said Eliphaz ; "but suddenly I cursed his habitation. His children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate; neither is there any to deliver them." "How oft is the candle of the wicked put out?" replies Job, "and how oft cometh their destruction upon them! God distributeth sorrows in his anger. They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carrieth away. God layeth up his iniquity (that is, the punishment of his iniquity), for his children; he rewardeth him, and he shall know it. His eyes shall see his destruction, and he shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty; for what pleasure hath he in his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off in the midst ?"

Confessedly mysterious as were the sufferings of Job, with principles such as these we shall find his practice in perfect harmony. He had seven sons and three daughters, all grown up; and of the manner in which they had been trained and instructed by him, any one may judge, by what is recorded of him, when they arrived at the years of maturity. Each of these sons had a house and table of his own, to which, at least on their birth-day, these three sisters were usually invited. Here there was nothing wrong, but, on the contrary, a fine exhibition of family harmony and love. Now, the previous care and watchfulness, the established authority and piety of Job may be conjectured, from his constant practice, and the as constant compliance of his children, after such family festivity. His authority he had not even now laid aside, nor had he, even when his children were thus far advanced in life, altogether let go the reins. At the same time, like a judicious parent, no anxiety was

expressed by him, but upon one point-the possibility of his children having, in some way, offended God at such seasons.

And his sons were wont to hold a banquet-house,

Every one on his birth-day;

When they sent and invited their three sisters

To eat and drink together with them.

And it came to pass, as the days of such banquets returned,

That Job sent for and sanctified them;

And made ready in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings,

According to the number of them all:

For, said Job, peradventure my sons

May have sinned, nor blessed God in their hearts.

Thus did Job on every such day.*

The high-toned parental feeling of this passage is manifest. Here we see a father who thought not for himself alone; who, when he could go no further than a peradventure, waited not, like Eli, till God should send a message to threaten him for the sins of his children. Aware that he might be visited as a parent, in his own person or in theirs, for the sin which he did not redress, and for which he sought not forgiveness and reconciliation, he sent and sanctified his children, and offered up sacrifices "according to the number of them all." his responsibility to God for the

The deep sense of conduct of his chil

dren; their obedience to an authority not even yet resigned; his tenderness of conscience; his unremitting care; and the wisdom of his conjecture, it is impossible not to admire. Surely this parent will be allowed to have acted under the influence of the pre

See Good's Translation of Job i. 4, 5, and the Notes; also Tyndal's Translation. 1549.

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cise principle laid down in the commandment which we now consider; yet did this eminent man live long before Moses, and was confessedly altogether out of the usual line of scripture characters.*

Thus it appears, not only that parental and filial duty had been the common law of man, before the decalogue was given on Sinai, or a single Mosaic statute was in existence; not only that the connexion between parent and child had been well understood from the beginning, and in various recorded instances finely exemplified, but that the very sanction of the second commandment had been applied by the Almighty, and its spirit imbibed by those who feared his name.

To return, however, from a digression perhaps too long, and account for the light which the decalogue now reflected on the domestic constitution : the truth is, that though parental and filial duty had been incumbent from the beginning, the insertion of the second as well as the fifth among the ten commandments, by the finger of God himself, at such a juncture, and in such terms, became necessary for important reasons. For our present purpose, one only is quite sufficient.

The law of all preceding ages, when every Father of a family had been its priest as well as its teacher, now demanded notice. It was about to undergo some change, though this was not until that moment when the dispensation began, which was more clearly to prefigure, and ultimately to introduce the Messiah. Parental and filial duty were

* See the case of Job again referred to under Section Fifth.

therefore only made the law of parents and children formally, when the priestly office was about to be transferred and confined to one particular tribe. The ceremonies of divine service might, it seems, be thus transferred and even confined; not so universal and unalienable obligations. Parental moral obligations, with regard to the character and worship of God, remained entire, and though employed as a safeguard against idolatry, they were placed neither upon new nor upon higher ground.* "Thou shalt have no

*

Precisely the same remark will apply to the fourth commandment. A great multiplicity of new external rites were about to be imposed. The Sabbath, ancient as the first week of time, required now to be guarded and sanctioned, lest the laborious and daily occupations of the Mosaic economy should invade the sanctity of that merciful and blessed day. "Amidst the complicated variety of new appointments," as though it had been said, "forget not the old, the unalterable, the invariably incumbent-Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy; for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore Jehovah blessed the Sabbath-day and (then of course) hallowed it." Yes, the reason for this commandment is at once the proof of its antiquity and previous obligation; the Sabbath being originally "made for man,” and made for him while yet in the garden of Eden. Hence the division of time into weeks, so repeatedly referred to in Genesis; the matrimonial feast and mourning for the dead, equally of seven days duration; hence, too, probably, when Noah sent forth the raven, he tarried seven days; and when the dove, he tarried three times in succession other seven. A like period the Almighty waited, after smiting the Nile and turning it into blood. If, as has been supposed with good reason, the Egyptians prevented the children of Israel from observing the Sabbath; had Pharaoh no reference to this sacred rest when he said, "Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their work? Behold the people of the land are many, and you make them rest from their burdens." But whether he, in these words, referred to the Sabbath and the interference of Moses in its favour, or not, what could Jehovah himself intend, when, before the giving of the law on Sinai, he said to Moses, "How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws? See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, (not the law, but the

other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments."

Such then, by the peculiar style of this law, is the shield held by an Almighty hand over the most helpless and dependent of all created beings, from the moment of birth, and such the law by which He prepares the Parents for the fulfilment of duties devolving necessarily on them alone. Nor is Nature silent on such an occasion as this. What though man is born the most helpless and dependent of all living? In the first hours of his existence, "when a few indistinct or unmeaning cries are his only language, he exercises an authority irresistible over hearts, of the very existence of which he is ignorant and unconscious;" nor will the infant wait long before he advances in his claims and in his influence. A few weeks only will pass away, when

opportunity to observe it, and ye can no longer plead excuse as you might in Egypt,) therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days; so the people rested on the seventh day." Had the institution not been observed by their progenitors, how could the nation have possibly understood this remonstrance? And, finally, when the decalogue itself was put into the hand of Moses, how came phraseology so peculiar to be employed with regard to this sacred day, if it was not ancient as the first week of time, obligatory from the period of the creation, and commemorative of that mighty work? Hence it was said, "Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy, for in six days," &c.