the firstlings of herds and flocks, all of which were devoted to the service of the Lord, that all worldliness and niggardliness should be banished from Israel, and "they should learn to fear the Lord their God always." The feast of Weeks and of the Tabernacles, when the families of Israel rejoiced before the Lord in the place which He chose, the WIDOW and the FATHERLESS were included. There was to be no affliction, no dependence, no sorrow in Israel (though the poor were not to cease out of the land) at these times. All were to rejoice before the Lord. And yet more in addition: "At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and lay it up within the gates. And the Levite, because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee, and the stranger, and the FATHERLESS, and the WIDOW, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied, that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest." And so important was obedience to this statute, that its profession was necessary in the confession of him who came to offer the basket of first-fruits, as a sign of his having come unto the land of his inheritance. "Then shalt thou say," proceeded the instruction of the priest, “before the Lord thy God, I have brought away the hallowed things out of mine house, and also have given them to the Levite and the stranger, and the FATHERless, and the widow, according to all thy commandments which thou hast commanded. I have not transgressed thy commandments, neither have I forgotten them" (Deut. xxvi. 12, 13).

Again, in Deut. xxiv. 17, it is not enough that we have already heard, "thou shalt not afflict them," under the

awful penalty of similar affliction from the hand of God, but prohibition as to the manner of that affliction is expressly pointed out. "Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the FATHERLESs, nor take a WIDOW's raiment to pledge." Why? Because they had no earthly friend to redeem the latter, or plead for the former. Weak and unguarded, they were exposed to all these evils, had not the Eternal, in His tender compassion, taken them under His own especial care; and, instead of compelling them to depend on the insecure tenure of man's compassion, or even justice, instituting laws for their benefit, the disobedience of which was sin unto Himself.

Had these laws been obeyed, it was impossible for the widow and the fatherless, however destitute they might have been left, to suffer mere worldly ills. The agony of the widowed wife could not be increased by the thought of how she was to provide for her fatherless little ones. The Lord was their guardian, and He gave her and her children the gentle care and affection of their brethren in Israel; bidding her cry unto Him in sorrow or affliction, for He would assuredly hear her cry, and punish those who called it forth.

What nation, then, what code, however just, however perfect, ever framed such laws as these? "What nation," in truth, "has God so near to them as Israel in all we call upon Him for?" Were no other laws relative to woman instituted, these alone would be sufficient to mark that their very weakness rendered them objects, even more than man, of compassion and love; for where has God provided for man as for woman in the desolation of her widowhood?

That modern Judaism cannot obey these laws now, as when they were given, interferes not with the fact of their institution itself. This very charge, reiterated, enforced, as it is, elevates woman, and excites towards her, not alone the humanity and tenderness, but the respect of man. How could he feel otherwise towards those whom

God Himself has promised to protect? What stronger incentive could he have to be forbearing and gentle towards her, and in no way to afflict her, than that if he failed in kindness, his wife should be widowed, his children fatherless? Where shall we find a law to disannul this, proceeding, as it does, from the mouth of God?

To the women of Israel at the present day, how inexpressibly consoling are these laws. In form they can no longer be obeyed; but, as in the case of the statutes relating to wives, it is the spirit pervading them which we must take to our hearts, till they swell in grateful thankfulness to Him who from His throne in heaven condescends to make widows His especial care. And He does so now as then. God is immutable-a Spirit of Truth, knowing not the shadow of a change; and, therefore, do we know and feel, that the same love from which issued those beautiful laws, actuates His dealings with His people now. It is vain, utterly vain, to say we are cast off, and therefore cannot claim it. The Bible teems with passages relating to our banishment alone, and to the Eternal's deep love borne towards us while in captivity, and consequently towards us now. We could multiply passages on passages, from the Pentateuch, Psalms, and Prophets, to prove this. But the very words already quoted from Jeremiah would be almost sufficient. When they were pronounced, the sins of Jerusalem were far

more heinous than those of Israel in her captivity. Yet even then God took the fatherless and the widow under His fostering care; separating them, for the innocence of the one, and the unprotected weakness of the other, from the mass of iniquity which desecrated Judea.

As concerns His compassion towards us now, we shall find them so distinctly, so clearly enforced in Leviticus xxiv., particularly from verse 40 to the end, and in the whole of Deuteronomy xxx., that to doubt and keep back, from a supposition of our inability to approach our God, and claim His love in our captivity, becomes actual guilt, and is likely not only to throw a wider and wider barrier between Him and ourselves, but to expose us more dangerously than any other temptation to the sophisms of the Nazarene, who, in mistaken kindness, would terrify us from our sole rock of refuge and strength, by insisting that, cast out from the Lord's favor as we are, nothing can save us from eternal perdition but the acceptance of their faith. The more solid sense and unimpassioned reason of man may, and do, effectually guard him from such danger; but woman's quicker feeling, and more easily blinded judgment, needs all the defence and rest in a divine love which the study of her own faith, and its manifold manifestations of the Eternal as a God of truth and love, alone can give. No argument is more likely to weigh with a strong-feeling, unguarded woman, knowing little or nothing but the mere formula of her own religion, than the idea, if pressed at a right moment, that the law of Moses is a law of fire and blood, given only to destroy, and that the religion of Jesus is one of love; that Jewish women can have no comfort in adversity, but that as Christians they will

find all they need: that in the one Faith they must feel themselves degraded, as in the other exalted and secure.

Now, without affecting actual creed at all, temptations like these, unless fully and faithfully convinced that we, as women of Israel, have privileges still higher, must on some dispositions fall with sufficient weight as so to confuse and entangle, that even belief is adopted ere we are at all aware of what we are about. We allude not to those whom reason only guides-who, cold, unimaginative, passionless themselves, laugh at feeling, because they know it not-who find philosophy always sufficient for their need. But the larger portion of women-creatures of mere feeling and impulse-we would beseech to come to the Word of God, and derive thence, in the days of youth and happiness, that peace, love, and consolation, which if unknown till "the evil days come, and the when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them," may be sought, from very blindness and wilfulness, in a stranger fold. The arguments we have quoted would fall to the ground by the simple answer, that as women of Israel, we have ALL we need; that God revealed His deep love to us ages before He became known to our Gentile sisters; that while we possess His blessed Word, we can never feel too unworthy to claim the tenderness He so proffers. He Himself has given us privileges in every relation and position in life which no other nation has, except as derived from us, and that, instead of fire and blood, the whole Jewish law to woman teems with

LOVE.

years

These feelings, inculcated in childhood, felt and experienced in riper years, will be sufficient for woman, and enable her to realise all the blessed consolation which