down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire."[1]
We should understand—what, indeed, it is difficult perhaps at this day fully to appreciate—that one of the greatest dangers to which the Israelites were exposed, in that age, was that of falling into idolatry, like that of all the nations around them, and thus losing all knowledge of the true God. Had this taken place, the whole purpose of their being so carefully guided and instructed, from the time of Abraham downward—would have been frustrated. They were the last hope of the world. All the rest of mankind, as already stated, were at this period sunk in the grossest darkness: the knowledge and worship of God, the Creator of the world, was well nigh lost: with its total extinguishment, mankind would have perished. For men cannot long exist without a knowledge of, and belief in, God their Creator and Heavenly Father. He is the one source of light and life: and these can continue to flow into man's mind, only so long as there is conjunction of spirit with Him,—and this is effected by a knowledge of, and belief in, Him. Were these altogether to cease, men would sink into utter darkness and wickedness,—into mere animal life—such only, indeed, as that of the fiercest animals, lions, tigers, and wolves. The earth would soon become a terrestrial hell: men would fall upon each other, like wild beasts, and tear each other to pieces: and the human race would perish.[2]
- ↑ Deuteronomy vii. 1—5.
- ↑ Was not an approach to this state of things seen in France, at the time of the Old Revolution,—when in consequence of the general denial of a God and the almost universal prevalence of
