Still another part of the sacred theory now received its
death-blow. Closely allied with the question of the origin of
language was that of the origin of letters. The earlier writers
had held that letters were also a divine gift to Adam; but as
we go on in the eighteenth century we find theological opinion
inclining to the belief that this gift was reserved for Moses.
This, as we have seen, was the view of St. John Chrysostom; and
an eminent English divine early in the eighteenth century, John
Johnson, Vicar of Kent, echoed it in the declaration concerning
the alphabet, that "Moses first learned it from God by means of
the lettering on the tables of the law." But here a difficulty
arose--the biblical statement that God commanded Moses to "write
in a book" his decree concerning Amalek before he went up into
Sinai. With this the good vicar grapples manfully. He supposes
that God had previously concealed the tables of stone in Mount
Horeb, and that Moses, "when he kept Jethro's sheep thereabout,
had free access to these tables, and perused them at discretion,
though he was not permitted to carry them down with him.
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