LAMENTATIONS, a canonical book of the Old
Testament, written by the prophet Jeremiah, accord-
ing to archbishop Usher and some other learned men,
who follow the opinion of Josephus and St Jerom, on
occasion of Josiah's death. But this opinion does not
seem to agree with the subject of the book, the lam-
entation composed by Jeremiah on that occasion be-
ing probably lost. The fifty-second chapter of the
book of Jeremiah was probably added by Ezra, as a
preface or introduction to the Lamentations: the two
first chapters are employed in describing the calami-
ties of the siege of Jerusalem: in the third the au-
thor deplores the persecutions he himself had suffered:
the fourth treats of the desolation of the city and tem-
ple, and the misfortune of Zedekiah: the fifth chap-
ter is a prayer for the Jews in their dispersion and cap-
tivity: and at the close of all he speaks of the cruelty
of the Edomites, who had insulted Jerusalem in her
misery. All the chapters of this book, except the
last, are in metre, and digested in the order of the al-
phabet; with this difference, that in the first, second,
and fourth chapters, the first letter of every verse fol-
lows the order of the alphabet; but in the third the
same initial letter is continued for three verses to-
gether,
ther. This order was probably adopted, that the book might be more easily learnt and retained. The subject of this book is of the most moving kind; and the style throughout lively, pathetic, and affecting. In this kind of writing the prophet Jeremiah was a great master, according to the character which Grotius gives of him, Mirus in affectibus concitandis.