precept which directed, "When thou dost "lend thy brother any thing, thou shalt "not go into his house to fetch his pledge:" as if the legislator said, intrude not into his abode, if he is not willing to expose to the stranger's eye, the humiliating circumstances of want and nakedness which attend his destitute state; or perhaps there is some little monument of his better days, which he reserves to console his misery, which he would not wish the person from whom he implores aid to see, least he should demand that in pledge, and either, if denied, refuse relief, or, by tearing away this almost sacred relic to which his heart clings, embitter his distress. No, says the Law, the hovel of the poor must be sacred as an holy asylum: the eye of scorn and the foot of pride must not dare to intrude; even the agent of mercy must not enter it abruptly and unbid, without consulting the feelings of its wretched inhabitant. "Thou "shalt not go into his house to fetch his "pledge; thou shalt stand abroad, and the "man to whom thou dost lend, shall bring " out the pledge abroad unto thee."

In

Deut. xxiv. 10.

In the same strain of humanity the Law goes on: "If the man be poor, thou shalt "not sleep with his pledge: in any case "thou shalt deliver him the pledge again, "when the sun goeth down, that he may "sleep in his own raiment and bless thee; "and it shall be righteousness unto thee "before the Lord thy God."

The same spirit of benevolence was to regulate the conduct, and soften the heart of the husbandman in all his labours. *"If "thou cuttest down the harvest of thy

field," says the Law, "and hast forgot a "sheaf, thou shalt not turn again to fetch "it: if thou beatest thine olive tree, thou "shalt not go over the boughs again: when "thou gatherest thy grapes, thou shalt not "glean it afterwards; it shall be for the

stranger, the fatherless and the widow, "that the Lord thy God may bless thee in "all the work of thy hands." With equal solicitude does the Law impress reverence for the authority, and attention to the wants. of the aged, delivering as the direct command of Jehovah: "Thou shalt rise up be"fore

* Deut. xxiv. 19,

"fore the hoary head, and honour the face "of the old man, and fear thy God; I am "the Lord." How much praise have the Spartan institutions justly obtained, for cherishing this principle; yet how much more energetic and authoritative is the language of the Jewish Lawgiver. With a similar spirit the same Lawgiver inculcates, in the strongest manner, the duty of shewing tenderness to those who labour under any bodily infirmity: "Thou shalt not curse the deaf,

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nor put a stumbling-block before the blind, "but shall fear thy God; I am the Lord." And with a still more exalted sense of the importance of virtue above every external advantage, and the proportionable obligation of promoting it in all with whom we have any intercourse, the inspired Lawgiver considers the neglecting to do so, as a proof of criminal malignity: "Thou shalt not hate

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thy brother in thine heart; thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him; thou shalt not avenge "nor bear any grudge against the children. "of thy people, but thou shalt love thy

neighbour as thyself; I am the Lord."

How

How admirably are such language and such sentiments as these, suited to the sacred original, from whence they are supposed to flow! How strongly do they attest the divine benevolence, which dictated the Jewish Law, and the divine authority, which alone could enforce such precepts by adequate sanctions, and impress such sentiments upon the human heart with practical conviction! If the intermixture of such sentiments and precepts with the civil code, and the union of political regulations with moral instruction and religious observances, is unparalleled in any other country, and by any other Lawgiver, does not this circumstance afford some presumptive evidence of the divine original of the Mosaic code?

TO REVIEW THE SKETCH WE HAVE EXHIBITED OF THE JEWISH CONSTITUTION, we have seen that it provided for the settlement of 600,000 freeholders, with independent properties, derived not from any human superior, but held in fee from the Sovereign of the Jewish state, even God himself. This distribution of property was guarded by preventing the accumulation of debt, and, if alienated

alienated for a time, securing its reversion to the family of the original proprietor, at regular periods. The distribution of this body of freeholders through the land, by their tribes and families, forms an additional provision for their union and happiness. They are employed in agriculture, attached to domestic life, estranged from war, but bound to assemble for their country's defence, and thus forming a secure barrier against hostile violence or insidious ambition. They are governed by a nobility, by magistrates and by elders, possessing properties suited to their several ranks, respected for their patriarchal descent, uniting in their persons civil and military authority, by an hereditary right, which precluded jealousy and discord. The whole tribe of Levi is set apart to attend to the religious and moral instruction of the nation, for which they have the fullest leisure, and to which they are bound by the strongest interests; dispersed over the whole, and forming a cement and bond of union between the remaining tribes. In this domestic and family government, as it has been justly termed, population is encouraged, freedom secured, agriculture and residence in the

country,