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THE JEWISH THEOCRACY.

that callousness of feeling, to that contempt of suffering and death, which was an essential ingredient in the character of a Roman. This was the education by which Rome insured victory and triumph to its rapacious eagles!

Having thus taken a short glance of the state of education as it was in the pagan world, it will be more easy for us to understand the change which was operated upon it by the introduction of Christianity. But before I proceed to this, it will be necessary that I should notice the character which education assumed under the influence of that theocratic principle upon which the social constitution of the Jewish nation was founded; as it forms a most striking contrast with those schemes of human policy which I have before mentioned. Among the Jews, education was, as we might expect from the peculiar and eminent station assigned to that people in the history of the ancient world, essentially religious. From the moment of birth the child was made subject to the ordinances of religion; its earliest impressions must have been those of indispensable religious duty. Every occurrence of daily life was a means of bringing to the recollection of the youths of Israel, the God of their fathers, by whose will the whole of their lives was to be regulated; and the visits which they paid, from the age of twelve years, three times every year, at the temple of Jerusalem, where the whole nation was on those solemn occasions assembled, gave to those religious feelings which domestic life had awakened, a national character. Then it was, that the idea of the invisible God ruling over his people Israel, and directing them in all their ways, received its full value, and its full force. Their priests and rulers were not men commanding in their own name; they were the witnesses of the Most High,-his standardbearers, the messengers of his will and word among his people; and and every individual felt, that the direction of his heart, and the conduct of his life, belonged not to himself, but to the Lord. It was this absolute submission of the soul to the ruling power of the invisible Jehovah,—the

THE PRIMITIVE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

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effect of a purely theocratic education, in those periods of the Jewish history, in which the people lived in the spirit, not after the letter of their dispensation,—that filled the whole nation with that high enthusiasm, with which they boldly held up the banners of the Lord of Hosts in the midst of an idolatrous world, and gained the most glorious triumphs over enemies, which, in a merely human point of view, must have overwhelmed them by the superiority of their power, as, in fact, they actually did, whenever the spirit of the Lord was departed from the elected nation. Of great and lasting importance is, in this, as in so many other respects, the great example which God has set up in Israel; for in spite of the abundant profession which there is among us, of religious education, I have no hesitation in saying, that if it was not for the picture exhibited in the better times of the Jewish history, the world would not yet have had, down to the present day, a practical illustration of the effect which the theocratic principle, the principle of the power and Spirit of God ruling over the heart of man, applied to education, has upon the character of individuals, and of nations.

But I resume now the history of education in the Gentile world, considering the changes which the introduction of Christianity produced. We have not, that I am aware, any direct information respecting this subject, as it stood in the primitive Christian Church; but, from what we know of its character in other respects, it will not be difficult to infer, with a high degree of certainty, what may have been the leading features of education among the early Christians. From the simple application, which was, at the very earliest period, made of the principles of brotherly love, upon the administration of the temporal concerns of believers, inducing them to establish among themselves community of goods, if not always in form, at least in spirit, and to unite in a sort of sacred household,—I should apprehend that the education of the first Christians was essentially domestic. From the meek and lovely character of the Christian dispensation

itself, and from the heartfelt simplicity with which charity was received, in those times, as its leading feature, I should further infer, that the moving principle in education also was love rather than fear. The strict discipline which obtained in the early churches, for the sake of consistency between doctrine and practice, as well as for the purpose of rigorous distinction from the pagan world, leads me to think, that attention to a proper conduct of life was a very essential point, also, in the domestic discipline; and lastly, I should conclude from the social position in which the first Christian communities were placed, and the persecutions under which they were labouring, on one hand, that their virtues were more of a passive and negative, than of an active and positive nature: and, on the other, that the whole tendency of their education was not to direct the child's attention to the goods and enjoyments, the honours and preferments, of this world, but to render him conscious of those eternal treasures, which no human exertion can procure, and no human persecution can take away.

But this happy time-for, notwithstanding all its persecutions, Christianity has never yet seen a happier one→→→ did not last long. Political power erected itself arrogantly as the protector of Christianity, and from this moment the latter received in itself a seed of corruption, of which the subsequent generations have reaped many a baneful harvest, and for the extermination of which, there was no other remedy than that which has very recently begun to be adopted, viz., an entire separation between religion and the state. In consequence of this separation, those who have hitherto been accustomed to look to political power for the support of religion, and to associate with it the idea of worldly preferment, will be obliged to acknowledge the superiority of the living truth of divine revelation over the dead forms of human institution, and to view the grandeur and the honours of man's making, with that indifference which becomes those that are made acquainted with the greatness and the glory of the Kingdom

CHURCH AND PRIESTHOOD.

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of God. Education, as one of the most vital and most sensitive parts of the social organization, soon began to feel the reaction of that uncongenial and pernicious alliance which religion had formed with human power. The unity of purpose which had existed in the primitive church ceased, and, with a twofold object, a twofold mode of education was introduced. Religious education became now in fact nothing more than the training for a particular trade; whilst, on the other hand, the tuition of those destined for civil life, or a political career, included in itself a far greater proportion of pagan than of christian elements. Of these two, the former became of necessity the more corrupt, because, with a higher profession of principle, it combined an equally low, and, in some instances, even a lower purpose than the latter. The first occasion of this corruption was an essential mistake, and one which, down to the present day, has not yet been sufficiently explored. The principle which has within the last years been laid down as the basis of what is called civil and religious liberty, viz.: that religion has nothing to do with matters of state, is certainly a false one; but the principle of clerical ascendancy, in opposition to which it has been established, is not less false. The primitive idea which gave birth to the claim of supremacy on the part of the church over all worldly matters, was no doubt a correct one-it was the undeniable, though, perhaps, at the present time, very unpractical idea, that the principles of religion, of course, pure and unadulterated, should be the only test and standard of all human transactions; and in this sense it is strictly true, that the church ought not only to be allied with, but to rule over the state. Unfortunately, however, the principle was soon perverted by a substitution of the idea of priesthood to that of the church. The consequence of this important mistake was the promulgation of a principle, as false and pernicious as the former is true and salutary, namely, that the priesthood should rule over, or at least participate in worldly power. In

16

MONACHISM AND CHIVALRY.

this manner it was, that the ministry of religion, which was originally a humble service of God and man, rose above the common level of society, to competition of rank with its rulers. The foundation, nevertheless, on which these pretensions ultimately rested, was not to be lost sight of; and the greater, therefore, the departure from the spirit of religion, the more necessary seemed a rigid adherence to its forms. In this contradiction of purpose and means originated the monastic education of the middle ages; which, in matters of knowledge, confined itself, at each period, to the least possible degree of knowledge, absolutely required by the exigencies of the age,—giving, at the same time, this scanty allowance in the most pedantic and the most enthralling form; and which, on the score of discipline, consisted in nothing else but an ostentatious display of outward austerity and sanctity, under which the most unrestrained and profane dispositions might lurk unmolested, and, under the ægis of secrecy, impunely obtain the basest and most sinful gratification. That this education, which chained down the intellect by a servile formalism, and acted upon the moral man by the most slavish fear, was, in its tendency, both anti-religious and antisocial, no one that has the slightest knowledge of monastic history, will attempt to deny nor will it be difficult to prove, that the education of those destined to appear on the stage of civil or political life, was equally inconsistent, both with the dictates of religion and with the welfare of society. The only schools in which, during the middle ages, that sort of education was given, were the courts of princes. As to knowledge, it is no secret that its extent was extremely limited; the chief objects of study being hawking, hunting, fencing, and some other acquirements of the like description; and, as regards the motives which were principally brought into action, they were ambition, the thirst of distinction in the eyes of the prince, and of his courtiers, and the pride of a prowess, consisting in the possession of a stronger hand and a stouter heart, by