But this was a kind of human sacrifice by which, as God intended to shadow forth the true sacrifice of his Son, so the enemy of the human race, aping the Almighty, and taking advantage of and insult- ing the blindness of mankind and the horror of their troubled con- sciences, arising from a sense of the guilt of sin, influenced and com- pelled them to the performance of ceremonies of a similar kind.
There is no need that we should dwell on the third instance of this kind of sacrifices that occurs in the sacred writings, — namely, that of the king of Moab, during the siege of his city, offering up either his own son or the king of Edom's upon the wall, as he was a heathen and a worshipper of Saturn, according to the custom of the Phoenicians. Despairing of his situation, when it seemed to him that the city could no longer be defended, and when he had no hope of breaking through or of escaping, he offered his own son, in my
' The author here uses the words, " at least iutciiirctatively," before " so requiring it ;" meaning thereby, as I understand him, tl)at the just and proper interpretation of the passage wherein this liistory is recorded, and of the others quoted, relating to vows, had clearly determined him to adopt this opinion. — 'J^it.
2 That is, both of the .Jewish and Cliristian persuasion. — Tn.
3 Patriarch of Constanthiople in the year 520. — Tk.
* Iphianassa, as t)ie story says, was daughter of Preetus, king of the Argives, who pre- ferring herself in beauty to Jiuio, was struck with such a madness as to believe herself to be a cow, but was afterwards cured by Mclampus, a famous physician, to whom she was given in mari-iage. — Tn.
* Or, than the daughter of Jephthah. For Iphigenia, sec note on p. 532,
ON HUMAN SACRIFICES. 537
opinion (for the king of Edom had no first-horn to succeed him in the government, being himself only a deputy king), as a sacrifice to the gods of his country, to procure a deliverance. The three kings then departed from the city which they were besieging, God so di- recting it, either having entered into an agreement to that purjDose, or because of the war not being successfully ended (for the conjec- tures on this point are by no means satisfactory), some indignation having broke out among the troops of the Isi'aelites, who also them- selves were idolaters.^ See 2 Kings iii. 26, 27.
We shall conclude this train of testimonies with that noted account of the Rugiani, certain inhabitants of an island of Sclavonia, related by Albertus Crantzius, from which we may learn the dreadful judg- ment of God against a late superstition of Christians.
" Some preachers of the gospel of Christ" (who and what they were the historian shows) " converted the whole island of the Rugi- ani to the faith. Then they built an oratory in honour of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and in memory of St Vitus, patron of Corveia. But after, by divine permission, matters were changed, and the Rugiani fell off from the faith, having instantly expelled the priests and Christians, they converted their religion into superstition;^ for they worship St Vitus, whom we acknowledge as a martjo* and servant of Christ, as God. Nor is there any barbarous people under heaven that more dread Christians and priests; whence also, in pe- culiar honour of St Vitus, they have been accustomed to sacrifice yearly any Christian that may accidentally fall into their hands." A more horrible issue of Christianity sinking into superstition would, perhaps, be difficult to be found. But we are now tired of dwelling on such horrid rites and abominable sacrifices. Forasmuch, then, as we ourselves are the offspring of those who were wholly polluted with such sacrifices, and by nature not better or wiser than they, but only, through the rich, free, and unspeakable mercy of God, have been
^ Dr Gill agrees with our author that the king of Moab sacrificed his own son, and thinks that he might be induced to otfer him thus publicly on the wall, that it might be seen by the camp of Israel, and move their compassion ; but rather that he did it as a religious action, to appease the Deity by a human sacrifice ; and that it was offered either to the tnie God, in imitation of Abraham, or to his idol Chemosh, the sun. It was usual with the heathens, particularly the Phoenicians, when in calamity and distress, to offer up what was most dear and valuable to them. See p. 527. Dr Gill seems of opinion that the cause why the three kings broke up the siege was, that after this bar- barous and shocking sacrifice the Moabites became quite desperate, and that the kings, seeing them resolved to sell their lives so dear, and to hold out to the last man, thought fit to raise the siege ; a very natural explication of these words, " And there was great indignation against Israel," if the indignation be understood as applicable only to the Moabites. But the concluding sentence of our author on this subject seems to imply it to be his opinion, that there were also dissensions and indignation in the allied army ; perhaps between the Edomites, the idolatrous Israelites, and the worshippers of the true God, arising from the horrid spectacle they had witnessed. This is only ventured as a conjecture, that may better account for the sudden departure of the kings. — Te.