HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vers. 1~8.-The bastinado. Professor W.R. Smitlt ('Old Testament,' p. 376) regards this law of stripes as indicating a late date for Deuteronomy. He argues from the customs of the free Bedouins. But it is perilous to reason from the customs of the Bedouins to the punishments in voguo among a people who had li,ed some centuries in Egypt, where, as is well-known, the bastinado was in constant use. The sculptures at Beni-Haesan represent the very scene here described. We learn- 396 THE BOOR OF DEUTERONOMY. [cu. xtv. 1-19,
I. THAT IT IB TUE FUNCTION OF CIVIL MAGISTRATES TO PUNISH CRIME. ~Vcrs. 1, 2.) The~· bear the sword for this purpose (Rom. xiv. 4; 1 Pet. ii. 14). 'l he modern humnnitarian spirit bmds to exalt the reformatory and preventive ends of punishment, nt the expense of the retributive. That every effort should be put forth for the reformation of the criminal ,vhich the case admits of, we cordially allow, Bnt the danger is, in these matters, that sentiment degenerate into sentimentalism. Crime de,serves punishment, and on that gronnd alone, were there no other, ought to receive it. No theory can be satisfactory which loses sight of retribution, and makes reforma- tion and prevention the all in all. II. 'l'HAT PENALTms OUGHT TO BE SUFFICIENTLY SEVERE. (Ver. 2.) To be effective in early stages of cil"ilization, penalties must be severe, prompt, and specific enough to be vi,·idly conceived ( cf. ll. Spencer's 'Essays:' 'Prison Ethics'). 'l'he progress of society admits of the substitution of punishments appealing to a higher class of sensibilities, But even these ought adequately to express the measure of the crimino.l's desert. If Mr. Spencer were right, the slightest restraint compatible with the safety of the community, combined with compulsory self-support, would be punishment sufficient for the greatest crimes. The sense of justice in mankind rejects such ideas. Carlyle's teaching in ' Model Prisons' is healthier than this. III. 'l'HAT PEKALTIES OUGHT TO DE MEASURED, (Ver. 3.) It is difficult to believe that in our own country, at the beginning of this century, tbe theft of five shillings from the person was a crime punishable by death. Yet the statute-book bristled with enactments, of which, unhappily, this was not the worst. Such outrageous dispropor- tion between crime and punishment must have robbed the law's sentences of most of their moral effect. Anomalies exist still, which it would be to any statesman's credit to endeavour to remove. IV. THAT PEKALTIES SHOULD NOT DI!: UNDULY DEGRADING. (Ver. 3.) Lest "thy brother should seem vile nnto thee." The effect of excessive severity is to harden, degrade, dehumanize. It often drives the criminal to desperation. As a victim of the older criminal code expressed it, "A man's heart is taken from him, and there is given to him the heart of a beast." The tendency in moderil'fecling is toward the abolition of corporal punishments entirely, as degrading alike to him who administers them, and to those by whom they are endured. Observe: 1. The profound idea on which the law rested. The body, part of human nature, and sharing its dignity as made in God's illlllge. 2. The best laws may be unjustly and cruelly administered (2 Cor. xi. 24, 25).-J. 0. Ver. 4.-The oxen. The apostle draws from this passage the general principle that the labourer is entitled to eat ;of the fruits of bis labour (1 Cor. ix. 9, 10). His application teaches us to look for similar general principles wrapped up in other precepts of the Law. We learn- I. ANDIALS ARE ENTITLED TO GENEROUS TREATMENT. The ox that trod out the corn was not to be muzzled. He was to be permitted to eat of the fruits of his work. Kindness to animals is a duty : 1. Wn.ich man owes to the creatures. Severe moralists, arguing that animals, being destitute of reason, are also destitute of rights, would bring all man's duties towards them under the head of duties to himself (e.g. Kant), Alford thinh this to be implied in Paul's language. But Paul's argument, if it is to "be pressed in this connection, rather implies the contrary. It recognizes in the ox, 011 the ground of its being a labourer, a kind of right to be provided for. All that the 1postle affirms is that the precept bad an end beyond the reference to oxen, that the "care for oxen" was subordinate to the inculcation of a principle of general application. Our duty to the creatures rests on the ground that they are sentient beings, capable of pain and pleasure, and on the law of love, which requires us to diffuse happiness, and avoid inflicting needless suffering. 2. WMch man owes to himself. For this vie_w, while not the whole of the truth, is an important part of it. Leibnitz, in a email treatise written for the education of a prince, advised that, during youth, he should not be permitted to torment or give pain to any living thing, lest, by indulging the spirit of cruelty, he should contract a want of feeling for his fellow-men. Alford says, "The go~ done to a man's immortal spirit by acts of humanity and justice infinitely out- weighs the mere physical comfort of_ a brute which perishes," CJ!, XXV, 1-19.] THE BOOK OF DEUTERONOMY. 397