Note 1 — Chapter IX · The Song of Songs.

But the late Russell Martineau, a thorough and unbiassed scholar, points out in the work phrases from Greek authors of the third century B. C., and assigns a date not earlier than 247–222.1 But may it not be that the Alexandrian of the third century built on some earlier foundation, as Shakespeare adapted the “Pound of Flesh” and the “Three Caskets” (Merchant of Venice) from tales traceable as far back as early Buddhist literature? or as Marlowe and Goethe used the mediæval legend of Faustus?