holy, for I am holy;" and "What does the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" could never have been borrowed from any heathen system of religion. The writings of Moses, and of the prophets that succeeded him, are in these respects a great original.

(3.) Nowhere in all the heathen world could Moses have heard of such a sublime worship as that which he introduced. The Hebrews alone had one single object of their worship, one altar, one precise ritual, one only place for the meeting of the whole nation at the great public festivals. In no other country in the world were the public festivals instituted in commemoration of such great events, respecting their history and the Divine origin of their religion. It is also peculiar to this nation, that directions for the celebration of them were reduced to writing at the time of their institution, so that there never could be any uncertainty about the origin or the reasons of them. These festivals were three; the Passover, or their deliverance from their state of servitude in Egypt, when the first-born of all the Egyptians were destroyed, and all theirs preserved; the Pentecost, or the giving of the Law from Mount Sinai; and the Feast of Tabernacles, in commemoration of their living in tents or booths during their travels through the Wilderness.

No heathen festivals were so well adapted to important events as these. The festivals of the heathens were numerous and perplexing; the origin and reasons of their institution were uncertain, and none of them were to answer any important moral purpose. The heathen festivals were also in general celebrated in a manner the most disgusting to modesty and common sense; and those of Greece were chiefly borrowed from Egypt. Why did not Moses the same? Such acts would, no doubt, have been acceptable to his people, naturally prone to sin like others; and this is evident from his own history of the Israelites joining in the worship of Baal Peor. So far, however, was the Jewish legislator from yielding to such compromising suggestions, that in the place of the infamous rites and orgies inseparable from Egyptian festivals, the Jewish festivals were united with inviolable principles of morality, which were constituted solemn acts of religion, and, in their purport and manner of observation, perfectly distinguished the Israelitish congregations from the other families of mankind.

(4.) In no other country was the place and other circumstances of the public worship so well calculated to inspire a profound respect for the object of it as among the Hebrews. No heathen temple could be compared with the temple of Solomon, or even the tabernacle of Moses, erected in the Wilderness, designed only for temporary use, and portable. The dress and office of the high-priest, and the whole of the ceremonials annexed to the priesthood, were in the highest degree striking and impressive, and far beyond anything of the kind in the heathen world.

When the nation was in the wilderness, even then an order and solemnity were observed, for which there was no precedent. The place of the tabernacle was in the centre, each of the twelve tribes had its prescribed place on the north or south, the east or west, side of it. The Levites had their station nearest to it, and were employed in taking it down, carrying, or erecting it. They were not, however, allowed to touch the most sacred utensils, this duty remained solely with the priests. To them also exclusively appertained the carrying the ark; the place of which was the Holy of Holies, and over which was the place where the immediate presence of God was manifested.

How different from this were the most solemn proces

sions of the heathens, when they carried the images of their gods from place to place, generally at least in the East, on the idea of giving them an airing, or amusing them with an excursion from their temples! In time of public danger, they made a public feast in the temples, and the statues of the gods were brought in rich beds with pillows, and placed in the most honourable parts of the temple, as the principal guests.

The ark of the Hebrews was never removed on any such ideas as these. It contained no image to which such an excursion or entertainment could apply; and, after the building of the Temple, it was never on any occasion removed out of it. Before this it had, by the order of God, been carried by the priests to the brink of the river Jordan, the waters of which were divided as their feet touched them; and on some solemn occasions it was permitted to be carried as a token of the Divine presence; and from the wonders thus wrought, the Hebrews must have had a much higher idea of the object of their worship, than any of the heathen could have of theirs.

(5.) Sacrificing was a mode of worship more ancient than idolatry, and instituted, as there are the strongest reasons to believe, by the Deity himself, as soon as the guilt of man made such an offering necessary. But this universal practice was greatly corrupted by the heathen, who introduced superstitious customs, thus teaching the worshippers to reverence and fear the creature rather than the Creator, all of which were excluded from the religion of the Hebrews; while their sacrifices assumed a greatness, and excited an elevated hope, by manifesting that they were the pattern of heavenly things, and shadows of good things to come, when "a body should be prepared for Him who was the substance of them all."

We read of nothing among the heathen from which Moses could take such distinctions of offering, as we read of in his institutions, the burnt offerings, sin offerings, peace offerings, or of the heaving or waving of them. These, therefore, he could not borrow from them. These positive institutions, by which the people were thus disciplined, Christian believers now know, and the whole Jewish nation might know, answered a Divine purpose, and as a schoolmaster brought the worshippers to Christ.

The belief of a future state, though not explicitly taught by Moses, is yet in his writings presupposed as a generally adopted article of religion. From the circumstance of the promise of temporal blessings being principally, if not entirely, annexed to the laws of Moses, Bishop Warburton attempted to deduce an argument in support of his Divine mission, which was, that the omission of the mention of a future state can be satisfactorily accounted for; another argument is, that the writings of Moses show that he himself believed in a future state. These two propositions, the former of which is in unison with the opinion of Warburton, the latter at variance with him, appear to be very satisfactorily established by the luminous reasoning of Dr. Graves. Instead of employing the omission of the doctrine as a medium, by which to prove that a Divine interposition was necessary for the erection and maintenance of Judaism, he first exhibits the reality of a Divine interposition, and then that the omission in question, so far from being inconsistent with the Divine origin of the system, does, in fact, necessarily result from the peculiar nature of the dispensation, and from the character of the people to whom it was given. The polytheistic principle of tutelary deities maintained that their worship attended with a national prosperity. The futility of this it was the intention of God to display by open and une

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quivocal demonstrations of his own omnipotence. The moral government of Jehovah was to be exhibited on the earth by the theocracy which He established. Its very nature required temporal sanctions, and their immediate enforcement; its object could not be attained by waiting till the invisible realities of a future state should be unveiled. The previous exhibition of such a moral government was the best preparation for the full revelation of man's future destiny, and of the means provided for his welfare in it. "Life and immortality were thus to be fully brought to light by the Gospel." As yet the bulk of mankind were unprepared for it, and were better fitted to comprehend, and be influenced by, sensible manifestations of the Divine judgments, than by the remoter doctrine of a future state of retribution. In the Books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, there are various enactments against diviners, enchanters, and those who profess to know the future by consulting either familiar spirits or the spirits of the departed. All these superstitions suppose the belief of spirits, and the doctrine of the existence of souls after death; and Moses would not have prohibited the consulting of them by express laws, if he had not been apprehensive that the Hebrews, after the example of the neighbouring heathen nations, would have abused the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, which was universally received among them. Severe, however, as these laws were, they did not entirely repress this abuse; for the Psalmist reproaches the Israelites with having eaten the sacrifices of the dead, that is, sacrifices offered to the manes of the dead. (Psalm 106. 28.) Saul likewise affords an instance of this superstition. After he had cut off those that had familiar spirits, and the wizards out of the land, (1Sam. 28. 3,9,) having in vain consulted Jehovah respecting the issue of his approaching conflict with the Philistines, he went in quest of a woman that had a familiar spirit, and commanded her to evoke the soul of the prophet. This circumstance clearly shows that Saul and the Israelites believed in the immortality of the soul.

The repression of idolatry among the Hebrews was one great object of the Law; this throws light on many of the precepts and injunctions which would otherwise be unmeaning. Many of these injunctions must probably always remain obscure, from our ignorance of the idolatrous practices to which they refer. Maimonides, in his More Nevochim, acquaints us with many superstitions and practices of the ancient idolators which were understood to have been aimed at by particular injunctions and prohibitions of the Mosaic law. Professor Jahn remarks, "Since God was the sovereign of Palestine and its inhabitants, the commission of idolatry by any inhabitant of the country, even by a foreigner, was a defection from the true king. It was in fact treason; it was considered a crime equal to that of murder, and was consequently attended with the severest punishment. Whoever even encouraged idolatry was considered seditious, and was obnoxious to the same punishment. Incantations, necromancy, and other practices of a similar nature, were considered equally nefarious with idolatry itself, and deserving an equal punishment. Any one who knew a person to be guilty of idolatry was bound by the law to accuse that person before the judge, although the criminal were a wife, a brother, a daughter,

or a son.

"The Law, with the penalty attached to it, as we may learn from other sources, had reference only to overt acts of idolatry; it was rather a civil than a religious statute; and the judge who took cognizance of the crime, whilst he had a right to decide upon the deed, the undeniable act, in any given instance, evidently

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went beyond his promise if he undertook to decide upon the thoughts and feelings of a person implicated, independently of any overt commission of the crime.

"It has been observed that the Law was not so much a religious as a civil one. The distinction is obvious. A religious law has reference to the feelings; and those laws, consequently, which command us to love God, to believe in Him, and to render Him a heartfelt obedience, are of this nature. It should be remarked that the severe treatment of idolatry, of which we have given a statement, was demanded by the state of society at that period, when each nation selected its deity, not from the dictates of conscience, but from the hope of temporal aid. It was an age when idolaters were very numerous, and when nothing but the utmost severity of the laws could prevent them from contaminating the soil of the Hebrews."

It is not our intention here to enter upon a discussion of the various branches of the Mosaic law; this would occupy too much space for the limits assigned to the present work, and besides, we should unavoidably be going over the same ground twice, as, in the alphabetical form, most of the subjects are given under their respective terms. The reader, by turning to the APPENDIX, will find a table of the Jewish Law, divided into three classes. The first is the Moral Law, containing the ten commandments. The second is the Ceremonial Law, reduced under its several heads. The third is the Political Law, having reference to the state of society which then prevailed. The various topics enumerated under these heads will be found noticed in alphabetical order in the body of the work.

In reference to the question whether there are types in the laws of Moses, Professor Jahn remarks,—

“That there are historical and moral types in the laws of Moses, is evident from the Passover, and from the Feast of Tabernacles, also from the rite of circumcision, and the golden plate on the mitre of the high-priest'; for a typical import is expressly assigned to these last by Moses himself. But whether there are to be found in the writings of Moses what are termed prophetical types, has been a subject of very great controversy. We see in the discussions which have arisen upon this subject the tendency of men to rush from one extreme to another; and because types of this kind were formerly too. much multiplied, the wisdom of men in later days has taken upon it boldly to deny the existence of any such types at all. One thing, however, appears to be certain, that the whole Mosaic discipline, taken in connexion with the promises made to the patriarchs, was not only introduced to preserve and transmit the true religion, but implied and intimated something better to come. Those better times were not hidden from the sight of the prophets, and after, from age to age, they formed the subject of their predictions. But express and insulated types of Christ, or the Christian church, known to be such by the ancient Hebrews, do not appear to be found in the laws of Moses. Still it is a question worthy of further investigation than has hitherto been bestowed upon it, whether God, through the instrumentality of Moses, did not so far order certain events and ceremonies, that they should be discovered to be typical at the coming of Christ, and in this way facilitate the conversion of the Jews to the Christian religion."

Dr. Wait likewise remarks upon this subject:-“ If we advert to the internal structure of the Law, which was accommodated to the temporary circumstances of the Israelites, restricted as it was, from the nature of the times and the genius of the people, who were thus appointed the guardians of God's truth and oracles, it will appear most eminently adapted to the preservation

of the more ancient promises and revelations, and in every way fitted to be the connecting medium between the patriarchal economy and the Gospel. Its very deficiencies contained indications that the end of its institutions remained to be accomplished; its obscurities intimated that its object and intent would hereafter be plenarily disclosed. Its whole catalogue of ceremonies was so constructed that, surrounded as the Hebrews were by nations who veiled their esoteric faith in external symbols or hieroglyphical devices, it was impossible they should not have directed the inquirer, even at the time when they were confining him to the pure worship of the One Eternal God, to have sought in them a hidden and fuller signification; and if at any time, observant of the depravity of the Canaanite, or inquisitive concerning the superstitions of the house of bondage, the Israelite might have been induced to compare his legislative code with the laws of other communities, he must have perceived that it had proceeded beyond the civilization of the rest of the world: and could not have failed to have remarked that it ranked above all others in a permanent distinction, that bearing the impress of a Divine revelation, it contained provisions for the future, and prefigured, in its whole body of services, a far more expansive, although distant, communication from God to man; and although these evidences were dispersed though the whole economy, they may nevertheless be said to have been more especially comprised in the types, which rendered the sacrifices, oblations, and expiations, figurative of Him in whom they were ordained to receive their completion in the fulness of time: and as they supplied the student of Moses with the requisites to identify the true Messiah at his appearance, and established a union between the two Testaments, which then evinced both to be revealed by the same Allwise Being, so they doubtless compensated to the Israelites for the absence of those mysteries and secret rites which the Gentiles had engrafted on theology, and which even the divinely-taught Hebrew appears, from his numerous defections and his endless propensity to idolatry, to have required.”

The term Law is used in Scripture with considerable latitude of meaning; and in order to ascertain its precise import in any particular place, it is necessary to regard the

and connexion of the passage in which it occurs. scope Thus, for instance, it sometimes denotes the whole revealed will of God as communicated to us in his word. In this sense it is generally used in the Book of Psalms. Sometimes it is taken for the Mosaic institution as distinguished from the Gospel. (Matt. 11. 13; John 1. 17; Acts 25. 8.) Hence we frequently read of the law of Moses as expressive of the whole religion of the Jews. (Heb. 9. 19; 10. 28.) Sometimes it is used in a more restricted sense, for the ritual or ceremonial observances

of the Jewish religion. In this sense the Apostle speaks

of "the law of commandments contained in ordinances," (Eph. 2. 15; Heb. 10. 1;) and which, being only "a shadow of good things to come," Christ abolished by his death, and so in effect destroyed the ancient distinction between Jew and Gentile. (Gal. 3. 17.) It is often used to signify the decalogue, or the ten commandments which were delivered to the Israelites from Mount Sinai. It is in this acceptation of the term that Our Lord declares he came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it, (Matt. 5. 17,) and he explains its import as requiring perfect love to God and man. (Luke 10. 27.) It is in reference to this view that St. Paul affirms, "By the deeds of the law shall no flesh living be justified; for by the law is the knowledge of sin." (Rom. 3. 20.) The language of this Law is, "The soul that sinneth it shall die," and "Cursed is every one that continueth not

in all things that are written (or required) in the book of the law to do them." (Gal. 3. 10.) To deliver from this penalty "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.” (Gal. 3. 13.) The Law in this sense was not given that men should obtain righteousness or justification by it, but to convince them of sin, and to show them their need of a Saviour.

The term Law also denotes the rule of good and evil, or of right and wrong, revealed by the Creator and inscribed on the consciences of mankind, and therefore binding upon them by Divine authority. That such a law was implanted in man appears from the traces it has left, which are still extant in every man. It is from these common notions, handed down by tradition, though often imperfect and perverted, that the heathens themselves distinguished right from wrong by which "they were a law unto themselves. Which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing, or else excusing one another." (Rom. 2. 12-15.)

LAWYERS, voμikol. This term in the Jewish sense was applied to those persons who were interpreters and teachers of the Mosaic law, particularly of the traditionary or oral law. Lawyers and scribes appear to be synonymous terms, implying one and the same order of men, as St. Matthew in 22. 35, calls him a lawyer whom St. Mark (12. 28,) designates as a scribe.. Dr. Macknight conjectures the scribes to have been the public expounders of the Law, and that the lawyers studied it in private, or, as Dr. Lardner supposes, taught in the schools. This is the general opinion of commen-tators, but M. Basnage maintains that the lawyers were a distinct class or sect of men who adhered closely to the text of the Law, and totally disregarded all traditions, and that they were the same as the modern Karaites.

LAYING ASIDE EVERY WEIGHT. This form of expression occurs in Hebrews 12. 1, where the "WhereApostle exhorts the Christian in these terms: fore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that doth so easily beset us, and let us run with The athletæ patience the race that is set before us." took care to dismember their bodies of every article of clothing which could in any manner hinder or incommode them. The pugilists at first used a belt, with an apron or scarf fastened to it, but this was at length laid aside. In the foot race they were anxious to carry as little weight as possible, and uniformly stripped themselves of all such clothes as by their weight, length, or otherwise, might entangle or retard them in the course.

The Olympic games generally opened with races, and. were celebrated at first with no other exercise. The lists or course where the athletæ exercised themselves in

running, was at first but one stadium in length, or about

six hundred feet; and from this measure it took its name, and was called the stadium, whatever might be its extent. This in the language of St. Paul, speaking of the Christian's course, was the "race which was set fully measured. On each side of the stadium and its before them," determined by public authority and care

extremity ran an ascent or kind of terrace, covered with seated, an innumerable multitude collected from all seats and benches, upon which the spectators wereparts of Greece, to which the Apostle thus alludes in his figurative description of the Christian life. See GAMES

I. LAZARUS, was the name of the brother of Martha and Mary, whom Jesus loved. Nothing is recorded of his life, except that he resided at Bethany, when he was miraculously raised from the dead. The circumstances of this miracle are minutely detailed in the eleventh chapter of the Gospel by St. John; and upon it, a modern writer makes the following remarks:-“ The scene was not laid in Jerusalem, where the minds of men might be supposed to be held in awe, or biassed by power, where the miracle might be charged with ostentation, and where personal prejudices were triumphant; nor was it laid in a desert, where there might be suspicion of deceit, but at the distance of only two short miles from Jerusalem.

"The precise time of Christ's arrival at Bethany is a circumstance that must be viewed in the same light. His coming so late destroys all suspicion of any concert. It gave his enemies an opportunity of observing the whole transaction; as the season was, of all others, the fittest for finding access to their minds. By this time, the sisters of Lazarus were receiving the consolatory visits of their neighbours and friends: many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother. Jesus himself approaches, and mingles with the company as a mourner and friend. When Jesus, therefore, saw the Jews also weeping, who had followed Mary out of the house, he groaned in spirit and was troubled. He was under no necessity of affecting the appearance of sorrow, for he felt it-Jesus wept; and the reality both of his sympathy and sorrow did not fail to make him an object of regard. Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him. Everything concurred to excite expectation and scrutiny from the malice of some of the Jews who were present, which caused them to insinuate a defect in the power or goodness of Jesus. Some of them said, Could not this man, which opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died?

"At length they arrive at the grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it, which Jesus commanded to be removed, for he exerted his miraculous power only in cases where second causes were inadequate. This stone might be removed by the hand of man; therefore Jesus ordered it to be removed. This circumstance would excite the greater attention, as the objection felt by Martha to the execution of this command most evidently shows, that death had indubitably taken place; and from the time he had been buried, especially under the influence of so warm a climate, it is certain that those changes of mortality must have passed upon the frame to which she alluded. No human means, however, could raise Lazarus: Jesus, therefore, interposed his miraculous power; and after a short prayer, which was expressly intended for the spectators, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth! And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot, with grave clothes. That all present might have the fullest conviction of the reality of the miracle which had thus been wrought, Jesus commanded them to loose him and let him go. The question has been asked, How could a man come out of a grave who was bound hand and foot? To this inquiry of the unbeliever a satisfactory answer may be returned. We learn from Josephus, and travellers who have visited Palestine, that the Jewish sepulchres were generally caves or rooms hewn out of rocks. The Jews, therefore, as they did not make use of coffins in burying their dead, generally placed their bodies in niches cut into the sides of these caves or rooms. This form of the Jewish sepulchres affords an easy solution of the supposed difficulty. The Evangelist does not mean to say that Lazarus walked out of the sepulchre;

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but that, lying on his back in a niche or cell, he raised himself into a sitting posture, and then, putting his legs over the edge of his niche or cell, slid down and stood upright on the floor. All this he might do, notwithstanding his arms were swathed with rollers, after the custom of his countrymen. Accordingly, when he thus came forth, Jesus commanded them to loose him and let him go, which circumstance plainly indicates that the Evangelist knew that Lazarus could not walk till he was unbound.

"The witnesses of this miracle are likewise to be considered. Though some of those who had come to mourn with the sisters of Lazarus were the friends of Christ and his Apostles, the Evangelical narrative informs us that others were not friendly to Christ and his Gospel. Many of these, however, having witnessed the transaction, believed on him; but others, who were not willing to be his disciples, though they found it impossible to reject or to deny the miracle which had been wrought, went their way to the Pharisees, and told them what Jesus had done. The Pharisees themselves could not contradict the miracle, though they were interested in denying it. A council of the chief priests and Pharisees was convened. They did venture to examine the miracle, as they had done in the case of the man who had been born blind. The consideration of Lazarus and of his sisters, who were not mean persons, the number of the witnesses, who were also persons of distinction, and who had filled Jerusalem with the news at their return, and the fear of adding a further degree of evidence to a miracle which they were desirous of suppressing,-all these circumstances augmented their indignation against Jesus, and determined them to put him to death, and thus terminate his miracles. They said, What do we, for this man doth many miracles? If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him; and the Romans will come and take away both our place and nation.

"If any additional evidence were wanting to confirm this miracle, it might be added that, after the resurrection of Lazarus, and six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where he supped with Lazarus and his sisters; and much people of the Jews knew that he was at Bethany, and they came from Jerusalem thither, not for Jesus' sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead. But the chiefpriests consulted that they might put Lazarus to death; because that, by reason of him, many of the Jews went away and believed on Jesus. (John 12. 1,2,9-11.) The curiosity of those who came to Bethany, and their belief in Christ, are natural consequences of the truth of Lazarus's resurrection, which could not but enrage the priests and Pharisees, who were the enemies of Christ; and their determination to put Lazarus to death shows the desperation to which the publicity of the miracle drove them. The resurrection of Lazarus was also one reason why, on the following day, much people that were come to the feast (of the Passover), when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm-trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord. The people, therefore, that was with him when he called Lazarus out of his grave, and raised him from the dead, bare record. from the dead, bare record. For this cause, the people met him, for that they heard that he had done this miracle. The Pharisees, therefore, said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing by your threatenings or excommunications? Behold the world is gone after him-the whole mass of the people are becoming his disciples. (John 12. 12,13,17-19.) Is it possible to deny that Christ made his entry into Jerusalem in the manner related by the Evangelists, while

many persons were living who had actually witnessed it? Can we separate so notorious an event from the important circumstances which are blended with it in the Evangelical narration? And can a more natural reason be assigned for such a concourse and triumph than the resurrection of Lazarus, of which many were witnesses, and which the whole multitude already believed to be a true miracle?"

called Sheff, near Mount Sinai. Another source of supply is indicated in the recent discovery by Mr. Burton of ancient lead mines, in some of which the ore has been exhausted by working, in the mountains between the Red Sea and the Nile.

On the above passage in Job 19. 24, Roberts observes, "The fact of lead being used may allude to the fixing of the stone by means of that metal. In all parts of the East are to be found records thus written, many of which have never been deciphered, as they are in the languages not now understood. It is proverbial to say, 'The words of the wise are written on stone.""

II. Lazarus is the name of a person introduced by Our Lord into a very instructive parable or narrative, to represent, figuratively, the poor and distressed in this world. (Luke 16. 19-25.)

LEAD, Ay ophereth. Lead, a widely-diffused | metal, appears to have been well known in very early times, as it is alluded to both by Job and by Moses, in terms that prove that its peculiar characteristics must have been familiar to all. By the Egyptians it was employed for a variety of purposes, but chiefly as an alloy with more precious metals. Sir John Gardner Wilkinson says, “The skill of the Egyptians in compounding metals is abundantly proved by the vases, mirrors, arms, and implements of bronze, discovered at Thebes and other parts of Egypt; and the numerous methods they adopted for varying the composition of bronze by a judicious mixture of alloys, are shown in the many qualities of the metal." This art must also have been well known to the Hebrews; for the prophet Ezekiel alludes to this compounding of metals, and the consequent deterioration of the more precious metals, in his description of the corrupt state of the Jewish nation: “ Son of man, the house of Israel is to me become dross; | all they are brass, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of the furnace; they are even the dross of silver. Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Because ye are all become dross, behold, therefore, I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem. As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it, so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you." (Ezek. 22. 18-20.)

On the breasts of mummies that have been unrolled, there is frequently found in soft lead, thin and quite flexible, the figure of a hawk, with extended wings, emblematical of Re, or Phra, the sun. In the bird's talons are the disks, the emblems of the sun. This leaden figure is sometimes gilded. Lead is mentioned by the patriarch Job as a substance on which writings were graven, and we know from other authorities that it was used for the purpose of writing upon by the ancients. If Job lived in the land of Edom, he was not very far from one of the sources from which this metal might be supplied; for lead is to be met with at a place

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LEAF, LEAVES, nby aleh, niby aloth. Leaves, the organs of perspiration and inhalation in plants, are used symbolically in the Scriptures, in a variety of senses; sometimes they are taken as an evidence of grace, (Psalm 1.3,) while at others they represent the mere outward form of religion without the spirit. (Matt. 21. 19.) Their flourishing and their decay, their restoration and their fragility, furnish the subjects of numerous allusions of great force and beauty, some of which we may briefly notice.

The prophet Isaiah, after foretelling the approaching desolation of his country, intimates, under the figure of the restoration of the leaves of trees, that a remnant shall be saved. The Lord says, “ But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return, and shall be eaten as a teiltree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them when they cast their leaves; so the holy seed shall be the substance thereof." (ch. 6. 13.) No longer cultivated as a garden, but left like a wilderness, Judæa is, indeed, greatly changed from what it was; all that human ingenuity and labour did devise, erect, or cultivate, men have laid waste and desolate; all the "plenteous good" with which it was enriched, adorned, and blessed, have fallen like seared or withered leaves, when their greenness is gone; and stripped of its "ancient splendour," it is left an oak whose leaf fadeth;" but its inherent sources of fertility are not dried up; the natural richness of the soil is unblighted; the substance is in it, strong as that of the teil tree or the solid oak, which retain their substance when they cast their leaves. And as the leafless oak waits throughout winter for the genial warmth of returning spring, to be clothed with renewed foliage, so the once glorious land of Judæa is yet full of latent vigour, or of vegetative power strong as ever, ready to shoot forth, even "better than at the beginning," whenever the sun of heaven shall shine on it again, and the "holy seed" be prepared for being finally "the substance thereof."

as

To appreciate the beauty of the allusions in Psalm 1. 3; Jeremiah 17. 8, where green leaves appear as the symbols of the righteous, it is necessary, Roberts says, "to think of a parched desert, where there is scarcely a green leaf to relieve the eye. In the midst of that waste is perhaps a tank, a well, or a stream, and near to the water's edge will be seen plants and shrubs, and trees covered with the most beautiful foliage. So shall the man be who puts his trust in Jehovah."

Job, deprecating the Divine inflictions, compares man to a leaf: "Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro? and wilt thou pursue the dry stubble?" (13.25;) so also the prophet Isaiah: "We all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away." (64. 6.) See TREES; TREE of Life.