Having descanted at large upon the first and second heads, Durham remarks on the third:
“Thirdly. There is a motive to press, implied, while he (i.e. Christ) saith this; ‘Take us,’ which words insinuate that it is service both to him and her, and that ministers are his servants, and the Church’s for Christ’s sake. It shows also his sympathy in putting himself, as it were, in hazard with her (at least mystically considered), and his love in comforting her, that he thinks himself concerned in the restraint of these foxes as well as she is.
“Fourthly. The direction is amplified, to remove an objection (say some) ‘All heresies, or all heretics are not equal; some comparatively are little to be regarded, and it is cruelty to meddle with these, that seem to profess fair.’ ‘No (saith he), take them all, even THE LITTLE FOXES; for though they be but little, yet they are foxes; though they be not of the grossest kind (as all scandals in fact are not alike, yet none is to be dispensed with), so they are (saith he) foxes, and corrupt others; for a little leaven will leaven the whole lump (often small-like schisms, or heresies, such as the Novations and Donatists, &c., have been exceedingly defacing to the beauty of the Church), therefore, saith he, hunt and take them up.’ How small a friend is our Lord to toleration! and how displeased is he with many errors, that the world thinks little of! Magistrates, ministers and people may learn here, what distance ought to be kept with the spreaders of the least errors; and how every one ought to concur, in their stations, for preventing the hurt that comes by them.”[95]
1723. Whether this commentary, with its affirmation that “this Song is a little magazine, for direction and consolation in every condition,” and whether the doctrine of intolerance palmed upon Chap. ii. 15 of the Song were published in time to be seen by Whiston, who was neither convinced by Durham’s arguments nor daunted by his appeal to the magistrates, ministers, and people; or whether they appeared too late to be seen by him, I cannot tell. But, in the same year that Durham’s commentary was published Whiston’s Essay appeared, in which he declares that he finds in the Song of Solomon, “from the beginning to the end marks of folly, vanity, and looseness,” and assures us that “it was written by Solomon when he was wicked [[83]]and foolish, and lascivious and idolatrous,”[96] and that the sooner this immoral book is rejected from the sacred canon the better.
1728. About five years afterwards appeared the bulky Exposition of Dr. Gill on Solomon’s Song, consisting of one hundred and twenty-two sermons, which the Doctor delivered to his congregation. In this confused mass of accumulated learning Gill warmly refutes both Whiston and others who had written against this book. He acknowledges “the profit and advantage” which he had received from “the sweet observations of the excellent Durham,” and affirms that this divine poem is wholly allegorical; “and sets forth in a most striking manner the mutual love, union and communion, which are between Christ and his Church; also expresses the several different frames, cases, and circumstances which attend believers in this life, so that they can come into no state or condition, but there is something in this Song suited to their experience; which serves much to recommend it to believers, and discovers the excellency of it.”[97] In vain do we look even here for an exposition based upon the sound rules of grammar and philology.
1753. It was reserved for Bishop Lowth to commence in this country a new era in the interpretation of this book. Two of his admirable “Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews” are devoted to the investigation of the import and interpretation of this Song, and the conclusion he arrived at is almost the same as that of Grotius and Bossuet. “The subject of the Canticles,” says this learned Prelate, “appears to be the marriage-feast of Solomon, (who was, both in name and reality, the Prince of Peace); his bride is called Shulamite.… Who this wife of Solomon was, is not clearly ascertained; but some of the learned have conjectured, with an appearance of probability, that she was the daughter of Pharaoh, to whom Solomon was [[84]]known to be particularly attached. May we not, therefore, with some shadow of reason, suspect that, under the allegory of Solomon choosing a wife from the Egyptians, might be darkly typified that other Prince of Peace, who was to espouse a church chosen from among the Gentiles?”
As to the explanation of the allegory, this learned prelate properly advises, “that we ought to be cautious of carrying the figurative application too far, and of entering into a precise explication of every particular; as these minute investigations are seldom conducted with sufficient prudence not to offend the serious part of mankind, learned as well as unlearned.”[98]
Bishop Lowth also takes this poem to be of a dramatic form, and adopts the division of Bossuet into seven parts.
1764. The excellent and judicious remarks of Lowth were followed by an elegant version of Solomon’s Song, with a brief Commentary and Annotations, by Thomas Percy, D.D., Bishop of Dromore. The author vindicates the theory of Grotius, Lowth, &c., that this poem literally describes the nuptials of Solomon; and, like Bossuet and Lowth, divides it into seven parts, answering to the seven days of the supposed duration of the nuptials, which are distinguished from each other by different solemnities. In terms, even more severe than those of Bishop Lowth, Percy censures those commentators, “who have been so busily employed in opening and unfolding the allegorical meaning of this book as wholly to neglect that literal sense which ought to be the basis of their discoveries. If a sacred allegory may be defined a figurative discourse, which, under a lower and more obvious meaning, delivers the most sublime and important truths; then it is the first duty of an expositor to ascertain the lower and more obvious meaning. For till this is done, it is impossible to discover what truths are couched under it. Without this all is vague and idle conjecture. It is erecting an edifice without a foundation, which, [[85]]however fair and goodly to the view, will be blown down by the slightest breath of true criticism.”[99]
1765. Wesley, however, opposed this theory. He maintained that “the description of this bridegroom and bride is such as could not with decency be used or meant concerning Solomon and Pharaoh’s daughter; that many expressions and descriptions, if applied to them, would be absurd and monstrous; and that it therefore follows that this book is to be understood allegorically, concerning that spiritual love and marriage which is between Christ and his Church.”[100]
1768. Harmer advanced a new theory. Whilst advocating with Grotius, Bossuet, Lowth, Percy, &c., that this Song in its literal and primary sense celebrates the nuptials of Solomon with the daughter of Pharaoh, he maintained that the heroes of the plot are not two, as generally believed, but three—viz., Solomon, the Shulamite, who is the principal wife and a Jewish queen, and the daughter of Pharaoh, whom Solomon afterwards married, with which the Jewish queen was exceedingly displeased, and looked with jealousy upon the Gentile wife as an intruder. “This event of Solomon’s marrying a Gentile princess, and making her equal in honour and privilege with his former Jewish queen, and of her being frequently mentioned afterwards in history, while the other is passed over in total silence, resembles the conduct of the Messiah towards the Gentile and Jewish Churches.” … “Nothing more, according to that,” says Harmer, “is to be sought for of the mystic kind, than the making out the general resemblance between Solomon’s behaviour with respect to his two queens, and the situation of affairs between the Messiah and the two Churches; of those that observed the laws of Moses and those that did not.”[101] [[86]]