happiness of society,-are placed among the number of human

duties.

Where else, in all antiquity, are to be found ideas of God and his worship, so just and sublime; religious institutions, so pure and spiritual; ethical doctrines, so conformable to the sentiments of nature and the light of reason? Recal the picture, presented in a former part of this chapter, of the religious and moral condition of the ancient world. What false and grotesque notions of the divine nature! What extravagant, impure, and cruel rites! What objects of adoration! From the heavenly orbs to the meanest plant, from the man distinguished for his talents or his crimes to the vilest reptile,-everything has its worshippers. Here, chastity is sacrificed in the temples. There, human blood flows upon the altars, and the dearest victims expire amid flames, kindled by superstition. Again, nature is outraged by beastly amours, and humanity brutalized by vices that cannot be named without offence. Everywhere, the people are plunged into a frightful ignorance, and the philosophers themselves grope in doubt and uncertainty.

Wherefore this difference? But one cause, adequate to the result, can be assigned. All the pagan nations had for their guide only the feeble and tremulous light of human reason. Among the Hebrews, a higher, even the pure and eternal reason, had pierced the darkness, scattered its shades, and poured a divine illumination into the mind of prophet, priest, lawgiver, judge, and king. Thus was the intellect of the nation enlightened, and its heart purified. Thus were its manners humanized; its morals elevated; its institutions liberalized. Thus was the nation educated for its great mission of guidance and of blessing to all the nations of the earth, in all the periods of their history.

The Hebrew government was a government of tutelage. No form of polity has ever approached it in grandeur, purity, simplicity, and beneficence. Had men been more perfect, it

would have stood forever. But human inconstancy wearied even of a perfect government; mortal passions corrupted even a divine institution; and the commonwealth of Israel, like the empire of Rome, at length fell beneath the weight of its own vices, and disappeared from the brotherhood of nations. It lives only in history, a monument at once of the divine goodness and equity.

CHAPTER III.

General Idea of the Hebrew Constitution.

THE political equality of the people, without either nobles or peasants properly so called, was, as we have seen,* a fundamental principle of the Mosaic constitution. This could not but give the state a strong democratic tendency. Nor is it matter of surprize, that on this foundation Moses established a commonwealth, rather than a monarchy. On this point, there is scarcely a dissenting voice among all the learned men, who have written upon these institutions. Mr. Horne does but echo the general opinion, when he says, that "the form of the Hebrew republic was unquestionably democratical."

Moses did not, indeed, by an unchangeable law, enact, that no alteration should ever be made in the form of government. On the contrary, his prophetic eye foresaw, that the time would come, when his countrymen, infected and dazzled

*Bk. 2, c. 1, p. 400.

Introduction, vol. 2, Pt. 2, c. 1.

† Mich. Com. on the Laws of Moses.

by the example of the surrounding nations, would lose their relish for republican simplicity, and would demand the splendors of a throne and a court. But it was not his wish, that they should have a king. Upon this point he reasoned; he dissuaded; he expostulated; he warned. The spirit of his law was strongly against monarchy; and all, who afterwards maintained that spirit, were equally strong against it. This was the case with Gideon, who indignantly rejected the offer of a crown. This was the case with Samuel, that model of a popular magistrate. He remonstrated, solemnly and eloquently, with the people, against their rash determination to have a king. He told them, that they were fastening upon themselves an oriental despotism; that their kings would rule them with a rod of iron; and that they would repent of their rashness, when it was too late. The truth is, that all. who followed the maxims of the founder of the state, set their faces against usurpation, and maintained the rights of the people at all hazards, and in the most disastrous times.* Foreseeing, however, that all his admonitions would, in the end, prove unavailing, Moses enacted a fundamental law to define and limit the power of the future kings. This law is found in the 17th chapter of Deuteronomy. Despotismn seems to be the native growth of the east. Man there, cradled in servitude, becomes fitted to listen to his fate, in the mandates of a tyrant. The climate dissolves the energy of the heart, and hence the people of the east have always been mere children in respect of political institutions. Indolence loves to gaze, and hence they have ever been delighte with the trappings of royalty, and have been prone to look on an earthly king with a veneration approaching to idolatry. The pomp of their sovereign feeds their vanity; his power is their pride. They have no notion of popular freedom. Hence a chief magistrate, subject to the laws of his people, a constitutional king, is a conception, foreign to all their

* Chr. Exam, for Sept. 1836.

habits of thought and feeling. In Egypt, Moses had witnessed the abuse of the regal power; in the wilderness, he had observed the tyranny of the petty despots in the neighborhood of Israel. Hence the enactment of the law referred to above. The particular provisions of this law will be ex amined in another chapter. I will only observe now, in passing, that they were such as to insure, whenever the anticipated change in the form of polity should take place, the existence of a constitutional monarchy. The king, permitted by Moses to the folly of his countrymen, was, in truth, what a late monarch in France* claimed to be, a "citizen king;" a popular magistrate, rather than an arbitrary sovereign. If the Hebrew statesman could not wholly resist the proclivity of his nation to the regal form of government, he at least, with prescient wisdom, limited the power intrusted to the hands of royalty. In this he shows how thoroughly his own spirit was impregnated with democratic principles, how deep was his hatred of tyranny, and how ardent and irrepressible his sympathy for the rights, the liberty, and the happiness of man.+

Considerable difference of opinion exists among the learned in regard to the number and nature of the departments of the Hebrew government, and the officers by whom the administration of public affairs was conducted. The mixture of civil and military authority, which marks this constitution, the blending of the legislative and judicial functions in the same. assembly, the union of various and, according to our way of thinking, somewhat incongruous powers in the priesthood, the apparent chasms in the Mosaic legislation arising from the frequent retention by Moses of ancient consuetudinary

* Louis Philippe.

See on this subject D'Israeli's Genius of Judaism, c. 4.

I say "apparent chasms," because what are chasms to us were not so

to the Israelites, being supplied by a then well known law of usage; a

6

lex non scriptu," corresponding to the common law among us.

laws, without any formal introduction of them into the body of his own laws, and the extreme brevity of the history of the Israelitish state, as contained in the sacred books, are the causes of that obscurity, which has operated to produce this diversity of opinion. As far as I have been able to satisfy my own mind, the following statement embodies the radical features of this ancient and venerable polity.*

Each of the Israelitish tribes formed a separate state, having a local legislature and a distinct administration of justice. The power of the several states was sovereign within the limits of their reserved rights. Still, there was both a real and a vigorous general government. The nation might have been styled the united tribes, provinces, or states of Israel. The bond of political union between the sovereign states appears to have been fourfold. In other words, there were four departments of the Hebrew government: viz. the chief magistrate, whether judge, high priest, or king; the senate of princes; the congregation of Israel, the popular branch of the government; and the oracle of Jehovah, a most interesting and singular part of the political structure. The form of a legal enactment might have run somewhat after this fashion:-"Be it enacted by the senate and congregation of Israel, the judge approving, and the oracle concurring.” There was a judiciary system, in which causes of a sufficient magnitude could be carried up, through courts of various grades, till they came, for final adjudication, before a supreme national court, which held its session in the capital of the nation. Finally, on the one hand, the organization of the tribe of Levi gave vitality to the whole system, acted as a counterpoise to the democracy, and restrained its excesses, while, on the other, the prophetical order maintained the rights of the people, and formed a powerful barrier against the encroachments of arbitrary power.†

* Lewman on the Civ. Gov. Heb. C. 8.

I do not here cite the particular Scriptures in support of these views,