§ 230. But the technique proper of the mechanism is not the most important pedagogical element of the theocracy. We find this in its historical significance, since its history throughout has a pedagogical character. For the people of God show us always, in their changing intercourse with their God, a progress from the external to the internal, from the lower to the higher, from the past to the future. Its history, therefore, abounds in situations very interesting in a pedagogical point of view, and in characters which are eternal models. § 231. (1) The will of God as the absolute authority is at first to them, as law, external. But soon God adds to the command to obedience, on one hand, the inducement of a promise of material prosperity, and on the other hand the threat of material punishment. The fulfilment of the law is also encouraged by reflection on the profit which it brings. But, since these motives are all external, they rise finally into the insight that the law is to be fulfilled, not on their account, but because it is the will of the Lord; not alone because it is conducive to our happiness, but also because it is in itself holy, and written in our hearts: in other words, man proceeds from the abstract legality, through the reflection of eudæmonism, to the internality of moral sentiment——the course of all education. ——This last stand-point is especially represented in the excellent Gnomic of Jesus Sirach——a book so rich in pedagogical insight, which paints with master-strokes the relations of husband and wife, parents and children, master and servants, friend and friend, enemy and enemy, and the dignity of labor as well as the necessity of its division. This priceless book forms a side-piece from the theocratic stand-point to the _Republic_ of Plato and his laws on ethical government.——