The true spiritual life of the world commenced in the Chosen People. He who denies this would seem to deny not a theory of Inspiration, but a great and manifest fact of history. But the spiritual life commenced under an earthly mould of national life similar in all respects, political, social and literary, to those of other races. The Jewish nation, in short, was a nation, not a miracle. Had it been a miracle, it might have shewn forth the power of God, like the stars in heaven, but it would have been nothing to the rest of mankind, nor could its spiritual life have helped to awaken theirs ".

This commencement of the spiritual life was marked by the appearance (1) of a Cosmogony which, unlike those of heathen nations, gave a true account of the origin of the world and of Man, and a true account of the relations between Man and his Creator; (2) of a series of histories written on a moral and religious principle, and still unrivalled among historical writings for the steadiness with which this, the true key to history, is kept in view; (3) of a body of religious literature, in the shape of hymns, reflections, preachings, apologues, which though not Christian, and therefore not to be indiscriminately used by Christians, was wholly unapproached among the heathen; (4) of a Code of Laws the beneficence of which is equally unapproached by any code, and least of all by any Oriental code, not produced under the influence of Christianity.

This code of laws takes the rude institutions of a primitive nation, including Slavery, as they stand, See the Author's work on Rational Religion, p. 50.

not changing society by miracle, which, as has been said before, seems to have been no part of the purposes of God. But while it takes these institutions as they stand, it does not perpetuate them, but reforms them, mitigates them, and lays on them restrictions tending to their gradual abolition. Much less does it introduce any barbarous institution or custom for the first time.

To shew that this principle is not invented for the case of Slavery, we will try to verify it in some other cases first. It will be the more worth while to do this, because if the principle be sound, it may help to relieve the distress caused by doubts as to the morality of the Old Testament on other points as well as on the question now in issue. It may do this at a less expense than that of supposing the existence of two different Moralities, one for God, the other for Man, and thus making Man worship, what to his mind must be, an immoral God.

In times before the reign of Law, justice was done on the murderer by the nearest kinsman of the murdered as Avenger of Blood. Such justice was a degree better than no justice; and a custom which assigned the sacred duty of revenge to a particular person, instead of leaving it to any chance hand, was the first step towards the appointment of a regular magistrate. This institution seems to have been universal among primitive tribes. A relic of it lingered in the law of this country till the reign of George III., when Wager of Battle having been demanded in a case of murder by the nearest of kin against the murderer, as a common law right, the demand was with difficulty evaded.

The law of Moses accordingly recognises the Avenger of Blood, (Numb. xxxv., &c.)

But the custom was liable to great abuses, which were apt to make it a step backwards instead of forwards in morality and civilization. (1.) The same revenge was taken for blood however shed, whether wilfully or accidentally, which confounded men's notion of crime, and in fact multiplied murders. (2.) When covetousness overcame revenge, and the slain kinsman was not very dear, a sum of money (called by our German ancestors the wehrgeld) was taken for his blood instead of the blood of the slayer; and this practice grew into a regular system, which destroyed the distinction between crime and civil injury, took away the sanctity of human life, the foundation-stone of civilization, and moreover sharpened barbarous divisions of class, since the price of a man's blood was assessed in the tariff according to his rank. (3.) Revenge became hereditary, and blood feuds arose between family and family or clan and clan, which filled the world with slaughter. Such blood feuds were common in the Highlands while the old clans existed, and they are still common among the wild tribes of Syria and in other parts of the East.

Now (1) the law of Moses expressly distinguishes wilful murder from accidental homicide, and confines the office of the Avenger of Blood to wilful murder. "And if he smite him with an instrument of iron, so that he die, he is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death.... Or if he smite him with a hand weapon of wood, wherewith he may die, and he die, he

is a murderer: the murderer shall surely be put to death. The revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer: when he meeteth him, he shall slay him. But if he thrust him of hatred, or hurl at him by laying of wait, that he die; or in enmity smite him with his hand, that he die he that smote him shall surely be put to death; for he is a murderer: the revenger of blood shall slay the murderer, when he meeteth him. But if he thrust him suddenly without enmity, or have cast upon him anything without laying of wait, or with any stone, wherewith a man may die, seeing him not, and cast it upon him, that he die, and was not his enemy, neither sought his harm: then the congregation shall judge between the slayer and the revenger of blood according to these judgments: and the congregation shall deliver the slayer out of the hand of the revenger of blood, and the congregation shall restore him to the city of his refuge, whither he was fled: and he shall abide in it unto the death of the high priest, which was anointed with the holy oil." (2.) The taking of money as a satisfaction for blood is strictly forbidden. "Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer which is guilty of death: but he shall be surely put to death. And ye shall take no satisfaction for him that is fled to the city of his refuge, that he should come again to dwell in the land, until the death of the priest." (3.) Hereditary blood feuds are forbidden with equal strictness o. "The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be d Ibid., v. 31, 32.

c Numb. xxx. 16-25.

e Deut. xxiv. 16.

put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin."

By providing judges in all the tribes to do equal justice between man and man', and by calling the congregation to judge between the slayer and the avenger of bloods, Moses secures the speedy departure of the need of private revenge and the speedy advent of a reign of public law.

The right of Asylum is another primitive institution which is recognised by the Law of Moses; and which was not without use in its day, as the history of the Middle Ages, no less than that of the more ancient barbarism, can bear witness. It gave vengeance time for reflection, and in default of a magistrate armed with sufficient powers, helped to prevent society from becoming a slaughter-house. But this institution also was liable to the grossest abuses. It sheltered the wilful murderer as well as him who had killed a man accidentally or in self-defence, and in the case of wilful murder led to a final defeat of justice. Being connected with holy places and the priests who kept them, it bred gross superstition. For the same reason, and because the asylum was a source of power and profit to the priests, asylums were multiplied till they gave impunity to crime. In the reign of Tiberius the Roman Government found it necessary to interfere with the growing license of setting up asylums in the Greek cities of the Empire. "The temples were filled with the vilest of the slaves; the same receptacles sheltered

f Deut. i. 16.

g Numb. xxxv. 24.