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"The Dairyman's Daughter," in Syriac, had just then issued from the press, and was a great favorite with the Nestorians. As early as March, it was seen that she must die. Still she clung to the school, and not for nought. She had a mission to fulfil, and her Saviour strengthened her for the work to which he called her. As yet, none of the pious Nestorians had finished their course.
At last, there came to the King's capital city a great physician, stricken in years, whose name was Douban: and he had studied many books, Greek, ancient and modern, and Persian and Turkish and Arabic and Syriac and Hebrew, and was skilled in medicine and astrology, both theoretical and practical.
Aldus did not live to carry his scheme out; and it was left to Ximenes and the band of scholars that he gathered at Alcala, to produce the first edition of the Bible complete in the original tongues, the Complutensian Polyglott, containing the Hebrew side by side with the Septuagint and the Vulgate, and for the Pentateuch a Syriac paraphrase.
At the same time the language has peculiarities of its own, which separate it from its kindred tongues, and constitute it a distinct form of Semitic speech, not a mere variety of any known form. It is neither Hebrew, nor Arabic, nor Phoenician, nor Chaldee, nor Syriac, but a sister tongue to these, having some analogies with all of them, and others, more or fewer, with each.
James of Sarug, a Syrian bishop, who was born only two years after the death of the younger Theodosius, has devoted one of his two hundred and thirty homilies to the praise of the young men of Ephesus. Their legend, before the end of the sixth century, was translated from the Syriac into the Latin language, by the care of Gregory of Tours.
I can well understand that Arabic, and I should suppose Syriac also, must be of the greatest use towards a true understanding of much of the Old Testament: a great deal of which is doubtless not understood by those who understand only our translation, or even the Septuagint, which I suspect to have many passages far from a faithful vehicle of the meaning of the original.
His books were at my disposal and he had a very extensive library. Upon the days when we walked to Issy he went with me to the heights of La Solitude, and there he taught me Syriac. We talked together over the Syriac New Testament of Guthier. M. Le Hir determined my career. I was by instinct a philologist, and I found in him the man best fitted to develop this aptitude.
These branches of knowledge were represented in Greek literature, and hence the works treating of these subjects had to be translated into Syriac for the benefit of those who did not know Greek. Aristotle was the authority in philosophy, Hippocrates and Galen in medicine. The oldest of these schools was in Edessa in Mesopotamia, founded in the year 363 by St. Ephrem of Nisibis.
As there are eight famous and chief languages; Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic, Italian, Spanish, and French; so there are eight notable several kinds of poets, Heroic, Lyric, Tragic, Comic, Satiric, Iambic, Elegiac, and Pastoral. As HOMER and VIRGIL among the Greeks and Latins are the chief Heroic poets: so SPENSER and WARNER be our chief heroical "makers."
Many other natives of Syria soon followed Severus to Alexandria; so many indeed that as Greek literature decayed in that city, Syriac literature rose. Many Syrians also came to study the religious life in the monasteries of Egypt, and after some time the books in the library of the monastery at Mount Nit-ria were found to be half Arabic and half Syriac.
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