wealth, and the sole road to this was commerce.

There can be no question that, according to the Divine purpose, Israel was not intended

to be a commercial people. The many restrictions to the intercourse between Jews and

Gentiles, which the Mosaic law everywhere presents, would alone have sufficed to

prevent it. Then there was the express enactment against taking interest upon lo ans

(Lev 25:36,37), which must have rendered commercial transactions impossible, even

though it was relaxed in reference to those who lived outside the boundaries of

Palestine (Deu 23:20). Again, the law of the Sabbatic and of the Jubilee year would have

brought all extended commerce to a standstill. Nor was the land at all suited for the

requirements of trade. True, it possessed ample seaboard, whatever the natural

capabilities of its harbours may have been. But the whole of that coast, with the

harbours of Joppa, Jamneh, Ascalon, Gaza, and Acco or Ptolemais, remained, with short

intervals, in the possession of the Philistines and Phoenicians. Even when Herod the

Great built the noble harbour of Caesarea, it was almost exclusively used by foreigners

(Josephus, Jew. War, 409-413). And the whole history of Israel in Palestine points to the

same inference. Only on one occasion, during the reign of Solomon, do we find anything

like attempts to engage in mercantile pursuits on a large scale. The reference to the

"king's merchants" (1 Kings 10:28,29; 2 Chron 1:16), who imported horses and linen

yarn, has been regarded as indicating the existence of a sort of royal trading company,

or of a royal monopoly. A still more curious inference would almost lead us to describe

Solomon as the first great "Protectionist." The expressions in 1 Kings 10:15 point to

duties paid by retail and wholesale importers, the words, literally rendered, indicating as

a source of revenue that "from the traders and from the traffick of the merchants"; both

words in their derivation pointing to foreign trade, and probably distinguishing them as

retail and wholesale. We may here remark that, besides these duties and the tributes

from "protected" kings (1 Kings 9:15), Solomon's income is described (1 Kings 10:14) as

having amounted, at any rate, in one year, to the enormous sum of between two and

three million sterling! Part of this may have been derived from the king's foreign trade.

For we know (1 Kings 9:26, etc.; 2 Chron 8:17, etc.) that King Solomon built a navy at

Ezion-geber, on the Red Sea, which port David had taken. This navy traded to Ophir, in

company with the Phoenicians. But as this tendency of King Solomon's policy was in

opposition to the Divine purpose, so it was not lasting. The later attempt of King

Jehoshaphat to revive the foreign trade signally failed; "for the ships were broken at

Ezion-geber" (1 Kings 22:48; 2 Chron 20:36,37), and soon afterwards the port of Ezion-

geber passed once more into the hands of Edom (2 Kings 8:20).

With this closes the Biblical history of Jewish commerce in Palestine, in the strict sense

of that term. But our reference to what may be called the Scriptural indications against

the pursuit of commerce brings up a kindred subject, for which, although confessedly a

digression, we claim a hearing, on account of its great importance. Those most

superficially acquainted with modern theological controversy are aware, that certain

opponents of the Bible have specially directed their attacks against the antiquity of the

Pentateuch, although they have not yet arranged among themselves what parts of the

Pentateuch were written by different authors, nor by how many, nor by whom, nor at

what times, nor when or by whom they were ultimately collected into one book. Now

what we contend for in this connection is, that the legislation of the Pentateuch affords

evidence of its composition before the people were settled in Palestine. We arrive at this

conclusion in the following manner. Supposing a code of laws and institutions to be

drawn up by a practical legislator--for unquestionably they were in force in Israel--we

maintain, that no human lawgiver could have ordered matters for a nation in a settled

state as we find it done in the Pentateuch. The world has had many speculative

constitutions of society drawn up by philosophers and theorists, from Plato to

Rousseau and Owen. None of these would have suited, or even been possible in a

settled state of society. But no philosopher would ever have imagined or thought of

such laws as some of the provisions in the Pentateuch. To select only a few, almost at

random. Let the reader think of applying, for example, to England, such provisions as

that all males were to appear three times a year in the place which the Lord would