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the Hebrew Government in Peace and Safety; and here was a Provifion for a general National Plenty and National Virtue, the Conftitution recommending Induftry, Hufbandry and Frugality, as prudent and honourable, when every Man's Circumstances naturally represented them fo, to every wife Man's Obfervation. And here was further a Provifion to leave this Property and Liberty with great Security to their Families, and Pofterity, free from foreign or domestick Oppreffion.

To make this Foundation of the Hebrew Government folid and lafting, the Wisdom of Jehovah their Lawgiver declared, as two effential Laws of the Conftitution, that the Territory fhould be equally divided; fo that the whole fix hundred thousand should each have a full Property, in an equal Part of it; and that every Man fhould hold his Estate as a Free-hold in chief, immediately from God himself, as of his Crown, without any other Tenure of Service or Vaffalage to any great Men whatsoever, as intermediate Lords; and that this Tenure fhould be unalienable, or that these Estates thus originally fettled fhould never after be alienated from the Family, but were to defcend by an indefeasible Entail in perpetual Succeffion.

CHAP.

xxxiv. 16,

CHA P. IV.

Diftribution of the whole Territory into equal Parts.

T

HE Divifion of the Land was ordered

to be made with great exactnefs, under the Care and Direction of the High-Priest, the Judge, and one of the Princes of each Numbers Tribe. And the Lord fpake unto Mofes, fay17, 18. 'ing, these are the Names of the Men which fhall divide the Land unto you, Eleazer the Prieft, and Joshua the Son of Nun; and ye shall take one Prince of every Tribe to divide the Land by Inheritance. The Manner of this Divifion is expreffed in another Numbers Law. And ye shall divide the Land by xxxiii. 54. Lot, for an Inheritance among your Families; and to the more, ye fhall give the more Inheritance; and to the fewer, ye shall give the lefs Inheritance: every Man's Inheritance fhall be in the Place where his Lot falleth, according to the Tribes of your Fathers, ye shall inherit.

This Divifion was accordingly made by Joshua, who, after Gad, Reuben, and the half Tribe of Manaffeh, had received the Lot of their Inheritance beyond Jordan, to the Eastern Boundaries; and when they, who had been fent out on Purpose to describe the Land, had described it by Cities, and were

returned

returned with the Defcription in a Book to Joshua, Joshua caft Lots for them in Shiloh, Joh.xviii. before the Lord; and there Joshua divided 1o. the Land unto the Children of Ifrael, according to their Divisions, that is, to the Tribes who had not yet received their Division, Eastward of Jordan.

You fee this Divifion of the Land by Lot, was to the feveral Tribes according to their Families; fa that in this Divifion, everyTribe and every Family received their Lot and Share by themselves, diftinct from all the other Tribes. Thus each of the Tribes remain'd by the Conftitution a diftinct Province, in which all the Free-holders were not only Ifraelites, but of the fame Tribe, or the Defcendants of the fame Patriarch of Reuben, or of Judah, &c. And the feveral Families were placed together in the fame Neighbourhood, receiving their Inheritance in the fame Part or Sub-divifion of the Tribe; or each Tribe may be faid to live together in one and the fame County, and each Family in one and the fame Hundred: fo that every Neighbourhood were Relations to each other, and of the fame Families, as well as Inhabitants of the fame Place. Nor was it permitted for an Estate in one Tribe, to become the Property of any Perfon belonging to another Tribe, though by the Marriage of an Heiress; for it was provided by an exprefs Law, in the Cafe of the Daughters and Coheireffes of Zelopbebad, Let them marry to whom they Numbers like xxxvi.6,7.

like beft, only to the Family of the Tribe of their Father Shall they marry: So shall not the Inheritance of the Children of Ifrael remove from Tribe to Tribe: for every one of the Children of Ifrael fhall keep himSelf to the Inheritance of the Tribe of his Fathers.

The Manner in which the Territory was divided by Lot, is very juftly defcribed, I think, by an ingenious Author.

"It were

"abfurd to think, that this Lot determined "of Proportions; for fo a mean Man might "have come to have been richer than the "Prince of his Tribe but the Proportions "allotted unto Tribes being stated, though "at first but by guefs, and enter'd into the "Lot-Book of the Surveyors, (who, faith

Jofephus, were most expert in Geometry) "the Princes came firft unto the Urns, "whereof the one contain'd the Names of "the Tribes that were to draw, the other the "Names of thofe Parcels of Land that were "to be drawn firft unto a whole Tribe : "Thus the Name of a Tribe, for Example

Benjamin, being drawn out of one Urn, "unto that Name a Parcel was drawn out "of the other Urn, for Example, the Coun

try lying between Jericho and Bethleem: "This being done, and the Prince of the "Tribe having chofen in what Place he "would take his agreed Proportion, whe"ther of fourteen thoufand Acres, or the " like :" (For our Author supposes the Heads

of

of Families and Princes of the Tribes had a greater Proportion of Land affigned to them, on Account of their Quality and Power in the Tribes :) "Then the reft of the Country "was fubdivided in the Lot-Books, accord

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ing to the Number of Families in the "Tribe of this Prince; and the Parcels fub"divided being caft into one Urn, the "Names of the Patriarchs into the other, "the fame Tribe came again by Families. "Thus every Patriarch making Choice in "what one Part of this Lot he would take his "agreed Proportion, whether of four thou"fand Acres, or the like; the Remainder "was again fubdivided, according to the "Number of Names in his Family: If they "were more than the Parcel would furnish, at "fourAcres a Man;" (which was the Proportion according to the* Estimate of Hecateus, which our Author follows; but fhould have been on a truer Calculation fixteen or twentyone, or twenty-five Acres for each Man;) "then was that Defect amended by Additions "of the next Parcel, and if they were fewer, "then the Overplus was caft over unto the "next Parcel. Thus the Inheritance of the "Children of Simeon was taken out of the "Portion of the Children of Judah, for the "Part of the Children of Judab was too "much for them; therefore the Children "of Simeon had their Inheritance within "the Inheritance of them." This gives an Jof.xix. 9.

* Harrington Commonwealth of Ifrael, c. 11. §. 12.

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