rapis, or Osiris), whom they worshipped unTo govern

der the figure of a young ox.

such a people as this, nothing less than laws dictated by eternal wisdom, and their obedience inforced by threats of national as well as personal destruction, could suffice. In remarking upon these Commandments, we shall clearly find their use extended to the present age, and we might perhaps prove them also the grand basis of all national laws, however distorted by the pride, the passions, or the idolatry of mankind.*

The

*We are justified in this supposition by the following remarks:

1st. Plato, in his Book de Legibus, says, that it is an excellent lesson to be very cautious and tender, in so much as mentioning the very name of God.

2dly. According to Philo, the seventh day was truly called Eortee pandeemos, the universal or popular festival. The Athenians observed it with great strictness, and suffered no servile work to be done upon it.

3dly. By Solon's laws, no one was to dare to strike a parent, or not to provide for him in his old age, except the

child

The people of Israel being properly prepared for some stupendous event, the Almighty sent them, by the hand of his servant Moses, his divine commands, declaring first of all, that he was their God; that he had just delivered them from the most severe oppression, to lead them into a land of peace and rest; that he was the one all-wise, allpowerful, and eternal being; that they should therefore serve him, and him only; that they should erect no idols or representation of any sensible object, as the invisible God was a being jealous of his honour, who would visit their iniquities upon their latest posterity, but who would reward their obedience and faithfulness with mercy the most extensive that human nature could conceive.

child was illegitimate, or not brought up to some business or profession.

4thly. Murder was made capital; adultery, theft, and false witness, were punished by the Athenians, according to the several laws of Draco and Solon.

Having now declared the nature of that Being whom they were to worship, and the strict manner in which that worship should be directed, he proceeds to impress them still further with the awful idea of his almighty majesty, by charging them to make no light or trifling, no unnecessary or prophane mention of his holy name, but to use it in supplication and in prayer, for that he would by no means hold him guiltless; on the contrary, should think him deeply guilty, who took his name in vain.

The next Commandment, by the word remember, seems the repetition of some former Commandment, probably delivered to Adam at the creation of the world, as we may judge from these words, Genesis ii. 3: "And God blessed the seventh day, and "sanctified it, because in it he had rested from "all his work." This is repeated in the delivery of this Commannment: "For in six

❝ days

"days the Lord made Heaven and earth, "the sea, and all that therein is; wherefore "the Lord blessed the seventh day, and hal"lowed it." A seventh part of man's time was but small to be employed in the public service of the Deity, a small return for his creation and preservation, a small and not a tedious test of his openly professing himself the servant of God, and setting a good example to mankind. The breach of the Sabbath, under the Mosaic institution, was punished with death: such was the strictness of that law, that no fires were to be kindled in the Jewish habitations on the Sabbath-day. At this present time its neglect or contempt brings its punishment along with it; it hurts the morals both of the rich and

poor, and calls off their attention from reflection and serious duties; thus it is subversive of the good of society, in weakening those laws, by which the weak or the just are protected from

P 3

from the injuries of the strong or the unjust. But a due observation of the Sabbath was not enjoined by the Almighty for his own glory and advantage; it brought temporal as well as spiritual benefits along with it; humanity required it: "That thine ox and thine 66 ass may have rest, and that the son of thine "handmaid (thy slave or bondsman) may "be refreshed. Remember (says the Di"vine Legislator) that thou wast a servant "in the land of Egypt;" remember the bitterness of slavery, and feel for others by experience. Without this command, without the interference of the laws, both of God and man, towards the enforcement of this excellent institution, many, no doubt, might every where be found, whose pleasures or whose interests would leave them little feeling for the patient animal or the faithful servant.

The Divine Lawgiver having thus enjoined mankind the proportion and manner of ho

mage