The Song of Songs commonly called the Song of Solomon or the Canticle

Excerpt from The Song of Songs: Commonly Called the Song of Solomon, or the Canticle
"Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away,
For lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone,
The flowers appear on the earth,
The time of the singing birds is come,
And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land."
Such is a song of the spring-time, which a traveller along the western chain of the Lebanon, towards the end of the eighth century before our era, might have heard resounding among the pasturages of these green mountains. If he could foresee the future, and could have contemplated the destinies of the charming idyll of which it forms part, his astonishment would have been great to see it transformed into a theological oracle, and furnishing a favourite theme of meditation to the most austere preachers of distant times. His astonishment would not be less if he could foresee the severity with which it might be treated by a posterity still more remote.
Nothing can be more extraordinary than the destiny of the book which we propose to study.
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