and in the pursuit of which the soul forgets its higher destiny and its
paramount obligations. Moses is the first to expose with terrific force
and solemn earnestness this universal tendency to the oblivion of the
One God amid the temptations, the pleasures, and the glories of the
world, and the certain displeasure of the universal sovereign which must
follow, as seen in the fall of empires and the misery of individuals
from his time to ours, the uniform doom of people and nations, whatever
the special form of idolatry, whenever it reaches a peculiar fulness and
development,--the ultimate law of all decline and ruin, from which there
is no escape, "for the Lord God is a jealous God, visiting the
iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth
generation." So sacred and awful is this controlling Deity, that it is
made a cardinal sin even to utter His name in vain, in levity or
blasphemy. In order also to keep Him before the minds of men, a day is
especially appointed--one in seven--which it is the bounden duty as well
as privilege of all generations to keep with peculiar sanctity,--a day
of rest from labor as well as of adoration; an entirely new institution,
which no Pagan nation, and no other ancient nation, ever recognized.
After thus laying solemn injunctions upon all men to render supreme
allegiance to this personal God,--for we can find no better word,
although Matthew Arnold calls it "the Power which maketh for
righteousness,"--Moses presents the duties of men to each other, chiefly
those which pertain to the abstaining from injuries they are most
tempted to commit, extending to the innermost feelings of the heart, for
"thou shalt not covet anything which is thy neighbor's;" thus covering,
in a few sentences, the primal obligations of mankind to God and to
society, afterward expanded by a greater teacher into the more
comprehensive law of Love, which is to bind together mortals on earth,
as it binds together immortals in heaven.