Deut. xiii. 6 — 11. If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the ivife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him ; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him; but thou shalt surely kill him ; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die ; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is among you.
THERE is a striking difference between the laws of man and the laws of God : those which are framed by human legislators, proportion always the sanctions to the influence which crimes have upon the public welfare : whereas those enacted by our heavenly Lawgiver, mark with greater severity the evils which more immediately affect his own honour and glory. If one man robbed or maimed another, his law re- quired only a four-fold restitution, or the infliction of a punishment precisely similar to the injury sus- tained : but if a man, even the dearest relative they had, should only propose to any of his people to wor- ship another god in preference to Jehovah, he must instantly be brought before the magistrates, and, on conviction of the offence, be stoned to death.
It will be proper to consider this ordinance in a two-fold view ; I. As a temporary enactment —
This enactment, or law, appears at first sight to be severe : but we undertake to shew that it was, 1. Just, as it respected the individual — [The greatest crimes against any human government are