And as they were commanded this, so it is obvious how much the constitution of that law was adapted to effect it, and keep religion ever in view. And without somewhat of this nature, piety will grow languid even among the better sort of men; and the worst will go on quietly in an abandoned course, with fewer interruptions from within than they would have were religious reflections forced oftener upon their minds,[1] and consequently with less probability of their amendment. Indeed, in most ages of the church, the care of reasonable men has been, as there has been for the most part occasion, to draw the people off from laying
- ↑ Were religious reflections forced oftener upon their minds.]—"According to the Bishop's doctrine, then," says the Inquirer, "it should be not only good policy, but wholesome discipline, to force men in England to come to church, and in France to go to mass." And again, "If externals have this virtue to enforce religious reflections, it must be right to compel those who are indisposed to such reflections, to attend these memorials. "Yes; granting that the sense of the passage in the Charge is not shamefully perverted, and that we are to understand the Bishop here to speak of external force and compulsion. Whereas by "religious reflections forced," is plainly meant no more than religious reflections oftener thrown in men's way, brought more frequently into their thoughts, so as to produce an habitual recollection that they are always in the Divine presence.
that the end itself was actually gained. For though it be too notorious to be denied, that the Jews did not always confine their religious homage to the God of Israel, but polluted the service, due to him alone, with foreign worship; yet, even in their worst defection, it should be remembered, they never totally rejected the true Jehovah; and after their return from captivity, they were so thoroughly cured of all remaining propensity to the idolatrous rites of heathenism, as never again to violate their allegiance to the God of their fathers. It appears, then, that in consequence of the Jewish separation, the principle of the Unity was in fact preserved inviolate among that people till the coming of Christ. When the Mosaic constitution had thus attained its end, and mankind were now prepared for the reception of a better covenant, the law expired of course; the partition wall that had divided the Jew from the Gentile was taken down, and all distinction between them lost, under the common name of Christians. And this may suffice to show, in opposition to our Inquirer, that it was both very well and very wisely done to abrogate a law, when the purpose for which the law had been enacted was accomplished.
