company of Gideon at the main action, the attack on the hostile camp, consists of 300 men in chap. vii. as well as in chap viii.; but in chap. vii., to draw out the significance of the small number, they are treated as the last residuum of what was at first quite a considerable army; and this gives rise to a long story.  We may also remark that chap. vi. begins with the relation in which the judge stood to the sanctuary of his native town, while chap. viii. closes with this.  In the one case he discovers by a theophany, like the patriarchs in Genesis, the sacredness of the altar-stone under the oak; in the other he sets up, in far more realistic fashion, the plated image (ephod) he has made of the golden ornaments of the Midianite kings.  History has to take account principally, if not exclusively, of the natural version, which is dry in tone and lets things speak for themselves, not overlaying the simple story with the significance of its consequences.  The relation, however, is somewhat different from that which we found existing between Judges iv. and v.  Chapter vi. seq. is not based directly on chap. viii., but was probably formed from independent oral material Though the local colour is lively, the historical reminiscences are extremely vague, and there has been a much freer growth of legend than in Jud. iv., producing pictures of greater art and more naivete.  But in the field of miracle poetry is manifestly earlier than prose.

In the case of those narratives which have come down to us in double form, the difference of standpoint is unmistakable; but it may also be perceived in cases where we have no direct parallels to compare.  How noticeably does the story of Abimelech differ, say from that of Jephthah which follows it, in the rich detail of its facts, and in the spontaneous interest it shows in the secondary and subordinate links in the chain of events!  There is no gilding with a supernatural nimbus; facts are simply and plainly set down such as they are; the moral is left to speak for itself as the story goes on.  In the Samson legends again we find two souls united, as it were, in one body.  Traits belonging to the rough life and spirit of the people are wrought, especially at the beginning and end of the narrative, into a religious national form; yet the two stand in an inner contrast to each other, and it is scarcely probable that the exploits of this grotesque religious hero were at first conceived in the Spirit of Jehovah, of which, in the story as we have it, they are the product.  More probably the religious way of telling the story was preceded by a way considerably more profane; but we cannot now separate the older stage from that which is more recent.  We may also remark that the contrast of historical and unhistorical is obviously inapplicable to this case, and, moreover, is unessential for the end we have in view.  Only it may stand as a general principle, that the nearer history is to its origin the more profane it is.  In the pre-Deuteronomic narratives, the difference is to be recognised less in the kind of piety than in the degree of it.