IĮ. POPULARITY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. The affection felt by the Puritans for the Old Testament has been observed by all writers upon the period, and of the period. Cleveland's remark, quoted by Hume, is, of course, an exaggeration. "Cromwell," he says, "hath beat up his drums cleane through the Old Testament--you may learne the genealogy of our Saviour by the names in his regiment. The muster-master uses no other list than the first chapter of Matthew." Lord Macaulay puts it much more faithfully in his first chapter, speaking, too, of an earlier period than the Commonwealth: "In such a history (i.e. Old Testament) it was not difficult for fierce and gloomy spirits to find much that might be distorted to suit their wishes. The extreme Puritans, therefore, began to feel for the Old Testament a preference which, perhaps, they did not distinctly avow even to themselves, but which showed itself in all their sentiments and habits. They paid to the Hebrew language a respect which they refused to that tongue in which the discourses of Jesus and the Epistles of Paul have come down to us. They baptized their children by the names, not of Christian saints, but of Hebrew patriarchs and warriors." The Presbyterian clergy had another objection to the New Testament names. The possessors were all saints, and in the saints' calendar. The apostolic title was as a red rag to his blood-shot eye. "Upon Saint Peter, Paul, John, Jude, and James, says the Water-poet in execrable verse. Its local use was still more trying, as no man could pass through a single quarter of London without seeing half a dozen churches, or lanes, or taverns dedicated to Saint somebody or other. "Others to make all things recant The christian and surname of saint, Would force all churches, streets, and towns The holy title to renounce." To avoid any saintly taint, the Puritan avoided the saints themselves. But the discontented party in the Church had, as Macaulay says, a decided hankering after the Old Testament on other grounds than this. They paid the Hebrew language an almost superstitious reverence.* Ananias, the deacon, in the "Alchemist," published in 1610, says "Heathen Greek, I take it. Subtle. How! heathen Greek? Ananias. All's heathen but the Hebrew."† * Several names seem to have been taken directly from the Hebrew tongue. "Amalasioutha" occurs as a baptismal name in the will of a man named Corbye, 1594 (Rochester Wills); Barijirehah in that of J. Allen, 1651, and Michalaliel among the Pilgrim Fathers (Hotten). † Colonel Cunningham, in his annotations of the "Alchemist," says, speaking of the New Englanders bearing the Puritan prejudices with them: "So deeply was it rooted, that in the rebellion of the colonies a member of that State seriously proposed to Congress the putting down of the English language by law, and decreeing the universal adoption of the Hebrew in its stead.”—Vol. ii. p. 33, Jonson's Works. Bishop Corbet, in his "Distracted Puritan," has a lance to point at the same weakness: "In the holy tongue of Canaan I placed my chiefest pleasure, With an Hebrew root, That I bled beyond all measure.” In the "City Match," written by Mayne in 1639, Bannsright says "Mistress Dorcas, If you'll be usher to that holy, learned woman, That can heal broken shins, scald heads, and th' itch, The Puritan was ever nicknamed after some Old Testament worthy. I could quote many instances, but let two from the author of the "London Diurnall" suffice. Addressing Prince Rupert, he says— "Let the zeal-twanging nose, that wants a ridge, Yes, and the gossip's spoon augment the summe, More racy is his attack on Pembroke, as a member of the Mixed Assembly: 66 Forbeare, good Pembroke, be not over-daring : Such company may chance to spoil thy swearing; And these drum-major oaths of bulk unruly He'll fright the Obediahs out of tune, A name so stubborne, 'tis not to be scanned If a Bible quotation was put into the zealot's mouth, his cynical foe took care that it should. come from the older Scriptures. In George Chapman's "An Humorous Day's Work," after Lemot has suggested a "full test of experiment" to prove her virtue, Florilla the Puritan cries "O husband, this is perfect trial indeed.” To which the gruff Labervele replies— "And you will try all this now, will you not? Florilla. Yes, my good head: for it is written, we must pass to perfection through all temptation: Abacuk the fourth. Labervele. Abacuk! cuck me no cucks: in a-doors, I say: thieves, Puritans, murderers! in a-doors, I say!" In the same facetious strain, Taylor, the Waterpoet, addresses a child thus : "To learne thy duty reade no more than this: Paul's nineteenth chapter unto Genesis." This certainly tallies with the charge in "Hudibras," that they This affection for the older Scriptures had its effect upon our nomenclature. No book, no story, especially if gloomy in its outline and melancholy in its issues, escaped the more morbid Puritan's notice. Every minister of the Lord's vengeance, every stern witness against natural abomination, the prophet that prophesied ill-these were the names that were in favour. And he that was least bitter in his maledictions was most at a discount. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were in everyday request, Shadrach and Abednego being the favourites. Mordecai, too, was daily commemorated; while Jeremiah attained a popularity, as Jeremy, he can never altogether lose. "Lamentations" was so melancholy, that it must needs be personified, don a Puritanical habit, and stand at the font as godfather-I mean witness-to some wretched infant who had done nothing to merit such a fate. "Lamentations Chapman" appeared as defendant in a suit in Chancery about 1590. The exact date is not to be found, but the case was tried towards the close of Elizabeth's reign ("Chancery Suits, Elizabeth"). It is really hard to say why names of melancholy import became so common. Perhaps it was a spirit morbidly brooding on the religious oppressions of the times; perhaps it was bile. Any way, Camden says "Dust " and "Ashes" were names in use in the days of Elizabeth and James. These, no doubt, were translations of the Hebrew "Aphrah" into the "vulgar tongue," the name having become |