals were numerous in Palestine;
as we find places with a name intimating their having been the haunts of
leopards: _Nimrah_, Num. xxxii, 3; _Beth-Nimrah_, Num. xxxii, 36; Joshua
xiii, 27; and waters of _Nimrim_,” Isa. xv, 6; Jer. xlviii, 34; and
mountains of leopards,” Cant. iv, 8. Nimrod might have his name from
this animal: He was a mighty hunter before the Lord; wherefore it is
said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord,” Gen. x, 9. It
is supposed, however, that his predations were not confined to the brute
creation. Dr. Geddes remarks, that the word hunter” expresses too
little. He was a freebooter, in the worst sense of the word; a lawless
despot:
Proud Nimrod first the bloody chase began,
A mighty hunter, and his prey was man.
Isaiah, describing the happy state of the reign of Messiah, says, The
leopard shall lie down with the kid,” Isaiah xi, 6. Even animals shall
lose their fierceness and cruelty, and become gentle and tame. Jeremiah,
v, 6, mentions the artful ambuscades of this animal; and in xiii, 23,
alludes to his spots: Can a Cushite change his skin; or a leopard his
spots? Then may ye prevail with them to do good who are habituated to do
evil;” and Habakkuk, i, 8, refers to its alertness.
LEPROSY. See DISEASES.
LETTERS, marks for the purpose of expressing sounds, used in writing.
Few subjects have given rise to more discussion than the origin of
alphabetic characters. If they are of human invention, they must be
considered as one of the most admirable efforts of the ingenuity of man.
So wonderful is the facility which they afford for recording human
thought; so ingenious, and at the same time so simple, is the analysis
which they furnish for the sounds of articulate speech, and for all the
possible variety of words; that we might expect the author of this happy
invention to have been immortalized by the grateful homage of succeeding
ages, and his name delivered down to posterity with the ample honours it
so justly merited. But the author and the era of this discovery, if such
it be, are both lost in the darkness of remote antiquity. Even the
nation to which the invention is due cannot now be ascertained. The
Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Phenicians, the Persians, the Indians,
have all laid claim to the honour of it; and each has named its inventor
among the remote, and probably fabulous, personages that figure in the
earlier ages of their history. In consequence of this uncertainty
respecting the author of alphabetic writing, and the high value and
extreme difficulty of the invention itself, many have been inclined to
attribute this art to an immediate revelation from the Deity; contending
that it was communicated with other invaluable gifts from above, in
remote ages, to the descendants of Abraham, and probably to the
Patriarch Moses, who was the author of the most ancient compositions in
alphabetical writing that we at present possess. The arguments which are
brought in support of the divine revelation of the alphabet, are chiefly
these: 1. The high antiquity of the use of letters; the Hebrew
characters having existed in a perfect state when Moses composed the
Pentateuch, the most ancient writing now known to be extant. 2. The
similarity between the various alphabets of different nations, which,
for the most part, are the same, in the order, power, and even form, of
their letters with the Hebrew. 3. The complete want of alphabetic
characters among those nations, which have been cut off from all
communication with the ancient civilized world, as the aboriginal
Americans; or that part of the human race which had no opportunity of
borrowing the system of written characters revealed to the Hebrews, as
China.
Had man been left to himself, the first and most natural way of making
his thoughts visible to the eye would be by pictorial representations.
The second step would, for convenience’ sake, be to invent an
abbreviated form of these pictures, sufficiently legible to call to mind
the original picture in full, and yet so reduced and intermixed with a
few easily remembered arbitrary characters, or symbols, as to be more
extensively useful. The next and most difficult step would be the
alphabet so formed as to express all the sounds of the language, by
convenient combination. The Egyptian monuments show specimens of each;
the hieroglyph, the mixed and abbreviated, and the alphabetical. The
magnificent ruins of Persepolis, the capital of ancient Persia, exhibit
also the pure pictorial style, and tablets of abbreviated emblems. The
characters on the bricks dug up from the ruins of ancient Babylon have
characters, which are supposed to be, not alphabetic, but abbreviated
symbols, and therefore suppose the existence of the larger picture
writing, whether the people possessed a proper alphabet or not. All the
savage tribes of America had their picture writings, and this style was
carried to great perfection by the Mexicans. The latter had, likewise,
abbreviated marks, which were used as symbols; and thus made an approach
to letters, although they never reached this discovery. It is a curious
fact, that in our day a Cherokee chief has actually invented an
alphabet, and that in the process he commenced with a pictorial
representation of animals which uttered sounds somewhat like those of
his own tongue; which thought seems not to have entered into the picture
writing of the ancients, whose delineations spoke wholly to the eye, and
not at all to the ear. Finding this method imperfect and cumbersome, he
at last hit upon the expedient of arbitrary characters, which he
gradually reduced in number, and so perfected, that, with a few European
improvements, books are now printed in them for the use of his nation.
In China the language is a complete system of abbreviated pictures,
emblems, or symbols; and there is no proper alphabet to this day.
These facts are urged as direct proofs or strong presumptions that all
alphabetical characters have been preceded by picture or imitative
characters; and that as the whole is within the compass of human
ingenuity, the notion of a divine suggestion of letters, or of the
important art of alphabetical writing, is bringing in the divine agency
without necessity. But the assumption that alphabets have in all cases
been formed through this process, is wholly hypothetic. Certain it is
that we can prove from the Scriptures that _literal_ writing was in use
at an earlier period than can be assigned to any picture writing
whatever. Writing and reading were familiar to Moses and the Israelites
when the law was given, and must have long previously existed among
them, and, probably, among the Egyptians of the same age too; which is
much earlier than any of those monuments bearing hieroglyphical
characters reach. We have given sufficient reason to conclude that Job
lived at an earlier period still, and as he expresses a wish that his
words should be written in a book, and engraven on the rock, the
knowledge of reading as well as writing must have been pretty general in
his country, or the book and the inscription could not have been a
testimony of his faith and hope to his countrymen, as he passionately
desired it to be. Here, too, it is to be observed, that in the early
Mosaic history we have not the least intimation of writing by pictures
or symbols, nor any that the art of writing had been revealed from
heaven in the days of Moses, preparatory to the giving of a written law
and the introduction of inspired books for the religious instruction of
the people. We must trace it up higher; though whether of divine
revelation, or human invention, cannot certainly be determined. Its
importance was assuredly worthy of the former; and if this was not done
by particular revelation, doubtless we may reasonably and piously
ascribe it to a divine suggestion.
It may, indeed, be asked, How then is it that in other nations we can so
accurately trace the progress from the picture to the symbol, and thence
on to the alphabet; as for instance in Egypt? We answer, that if this
were allowed, still it might be, and probably was, a part of the divine
procedure with reference to the preservation of the true religion, that
the knowledge of letters should be early given to the Abrahamic family,
or, at least, preserved among them, while many others of the more
dispersed branches of the human race becoming barbarous, as stated under
the article _Language_, might lose it; because picture writing was
easily convertible to idolatrous purposes, and in reality was greatly
encouraged from that source. The same care would be exerted to prevent
pictorial representations of spiritual beings and things as the forming
of images; and the race of true worshippers of God was never therefore
placed under the necessity of thus expressing their thoughts by such
delineations. But it is, in fact, far from being proved, that the
hieroglyph, or picture writing, of Egypt for example, was more ancient
among that people than alphabetic writing. One of the most recent
writers on this side is the Marquis Spineto, in his Lectures on Egyptian
Hieroglyphics.” His theory is, in fact, that of Warburton; and he thinks
that the recent discoveries as to the hieroglyphics of Egypt fully
establish it. The opinion of this learned prelate was, that the
primitive mode of writing among the Egyptians was by figurative
delineations or hieroglyphics; that this becoming too tedious and
voluminous, by degrees they perfected another character, which he calls
the running-hand of hieroglyphics, resembling the Chinese characters;
which being at first formed only by the outlines of figures, became at
length a kind of marks; and at last led to the compendious use of
letters by an alphabet. His argument against the knowledge of letters by
the immediate descendants of Noah is as follows: For, if the invention
of the alphabet had preceded the dispersion, we should have found the
use of it generally established among mankind, and hieroglyphics and
picture writing entirely lain aside. But this is not the case. The
Mexicans and the Peruvians, up to the fifteenth century, and, to this
day, the Chinese, have no knowledge of the alphabet. They all, like the
Egyptians, made use of hieroglyphics, more or less abridged, more or
less symbolical, or, if you please, more or less arbitrary; but they had
no knowledge of the alphabet. The invention of letters, therefore, must
have happened after the dispersion, at a time when picture or
hieroglyphical writing was generally used; it was thus imported into the
respective countries, by the primitive inhabitants, as they separated
themselves from the common society, carrying in their migrations those
partly true and partly false notions of the Deity, and of the great
event which had submerged the world; notions which, in fact, are to be
found in the theology and ritual of all the nations in the universe,
although more or less disfigured and altered.”
But as the running-hand hieroglyphics, spoken of by Warburton, were no
more alphabetical than the hieroglyphics themselves, still we are left
to make the inquiry, Who was the inventor of the Egyptian alphabet? This
is supposed by the Marquis on the authority of a passage in Plato, to be
a secretary of one of the kings of Egypt. This king is called Thamus;
who forbade his ingenius secretary, Thouth, or Theuth, to make the
invention public; lest the people should no longer pay attention to the
hieroglyphics, which would then be soon forgotten. The secret, however,
soon escaped; and as it diminished to a prodigious degree the difficulty
of writing, it was generally adopted by the Egyptians, and from them
passed into other nations. The first,” says the Marquis, who seem to
have got a knowledge of this system, were the Phenicians; they imparted
it to the Arabians, to the Jews, and carried it over to Greece. From
that country it was exported to the several islands, carried to the
continent, and reached the northern nations. The Chinese alone refused
to adopt the valuable discovery; proud of the antiquity of their social
establishment, believing themselves superior to the rest of mankind,
they still adhered to their ancient mode of writing. This, as I have
already observed, though originally the same with that used by the
Egyptians, became, in process of time, materially different, being made
up of arbitrary marks, which are for the most part ideographical. With
the discovery of the alphabet, however, a very material change took
place in regard to hieroglyphics. Originally, as we have seen, they had
been the common, nay, the sole mode of writing, employed by the nation
at large, in all the transactions of life, and through the policy of
King Thamus, the alphabetical letters were kept secret: but, as soon as
this discovery became known, the contrary happened; alphabetical writing
became common, and hieroglyphics mysterious, not because they were
purposely hidden in mystery, but simply because they required greater
application and greater trouble. They indeed still continued to be used
in matters of religion, funerals, public monuments, and the like; but in
all business, and common transactions, the alphabetical writing was
employed. This was a necessary consequence of the general use of
hieroglyphics in their primitive state; for although the Egyptians
might, and, in fact, did, give the preference to the alphabet, yet they
did not think it necessary to erase the old hieroglyphical characters
from their temples, from their obelisks, from their tombs, and religious
vases. The priests, therefore, still continued to study and preserve the
knowledge of hieroglyphics; and these, partly by their showy nature,
partly by the continuation of the old custom, continued still to be used
in public monuments of a votive and funeral nature. To distinguish them,
therefore, from the alphabetical letters newly invented, they obtained
the name of sacred, on the score of their being employed only in matters
of religion. The priests, however, who had already invented a new set of
arbitrary marks, as a shorter way of hieroglyphical writing, which they
employed exclusively in transactions which concerned their body and
their pursuits, after the invention of the alphabet turned these marks
into letters, and thus they formed another set of characters, or mode of
writing, to which they gave the appellation of hieratic, as belonging
exclusively to their order. In these characters they wrote all
historical, political, and religious transactions. And as the common, or
demotic letters were employed in all the common business of life, and
hieroglyphics confined to public monuments, and funereal and votive
ceremonies, the Egyptians became possessed of at least three different
modes of writing, or sets of characters, which were hieroglyphic,
demotic, and hieratic. Whether the priests had invented another set of
characters, unknown to the people, and in which they concealed their
doctrine and their knowledge, is a question which cannot be solved at
present. The want of monuments disables us from saying any thing of a
decisive nature on this subject. One thing alone we can suppose with
certainty, that if such a mode of writing did ever exist, and for the
purpose for which it is supposed to have existed, the knowledge of it
must have been confined to the priests only, and the records so written
concealed with the greatest care from the eye of the nation. If,
therefore, such records exist, they must be sought for in the dwelling
of the hierophant, in the most recondite places of the temples; perhaps
in those subterraneous passages which now lie hidden under mountains of
sand, and in which no one but the priests were ever permitted to enter.”
The whole of this account, we may however observe, is far from being
satisfactory. Whether the early Egyptians wrote hieroglyphics at all, no
monuments yet discovered are so ancient as to prove; since all such
characters now known must have been written subsequently to the
advancement of the kingdom into great power, and after considerable
progress had been made in architecture and other arts. The passage, too,
in Plato, on which the argument is made to depend, may just as well
refer to the running-hand or abridged hieroglyphical signs, as to
alphabetical writing; and the supposition, that the priests gave an
alphabetical character to this kind of abridged pictorial writing
_after_ the discovery of the real alphabet, (and alphabetical Ackerblad
and Dr. Young have proved it to be,) is quite hypothetic. We think it
more probable that alphabetical writing is much older than the
hieroglyphics; that the phonetic hieroglyphics were fanciful
representations of the alphabetic characters, intermingled with those
symbols which idolatry and the natural peculiarities of Egypt would
suggest; that the whole was originally easy to be deciphered by those
who knew letters at all; and that the leading motive of fixing them on
public monuments in preference to literal inscriptions, was the taste of
the day, which custom, and antiquity, and superstition at length
consecrated. We have thus an easy way of accounting for the
alphabetical, though obscure, character of the hieroglyphic
running-hand, or hieratic writing, so much used in manuscripts. As an
abridged form of the hieroglyphical outline, it would at least be
phonetic wherever the hieroglyphic was so; and where that was
symbolical, it would naturally present greater difficulty in
deciphering, which, in fact, has been proved to be the case, by modern
students in the art. It is, indeed, acknowledged by those who advocate
the priority of the hieroglyphic to the alphabetic signs, that the
number of ideas which could thus be expressed is few; and this the
Marquis Spineto considers as a presumptive proof of his theory. In these
early ages, the position of mankind after the flood,” he observes, was
such as to preclude the possibility of supposing that they had many
ideas and many wants; therefore we may reasonably conclude, that their
language consisted of words only which were intended to express the
things most necessary to life, and consequently contained a small number
of words.” We know, indeed, that it is the notion of many infidel
writers, that the original race or races of mankind were a sort of
savages; and that a state of society gradually increased the ideas, and
enriched the language of those who at first were capable of uttering but
a few simple articulate sounds; but that any person should talk in a
similar strain, who professes to receive the Mosaic history, is absurd.
The antediluvians had surely much knowledge. Many arts were invented
before the flood; and the ark itself is a vast monument of mechanical
skill. Arts, science, morals, legislation, theology, were all known
before the flood; and were all transmitted from the old world to the
new, by Noah and his sons. These were not men of few ideas,” nor was the
pastoral mode of life incompatible with great moral knowledge,
eloquence, and the highest and richest poetry, as we see in the book of
Job. Men were not then, as many moderns have supposed, a race of babies,
able only to ask for what they needed to eat and drink, or childishly to
play with; and we may therefore rest assured that they had a language so
copious, and enunciations of ideas so various in their respective
tongues, that picture writing neither was nor could be adequate to their
full expression. The true origin of hieroglyphic writing is still
unexplained; and will, after all, probably, remain inexplicable: but it
has little claim to be considered as the first mode of expressing the
sounds of language. As for the Chinese language, it is evident that it
cannot be urged in proof of alphabetical writing having in all cases
passed through the process above mentioned; for to this day the Chinese
have no alphabet. As a language it is indeed peculiar, as being wholly
monosyllabic; and we must be better acquainted with the early
circumstances of that people before we can account for either. See
WRITING.
LEVIATHAN, לויתן, Job iii, 8; xli, 1; Psalm lxxiv, 14; civ, 26; Isa.
xxvii, 1. The old commentators concurred in regarding the whale as the
animal here intended. Beza and Diodati were among the first to interpret
it the crocodile: and Bochart has since supported this last rendering
with a train of argument which has nearly overwhelmed all opposition,
and brought almost every commentator over to his opinion. It is very
certain that it could not be the whale, which does not inhabit the
Mediterranean, much less the rivers that empty themselves into it; nor
will the characteristics at all apply to the whale. The crocodile, on
the contrary, is a natural inhabitant of the Nile, and other Asiatic and
African rivers; of enormous voracity and strength, as well as fleetness
in swimming; attacks mankind and the largest animals with most daring
impetuosity; when taken by means of a powerful net, will often overturn
the boats that surround it; has, proportionally, the largest mouth of
all monsters whatever; moves both its jaws equally, the upper of which
has not less than forty, and the lower than thirty-eight sharp, but
strong and massy, teeth; and is furnished with a coat of mail, so scaly
and callous as to resist the force of a musket ball in every part,
except under the belly. Indeed, to this animal the general character of
the leviathan seems so well to apply, that it is unnecessary to seek
farther.