high inspiration that it incites to the highest virtue, the firmest loyalty, and the greatest love for truth and justice. Judaism, knowing no such thing as original sin, points with pride instead to hereditary virtue, deriving an inexhaustible source of blessing from its historical continuity of four thousand years. Chapter LVI. The Stranger and the Proselyte 1. Among all the laws of the Mosaic Code, that which has no parallel in any other ancient code is the one enjoining justice, kindness and love toward the stranger. The Book of the Covenant teaches: “And a stranger shall thou not wrong, neither shalt thou oppress him; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt,”(1296) and “A stranger shalt thou not oppress; for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.” The Deuteronomic writer lays special stress on the fact that Israel’s God, “who regardeth not persons nor taketh bribes, doth execute justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment.” He then concludes: “Love ye therefore the stranger; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”(1297) The Priestly Code goes still further, granting the stranger the same legal protection as the native.(1298) 2. We would, however, misunderstand the spirit of all antiquity, including ancient Israel, if we consider this as an expression of universal love for mankind and the recognition of every human being as fellow-man and brother. Throughout antiquity and during the semi-civilized Middle Ages, a stranger was an enemy unless he became a guest. If he sought protection at the family hearth or (in the Orient) under the tent of a Sheik, he thereby entered into a tutelary relation with both the clan or tribe and its deity. After entering into such a relation, temporary or permanent, he became, in the term which the Mosaic law uses in common with the general Semitic custom, a _Ger_ or _Toshab_, “sojourner” or “settler,” entitled to full protection.(1299) This relation of dependency on the community is occasionally expressed by the term: “thy stranger that is within thy gates.”(1300) Such protection implied, in turn, that the _Ger_ or _protegé_ owed an obligation to the tribe or community which shielded him. He stood under the protection of the tribal god, frequently assumed his name, and thus dared not violate the law of the land or of its deity, lest he forfeit his claim to protection.