PREFACE.
THE Illustrated Dictionary of the Bible is the fruit of many years of loving labour. No pains have been spared to make it in all respects reliable and complete. The author has sought to embody in the work, in as compact a form as possible, the results of the most recent research in all departments of Biblical literature—doctrinal, historical, biographical, archæological, and geographical.
The learned research and criticism which resulted in the Revised Version of the Scriptures have, probably for the first time, been here utilized in a systematic way in a Bible Dictionary. The abundant use of illustrations and sketch-maps, and the introduction of chronological and other tables, will, it is believed, be found to add greatly to the value of the book.
The author offers this work to the public in the hope that it may prove to be worthy of a place on the table of all students of the Bible, and particularly of those who are engaged in the religious instruction of the young in Sabbath schools, and be helpful as a convenient and trustworthy book of reference on all Biblical subjects. He has taken cognizance of modern controversies bearing on the character and claims of the Word of God and on the doctrines of the gospel, and, while avoiding everything of a sectarian character, has freely stated the conclusions he has reached, under the deep impression that further study and research will only the more fully confirm the truth of "those things which are most surely believed among us."
May the Lord, whose Word this book is intended to elucidate, graciously vouchsafe His blessing with it, to His own glory!
Darvel.
