expected to find her coming out as a theologian and reunionist? Yet under these phases she appears in the article on "Russia, Rome, and the Old Catholics." Of course, whether as diplomatist or as divine, she always exercises her vocation as the chief literary apologist for the Russian to the English people; but the flavour of divinity imparts quite a new piquancy to the usual fare.

After dubbing "E. B. Lanin" Baron Munchausen come to life again with additional deformities, she proceeds, unconsciously of course, to corroborate his statement of the Russian identification of Church and State. "Greek Orthodoxy is the soul of our Government, and the great link between the Government and the people. But devotion to our faith is immeasurably superior to any worldly consideration. Russia is more of a Church than a State, more of a religion than a nationality. In fact our religion is our nationality. We are first Greek Orthodox and then Slavs or Russians. . . . There millions of us who know how to die, without phrases or self-advertisements, rather than betray our Orthodox

faith."

are

The immediate occasion of the paper is to express Madame Novikoff's resentment at the wild-goose errand of Monsignor Vanutelli, "a Roman ecclesiastic of some eminence, who recently travelled all the way from Odessa to St. Petersburg in order to persuade the Russian nation to submit to the yoke of the Bishop of Rome." She quotes, however, with evident glee these words of Monsignor Vanutelli's "Nowhere is the title of holy so true an expression of the reality as in speaking of Russia. . . . The Christian idea is predominant everywhere, and nowhere does Christ reign to such an extent as in Russia.”

THE TZAR AS ARCH-PROTESTANT.

This is certainly astounding testimony. It encourages the lady who cites it to a pretty little excursion into the region of polemical theology.

"As there can be no other head of the Christian Church but Jesus Christ, the Bishop of Rome is obviously schismatic and heretic. . . . Nor can any Russian Orthodox even discuss the possibility of any union with Rome until Rome has repudiated her heresies and corruptions, abjured the dogma of Papal infallibility, and returned to the Primitive Orthodox Catholic faith." In the field of the Church Russia stands forth as the defender of liberty against the arbitrary pretensions of the Roman Curia. In view of the ceaseless efforts of the Pope to reduce all Christendom to slavish submission, .. Englishmen who love liberty may well rejoice that there exists in Eastern Europe a nation, which Monsignor Vanutelli describes as the greatest, the strongest, and the most solid Power in the world; where the largest portion of the people are profoundly attached to the Government, which represents to them their nationality in all its strength and glory; whose people have not been touched by the revolutionary principles which are wrecking by degrees all the kingdoms of Europe. Even Monsignor Vanutelli can see that Russia has a great mission before her; first, the destruction of the Ottoman Empire in Europe, and with it, Mohammedanism; secondly, the the crushing of the revolutionary spirit which is invading all other European countries; and thirdly, the arresting of the extension of Jewish influence, which is making everincreasing progress elsewhere.

"Russia is the champion of the most sacred of human liberties, as against the autocratic Pope, who is incessantly endeavouring to enslave the conscience and the intellect of mankind. Our autocratic Tzar, wielding with the effective decisiveness of a single will the combined forces of a hundred millions of Orthodox believers, precisely protects that liberty."

Verily Orang emen and members of the Protestant Alliance will rej oice to hear of so potent a backer in their "No Popery" crusade.

RUSSIA AS REUNIONIST.

Madame Novikoff proceeds: "Monsignor Vanutelli's mission serves, at least, to remind us how useful may be the influence which the Russian Orthodox Church may exercise in Western Christendom. As the recent Conference of Lucerne has reminded Europe, there are other than Roman Ultramontanes in Western Catholicism, and with these others the Russian Church may, I hope, with God's help, establish a hearty and deep sympathy and understanding. It is twenty years since the Old Catholic movement gave rise to high hopes of a return to primitive Christianity on the part of the rational Catholics of the West."

Bishop Reinkens' account of the International Old Catholic Congress is quoted at length with its enumeration of Churches represented-French, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Austrian, Swiss, Greek, Armenian, Russian, Anglican. From this sympathetic gathering the writer draws inferences flattering to the future of her own Church.

"Rome goes on binding heavy burdens upon the shoulders of her slaves. The Orthodox Church, true to her great traditions, maintains only that to be the true faith which was taught by the Holy Scripture as explained by the seven Ecumenical Councils.”

Catholics who repudiate the Ultramontane yoke are to "O.K." "Orthodox believers of the Western ritual." The possibilities of reunion between East and West are then discussed at length and principally by help of quotation from other authors.

How very edifying all this theology and ecclesiology should be to the persecuted Baptists of Russia—and we may add, to Baptists and others nearer home!

A SUGGESTIVE TRILOGY.

These three articles, taken together, amusingly illus trate the jumble of incongruous elements which make up the international policy of Europe. Here is the “Catholic" Pope, eager to get back his temporal sovereignty, coquetting with the "godless" Republic and the Orthodox Empire, which Powers by strange irony of fate are flung with him into common antagonism to the Triple Alliance of chiefly Protestant Germany, wholly Catholic Austria, and largely "Liberal " Italy. But it so happens that the Tzar is no less eager to assert his spiritual sovereignty, and so dragoons his Catholic subjects by the million into the Orthodox pale. This the Pope must "grin and bear," contenting himself with paper remonstrances and fanciful Vanutelli missions. Then Austro-Hungarians, eager to maintain the Triple Alliance, become frantically concerned about the Pope's neglect of the persecuted Russian Catholics, and, since "the teaching Church" would compel them to support the Pope's temporal sovereignity, straightway assail "the teaching Church, with the science of Wellhausen and the latest weapons of precision out of the arsenal of the Higher Criticism. Then the Panslav heroine, eager to rehabilitate the persecuting Tzar in the eyes of Protestant England, sets to work with supreme audacity to represent him as the champion of spiritual liberty, Europe's chief defence against the spiritual slavery of Rome. Nay, according to this valorous lady, in the imperial employer of M. Pobedonostseff is to be found the principal hope of a Reunited Christendom, wherein Russian and Greek, Armenian and Anglican, Old Catholics and New, are to fall on each other's necks, and live happily ever afterwards. So she writes and quotes learnedly

about the filioque controversy. "E. B. Lanin," on the other hand, who cares for none of these things, but whose only desire is to show up the seamy side of the Russian autocracy, dilates on the persecution of Stundists and Baptists, with whose religious convictions he has possibly the slightest of sympathy, but whose sufferings cannot fail to make English Nonconformists-the chief voting and fighting strength of the Liberal party-sincere haters of the illiberal Tzar.

But this comic medley suggests one fact of profound significance. The vital international power of religion is witnessed by these attempts of diplomatists to make capital out of its leading modern tendencies. The reconstruction of Biblical history is a movement which has passed out of the scholar's study or the professor's classroom, or even the Church conference. It is a force with which international statesmen are beginning to reckon. Wellhausen's name has been entered on the diplomatic lists. And the trend towards the Reunion of Christendom, though as yet only in what one might term the Conferential stage, is already perceived by the sharp-sighted scouts of the diplomatic campaign to be possessed of immense international potency. Theology, it seems, is becoming a necessary study, even for dabblers in la haute politique.

From all which one may learn the well-nigh unlimited power for good which would by virtue of their moral influence alone belong to the associated or reunited Churches of Christendom.

"A RELIGION FOR ALL TIME": READY MADE. A GERMAN theologian has found in man's fondness for constructing "systems of the universe "a striking proof of his sonship to the Creator. To mimic the work of the father is the play of the child. A similar evidence for affiliation might be said to be presented by the modern craze for manufacturing religions. This is a religionific age, if one may coin a most questionable word to describe a yet more questionable thing. Happily the universe abides while the card-castles known as systems of the universe are blown over; and the rapid succession of newly invented religions make only more manifest the stable work of the One Author of Religion. A late variety of the manufactured article is announced in the Arena for March by Louis R. Ehrich, under the modest title of "A religion for all time.' The article is of a piece with its title. We are told in the first paragraph "Christianity is going down. Jesus is rising higher and higher." But the writer soon shows that he imagines himself to have got beyond this "rising" Teacher; for he replaces Christ's twofold commandment of love by a single commandment. "The religion which will yet prevail among men will demand that man shall love his neighbour more than himself" "Love to man includes love to God-just as the brotherhood of man establishes God's fatherhood."

This last clause is a characteristic case of the writer's almost uniform hysteron proteron, or, as homely Saxon has it, of putting the cart before the horse. In fact Mr. Ehrich's patent seems to be simply that of putting the cart before the horse, or rather of putting the horse inside the cart and insisting that the cart shall draw itself and the horse too. Instead of the legend, "To the glory of God and therefore to the weal of man," he would write "For the weal of man and therefore to the glory of God." And he supports his preference by a sentence which he puts into italics, and which admirably illustrates his reading of religious history, -"all religion primarily devoted to the glory of God' has left one long hideous trail of suffering, of torture, and of blood"! Yet after talking about man's brotherhood

"establishing" God's Fatherhood, he appears to grant, with charming consistency, that the causal process may be precisely the reverse. The italics are his own. "Except

for the clearly defined purpose of adding to one's spiritual power in the consecration to humanity's service, no man has a right to give time to the praise of God so long as one single human being needs help, so long as there is a single dark spot on the earth which can be cleansed and illumined."

His main thesis he illustrates in the following string of opposites-"Here is the contrast between the religion of the past and of the future :

As the centuries grow, man will less and less concern himself about God, will more and more devote himself to man."

From another series of false antitheses some hints as to ministerial training may be gleaned :

"Here are the titles of eight theses of the class which graduated last year from the Divinity School of one of our most prominent colleges. I give the printed order, and add that twenty-three more subjects follow, all of the same character:

The essential elements of loving faith.

The rise and primitive character of Congregationalism.

An investigation of the orthodox doctrine of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper.

The Free Church movement of Sweden in its relation to theology.

The Scriptural doctrine of the design of punishment.
Paul's doctrine of sin.

The theology of the Heidelberg Catechism.

The significance of Christ's death in the four Gospels. "A century hence, the titles of these theses will, let us hope, be more of the following character :The relation of sanitation to morality. Conflicting theories of prison discipline. How to deal with intemperance. The economy of crime prevention. How to make labour trust capital. The sweetening of the life of the poor. Child saving as related to world purification. What art and music can do for the labouring classes.

"In other words, schools of theology will give way to schools of sociology; and the young man who desires to take up the cross of Jesus, and to live for the uplifting and ennoblement of the race, will find the highest post-graduate course of his training in The National Conference of Charities and Corrections.'

Our prophetic friend forgets that Christian Sociology is already an acknowledged branch of theology. But it is a common failing of humanitarian impatience to want the branch without the trunk, nay to insist on having the fruit alone, and to scout the tree, from root to blossom, as metaphysical, unpractical, superfluous. "The bond of Church Union," he predicts, "will not be believing, but doing."

Religions generally exist and grow before a name is given them. But mutual improvement societies, limited liability companies and other concerns that are made not born, take care to get the name first, as they often get nothing else. So our writer: —

"If I were asked to give a name to any sect or body of men who should represent the religious principles I have tried to express, I should prefer the simple name which, more than any other, Jesus dignified, the 'meek and lowly' name, Servants.'

MRS. MARY DAVIES ON SINGING, SCHOOLING, AND NATIONAL SONG.

IN the admirable portrait gallery of leading ladies which the Young Woman is month by month presenting to its readers, the figure for April is that of Mrs. Mary Davies. This famous soprano is one among the many women of song who have been eminent in religion as well as in music. She comes of a family active in good works and long and honourably associated with Tolmers Square Congregational Church; where her own career of public usefulness may be said to have begun. In tle wider and more conspicuous circles into which her gifts have introduced her, she has remained true to her origins. As is observed by Mr. Albert Dawson, the writer of the sketchinterview referred to, "Mary

Davies,' as she is invariably called, stands high in the profession and is a special favourite in religious circles. She is always willing to lend a helping hand-or rather voice-in any deserving cause. She is anything but a mere professional singer; her interest and activity cover a wider area. If I might be allowed the liberty of a personal testimony, I would describe her in one word as a good woman. She is exactly the kind of person a girl would choose to go to for advice and direction."

Asked what advice she would give to a young girl who contemplates going in for singing as a profession, she replied, "First of all, it is absolutely necessary that her general education should be thoroughly good. That is more necessary now than ever. Unless she has something decidedly more than mere voice, I would not advise her taking up the profession at all..... Competition is so fearfully keen nowadays that it is really very questionable whether one in a hundred should be advised to go in for the musical

being made the basis of the instruction, these diseases would eventually diminish."

Asked whether she thought our religious services are improving from a musical point of view, Mrs. Davies replied: "I think they are. But I have not much personal knowledge, because I have always kept pretty regularly to the same place of worship. In the services of the Church of England, whether High or Low, the greater importance attached to music in recent years is patent to everybody. As for the Nonconformist churches generally, their musical services have also been steadily improving for years. Dr. Allon's church has a very high reputation for its singing, and the music at the City Temple is also excellent.'

"What do you think of the innovations that are being made in the way of solos and instruments?

profession. The multiplication of the facilities for learning music open up so many channels. When I was a student, for instance, there was only the Royal Academy; now we have the Royal College with its hundreds, the Guildhall School of Music with its thousands of pupils, and innumerable smaller institutions. But the effect of such institutions should be the improvement of music in the home rather than to develop the notion that, by having one lesson a week for a short time, girls can at once earn their living by singing in public."

Referring to the subject of breathing well, the lady remarked, "It is strange how imperfectly people do breathe. Somehow, most of the population manage to get on with the use of only about half their lungs; but we hear a great deal of chest complaint and lung complaint throughout the country, and I can't help thinking that if singing were more generally taught, and well taught, proper breathing

"I have not thought about that. Personally I much prefer pure congregational singing, and that all should take part in the musical portion of the service. An occasional solo now and then is good, but I think congregational singing is by far the most beautiful and the most desirable. Some of the finest congregational singing I have ever heard has been without an instrument at all-at the great festivals in Wales.

"The Welsh are notoriously in advance of the English musically?"

"Chorally or congregationally, distinctly so."

"It is often said that we English are not a musical nation-what is your opinion?"

Laughing heartily, Mrs Davies responded: "That is a difficult question to answer, if you like. Every part of England is not as musical as other parts. Lancashire and Yorkshire are more musical than any other English counties. The north is undoubtedly far more musical than the south."

Mrs. Davies was asked whether her experience confirmed the opinion that "poor unlettered people appreciate good music more than the wealthy and cultured classes." She answered:

"I think the more likely explanation is that the poorer classes give freer expression to their feelings. The natural tendency of civilization is to repress the expression of feeling. The uneducated classes often enjoy good music without knowing why; of course, the novelty of it adds to the pleasure. Emotional music will tell more upon the untutored than upon the cultured. It is very gratifying to find that the uneducated classes can appreciate good music. You know that in many of the homes of the cotton-spinners and factory-hands in Lancashire, almost the first thing they aim at getting is a piano or a harmonium. That has been so for years and years. Yorkshire is particularly noted for its brass bands. extraordinary what a difference there is between the

It is

expression of the audience in the north and of one in the south. Northerners are more easily roused by good music and singing, and they express themselves more spontaneously than people in the south."

Does that still hold good when you cross the border into Scotland?"

"Hardly. Scotch people are not so responsive." "Is that because they appreciate music less?" "No; only they are not so spontaneous. They are fond of music, and the cultivatio and love of music are growing in a marked degree. They have always been noted for the love of their national songs even more than the English, and are truer to their national music."

To the enquiry, "What is your favourite song?" Mrs. Davies said it was impossible to single out one song above all the rest. She mentioned that Schubert and Rubinstein are her favourite composers. Of national songs she prefers old English, and some of the Welsh ones. "I do not think," she remarked, "that we pay enough attention to national melodies. We should cultivate them more. There is an immense number of very beautiful ones which are very rarely sung, and very little known."

It is interesting to know that Mrs. Davies has been a total abstainer for over a dozen years, and considers it a safeguard both for the character and efficiency of the public singer. She mentions the banquets of the City Fathers as occasions where the young singer is most in danger of temptation to indulge in wine.

Mrs. Davies is very sympathetic towards the movement in which Miss Frances E. Willard and Lady Henry Somerset are the most conspicuous leaders. She sees no reason why women should not occupy all the places men fill, provided they are able. "I certainly would not make any artificial distinctions, or allow any unfair disabilities. It is only the fittest who will be elected to stand in public positions. Women who are fitted for other spheres will go in for them. It is ridiculous to have any disabilities beyond those imposed by nature."

"I see no reason for withholding the vote from my sex; nor have I any objection to women sitting in Parliament. It is often forgotten that only a comparatively small number of women would be ambitious in that direction, and they would be elected by the votes of men as well as of women. Things should be allowed to develop naturally, and then they will adjust themselves."

Mr. Dawson had actually the temerity to touch on the burning questions of corset and crinoline. He found that on both Mrs. Davies takes the rational view. She favours the entire abandonment of the corset until girls are fully developed or of an age to judge for themselves."

"The supposition that corsets support the body is a fallacy. It is at best a false support, and exhausts strength that would otherwise be a real and natural support."

She hopes that "there will be such an outcry against thecrinoline that no self-respecting woman dare adopt it," but fears that we are seriously threatened with the invasion.

SHOULD CHURCHES PROVIDE SUNDAY PLAYROOMS?

AN AMERICAN PLEA FOR THE CHILDREN OF THE SLUMS. "THE means that will uplift" the people who live in Darker New York are suggestively sketched by Lillian W. Betts, in a recent number of the Christian Union. The true evangelization of that great multitude, she maintains, can only be accomplished not by "the methods usually followed in the evangelistic work of the Churches," but "only by the secular activities maintained by them for the

seven days of the week." "It is impossible for any church to influence the life of this mass of people except through education." Among the leavening influences "not due to the churches," she mentions the Hebrew Free Education

Society, which is doing a tremendous work among the Hebrews of the city"; the College Settlement Association, commenced three years ago, where paid and volunteer workers went to live, clubs were established for boys and girls, ranging in age from seven to twenty-five, a club known as the Home Improvement Club was started for mothers, and now a Working Man's Club is about to be established; the Tee-To-Tum Club, a recent organization in Essex Street; and the Neighbourhood Guild-the first direct attempt to reach these people through other than church missionary efforts.

THE KINDERGARTEN THE GREATEST MORAL ENGINE.

"The greatest engine of moral elevation is, we are beginning to recognise, the kindergarten. The kindergarten does not meet the needs of the children only, but reaches over directly into the home. Every kindergarten in New York, if it is doing its full work, has in connection with it a mothers' class, where the mothers of the children come once a week, or once in two weeks, to learn kindergarten songs, to play kindergarten games, to discuss the training of children; and before they part tea or coffee and cake is served, and the mother whose only occupation and interest in life is to keep the two, three, or four rooms in a state of cleanliness and order, according to her standard, and who cares for her children, subject to the same limitation, is given here her one social opportunity. Here the educated kindergartner child-lover brings to the mother a new knowledge that there is something else to do for Johnny and Mary than just to wash their faces and their clothes and feed them; and no missionary in the city of New York is accomplishing more for the evangelization of the mother, for the elevation of the home and the family, than is the kindergartner who realizes her opportunities in her relato the mother of children placed under her care. There are kindergartners whose work does not stop here. The little boys and girls who are turned on the street after three o'clock soon arouse her interest, and they are gathered into little clubs, taught to play games, to sing songs, to be polite and considerate."

WHAT THE SUNDAY SCHOOL MIGHT DO.

"Take the Sunday-school; tremendous effort is made to reach the children. These children are placed under the control, too often, of people who have but little conception of their duty towards them. One hour to two hours is devoted to these children, and then they are turned into the street.

"Is it not possible to turn the Sunday-school rooms of these churches into picture galleries, into libraries, even into play-rooms, where the children can remain on Sunday afternoon if they wish under the care of intelligent men and women, the only condition of remaining under the roof of the church being good behaviour? Would it not be a thousand times better to have a bowling-alley in the cellar of a church where the boys could go and play, a concrete floor on which they could skate with rolling-skates, quiet games that would keep them indoors, rather than to turn them into the street, their only refuge? The home is overcrowded always, but especially Sundays.

"The Church must take its proper place among this community; its relations must cease to be purely didactic; it must be social, and social in the broadest sense of the term, not following merely the imitations of the polite entertainments given up-town, but furnishing the amusements which the people demand, if it means to fight rum and ignorance as it should."

THE LABOUR QUESTION IN ANCIENT ISRAEL. IF ever we are to have a true system of Christian Economics, or a faithful presentation of the economic ideal of Jesus, we shall require as a preliminary condition a careful investigation of the economic ideals and realities of the people of Israel. Here, as elsewhere, we shall only be able to understand our Lord's thought aright if we examine its presuppositions as rooted in the history and prophecy of His nation. The Rev. W. H Bennett, Professor of Old Testament Religion in Hackney and New (Congregational) Colleges, is, we are glad to see, contributing to this necessary study in a series of articles in the Thinker on "Economic Conditions of the Hebrew Monarchy." His April study is on Labour, and contains much fresh and suggestive matter. The style is vivid and frequently piquant. He thus discusses the questions: "What proportion of the available labour was utilised, and how far were the possible opportunities of leisure distributed throughout the community? What proportion of those who could work did work, and how long and hard did they work? We pointed out in a previous paper that the Israelite citizen was as a rule landowner. In the absence of rent and land agents, the landowner worked his own land with the help of his family and servants. Even in large holdings the owner can scarcely ever have been a mere receiver of the products of other people's industry, he must have exercised some general supervision; and on the ordinary smaller holdings the owner's own work and supervision would be the most important element in obtaining satisfactory returns.

FEW UNPRODUCTIVE CLASSES.

"There were not many classes of the community that were not engaged in agriculture. Government was rudimentary and economical. The kings, princes, and officials of the Court had their own estates, though doubtless the more powerful kings gathered round them idle crowds, who ministered to their love of pleasure and ostentation, and were maintained by requisitions on the harvests and cattle of the hardworking farmers. The most permanent and necessary portion of this royal clientèle was the bodyguard of foreign mercenaries, which, however, can never have attained to any very large dimensions. Another class not engaged in actual labour was made up of the ministers of religion—the priests of the various sanctuaries and the prophets. The Pentateuchal system, which devotes one whole tribe out of twelve to the service of a single sanctuary, had no counterpart in the actual arrangements of the monarchy. Probably, the total of priests and prophets combined did not make any serious deduction from the available industrial population. With regard to the women, agricultural life naturally drew into useful activity all the women of the household. A certain number of women would lead idle lives in the harems of kings and princes and great nobles; but these women were largely foreigners, and ancient Israelite life has no parallel to the modern withdrawal from all profitable occupation of the bulk of the women of the higher and middle classes. It is no great exaggeration to say that the provision necessary for the wants of the community was, speaking generally, produced by the united efforts of the whole community. It will follow from all these considerations that opportunities of leisure were very widely distributed. Indeed, it is obvious that the natural conditions of agriculture tend to secure a large amount of leisure both to the farmer and his le bourers."

Professor Bennett divides agricultural workers into three classes, which he describes seriatim, with enlivening

and enlightening glimpses at corresponding modern conditions.

THE HEBREW YEOMAN.

1. Landowners and their families.-The owner of a small holding would be "under certain semi-feudal obligations to the head of his house or clan and possibly to the chief of his tribe, and the language of the prophets indicates that these obligations were often made the instrument of vexatious oppression and ruinous extortion." But ordinarily the dread cf invasion made the nobles treat their yeomen well. When relieved from this fear, “under powerful and victorious kings like Jeroboam II., the nobles sought to grasp for themselves the holdings of poorer men who were no longer necessary as allies in war. Clearly, therefore, in his better days, the Israelite farmer enjoyed a far more satisfactory life than that of the modern peasant proprietor: he was not driven to the grinding and sordid and drudgery which is so often the lot of the latter; nor, apparently, were the holdings repeatedly subdivided.. so as to become too small to support a family upon each holding." "The honourable and healthy nature of the occupation of this class of workers is evident from the fact that the Old Testament records, in the most matterof-fact way, the personal labours of its most distinguished characters, many of them members of the wealthiest and. noblest families.

THE IDEAL HEBREW WOMAN

depicted for us in Proverbs xxxi, seeketh wool and flax and worketh willingly with her hands. In modern times her servants would know that she was not a lady, and people in society would not call upon her; but in Israel, her husband was known in the gates, when he sat among the elders of the land. . . . . Many daughters did virtuously, but she excelled them all.'

"Perhaps the best modern parallel to the average Israelite citizen and his family is the well-to-do American farmer, settled within reach of Indians or Mexicans or unruly whites. The settler's life, with its agricultural industries, its spice of danger and occasional fighting, its sturdy independence and self-respect, reproduces some of the most important features of ancient Hebrew life."

2. The hired servants were comparatively few and were not much appreciated. "The word Shakhir, hıred servant, occurs only seventeen times in the O.T., always either in laws or figurative expression and not of actual named persons; we never see the Shakhir at work. . . . On the other hand, 'ebhedh, slave, occurs hundreds of times." "There is one form of labour, specially common in the East, that may be classed with hired labour, namely, the corvée, or compulsory service for great public works." "We may say that, if the Israelite landowner may be compared to an American frontier-settler, the hired servant had points of contact with the 'mean white' of the Southern States. As neither landowner nor slave, he scarcely had any proper place in the regular framework of society."

SOCIETY BASED ON SLAVERY.

3. Slaves.-Hebrew society like every other ancient civilised society rested on slavery. Mr. Bennett objects to the way in which the Authorized Version conceals the fact. 'Manservant and maidservant have associations altogether incongruous with the realities of Hebrew life; they suggest liveries and neat caps and aprons, and a month's notice and other modern devices, which were unknown to the ancient world. They have the more serious fault of ignoring and obscuring the great gulf that yawns between ancient and modern civilization." "Thetrue history of the people for many centuries would be the