hibited the alienation of it to idolatrous uses. It is proper to add, that as tithes were a branch of the Hebrew theocracy, which has long since been abolished; and as the gospel no where enjoins the payment of them to christian magistrates and bishops; the latter have no divine right to this tribute; though they may justly claim a liberal support from those, to whose service they are devoted.

Our fifth and last question is this-Was not the union of civil and spiritual jurisdiction in the Jewish priesthood an impolitic arrangement? Did it not clothe this order of men with a power dangerous to the freedom and property of the people? This question has been artfully magnified into a formidable objection by some deistical writers, particularly by Dr, Morgan, who wrote about seventy years since, and whose falsehoods have been echoed by more recent authors. But it is sufficient to reply, that the supreme power of the nation, under God, was constitutionally vested, not in the Levites, nor even in the high priest, but in Moses, in conjunction with a senate and a popular assembly. The inferior judges, and the seventy elders appointed to assist Moses, were chosen out of all the tribes ;* and all the Jews agree that the Sanhedrim or supreme judiciary consisted not merely of ecclesiastics, but of persons in any of the tribes, who had a competent knowledge of the law. The Levites were equally subject to the magistrate and the law, as the other citizens. The judges were required impartially to decide on all causes and persons. They were commanded to take a criminal even from the altar, and put him to death; that is, as eminent Jewish commentators interpret it, they were to take a criminal priest, or even high priest, though actually ministering at the altar, and doom

• Numbers xi. 16, &c,

him to death. The priests had no interests separate from, much less hostile to that of their brethren. The constitution guarded them, as we have seen, against an accu'mulation of landed property. They could not be enriched by pecuniary presents in a country which afforded so little money; nor could any gifts of this kind produce an annual increase of revenue, because putting out money to usury was forbidden by the law. Their participation of civil power was confined chiefly to courts of justice. Their leisure and knowledge of the laws rendered their assistance in these courts convenient and proper. But the exercise of this office yielded little or no personal emolument. It conferred but a small portion of power. A large majority, who shared it were not Levites. Of course this order could draw from it very little wealth or dominion. The Levites were not sole judges in any court. They formed a small minority of any assembly, whether judicial or legislative, provincial or national.

Their interest as a tribe must have engaged them to avoid and to prevent all party ambition and animosity; because every factious disturbance in the state tended to lessen their own revenue or yearly dividend, by diminishing either the produce of the territory, or the regular payment of their dues.

Thus the Levitical constitution precluded every incitement to covetous and ambitious views in the priesthood. It also rendered the accomplishment of such views impracticable. Nor could the body of the Levites execute any similar plot to increase their own wealth and importance; for in order to this, they must set aside two capital articles of the constitution; one of which prohibited alienation of landed property; the other, interest on money. If a power of repealing the constitution, framed

by God himself, had even been vested in the local or national assemblies; yet the Levites, who had so little share in them, could never procure such a repeal in their own favor against the general interests of the people. Nor could they attain this object by force; for they were not only comparatively few, and scattered over the community, but their religious functions barred them from military discipline and skill, and even from the possession of arms. They had not one person of knowledge and experience in these matters to conduct them, and were surrounded by an armed, trained, and officered militia, above ten times more numerous than themselves, and ready at short warning to suppress any insurrection, which threatened their freedom or property. Accordingly no instance occurs in the long history of the Hebrews of any such effort on the part of the Levites. Amid the frequent changes and even revolutions in their gov. ernment, this order never appeared either to have originated, or assisted, or profited by any of them. The grand revolution under Jeroboam, by which ten tribes revolted from the house of David, was so far from being a plot of the priests, or conducive to their advantage, that it was a fatal blow to their constitutional privileges. It stripped them of above three fourths of their revenue, as well as degraded them from their office and dignity in the revolted tribes.

I thought it necessary to be particular on this subject, that you might be convinced of the ignorance or malice of a favorite objection against the Jewish constitution, and might join with me in admiring its excellent provisions against ecclesiastical, as well as political oppression.

I cannot close without adding, that the same remark eminently applies to the civil and religious constitutions

of these United States, especially to the institutions and habits of New England. These institutions and habits. render our clergy so dependent on the people for their support, so united to them by interest and affection, as well as by duty, and at the same time so effectually close against them every avenue to great worldly wealth and dominion, as to preclude this order from seeking, and much more from accomplishing any object inconsistent with the general freedom and prosperity. For our christian leaders to conspire against the people would be not only to contradict and stifle the whole spirit of their religion and office, but to wage destructive war against themselves and their families, against the sources of their own temporal comfort and even existence. Can you

possibly believe that the body of our clergy are such desperadoes and monsters? If on some political occasions they think and act differently from many of their parishioners, does not candor and even common sense oblige us to suppose, that they would not thus risk their popularity and subsistence, unless compelled to do it by conscientious motives? In short, the situation of our spiritual guides, abstracted from their moral characters, is so analogous to that of the antient Jewish priests, as to lay them under a happy necessity of seeking the temporal, as well as eternal good of their people. I have made. these remarks with the friendly design of preventing or extinguishing in your minds those prejudices against gospel teachers, which have a most unfavorable aspect upon religion itself, and consequently upon the dearest interests of our country.

Y

LECTURE XVI.

The nature and design of the prophetic office.

THE next religious order of men among the

Hebrews were the Prophets. This appellation strictly denotes a person inspired with a knowledge of secret, especially of future things, and commissioned to publish them to others. In a more lax sense it designates a person eminently devoted to religious studies and exercises. Thus this title is given to the sacred musicians, who with their voices or instruments sung the praises of God; these are said to prophesy with harps, with psalteries, and with cymbals. Agreeably, the heathen poets, who sung or formed verses in celebration of their gods, were styled by the Romans vates or prophets; which is synonimous with the Greek noun go@nrns, which St. Paul applies to Epimenides, the Cretan poet.* This use of the term, as a learned writer observes, may throw light upon those words in the first epistle to the Corinthians, which speak of a woman's publicly praying or prophesying. Prophesying here cannot be understood in the highest or most proper sense; because this same epistle forbids women to instruct or even to speak in the church. They may indeed be said to pray in public, as they silently join with the minister, as the mouth of the congregation; but they cannot be said to preach or to prophesy, merely as they attend to his preaching or message, because in this he represents, not his audience, but the Deity. Female prophesying therefore in this passage probably signifies the same act, which we have just stated, viz. praising