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with you, whom. perhaps, in your heart you wish | common burial-ground (Jer. xxvi. 23), and burna great way off, for having troubled you so long ing their bones into lime, Amos ii. 1. already."*

SECTION VII.

COMMERCE.

Early Commerce-Caravans-Commerce of the PhoeniciansArabian Merchants-Commerce of the Hebrews-Exchange or Barter-Money-Measures of Capacity and Length, mentioned in Scripture-Hebrew Weights.

II. The common method in the East of doing honour to an inferior, seems to have been by presenting him with a change of raiment. Thus Belshazzar promised Daniel that, if he could interpret the mysterious writing on the wall, he should be clothed in scarlet, have a golden chain about his neck, and be third ruler in the empire, 1. COMMERCE is coeval with society. The diDan. v. 16. Alexander, the son of Antiochus vision of labour, which is one of the first things Epiphanes, when he appointed Jonathan Macca- that take place in a social state, necessarily gives bæus high-priest, and declared him the king's rise to the interchange of commodities, which friend, sent him a purple robe and a crown of increases with the progress of a people in civilizagold (1 Macc. x. 20); and he afterwards did him tion and refinement. In the East, merchandise, more signal honour, by sending him a buckle of in its various branches, was carried on at the gold, to wear on the shoulder, and to fasten his earliest period of which we have any account. purple robe; as the use was to be given to such as Frequent mention is made of public roads, fording were of the king's blood, ver. 89. See also chap. places, bridges, and beasts of burden; also of ships xi. 57, 58; 1 Esd. iii. 6. The princes of the East, for the transportation of property, of weights, even at the present day, have many changes of measures, and coin, both in the oldest parts of the raiment ready, both as an article of wealth, and Bible, and in the most ancient profane histories. to suit the occasion. This accounts for the ease See Gen. x. 4, 5, xii. 5, xxiii. 16, xxxvii. 25, 26, with which Jehu's mandate was obeyed, when he xlii. 1-5; Judg. v. 17; Exod. xx. 23, xxv. 4; ordered 400 vestments for the priests of Baal, that Deut. iii. 14, xix. 3; Josh. xiii. 2, xii. 5, xiii. 13; none might escape, 2 Kings x. 22. For a superior1 Sam. xxvii. 8-10; 2 Sam. iii. 3, xiii. 37, to give his own garment to an inferior, was esteemed a high mark of regard. Hence Jonathan gave his to David, 1 Sam. xviii. 4. And the following extract from Sir John Malcolm's History of Persia may serve to throw some light on Elisha's request to have the mantle of Elijah, 2 Kings ii. 13: "When the Khalifa, or teacher of the Sooffees, dies, he bequeaths his patched garment, which is all his worldly wealth, to the disciple whom he esteems the most worthy to become his successor; and the moment the latter puts on the holy mantle, he is vested with the power of his predecessor."

XV. 8.

2. Camels were formerly, as now, much used in the East for the transportation of merchandise; and persons engaged in commerce usually travelled in large companies, called caravans, each of which consisted of a certain number of camels, officers, &c., marshalled under proper leaders, whose business, under the direction of the chief, was to direct the march, and every other thing pertaining to the expedition.+ See Gen. xxxvii. 25; Isai. xxi. 13, &c. Sometimes these caravans lodge in cities; but when they do not, they pitch their tents so as to form an encampment. In the cities there are public inns, called khanes and caracansaries, in which the caravans are lodged without expense. See Gen. xli. 17; Luke ii. 7, x. 34.

III. The chief of the marks of disgrace noticed in the Scriptures are, subjecting men to the employment of women (Lam. v. 13); cutting off the beard, and plucking off the hair (2 Sam. x. 5; 3. The Phoenicians, who possessed the knowIsai. 1. 6); spitting in the face (Isai. 1. 6); clap-ledge of the Egyptians, free from the superping the hands, hissing, and making significant gestures, Ezek. xxv. 6; Job xxvii. 23; Lam. ii. 15; Isai. lvii. 4. But marks of disgrace were not confined to the living. They often extended to the dead, by refusing them the rites of sepulture (Rev. xi. 1-12); raising them after they had been interred (Jer. viii. 1); forbidding them to be pub-properly speaking, and the Phoenicians, were

licly lamented; allowing them to become the prey of ravenous beasts (Jer. xvi. 5-7, xix. 7, xxii. 18, 19; 2 Macc. v. 10); casting them into the

*Journey, March 13.

stitious reluctance of the latter to venture upon the sea, and who had a most favourable local position along the coast of the Mediterranean, naturally engaged in commercial enterprise. "The border of the Canaanites was from Sidon, as thou goest to Gerar unto Gaza;" and though the Canaanites,

The late editor of Calmet has very ingeniously and sat'sfactorily illustrated the account of the exode from Egypt, by a reference to the manners in which a caravan is arranged and managed. See art. "Caravan," in the 8vo. edition of Calmet's Dictionary.

ever.

Mediterranean, and the Atlantic, beyond the Straits of Gibraltar, attest the extent of their early voyages. This enterprising nation may, in like manner, have occasionally reached India from the Red Sea. Phoenicians piloted the ships of Solomon in their three years' voyages to Tarshish. The great length of time required for these voyages betrays the timid progress of early navigation, and may, perhaps, have prevented their frequent repetition; but the regular communication with India was certainly maintained through the Arabs, who, when they saw strange nations circumnavigating their peninsula, were not slow to learn the advantages of their intermediate position. The fleets of the Ptolemies sailed to the ports of Arabia Felix, where they met the Arabian ships laden with the precious cargoes of the East.

parated from each other by Mount Carmel, they may, in a general sense, be considered as one people. The chief cities of the Phoenicians, Tyre and Sidon, had reached the highest degree of commercial opulence when the first dawn of social polity was only commencing in Greece. Their great superiority over the Hebrews, in the time of Moses, is clearly shown in the language of holy writ. When Joshua and the other chiefs, who were sent by the prophet to observe and report on the land of Canaan, returned, they said, "We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey. Nevertheless, the people be strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled and very great." In fine, they conclude, "We are not able to go up against this people, for they are very great." While the Canaanites inhabited walled and popu- 5. It is no wonder that the Arabian merchants, lous cities, the Hebrews dwelt in tents like the possessing the lucrative monopoly of the Indian brethren of Joseph, who declared to Pharaoh, trade, should be distinguished in antiquity by their "Thy servants are shepherds, both we and our fa- luxury and enormous wealth; they are spoken of thers." It is unfortunate that the Phoenicians have by the Greek and Latin writers nearly in the lannot transmitted to us any historical records what- guage applied by the prophet Isaiah to the inWe know of their enterprises only from habitants of Tyre, "whose merchants are princes, Scripture, and from the scattered notices of Greek and whose traffickers are the honourable of the and Latin authors. We have seen, in noticing the earth” (Isai. xxiii. 8). All the precious comgeographical knowledge of the Hebrews, that they modities, the gold, the gums, and the spices, imwere the pilots of Solomon's fleet; and as often as ported to the West from the southern parts of Egyptian ships are mentioned by ancient authors, Arabia, were once supposed to be the produce of we are sure to find them guided and manned by that country. The delusion, however, was beginPhoenicians. This people were, in fact, the mer-ning to vanish in the time of Pliny, who questions chants of the Egyptians, whose laws and religion the right of Arabia Felix to bear that title. Caswere at all times unfavourable to maritime ad-sia and cinnamon were imported into Egypt and venture; they were the foreign merchants of Tyre in very early ages; they are distinctly and Egypt in the flourishing days of the hundred-gated Thebes and the astonishing monuments which remain to prove the ancient wealth and grandeur of that kingdom, may render us less incredulous with respect to the naval proficiency of a kindred people. The survey of Egypt made by Joseph, the storing of corn in the several districts to meet the exigencies of impending famine, and the general use of money in that country, all bespeak a degree of social order and economy, and a familiarity with the routine of commercial dealing, which is truly astonishing at so early an age. Seven hundred years later, at the siege of Troy, the Greeks were unacquainted with the use of money. 4. The Phoenicians participated in the civilization of the Egyptians; they profited by supplying that luxurious and wealthy nation with foreign commodities; and, uniting to the knowledge which flourished in Thebes and Memphis a disposition to naval enterprise, we may easily conceive that they soon attained a considerable proficiency in all the arts of navigation. The numerous colonies which they planted on the shores of the Euxine, the

repeatedly named by Moses, Exod. xxx. 23. In the time of Ezekiel, "the men of Dan and Javan (the eastern Javan) going to and fro, brought cassia [the pipe-cinnamon of modern commerce], calamus, and bright iron." The merchants of Sheba and Raameh were occupied with the chief of all spices, with gold and precious stones." Thus we see that the productions of India were brought to Tyre both by caravans from the Persian Gulf, and by Phoenician vessels, probably from the ports of Arabia Felix. These productions were imported by the Arabians from Malabar, whither some of them (and cinnamon among others) were probably brought from remoter countries by the Malays, or native navigators of the Indian seas.

6. We have already had occasion to speak of the restrictions that were put upon the intercourse of the Hebrews with foreign nations. They were intended to be a peculiar people, the conservators of the true religion amidst idolatrous nations; and it was therefore the direct tendency of their polity

* Maritime Discovery, vol. i., pp. 8, 9, 125, 126.

to discourage foreign commerce, and make them | For example: one man, having a surplus quantity Jependant alone upon the productions of their of corn, might be compelled to convey it to a great own soil. They had, therefore, no commercial distance, in order to obtain in exchange for it such code; their intercourse with each other was to be commodities as he wanted in its stead. And this regulated by the principles of kindness, and in might be the case, even if an immediate neighbuying and selling they were to exercise good bour possessed a surplus quantity of those very faith and honesty towards each other. (See Lev. commodities, because his willingness to exchange xix. 36, 37; Deut. xxv. 13—16.) It was not till would, of course, depend upon the fact of his the reign of Solomon that the Hebrews engaged wanting corn. If he wanted wool, and not corn, largely in foreign commerce. After his death, it he would keep his surplus commodities until he appears to have been in a great measure neglected; met with some one who, wanting these, could and the attempt made to restore it, by Jehosha- give wool in exchange for them; and when the phat, was frustrated by his ships being wrecked, two parties thus wanting each other's surplus com1 Kings xxii. 48, 49; 2 Chron. xx. 36. In the modities had been brought together, their respecage of Ezekiel, however, the commerce of Jeru- tive commodities might have to be transported to salem was so great, that it excited the envy even a great distance, at considerable expense and inof the Tyrians (Ezek. xxvi. 2); and after the cap- convenience to both parties. tivity, a great number of Jews became merchants, and travelled, for the purpose of traffic, into all countries. About the year 150 B. C., Prince Surion rendered the port at Joppa more convenient than it had hitherto been; and in the time of Pompey the Great, there were so many Jews abroad upon the ocean, even in the character of pirates, that king Antigonus was accused before him of having sent them out on purpose. A new port was built by Herod at Cæsarea.*

7. In the earliest stage of society, exchanges would be confined to cases in which each of the parties engaged in the transaction desired to appropriate to his own immediate use the commodity he was to receive. For example: one man might have an excess of a bushel of wheat, over what he wanted for the consumption of his family; but he wanted a table or some other piece of household furniture, which none of his family could produce. Under these circumstances, he would look around him for some one occupied in the manufacture of the article he wanted, and, having found such a person, the two parties would mutually benefit each other by making an exchange of wheat for a piece of household furniture. The carpenter or artificer wanted the wheat, and the agriculturist wanted the piece of furniture; and the exchange, therefore, satisfied the wants of both. What was done in this case, would be done in numberless other cases. Wherever one person had an excess of any commodity, he would exchange that excess with some other person, who wanted the article, for another commodity of which he himself stood in need. This is exchange, or barter. But as society extended its limits, and the wants of its members became multiplied and diversified, great inconvenience would be found to attach to such a system of exchange.

* Jahn's Archæol., § iii.

8. The inconveniences attendant upon a system of barter would necessarily suggest the idea, that trade or commerce would be greatly facilitated by the employment of some instrument of exchange; that is, some material which, by common consent, should represent and pass current for the value of the several articles to be exchanged. Having made this discovery, traders would not be long in making another; namely, that any thing which possessed a general and undoubted value in the eyes of those who wanted to consume it, was a good payment, if offered at a proper rate; because, though the receiver might not want to consume it himself, the person could never be far off who would be willing to obtain possession of it, by giving something which the other did want to consume, in return for it. This substance, whatever it might be, would properly be denominated the instrument of exchange, and would introduce a decided improvement upon the method of direct barter. Inconveniences would still exist, however, until some very portable material came to be adopted as the instrument of exchange. Metals were at length invested with these functions; first, in rude pieces, the conventional or agreed value of which was ascertained by weighing them; and subsequently in coins, the value of which was authenticated by the external appearance. Such coins are properly called money. In the time of Abraham, the ruder sort of money was in use, for "he weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current with the merchant," Gen. xxiii. 16. At a later period, as we see from the book of Exodus, money was coined, and passed current without the process of weighing. Of the various coins employed by the Hebrews we have already spoken.†

+ See Part iv., chap. 4, sect. 4.

9. Commerce could no more be carried on without a system of weights and measures, than it could be without some description of money. By the Hebrew law, measures and weights to serve as models, both for form and contents, were deposited in the Tabernacle; and all the duties connected with a regulation of them devolved upon the priests. When the temple was built, the standards were removed thither, and they perished in the ruins of that splendid building. While in captivity, the Hebrews adopted the Chaldean weights and measures, and appear to have retained them after the restoration. The Hebrew weights and measures, therefore, must be distinguished into those before and those after the captivity.

(1) The following were the MEASURES OF CA

PACITY:

The bath, or ephah, contained 60 English wine pints, and almost a half.

The chomer, or cor, contained ten baths; near 605 pints English measure.

The lethech was half the chomer; 302 English

pints, and almost a half.

The seah was a third part of the bath; a little more than 20 English pints.

The gomer, omer, or assaron, was the tenth part of the ephah; something more than 6 English pints.

The cab was the sixth part of the seah, or the eighteenth part of the ephah; something above. 3 English pints, and nine twenty-fifths.

The log, or rebah, was a fourth part of the cab, or a little more than twenty-one twenty-fifths of an English pint.

The nebel contained 3 baths, or almost 181 English pints and a half.

The hin was the half seah, and the sixth part of the bath.

The half hin was a little above 5 English pints.

The betzah was the sixth part of the log, and therefore was very little above seven fiftieths of the English pint.

(2) The following were the MEASURES OF LENGTH :—

The cubit extended from the elbow to the wrist, or four palms, about the sixth part of the height of the human body. The Babylonian or new cubit, mentioned in Ezekiel, was five palms, or from the elbow to the knuckles. See 2 Chron.

iii. 3.

end of the little finger, or three palms. A span was from the end of the thumb to the

A handbreadth, or palm, was four digits. A finger, or digit, was about the breadth of a finger, or 0.912th of an English inch.

A stadium, or furlong, was a Greek measure adopted by the Jews. It was 125 geometrical paces in extent, or the 600th part of a degree, making 145 English paces, 4 feet, and 6 tenths.

A sabbath-day's journey was 729 English paces and 3 feet. It was a Jewish invention founded on Exod. xvi. 29.

Miλiov, a Roman mile, was 8 furlongs, or 1000 geometrical paces.

(3) Of WEIGHTS We may notice the following:The shekel was equal to 10 pennyweights English troy.

The beka was half a shekel.

The gerah was one twentieth of a shekel.
The maneh was 60 shekels.

The talent was 50 manehs, or 3000 shekels.

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should prefer them to all other entertainments. | sonated, in whose joys or griefs, in whose domestic Indeed, the Talmud affirms that all kinds of games felicities and infelicities, in whose elevation or and spectacles were not only prohibited but ab- depression, the actor is not really and personally horred by all good Israelites, in consequence of interested, but only supports a character perhaps the mischiefs which had befallen those who ven- entirely foreign from his own, and represents pastured to be present at those of the neighbouring sions and affections in which his own heart has no nations; and R. Simeon Ben Paki comments thus share; how beautiful and expressive, when conon Ps. i. 1: "Blessed is the man who hath not sidered in this light, is that passage of Scripture set his foot in a theatre," &c. It was reserved for in which the apostle is inculcating a Christian Herod to introduce amusements of this descrip- indifference to this world, and exhorting us not tion among the Jewish people; which he did on a to suffer ourselves to be unduly affected either by most magnificent scale, and at a vast expense. the joys or sorrows of so fugitive and transitory a But notwithstanding the degeneracy of the nation scene: "But this I say, brethren, the time is at this time, they were so disgusted at the attempt, short. It remaineth that both they that have that they united to put them down by compass-wives, be as though they had none; and they that ing the death of their founder.* Such being the distaste of this people for theatrical exhibitions, we are hardly prepared to expect any allusions to the stage or its amusements in the sacred writings; and the consequence is, that we overlook the force and beauty of several passages where such allusions exist.t

weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as not abusing it. For the fashion of this world passeth away,” 1 Cor. vii. 29–31. The following illustration of this passage cannot fail to gratify the reader: "If we keep in mind the supposed allusion in the text (the fashion of this world passeth away), we shall discern a peculiar beauty and force in his language and sentiment. For the actors in a play, whether it be comedy or tragedy, do not act their own proper and personal concerns, but only personate and mimic the characters and conditions of other men. And so when they weep, in acting some tragical part, it is as though they wept not; and there is more show and appearance, than truth and reality, of grief and sorrow in the case. On the other hand, if they rejoice in acting some brighter scene, it is as though they rejoiced not; it is but a mere semblance of joy, and forced air of mirth and

2. In the writings of Paul, especially, we meet with allusions to the drama, which has furnished him with some of the most beautiful metaphors that adorn his compositions. The drama was instituted for the purpose of exhibiting a striking picture of human life; as in a faithful mirror, to hold up to the spectators' view that variety of character by which it is diversified, and those interchanges and reverses of fortune with which it is chequered. It needs hardly be remarked, though the observation is proper for the purpose of illustrating a very beautiful passage in one of Paul's epistles, that a variety of scenes are painted, and, by means of the requisite machinery, are very frequently shifting, in order to show the charac-gaiety, which they exhibit to the spectators,—no ters in a variety of places and fortunes. To the spectators, lively and affecting views are by turns displayed-every thing, from the beginning to the catastrophe, perpetually varying and changing ac-fiction. And so when the play is over, they have cording to the rules and conduct of the drama. Agreeably to this, with what elegance and propriety does Paul represent the fashion of this world as continually passing away (1 Cor. vii. 31), and all the scenes of this vain and visionary life as perpetually shifting! "The imagery," says Grotius, "is taken from the theatre, where the scenery is suddenly changed, and exhibits an appearance totally different." And as the transactions of the drama are not real, but fictitious and imaginary, such and such characters being assumed and per

* See Josephus, Antiq., b. xv., c. 8. The remaining part of this section is derived from Dr. Harwood.

real inward gladness of heart. If they seem to contract marriages, or act the merchant, or persenate a gentleman of fortune, still it is nothing but

no wives, no possessions or goods, no enjoyments of the world, in consequence of such representations. In like manner, by this apt comparison, I imagine the apostle would teach us to moderate our desires and affections towards every thing in this world; and rather as it were to personate such things, as matters of a foreign nature, than to incorporate ourselves with them, as our own proper and personal concerns." +

The theatre is also furnished with dresses suitable to every age, and adapted to every circumstance and change of fortune. The persons of the drama, in one and the same representation,

Brecknell's Discourses, p. 318.

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