DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.548#0123
120 THE EXODUS PAPYRI.
suited Mm; the evidence of design is greatly
strengthened; and it seems more and more out
of the question to deny some such method and
purpose as I have imagined in these queer col-
lections.
But it is so easy to suppress and twist evidence,
so hard to see what really constitutes evidence, the
desire to find what we wish to find disturbs the
mind so deceitfully and subtlely; and, alas! the
worship of supposed good, the fear of anticipated
bad consequences, so often supplants that reverence
for Truth and Fact which alone fits a man for com-
munion with his Maker, that we ought rather to
scan suspiciously what evidence I have brought,
than at once to rush into a blind, and, perhaps,
partizan acceptance of it; and though I have a
considerable confidence that my translations will
be found substantially correct, and thus that the
Exodus of the Jews is probably specifically here
described, yet the natural emotion of the most
experienced in these matters, when they first hear
of such a declaration will, I am quite aware, be
one of incredulity. Time will shew.
But 1 must not omit the notice of a very re-
markable corroboration of my opinion. At the
back of this song, on the blank side of the papy-
rus, somebody has written in large characters the
date of The First Year of a King. Now, the
papyrus was drawn up, I can hardly doubt, in the
tenth year of Seti II. Seti reigned nineteen years.
It is extremely improbable that nine years after
the scribbling these fugitive songs for the tern-
suited Mm; the evidence of design is greatly
strengthened; and it seems more and more out
of the question to deny some such method and
purpose as I have imagined in these queer col-
lections.
But it is so easy to suppress and twist evidence,
so hard to see what really constitutes evidence, the
desire to find what we wish to find disturbs the
mind so deceitfully and subtlely; and, alas! the
worship of supposed good, the fear of anticipated
bad consequences, so often supplants that reverence
for Truth and Fact which alone fits a man for com-
munion with his Maker, that we ought rather to
scan suspiciously what evidence I have brought,
than at once to rush into a blind, and, perhaps,
partizan acceptance of it; and though I have a
considerable confidence that my translations will
be found substantially correct, and thus that the
Exodus of the Jews is probably specifically here
described, yet the natural emotion of the most
experienced in these matters, when they first hear
of such a declaration will, I am quite aware, be
one of incredulity. Time will shew.
But 1 must not omit the notice of a very re-
markable corroboration of my opinion. At the
back of this song, on the blank side of the papy-
rus, somebody has written in large characters the
date of The First Year of a King. Now, the
papyrus was drawn up, I can hardly doubt, in the
tenth year of Seti II. Seti reigned nineteen years.
It is extremely improbable that nine years after
the scribbling these fugitive songs for the tern-