certain that even in the last forty years of the sixteenth century the executions were not fewer than 17,000" (Ibid, p. 263). The Puritans in New England signalised themselves by their merciless severity towards wizards and witches. France was the first country to stem the tide of cruelty. In 1680 Louis XIV. "issued a proclamation prohibiting all future prosecutions for witchcraft; and directing that even those who might profess the art should only be punished as impostors." In England "the last execution was at Huntingdon, in 1716;" in Scotland, at Darnock, in 1722. The last person burned as a witch was Maria Sanger, at Wurzburg, in Bavaria, 1749 (Ibid, p. 265). Such fruit has borne the command of God from Sinai. It was under these circumstances that God taught that any who sacrificed to any God but himself should be "utterly destroyed" (Ex. xxii. 20). The practical effect of this we shall presently see, in conjunction with other passages. If we pass from these precepts, given with such special solemnity, to the other articles of the so-called Mosaic code, we shall find rules of an equally immoral character. Lev. xxiv. 16 commands that "he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord" shall be stoned. Lev. xxv. 44-46 directs the Hebrews to buy bondmen and bondwomen of the nations around them, "and ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession," thus sanctioning the slave-traffic. Leviticus xxvii. 29 distinctly commands human sacrifice, forbidding the redemption of any that are "devoted of men." Clear as the words are, their meaning has been hotly contested, because of the stain they affix on the Mosaic code. "[Hebrew: MOT VOMOT]" that he die. The commentators take much trouble to soften this terrible sentence. According to Raschi, it concerns a man condemned to death, in which case he must not be redeemed for money. According to others, it is necessary that the person shall be devoted by public authority, and not by private vow; and the Talmud speaks of Jephthah as a fanatic for having thought that a human being could serve as a victim, as a burnt-offering; but there are too many facts which prove the existence and the execution of this barbarous law; see, besides, the paraphrase of Ben Ouziel: [Hebrew: KL APRShA TMVL DDYN QShVL MYTChYYB] "all anathema which shall be anathematised of the human race cannot be redeemed neither by money, by vows, nor by sacrifices, neither by prayers for mercy before God, since he is condemned to death" (Lévitique, par Cahen, p. 143; ed. 1855). Thus Jephthah devoted to the Lord "whatsoever cometh out of the doors of my house to meet me," and, his daughter being the one who came, he "did with her according to his vow" (Judges xi. 30-40).