ment, the intellectual and moral degradation of the race? And thus, if the great First Cause of Nature's laws sanctioned, as the temporal ruler of the Hebrews, a legislative compromise with evil, He condemned the Chosen Race, through the universal laws controlling all mankind, to cumulative abasement.

Say that we accept the theory of divinely debased legislation in Judaism, when and how were objectionable statutes repealed? Jesus left slavery where He found it; Paul recommended men to rest content as bondservants or freemen; and Anglican Protestantism obviously accepted slavery as a divine institution when instructing infant slaves, through the Church Catechism, to be content with that station of life to which it had pleased God to call them. Has theocratic legislation been therefore repealed by the voice of Humanity, and has modern civilisation pronounced a tardy vote of censure on Divinity by restoring freedom to races condemned to slavery by the divinely ratified curse of Noah ?

In sustaining Scripture through the theory of temporising legislation, apologetic theologians obviously assume that this form of divine policy was beneficial to the Chosen Race. But, as debased revelation involves debased Divinity, we still await their version of the advantages conferred on mankind in any stage of human progress, though an inspired ideal of the Deity, false to the infinite attributes assigned to Him in modern theosophy.

Thus far, we have shown that the pretensions of Hebrew morality to a divine origin are unattested by any superiority to merely human systems. This adverse

criticism is, however, conceived in no unfriendly spirit towards Judaism. Its manifest imperfections are irreconcilable with revelation; but we do not, therefore, deny the presence of human wisdom in some of its ordinances. Thus we read, 'Thou shalt take no gift, for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.'1 How admirable a precept for this age of fraudulent commissions, and universal backsheesh! Again, if the Mosaic law,2 which commands the seducer to marry or provide for his victim, were present in the statute books of Christendom, how much more effectual would it prove in social reformation than the sermons of bishops or the prayers of saints!

1 Exod. xxiii. 8.

2 Exod. xxii. 16, 17.

53

CHAPTER VI.

THE CHOSEN RACE.

III. IF it is historically true that a Chosen Race once lived under the rule of the Deity as their temporal legislator and king, may we not reasonably expect, in that highly favoured people, a wisdom, virtue, happiness, and prosperity unattainable by ordinary mortals denied the boon of theocratic government? And if these conditions are unfulfilled in Judaism, shall we discard the illusion of a Chosen Race, or attribute legislative failure to Divinity?

The pages of Genesis record the covenant with Jehovah, through which the land of Canaan was secured to the descendants of Abraham as an everlasting possession.1 This divine charter was ratified by the rite of circumcision: any male child found uncircumcised after eight days was to be put to death, 'because he had broken the covenant.'. A savage inauguration of divine government, which Christian piety accepts as theocratic legislation because it is in the Holy Bible, and only concerns Hebrew babes such a long time ago: but, if the truth were brought home to modern maternity through the capital punishment of Christian babes negligent of baptism, feminine instincts would detect

1 Gen. xvii. 8.

the Satanic tendency of this legislative cruelty, and vindicate the Deity by denying His complicity in sacerdotal infanticide, Sacred Scripture notwithstanding.

From a merely mortal point of view, we might reasonably expect that, in selecting the father of the Hebrew race, Jehovah would have chosen a man as pre-eminent in courage and virtue as the most illustrious chief of Gentile antiquity; but immediately after his election, Abraham discloses a despicable cowardice unreproved by Jehovah, who, instead of punishing his baseness, inflicts the penalty on the innocent.

It is recorded that, in consequence of a famine in the land, Abraham set out for Egypt in company with Sarah, his beautiful and affectionate wife.1 As they drew near to their destination, the true character of the Patriarch became apparent. He entreated Sarah to save him from any personal danger by concealing that she was his wife. In consequence of this deception, Sarah became an inmate of Pharaoh's house; and Abraham was freely supplied, for her sake, with sheep and oxen, asses and camels, men-servants and maidservants, which, for anything he knew to the contrary, were the price of his wife's dishonour. Jehovah forthwith afflicted 'Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarah, Abraham's wife. And Pharaoh called Abraham, and said, What is this that thou hast done unto me? Why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife? Take her, and go thy way. And Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him, and they sent him away and his wife, and all that he had.' Thus the Egyptian king, who erred in ignorance, was severely

1 Gen. xii. 10–20.

punished with all his innocent household, whilst the Hebrew impostor escaped with impunity, carrying with him the spoil acquired by false pretences.

Was Sarah when wooed by her royal lover quite true to her caitiff husband? The king, as a man of honour, sustained her innocence; and if she was, indeed, faithful to the man who thought more of possible danger to himself than of almost certain dishonour to his wife, modern Hebrews may well feel proud of their ancestress, whilst humiliated by the disreputable conduct of the father of the race, who subsequently played the same trick on Abimelech, King of Gerar. This monarch, fascinated by the charming Sarah, also committed the indiscretion of introducing her into his house; but, warned by Jehovah in a dream, he forthwith sent her away, and bestowed a number of valuable presents on her husband, who thus travelled about reaping a rich harvest from the good looks of his wife.

The Hebrew historian, Josephus, tells us that, in the compilation of genealogies, women who had been in captivity were carefully excluded, in consequence of the suspicion attaching to their intercourse with foreigners. As Isaac was, therefore, born subsequent to the residence of Sarah with Abimelech, is it not questionable, according to this theory, whether modern Jews are the veritable descendants of Abraham?

From the age of Abraham to the departure of Jacob for the land of Egypt, the Hebrews enjoyed one of those intervals of peaceful prosperity which rarely relieved the calamities of their subsequent career. But having settled in Egypt as colonists, and become as numerous as the native population, they proved so bereft of every