quarters in the vicinity of Shiloh, around the tabernacle, as they before had at Gilgal. But that a part of them meanwhile were engaged in a desultory warfare with the unconquered tribes of Canaan, is almost certain. Their first ardor appears, however, to have considerably abated, from the reproach which Joshua directed to them in the following words: "How long are ye slack to go to possess the land which Jehovah, the God of your fathers, hath given you." "It seems then to have occurred to him, that if the lands of the country were distributed in proper allotments to those tribes, without regard to their being conquered or unconquered, its own interests would induce each tribe to exert itself to gain possession of the territory which fell to it. It seemed that enough had been done by

Joshua xviii. 3.

+ But some inconvenience had resulted on the former occasion from proportioning a part, without having surveyed the whole. It already appeared that the allotment of the tribe of Ephraim was not sufficient for its wants. When, therefore, the Ephraimites complained of their confined limits, they were permitted to subdue for their own use as much more neighboring territory as they wanted, before the distribution to the other tribes took place. On the other hand, it appeared that the tribe of Judah had considerably more territory than it needed, or could occupy; in consequence of which, when the actual extent of the whole country to be portioned out became better known, two other tribes, Simeon and Dan, received their shares out of the territory which had been first assigned solely to Judah. Is this not enough to show that the omniscient Deity had not made the first allotment? How long are acts of fallible man, or the chances of a lottery, to be charged to God, solely because the true interpretation of the writings of the Hebrews is disregarded?

These circumstances showed the advantage, if not necessity, of an actual survey of the whole country before the designed distribution to the unprovided tribes was made. Joshua, therefore, directed that each of the seven tribes should select three competent men to survey the whole country, bringing back the results entered carefully in a book. Interesting it would be to know whether an attempt at mapping the surveyed districts formed any part of this undertaking. It is only stated that they were to "describe it in a book," without mention of the nature of the description, save that the land was described "by cities" and "in seven parts." At all events it shows that there must have been some knowledge of geometry among the Hebrews; and there can be no doubt that this had been communicated to them from the Egyptians.

Seven months were occupied in this survey; at the expiration of which the surveyors returned with the requisite information in their books. The lots were then taken before Jehovah in Shiloh. The northern portion, in after times called Galilee, was divided among the four tribes of Napthali, Zebulon, Isaachar, and Asher. The central portion, afterwards called Samaria, was assigned to the half tribe of Manasseh, and to the tribe of Ephraim. The southern part, which in after times formed the kingdom of Judah, as distinct from that of Israel, was alloted to the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, Simeon, and Dan; the patrimony of the two latter being, as before intimated, taken out of that which had been wholly assigned to Judah.

The Levites received from each of the other tribes a certain number of cities, making fortyeight in all, each of them with a domain of between eight and nine hundred acres of land, for gardens and pasture-fields. Of these cities the Kohothites received twenty-three, the Gershonites thirteen, and the Merarites twelve. Six of these forty-eight cities were, as already related, appointed for cities of refuge. Thirteen of the forty-eight cities were also assigned to the priests, as distinguished from the other Levites. This was the second and final division of the conquered territory.

The assignment of the different estates-the average of which has been assumed at about

the nation at large; and that the rest might be left to the particular tribes which were to be benefitted."

The forty thousand men of those tribes who had received their allotments on the other side of the Jordan, had meanwhile been allowed to return to their own possessions. Joshua, in his farewell address, passed a high encomium on the fidelity with which they had fulfilled their engagement, in fighting with and for their unprovided brethren, after they had received their own allotments; and he earnestly spoke to them of their duties, and exhorted them to "take heed to do all that Moses, the servant of Jehovah, urged you. To love Jehovah, your God, and to walk in all his ways; to keep his commandments, and to cleave unto him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul." With his blessing they departed, greatly enriched by their equal share in the spoil of the Canaanites, which, we are told, consisted of "very much cattle, gold, silver, brass, iron, and very much raiment." This they were to divide with those who had remained at home.

When the returning tribes had crossed the Jordan, and entered their

twenty acres seems to have been left to the local government of each tribe, or perhaps to a partition by lot. The great principle of this law was the inalienability of estates. Houses in walled towns might be sold in perpetuity, if unredeemed within the year; land only for a limited period. Even during this time it might be redeemed, should the proprietor become rich enough, at the value which the estate would produce during the years unelapsed before the jubilee. "This remarkable agrarian law secured the political equality of the people, and anticipated all the mischiefs, so fatal to the early republics of Greece and Italy, by the appropriation of the whole territory of the state by a rich and powerful landed oligarchy, with the consequent convulsions of the community, from the deadly struggle between the patrician and plebeian orders." If the same law had existed in Great Britain, that country would not now present to the world the dismal view of a few thousand families living in splendid palaces, and enjoying all the pleasures wealth can bestow, while millions of their countrymen are reduced to drag out a starving life in damp and gloomy cellars.

The outline of the agrarian law, as existing among the Hebrews, was undoubtedly Egyptian, whose king became, as we know, under the administration of Joseph, the feudal lord or proprietor of the whole land, and leased it out on a reserved rent of one-fifth, answering to the two-tenths paid by the Israelites. "Thus the body of the people [the Israelites] were an independent yeomanry, residing on their hereditary farms, the boundaries of which remained for ever of the same extent; for the removal of a neighbor's landmark was among the crimes against which the law uttered its severest maledictions; an invasion of family property, that of Naboth's vineyard, is selected as the worst crime of a most tyrannical king; and in the decline of the state, the prophets denounce, with their sternest energy, this violation of of the very basis of the commonwealth. In this luxuriant soil, each man had the only capital necessary to cultivate his property to the highest degree of productiveness, the industry of himself and his sons. Hence large properties would by no means have increased the general wealth, while they may have endangered the independence of the people. The greater danger to be apprehended in so populous a country, might seem to have been the minute subdivisions of the estates, as all the sons inherited; the eldest had a double portion. Females succeeded only in default of males, and then under the restriction that they might not marry out of their own tribe. Yet this inconvenience seems never to have been practically felt; the land, though closely, was never over-peopled. Periods of famine were not common."-Milman's History of the Jews.

own territories, they erected a great altar, as a monument to posterity of the real connection between the tribes which the river separated. This transaction produced a strong sensation when the news of it was brought to Shiloh. The object of this undertaking was entirely misunderstood. The altar was thought to be a monument of separation rather than of union. For as there could be, according to the law, but one altar for national worship, the erection of another altar beyond Jordan was judged to intimate an intention to form a separate establishment for worship in that country, which, even if at first intended for the honor of Jehovah, might lead to the worship of the gods of other nations, and to disunion. In short, the act, as viewed by the other tribes, and, we may well suppose, by the Levites chiefly, was an overt act of rebellion, and as such they determined to punish it, unless a satisfactory explanation could be obtained. The whole congregation assembled at Shiloh, ready to make war against the tribes beyond Jordan. But first they sent a deputation to expostulate with them, and to require an explanation. This deputation was worthy of the occasion, consisting of Phineas, the son of the high priest, and with him ten chiefs, one from each of the tribes west of the Jordan. On its arrival in Gilead, the deputation, assuming the fact to be as they supposed, proceeded to threaten the two and a half tribes with punishment for their rebellion against Jehovah and the congregation. If they disliked the lands which they had received beyond the river, as being "unclean," or unhonored with the presence of the tabernacle, or if they deemed it too hard for them to resort beyond the river to render the periodical service which the law required, then let them come and share with the other tribes in the country west of the river. They, against whom these imputations were made, showed themselves much distressed, and repelled the charge, explaining that their object had been to prevent the very alienation and separation of which they were accused of contemplating. After declaring this in general terms, they proceeded to explain their precise object more particularly, in the following remarkable words: "Lest your children might hereafter say unto our children, what have ye to do with Jehovah, the God of Israel, ye children of Reuben and Gad? For Jehovah hath made the Jordan as a boundary between us and you; ye have no share in Jehovah. And so your children might make our children cease from worshipping Jehovah. Therefore we said, Let us build ourselves an altar, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice, but for a WITNESS between us and you, and our generations after us; that your children may not say to our children in time to come, Ye have no part in Jehovah."

This explanation fully agreeing with the spirit of the Mosaic institutions, gave great satisfaction to the embassy, and afterwards to the people who

* Joshua xxii.

awaited the result at Shiloh. The tribes beyond Jordan gave the name of El, The Witness, to the monument they had erected, which continued long after to bear its testimony to the unity of Israel.

After this Joshua survived about fourteen years, during which he lived, chiefly in his own city of Timnath-serah. During this period the Israelites, finding that they had land enough for their present wants, do not appear to have made any attempts to gain those parts of the country still held by the natives.

When Joshua felt the approach of death he called the people together, in order that before his departure he might have the satisfaction of again receiving the pledge of their obedience to the established institutions. On this occasion he addressed them, and after having reminded them of their obligations to Jehovah, of the successes and earthly blessings with which they had been favored, he exhorted them to purge away the idolatry that still lurked among them; and no longer to serve "the gods which their fathers served on the other side the flood" and "in Egypt," but to devote themselves to the worship of Jehovah. He then demanded that they should at once decide, either wholly to serve Jehovah, or the gods of their fathers and of the nations among whom they now dwelt; adding, "But as for me, and my house, we will serve Jehovah." The people unanimously responded, "We will serve Jehovah, for he is our God." He explained to them the obligations which that declaration involved: still they did not waver, but repeated it again and again in the usual terms of a solemn covenant. The terms of this covenant Joshua wrote down in the book of the law, and for a public testimonial of this solemn engagement he set up a great stone under an oak that grew near the tabernacle, and, in conformity with the ideas so usually connected with these memorials, said, "Behold this stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard the words of Jehovah which he spoke unto us; it shall therefore be a witness against you, lest ye deny your God.”‡

The heroic Joshua soon after died, at the advanced age of one hundred and ten years, and was buried near the borders of his own possession, on the side of the hill of Gaash. As he appointed no successor to exercise, under the guidance of Jehovah, the supreme executive authority, the chieftains of the separate tribes appear to have assumed the administration of affairs, subject, however, to the surveillance of the high-priest, as the prime minis

Supposed by some to mean the Euphrates, but not very likely. Why can it not mean the Jordan? I think that there were a great many of those that died in the wilderness who in secresy had continued to worship idols, and to these I suppose Joshua alludes.

These words are very remarkable, and cannot but arrest the attention of the reflecting reader. They go far. in my opinion, to confirm what Manetho relates concerning the Hebrews. These words have been railed at by those who had wit enough to throw forth a bitter sarcasm, but not knowledge enough to understand that their wit would be but the instrument of proving their own ignorance of the customs of these ancient times and the true meaning of these words.

ter of the Invisible King. The high priest, after the death of Eleazer,* was his son Phineas, who had, on several occasions, distinguished himself for boldness and zeal in the service of Jehovah.

There seems to have existed much similarity of character between Moses and Joshua; and none could have been more fit to accomplish the plan of the former than the latter, to whom I think credit is due for some things that appear to have been originated with Moses. Still his merits were rather those that belong to a military chieftain than to a founder of an empire; and though equally able, or perhaps abler, than Moses on the field, he cannot be compared with the great lawgiver in political wisdom. But his zeal in the worship of the Deity in Unity seems to have been equal to that of his illustrious teacher, and it is this which ought chiefly to make his memory dear to us.

LETTER VIII.

THE HEBREW STATE FROM THE TIME OF JOSHUA TO THAT OF SAUL.

THE length of this periodt cannot with certainty be given, and I consider all the attempts which have been made to determine it, as not yet having led to any definite result.

* Eleazar, the high-priest, died soon after Joshua, and was buried in a hill of Mount Ephraim. Hills are mentioned as places of burial because the sepulchres were usually excavations in the sides of the hills. Even at the present day the cemeteries, though only for graves, of the East, are commonly upon the slopes of hills, outside of the towns to which they belong.Kitto's Palestine, book 3, chap. i.

It may be here properly observed that the body of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought with them out of Egypt, had before this been deposited, according to his wish, in "the parcel of ground" at Shechem.

+ The period from the exodus to the building of Solomon's temple was, according to Josephus and St. Paul, 591 years 6 months; and according to the Vulgar Bible chronology, 478 years 6 months, as the following tables show;