"I do this great wickedness" (said he) " and sin against "God?". It was a wickedness she could not but ac knowlege, tacitly at least-her passions warring with her conscience. It was 66 a sin against God." To the risque of the Divine displeasure the Patriarch preferred chains and imprisonment and death. And "lo"-the blessings of his father Israel*-that "prevailed over the "blessings of his progenitors unto the utmost bound "of the everlasting hills !” That the primitive law of marriage was observed with a considerable degree of strictness, and that incontinence was severely punished in Egypt, might be determined almost from the case of Joseph; had history been silent on the subject. In that country, the female sex seem to have maintained their dignity, and to have held a high rank in political as well as literary society. But whether the peculiar homage they received were a tribute to their chastity or not, we are not sufficiently informed. We are sure, however, that the Assyrians and other people of the East were sunk in voluptuousness: And in the commerce of the sexes, we are shocked by the most abominable prostitution.+ Gen. xlix. 22-26. According to a law of Sesostris, prostitutes were burnt to death. Lucian tells us, that at Croton in Italy, Salethus enacted a similar law. Herod. Euter pe-Diod. Sicul. lib. 2. ON THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINES OF MARRIAGE, ADULTERY, AND DIVORCE ; AND, ON THE CRIMINAL CHARACTER AND PUNISHMENT ОР ADULTERY: Under the Mosaic Dispensation. SECTION II. THOU shalt not commit adultery," was the express commandment of God, through his servant Moses. It is in the decalogue, that the crime is first mentioned by name, and without comment-without periphrasis too palpable a proof of its frequency-of its familiarity.* But the lawgiver acquiesced not in this positive prohibition. In another commandment, He Exod. xx. 14. went farther; descending even into the heart: "Thou "shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife." And He promulgated other laws, forbidding the crime of adultery, and punishing it by death.* But the most remarkable texts on the subject of incontinence, relate to Virginity and to the law of Divorce. First, with respect to Virginity- "If a man entice a maid that is not betrothed and lie with her, he shall "surely endow her to be his wife."† And, as in Deuteronomy: "If a man take a wife, and go in unto her, "and hate her-and say, I found her not as a maid," the father of the damsel, (and her mother) shall bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity to the Elders of the city. And they shall chastise that man, and amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give "them unto the father of the damsel: And she shall be “ his wife.” "He may not put her away, all his "days." "But if this thing be true, the men of the "city shall stone the damsel with stones, that she die." "If a man be found lying with a married woman, they "shall both of them die." "If a man find a betrothed "virgin in the city, and lie with her, they shall both Lev, viii. 20. xx. 10. + Exod. xxii. 16, "die." "If a man force a betrothed virgin in the field, "he only shall die." But " if a man find a Virgin who "is not betrothed and LIE WITH HER, he shall give "unto the damsel's father, fifty shekels of silver; and "SHE SHALL BE HIS WIFE: He may NOT PUT HER 86 AWAY ALL HIS DAYS." Here I shall remark onl that a maiden from her commerce with a man, becomes verily his wife. In the carnal intercourse, their union constitutes the marriage. For the law of Divorce.*" When a man hath taken "a wife and married her, and she finds no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness ́ in "her; then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and 66 give it in her hand, and send her out of his house."† "And she may go, and be another man's wife." "And, if the latter husband write her a bill of divorce"ment, or if he die; her former husband-may not take "her again after she is defiled." Among the nations with which the Israelites were surrounded, husbands had no scruple in repudiating their wives for very trivial causes: And this licentious practice had so far prevailed with the Israelites, that to abolish it altogether, was no easy task. Not wholly, therefore, to disallow it, * Deut. xxiv. 1-4. + Under the old Law, the bill of Divoree that the woma■ received from her husband, was: "I promise, that hereafter I will lay no claim to thee." Joseph, St. Jerom. but to put it under certain regulations, was the intertion of Moses, in fixing the cause, and in prescribing the mode of divorcement. What is implied by that "uncleanness" or (as exprest in the Septuagint) the ȧsýμov πρayμa"-" the matter of nakedness”"the indecent work,” our biblical critics have variously conjectured." It could not be adultery (says one)"since adultery was punishable by death." "It could "be, that the husband was jealous of her, from a sus"picion of adultery" (says another)" since the law had "made provision for the case."* "It might have been. (says a third)" some levity-some defect of mind, ❝or some disorder of body." It was probably a fault which, however exceptionable in the eyes of the man who put her away, might have been of trivial moment in the opinion of another: For in being so put away, she was not disqualified from marrying another man, Possibly it was some bodily uncleanness, or disease of a temporary nature. Be this as it may-I was at first inclined to think, that the two passages above adduced as containing the laws of Virginity and the laws of Divorce, might be brought to reflect mutual light, Numb. v. 12.-The law of trial by bitter waters.-See Lightfoot's observations on this subject and illustrations from the Jewish history. + Dr. Wells, in particular, inclines to this opinion. See his Paraphrase, &c. It has been thought, that these passages throwing light on each other, the sɣýμov тpayμa was fornication-But how |