if they did signs and wonders, were put to death.[444] "If thy brother," the Book continues, "or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thy own soul, entice thee to serve other gods, thou shalt not spare him; thy hand shall be the first upon him to stone him to death."[445] If a city practises idolatry, the inhabitants and every live thing in the city, even the cattle, are to be "cursed" and put to the edge of the sword; all furniture and property is to be brought into the market-place and burnt as a burnt-offering for Jehovah. Then the houses are to be destroyed with fire and never rebuilt.[446] The Book of the Law sought to avoid the greatest danger of all, by the provision that the people should not choose any stranger to be king. How could a stranger be king in Israel when no strangers were to be admitted into the people? The king of the people which Jehovah chose must belong to the chosen race. But the new law also adds, that the people are "to make him king whom Jehovah shall choose," a regulation which, in so far as it recognises and sanctions the old right of election, must be intended to guard against the influence of the priests on the possession of the throne, and their decision. For the king himself the Book lays down the rule: not to multiply horses and wives to himself, that his heart turn not away, as had been the case with Solomon and Ahab, and not to greatly multiply to himself silver and gold. He is also to make a copy of the law when he sits upon the throne of his kingdom, that it may be with him, and "he may read therein all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear Jehovah, and observe all the words of the law, and that his heart be not lifted up above his brethren."[447] The old law gave the rules of blood-right, and family-right, and in addition canons on the rights of the person, and the protection of property. In the new law the main object was to secure the carrying out and application of these rules of justice in the practice of the tribunal. For this object a definite influence of the priests on the tribunal was required. In principle the Book declares, that "every sentence shall be given after the decision of the priests and Levites,"[448] for practice it is contented to prescribe, that judges and overseers were to be placed at all the gates; and then adds: "If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment between blood and blood, and between plea and plea, and stroke and stroke in the gates, then thou shalt arise and get thee to the place which Jehovah shall choose (the temple), and come to the priests and Levites and the judge, who shall be there, and do according to the sentence which they pronounce for thee." The man who will not listen to the priest who stands there to minister before Jehovah is to be put to death.[449]