*Chapter xvii., vv. 3 and 4. The absurdity of this command will be apparent upon the slightest examination. If the Jews were as numerous as is represented when in Egypt, and continued to increase and multiply in the same ratio, they would have filled a very large portion of the earth's surface; but even allowing for biblical exaggeration, it would have been impossible for a people, amounting to several hundreds of thousands, to have all slaughtered their cattle at one spot (the door of the Tabernacle); and if they had done so, judging from the appearance and odour of modern slaughterhouses, I can scarcely think that the 'holiest of holies' would have been at the same time 'the sweetest of sweets.' It would have been still more impossible for each individual to have brought (perhaps from a distance of several miles) each an ox, lamb, or goat killed. It is not at all probable, in a nation so ignorant as the Jews, that the people possessed carts and waggons for the purpose of transporting the dead cattle to and fro, and if they had, the waste of labour would have been enormous. The severe penalty of death is all that is required to make this essentially one of 'God's laws.' What would be said if all the slaughtered cattle in England were, by Act of Parliament, compelled, under penalty of death, to be brought to the door of St. Paul's Cathedral to have the fat and blood taken from them? Verse 7, chap, xix., w. 26 and 31, chap, xx., vv. 6 and 27. What are devils? If God is the Creator of all things, did he create devils? If so, it is scarcely just to punish us for falling victims to devils, whom God must have made sufficiently powerful to tempt us to the commission of crime. If otherwise, are devils independent existences, because in that case the Deity is not omnipotent. They are neither; devils, angels, gods, familiar spirits and demons, all stand in the same mythological position. They belong to the past, not to the present. They belong to the age of ignorance, not of inquiry. We find in such verses as these the clue to the superstitious fear with which the inhabitants of some little villages still regard certain old men and women; we find in them also the clue to the persecutions for witchcraft in the reign of King James, etc. Strong objections have been urged against the doctrine of devils, demons, and familiar spirits. It is said by Theists that it is contrary to all natural conceptions of the benevolence and mercy of the Deity; that he should have created, and should sustain in existence, beings of the highest intellectual order to be the subjects of eternal misery, not only to themselves, but to all humanity. It is further urged that the doctrine detracts from the power of God by holding forth an almost omnipotent chief of a legion of powerful and mischievous devils, all bent on the destruction of mankind. It is further, and very reasonably, urged that the Jews, {68} especially alter their connection