to blur their example and to spoil it for a perfect model. Their example showing so clearly the subordination of the formal to the spiritual, together with the general teaching of the New Testament respecting things formal and things spiritual, and, above all, the permanent presence of the Spirit of all truth in his living temple, seem sufficient to guide us in the outward ordering of Zion in these latter days.

But, though forms and shadows are not the substance of true religion, these will have a reactionary influence, through human nature, for good or for ill, on the spiritual life and welfare of the church. Just as the forms of civil government grow out of the fundamental idea and inherent spirit of each; despotism naturally assuming its own congenial forms, constitutional monarchy its own, republicanism its own; and as these forms respectively serve to strengthen and perpetuate these different kinds of government, so is it with Christianity. If the existing outward forms and modes of its action are congenial to its holy and heavenly nature, they will have, under God who alone can impart, and give increase to the inner life of the church, an influence subservient to the enlargement and beneficent action of the vital energies of the church. But if they are not, but wholly or partially are embodiments of some worldly idea of aggrandizement and power; if they are adapted to seize upon and captivate the sensuous and the imaginative in man rather than to arouse his conscience and penetrate his moral affectious; if they tend practically to eclipse Christ behind the cross, presenting the latter to be kissed with the lips instead of the former to be believed on for righteousness; if they substitute holy water for the washing of regeneration by the Spirit of God as the way of salvation from sin, then their forms and formalities, and all such like, will prove detrimental to the inner life of the church, or even destroy it altogether, and imperil the salvation of souls. It is true, if pure, spiritual Christianity could have its own way, in the matter of forms and usages, without hindrance or perversion from man, unquestionably it would assume for itself those forms most congenial to its own nature and best adapted to the circumstances of man. But it encounters more or less of the world even in the church; besides, the feebleness of man and the imperfections of the Christian must ever cleave to the administration of the church on earth. Hence, it is not to be supposed that all the forms in which Christianity has appeared in the world, are per

fectly congenial to its holy and heavenly nature; perhaps no one is, or ever can be, though some doubtless are more so than others. The Bride, the Lamb's wife, will not appear all glorious within and without, till finally redeemed from earth she is presented by the Bridegroom before the Father's throne.

Meantime, it remains that her dress on earth should be as near as may be after the fashion of the heavenly. This, however, calls for no iconoclastie zeal demolishing existing forms, but rather for the cherishing of spiritual life in all the churches, and giving it free scope, world-wide, in the fellowship of the churches among themselves and in all enterprises of Christian benevolence. The inner life of the church, being fed from above, growing with the increase of God, acting freely, energetically, beneficently on earth, will naturally, though perhaps very gradually, appropriate from existing forms and modes, those which, under the circumstances, will be the best for it. And such as are not suitable or the best, it will tend to transform, or throw off in the best way, without violence to its own benign spirit and with no counterbalancing evil left behind.

Any further and direct argument for the proposition before us, seems hardly called for. That the best forms of church life and action are those which permit its inner life to increase and to do good with the greatest freedom, purity, and power, is what no one will gainsay who believes in such life at all. It is the great design of the church's existence to cherish that life and to perfect it in her members, and her great mission in the world is to open up channels whereby the stream that makes glad the city of our God, may flow forth to bless the nations. Those forms and ways and means, therefore, must be the best, which best subserve this great end and mission. To describe or to discuss them in the concrete, and from the outside, was not the purpose of this Article. They are to be seen now wherever the life, love, and holy activity of Christ's church are the most manifest. They will be seen, whatever they may be, when the church will arise and shine, her light having come and the glory of the Lord having risen upon her.

ARTICLE III.

THE HISTORICAL AND LEGAL JUDGMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT SCRIPTURES AGAINST SLAVERY.

By George B. Cheever, D. D., New York.

In this investigation, the words, or periphrastic expressions, employed for servants and bond-servants, servitude and bondage, first claim our attention. Not a little is depending on their his tory and usage. The modern definition of the word slavery can. not, with the least propriety or truth, be assumed as the meaning of the word used for servant or bond-servant in the Hebrew Scriptures.

The ordinary word for servant is . The verb, to labor, constitutes the root. The primary signification of the verb has nothing to do with that afterwards attached to the noun, but is independent, separate, generic. It is an honorable meaning; for labor is the vocation of freemen, or was so before the fall, when the father of mankind was put into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it, and to till the ground; to work upon the ground, to cultivate it. The first instance of the use of the verb is in Gen. 2: 5, There was not a man to till the ground, i, to labor upon it, to cultivate it.

So in Gen. 3: 23, The Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground, from whence he was taken; is, to work upon it.

So in Gen. 4: 2, Cain was a tiller of the ground, , a man working the ground; that was his occupation.

Also, Gen. 4: 12, in the sentence of Cain, the same word is made use of, the verb in the second person, when thou tillest the

. תַעֲבֹר,ground

The generic signification of the word, and the only signification possible in primeval society, is that of labor, work, personal occupation. The same universal meaning is in the commandment, Six days shalt thou labor, in, Ex. 20: 9.

In process of time comes the secondary meaning, with the idea included of laboring for another; that additional idea constitutes, indeed, the secondary meaning. At first it is only the idea of working for another willingly, or for a consideration, for wages;

as might be done by brothers and sisters, or other blood relatives in the same family. See Malachi 3: 17. As a man spareth his own son that serveth him, . There is yet no signification of subjection or of servitude. In Gen. 29: 15, it is used concerning the service of Jacob to Laban: Shouldst thou serve me for nought? Tell me what shall thy wages be?, a voluntary service. And Jacob served, etc., as, 29: 20.— For the service which

Next comes the added significance of subjection, first, politically, the subjection of tributary communities under one lord, as in Gen. 14: 4, Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer,

. עָבְדוּ אֶת

So Gen.

So in Deut. 20: 11, All the people shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee, 1. So in Gen. 25: 23, of the subjection of Esau to Jacob, The elder shall serve the younger, . Also, Gen. 27: 40, in Isaac's prediction, Thou shalt serve thy brother, in. Also in Jeremiah 25: 11, These nations shall serve the king of Babylon,. 27: 29, Let people serve thee, 77. Second, both politically and personally. Gen. 15: 13, spoken of the bondage in Egypt, Thy seed shall serve them, Gen. 15: 14, That nation whom they shall serve, will I judge, . Also, Ex. 1: 13, The Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigor, . Also, Ex. 14: 12, Let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians,

Also, Jer. 5: 19, Ye shall serve strangers in a land not yours, 250. Also, Jer. 17: 4, I will cause thee to serve thine enemies,

Third, spoken of personal servitude. Ex. 21: 2, concerning a Hebrew servant, six years shall he serve thee, NY UD. — Ex. 21: 6, shall serve him forever,.-Lev. 25: 39, Thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bond-servant, ispræd.

- Lev. 25: 40, Shall serve thee, unto the year of Jubilee,

The personal servitude embraces the idea of laboring for another, in subjection and inferiority, either on contract, for wages, or as a bond-servant without wages. And thus the meaning and reality of the verb passes gradually from voluntary labor for oneself into service performed for another, at first for wages, then in bondage.

There are several other modes of usage in which the verb is employed, as first, and most commonly, of the service of God. Deut. 6: 13, Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve him,

.-Josh. 22: 5, To love the Lord your God, and to serve him, 1 Sam. 7: 3, Prepare your hearts unto the Lord, and Also, 7: 4, The children of Israel served

Second, of the service of idols. Ps. 97: 7, Confounded be all

וְעִבְדָהוּ,serve him only

. וַיַּעַבְדוּ אֶת־יְהוָה,the Lord only . יַעַבְדוּהוּ,him

. כָּל־עֹבְדֵי פֶסֶל they that serve graven images

Ezek. 20: 39, Serve ye every one his idols, . Deut. 12: 2, The nations served Deut. 17: 3 and Judg. 10: 13, served other gods, .-2 Kings 21: 3, worshipped all the host of heaven, and served them, r .-Jer. 22: 9, worshipped other gods, and served them, A775).

Third, it is used once as synonymous with, to perform, in the sense of presenting sacrifice to God; doing sacrifice, as our translation has it, Isaiah 19: 21, The Egyptians shall do sacrifice

Fourth, imposing labor on others. Ex. 1: 15, all their service

: וְעָבְדוּ זֶבַח וּמִנְחָה,and oblatio

service, כָּל־עֲבֹדָתָם אֲשֶׁר־עָבְדוּ בָהֶם,wherein they madle them serve

served upon them. Similar is Lev. 25: 46, rendered in our translation, They shall be your bondmen forever, is on, on them ye shall impose bond-service. So, Jer. 22: 13, with his neighbor's service without wages, n, upon his neighbor imposeth work for nothing. -Jer. 25: 14, Greek kings shall serve themselves of them,.-Jer. 30: 8, Strangers shall no more serve themselves of him, that is, of Israel,

shall no more impose servile bondage on him, shall no more play the bond-master with him. This is as far as the verb ever goes toward the signification to enslave, an expression for which there is no equivalent in Hebrew, though the verb, to sell, is used for the transaction, as in the enslaving of Joseph, when his brethren sold him to the Ishmaelites.

Now upon the verbal, which is the word all but universally employed in Hebrew for servant, it is the secondary meaning, and not the primary, that has descended from the verb . The noun never means a laborer, a worker, in the generic sense, as Adam and Noah were laborers, but always a worker with reference to the will of another, a worker in subjection, either on contract by hire, or by compulsion. In Eccl. 5: 12, it is said, Sweet is the sleep of a laboring man; but here the verb is used, and not the noun; , him that worketh, or him working, the working man. The noun means, indeed,