sequent Lawgivers; yet, how decided is the superiority of the Mosaic code. But in the regulations as to the tribe of Levi, we see an object pursued, which, until Christianity was established, no Lawgiver but the Jewish thought of attending to. Ministers of religion are indeed found in every state; wherever any idol was worshipped, there must have been altars and priests, there generally were soothsayers and diviners; but such men never attempted anything beyond the immediate performance of religious ceremonies, or employing that influence over the public mind, which their sacred functions gave them, to promote private gain, or, in some instances, political views; religious and moral instruction to the great mass of the people, they never attempted, and never desired. But the Jewish legislator set apart the entire tribe of Levi, one-twelfth of the nation, not merely to perform the rites and sacrifices which the ritual enjoined, (a purpose which I do not now particularly insist on) but to diffuse over the great mass of the people, religious and moral instruction, for which they were expressly set apart. "Of Levi," (says the Legislator, when in his last solemn hymn he sketches the characters and the fortunes of the different tribes) "Let "thy Urim and thy Thummim be with thy holy one: they have "observed thy word, and kept thy covenant; they shall teach "Jacob thy judgments, and Israel thy law; they shall put incense before thee, and whole burnt-sacrifice upon thine altar."* To them was the custody of the sacred volume consigned, with the ark of the covenant; and Moses commanded the priests, the Sons of Levi, and the elders of Israel, "At the end of every "seven years, in the solemnity of the year of release, in the "feast of tabernacles, when all Israel is come to appear before "the Lord thy God, in the place which he shall choose; thou "shalt read this Law before all Israel, in their hearing.† "Gather the people together, men and women and children, "and the stranger that is within thy gates, that they may hear, "and that they may learn, and fear the Lord your God, and "observe to do all the words of this Law: and that their children * Deut. xxxiii, 8-10. Among the various wise reasons for choosing this period, one most principal appears to be, its being the year of release, when the general abolition of debts and discharge from personal slavery, periodically took place; circumstances which would necessarily secure constant attention to this solemnity, and contribute to insure the observance of this command. Thus closely were the religious and civil parts of the Mosaic code connected. "which have not known any thing, may hear and learn to fear "the Lord your God, as long as you live in the land whither "ye go to possess it."* This public and solemn periodical instruction, though eminently useful, was certainly not the entire of their duty; they were bound, from the spirit of this ordinance, to take care that at all times the aged should be improved, and the children instructed in the knowledge and the fear of God, the adoration of his Majesty, and the observance of his Law: and for this purpose the peculiar situation and privileges of the tribe of Levi, as regulated by the divine appointment, admirably fitted them. Possessed of no landed property, and supported by the tithes and offerings which they received in kind, they were little occupied with labour or secular care; deriving their maintenance from a source which would necessarily fail if the worship and the Laws of God were neglected, they were deeply interested in their support. Their cities being dispersed through all the tribest and their families permitted to intermarry with all, they were every where at hand to admonish and instruct; exclusively possessed of the high-priesthood, as well as of all other religious offices, and associated with the high-priest and judge in the supreme court of judicature, and with the elders of every city in the inferior tribunals, and guardians of the cities of refuge where those who were guilty of homicide fled for an asylum, they must have acquired such influence and reverence amongst the people, as were necessary to secure attention to their instructions: and they were led to study the rules of moral conduct, the principles of equity, and, above all, the Mosaic code, with unceasing attention; but they were not laid under any vows of celibacy, or monastic austerity and retirement, and thus abstracted from the intercourse and the feelings of social life. Thus circumstanced, they were assuredly well calculated to answer the purpose of their institution, to preserve and consolidate the union of all the other tribes, to instruct and forward the Jews in knowledge, virtue and piety; "To teach Jacob the judgments, and Israel the Law of Jehovah;" that they might hear and fear, "and learn to obey the will of "their Sovereign and their God." And, as no more important object could be aimed at by any Lawgiver, so the almost total neglect of other legislators in this respect, and the caution and * Deut. xxxi. 10-13. Numbers xxxv. Deut. xvii. 9. and xxiv. 8. wisdom of the Jewish institutions for this purpose, seem to supply one important presumptive argument for the divine original of the Mosaic code. Hitherto we have considered the Jewish Law chiefly as it secured the rights and promoted the happiness of the higher and middling classes of society, the nobility and gentry, the Levites, and the great mass of the Jewish yeomanry or freemen.* But the Mosaic Law extended its parental care to the very lowest classes, the stranger and the slave, the poor, the fatherless and the widow. These it represents as the peculiar objects of the divine care, and denounces against any injury to them, peculiar indignation and punishment from God. "If a stranger sojourn "with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him; but the stranger "that dwelleth among you shall be unto you as one born among "you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers "in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord thy God." "The "tithes of the third year thou shalt give to the Levite, the "stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, that they may eat "within thy gates, and be filled.”‡ That part of the Hebrew constitution which forbade the acceptance of interest § from a fellow-citizen, and established a septennial abolition of debts, and a periodical restitution of all lands which had been alienated from their original proprietors, though necessary for the general balance and security of the Hebrew Government, might yet have operated to increase in some instances the pressure of poverty, by rendering it more difficult to obtain immediate relief. It is therefore important to observe, how anxiously the Legislator guards against any such effect from these regulations. If there be among you," says “If the Law," a poor man, one of thy brethren, within any of thy "gates in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou "shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother. Nor let there be a thought in thy wicked heart, "saying, The seventh year, the year of release is at hand; and 66 * Vide the Jewish Letters, Part III. Letter iv. Universal History, B. I. ch. vii. sect. 4, on the Laws relating to the sabbatic and jubilee years, p. 613 and 617. Lev. xix. 33 and 34. Deut. xxvi. 12. Interest from any one not a fellow-citizen, was permitted, but subject to the limitation of using him with the strictest regard to equity and benevolence, which the passages quoted in the last paragraph require. "thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest "him nought, and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be "sin unto thee. Thou shalt surely give, and thine heart shall "not be grieved when thou givest unto him; because that for "this thing the Lord thy God will bless thee in all that thou "puttest thine hand unto. For the poor shall never cease out "of thy land; therefore, I command thee, saying, Thou shalt 66 open thine hand wide to thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy "needy, in thy land."* With equal energy does the Law maintain the cause of the hired labourer: "Thou shalt not oppress an hired servant that " is poor and needy, whether he be of thy brethren, or of thy "strangers that are in thy land within thy gates. At this day "thou shalt give him his hire; neither shall the sun go down upon it, for he is poor, and setteth his heart upon it, lest he "cry unto the Lord, and it be sin unto thee."+ 66 Thus, also, how are the feelings as well as the wants of the poor consulted, in that precept which directed, "When thou "dost lend thy brother any thing, thou shalt not go into his "house to fetch his pledge:"‡ as if the Legislator said, Intrude not into his abode, if he is not willing to expose to the stranger's eye the humiliating circumstances of want and nakedness which attend his destitute state; or, perhaps there is some little monument of his better days, which he reserves to console his misery, which he would not wish the person from whom he implores aid to see, lest he should demand that in pledge, and either, if denied, refuse relief, or, by tearing away this almost sacred relic to which his heart clings, embitter his distress. No, says the Law, the hovel of the poor must be sacred as an holy asylum; the eye of scorn and the foot of pride must not dare to intrude: even the agent of mercy must not enter it abruptly and unbid, without consulting the feelings of its wretched inhabitant. "Thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge; "thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend "shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee."§ In the same strain of humanity the Law goes on: "If the "man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge. In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun 66 *Deut. xv. 7—11. Deut. xxiv. 10. + Ib. xxiv. ver. 14 and 15. Ib. ver. 11. "goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless "thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord "thy God." The same spirit of benevolence was to regulate the conduct and soften the heart of the husbandman in all his labours. "If "thou cuttest down the harvest of thy field," says the Law, "and hast forgot a sheaf, thou shalt not turn again to fetch it : "if thou beatest thine olive-tree, thou shalt not go over the "boughs again: when thou gatherest thy grapes, thou shalt not glean it afterward: it shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, " and the widow, that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all "the work of thy hands."+ With equal solicitude does the Law impress reverence for the authority, and attention to the wants of the aged, delivering as the direct command of Jehovah :"Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honour the face "of the old man, and fear thy God: I am the Lord." How much praise have the Spartan institutions justly obtained, for cherishing this principle; yet, how much more energetic and authoritative is the language of the Jewish Lawgiver. With a similar spirit the same Lawgiver inculcates in the strongest manner the duty of shewing tenderness to those who labour under any bodily infirmity: "Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put "a stumbling-block before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I 'am the Lord."§ And with a still more exalted sense of the importance of virtue above every external advantage and the proportionable obligation of promoting it in all with whom we have any intercourse, the inspired Lawgiver considers the neglecting to do so as a proof of criminal malignity: "Thou shall not hate "thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy "neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but "thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the Lord."|| How admirably are such language and such sentiments as these suited to the sacred original from whence they are supposed to flow! How strongly do they attest the divine benevolence, which dictated the Jewish law, and the divine authority which alone could enforce such precepts by adequate sanctions, and 66 * Deut. xii. 12 and 13. Levit, xix. 32. + Deut. xxiv. 19-21. Levit. xix. 17 and 18. |