merely ascribed by an individual opinion, there was one feature
peculiar to this state and of great importance in retaining the affections
of the citizens, and checking all thoughts of desertion, or abandonment of
the country: namely, self-interest, the strength and life of all human
action. (144) This was peculiarly engaged in the Hebrew state, for
nowhere else did citizens possess their goods so securely, as did the
subjects of this community, for the latter possessed as large a share in the
land and the fields as did their chiefs, and were owners of their plots of
ground in perpetuity; for if any man was compelled by poverty to sell his
farm or his pasture, he received it back again intact at the year of
jubilee: there were other similar enactments against the possibility of
alienating real property.

(17:145) Again, poverty w as nowhere more endurable than in a country where
duty towards one's neighbour, that is, one's fellow-citizen, was practised
with the utmost piety, as a means of gaining the favour of God the King.
(146) Thus the Hebrew citizens would nowhere be so well off as in their own
country; outside its limits they met with nothing but loss and disgrace.

(17:147) The following considerations were of weight, not only in keeping
them at home, but also in preventing civil war and removing causes of
strife; no one was bound to serve his equal, but only to serve God, while
charity and love towards fellow-citizens was accounted the highest piety;
this last feeling was not a little fostered by the general hatred with which
they regarded foreign nations and were regarded by them. (148) Furthermore,
the strict discipline of obedience in which they were brought up, was a very
important factor; for they were bound to carry on all their actions
according to the set rules of the law: a man might not plough when he liked,
but only at certain times, in certain years, and with one sort of beast at a
time; so, too, he might only sow and reap in a certain method and season -