II, THE IIUMAN LABOURER 18 ENTITLED TO SHARE IN THE PROFITS OF HIS LABOURS. 'l'hcoretically, he does so every time he is paid wages. In tbo distribution of the fruits of production, tho part which the labourer gets, we !Lre told, is wages, the share of the landowner is i·ent, tbat of the capitaliMt is interest, and the Government takes taxes. Practically, however, wages are settled, not by abstract rules of fairness, but by competition, which may press so hard upon the labourer as (Lill things right themselves) to deprive him of his fair proportion of industrial profits. The wage system is far from working satisfactorily, As society advances, it appears to be leading to an increasing amount of bitterness and friction. Masters and men represent opposin" interests, and stand, as it were, at daggers drawn. It is easier to see the evil than t~ devise a cure., Economists (Mill, Jevons, etc.) seem to look mainly in the direction of some form of co-operation. Their schemes are principally two: 1. Industrial co-operation. 2. Industrial partnerships-the system according to which a fixed proportion of profits is assigned for division amongst the workmen engaged in pro- duction. Ill. MINISTERS OF THE GOSPEL ARE ENTITLED TO BE SUPPORTED BY THEIR FLOCKS. This is the application made by Paul (1 Cor. ix.; et. Matt. x. 10-12; Gal. vi. 6). Christian ministers, labouring in spiritual things, and by that work withdrawn from ordinary avocations, are to be cheerfully supported. The text applies to this case more strictly than to the case of workmen claiming to participate in profits. The workman claims but his own. The right of the minister to support is of a different kind. He labours in things spiritual, but, it is to be hoped, with a higher end than the mere obtaining of a livelihood. While, therefore, bis support is a duty, it is, like duties of benevolence generally, not one that can be enforced by positive law. The right to support is a moral, not a legal one. It creates an obligation, but, as moralists say, an indeterminate obligation. It is an obligation to be freely accepted, and as freely discharged.-J. 0. Vers. 5-10.-The levirate law. At the root of this law, which obtained widely in the East, we find ideas and feelings such as these- I. RESPECT FOR THE HONOUR OF THE FAMILY. In the East, as is well known, childlessness is reckoned a calamity, almost a disgrace. Hence, as well as for other reasons, the severity of the law in ver. ll. Hence also this cnstom of marrying a brother's widow, in order to raise up seed to the brother. The motive is plaiuly to avert disgrace from a brother's house, to wipe out his reproach, to hand down his name in honour. We may respect the feeling while repudiating the form in which it embodied itself. What touches the credit of our families ought to be felt to concern ourselves. Not in the sense, certainly, of leading us to uphold that credit at the expense of truth and of justice to others; but in the sense of doing everything we can with a good conscience to maintain or redeem it. II. DESIRE FOR A PERPETUATED NAME. The men of the old dispensation, as Matthew Henry says, not having so clear and certain a prospect of living themselves on the other side death as we have now, were the more anxious to live in their posterity. The principle is the same at bottom as that which leads us to wish for personal immortality. What man desires is perpetuated existence, of which existence in one's posterity is a kind of shadow, affording, in contemplation, a like "shadow of satisfaction" to the mind. Positivism, in falling back from a personal to a corporate immortality, is thus a movement in the wrong direction. 'l'he exchange it proposes is the substance for the shadow. '!'he desire to exist in the remembrance of posterity, and to be well thoughi; of by them, is, however, a legitimate principre of action. It should operate in leading u~ to live good and useful lives, which is the secret of the only lasting honour. "Only the notions of the just Swell sweet 1Lnd blossom in the dust."
Ill. 'l'HE DISGRACE ATTACHING TO REFUSAL OF THE DUTIES IMPOSED ON US BY RELATIONSHIP TO THE DEAD. 'l'he disgrace in this case was emphatically marked (vers. 9, 10). 'l'he wishes of the dead should be very sacre<l to us. The duties which ,;_pring from the bond of relationship, or_from express request, should, if possible, bu 1198 THE BOOK OF DEUTERONOMY. [OH, XXV, 1-19,
faid1fully disclmrged, Aiding in the settlement of affairs, seeing provision made for a widol\· and children, accepting and folfilling trusts, eto.--J. 0 .