owner of such crops to affix any damage or trespass, that may have been committed, on any particular herd or flock; whereas by this congregated arrangement he recovers damage from the head herdman, who levies it from the real offenders.

Every cow and sheep-herd is furnished with a goad, as represented by fig. 1; every buffalo-herd, and the head herdman, carries a goad, as fig. 2. The word goad in the Hindostanee, Oordoo, and English languages, precisely corresponds in pronunciation; and, as it can be traced to times anterior to the existence of the English language, must have been borrowed from the East, as many others are. The goad is used to urge forward cattle that lag behind, to punish such as fight or are otherwise unruly, and to recall any that may stray into the cultivated spots. Should any goads be lost, broken, or their points bent or blunted during pasture hours, the head herdman, as being usually the most experienced hand, having most leisure, and being most interested in the good conduct of the herd, replaces such deficiencies, repairs the broken, or re-files the blunted, as referred to 1 Sam. xiii. 21-Yet they had a file to sharpen the goads'-and when so repaired, sends or distributes them to those who require them, and who may be at a considerable distance, by the hand of some shepherd who may be near him at the time.

Fig. 1. Fig. 2.

by iron ferrules. Such goads as are purchased ready made have, of course, regular spikes; but as repaired, or replaced when lost, by the head herdman in the fields, or made when new by the shepherds themselves for their own use, which is mostly the case, these spikes are made out of nails or parts of nails; and ninety-nine in one hundred are so made.

The staff of the goad is also armed with two flat leathern thongs (not plaited together whip-wise), secured to it about four inches from the upper extremity, which are about the same length with the staff and used as a lash. The word shepherd' being used in the text in connection with the goad, shews that the cow or shepherd goad, fig 1, is the one alluded to.

The buffalo goad, fig. (that species of cattle being more unmanageable), differs from the other in being longer, stronger, and without lash. It is usually five feet long, bound round between every joint of the bamboo with leather ties, and armed at the lower or thick end with several massive iron rings, from three to five in number, and of various pattern and device; as also, at the same extremity, with a strong iron spike, about six inches long, secured by an iron ferrule. This instrument is sometimes called goad lattee, and, being a formidable weapon, is probably the one spoken of, Judges iii. 31-Shamgar, the son of Anath, which slew of the Philistines six hundred men with an ox goad.'

The writer of the above (many years a resident in Eastern countries, and autoptically acquainted with the instruments and customs alluded to) deduces there from the following explanation of the text in question:

The words of the wise are as goads and as the nails fastened therein by the masters (or head herdmen) of assemblies of cattle, which are given (or distributed) by one of the shepherds.'

Or, paraphrased without the metaphor, thus

'The words of the wise, communicated by head teachers of assemblies to teachers under them, who again diffuse them generally to others, are as goads to instigate to energy the lukewarm and sluggish.'

GOATS, of which several kinds were known in Western Asia, one of which bears the name of the Syrian goat, having pendulous ears and long hair, were kept in flocks and tended by the patriarchs (Gen. xv. 9; xxxii. 14), as they still are by the Bedouins, and at a later period formed on all the high lands of Palestine an important member of the flock (1 Sam. xxv. 2). They served for food, and therefore for offerings (Deut. xiv. 4). Their milk furnished nutriment (Prov. xxvii. 27). Their hides were worn as cloaks by prophets and persons of ascetic mode of life (Zech. xiii. 4. Heb. xi. 37), and sup plied hair for making tents (Exod. xxvi. 7) as well as bed-clothes (1 Samuel xix. 13).

Among their contributions, the Israelites in the wilderness gave goats' hair which was spun by women (Exod. xxv. 4; xxxv. 6, 23, 26), which was probably used in part to make cords for the tent, and in part was made into tents (xxvi. 7-13). Such curtains, or saga (in Hebrew shak, in the Septuagint sakkos-whence our sack, shag, shaggy), of spun goats' hair, seem to have been commonly used for the covering of tents. Sack cloth, or a hair shirt, which was black or dark brown, the goats of Syria and Palestine being chiefly of that colour even to the present day, is alluded to in Rev. vi. 12 (comp Is. 1. 3), and was worn to express mourning and mortification (Jonah iii. 5— 8). When Herod Agrippa was seized at Cæsarea with a mortal distemper (Acts xii. 23), the people, according to Josephus (Ant. xix. 8, 2), sat down on sack-cloth, beseeching God on his behalf. Hence the use of hairshirts worn by devotees in more recent times. The goat is often found in connection with sheep. General terms were employed in the ancient world to include both sheep and goats. Sheep and goats were offered together in sacrifice. Numerous are the instances found in ancient writers in which the same flock, or the wealth of a single individual, included both these animals. In Walpole's Travels' is a plate taken from a tablet dedicated to Pan, in which goats and sheep appear in different groups. The two kinds of animals were generally kept apart. To this circumstauce allusion is made by our Saviour in his image of the shepherd dividing the sheep from the goats (Matt. xxv. 32). The he-goat was employed to

lead the flock, as the ram was among sheep. The following passages of Scripture allude to this custom: Jer. 1. 8. Zech. x. 3.

In Daniel viii. 5, a he-goat is the symbol of the Macedonian empire. The reason assigned is, that Macedon having in early pe riods abounded in goats, assumed a goat's head as its insignia, as appears from extant coins. In Matt. xxv. goats symbolise those who are rejected of the Great Judge.

The preceding engraving represents an ancient goat-herd holding the syrinx, or pipe, in his left band, and a young kid in his right.

Scape goat, in the Hebrew Azazel, offers a subject on which great diversities of opinion prevail. By the Biblical account (Lev. xvi.), we learn that on the day of annual atonement the high-priest, after certain expiatory acts, took two goats, and, having presented them to Jehovah, cast lots on them-'one lot for Jehovah, and the other lot for the scape-goat;' in the original (see the margin), 'for Azazel.' The lot, or goat, which fell to Jehovah, the priest slew and offered to the Almighty as a sin-offering. But the goat designated by lot for Azazel was presented alive before Jehovah, to make an atonement with him, to send him to Azazel into the wilderness (we have literally translated the 10th verse). When the ritual of atonement was completed, Aaron laid his hands on the head of the live goat, and, confessing over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, putting them on the head of the goat, sent the goat by a fit man into the wilderness; and the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities into an uninhabited land,' where he was set at liberty and lost. The transaction is obviously symbolical; designed, apparently, to show the obliteration of the sins of the people by the immediately preceding expiations; for the goat, with the forgiven sins of the people on his head, was led into the wilderness, where, with all about him, he was lost from sight, and probably perished. This symbolical act some have supposed was founded on the old notion, namely, that the wilderness was inhabited by Azazel and other wicked spirits (comp. Lev. xvii. 7. Deut. xxxii. 17), to whom victims were offered. With this delusion the Israelites were doubtless acquainted, especially as propitiatory offerings were made by the Egyptians to Typhon, their personification of evil. Hence arose the notion, that to send or devote to Azazel (probably from azaz, power, and el, god, meaning the power of God, or great power, the demon of power) was to consign to destruction. In process of time, the phrase 'to send to Azazel,' came to signify merely to hand over to oblivion, without any reference to the superstition whence it had arisen. In this sense it seems to have been employed by Moses. Similar usages of languages are found among other nations. To throw to the crows' meant, with the Greeks, 'to consign to ruin'-similar to the English 'go to the devil,' which, though low, throws light

on the point under consideration; so in German, geh zum henker.

This explanation is not without support from analogy. The two goats-one offered in sacrifice to Jehovah, the other given over to perdition and forgetfulness-are similar to the two pigeons employed in the purification of the leper, one of which is sacrificed, the other flies away with the impurity and sin (Lev. xiv. 4—7). The notion that a sacrifice to Satan was here intended is without support. Such an impiety is immediately after expressly forbidden (xvii. 7), and is wholly repugnant to the principles of the Mosaic polity.

Bruce, in his Travels (iii. 731), relates a ceremony as practised by an ignorant tribe of Abyssinians, which is called to mind by facts connected with the scape-goat. After having once a year, on the first appearance of the dog-star, sacrificed a black heifer that never bore a calf, and having, at the end of certain ceremonies, eaten the carcase raw, they carry the head, close wrapt from sight in the hide, into a cavern which they say reaches below two fountains, where, without torches or other artificial light, they perform their worship, which all the natives are said to know, but no one to reveal; neither would any one report what became of the head. It would appear to be an offering to the spirit whom they suppose to reside in the river Nile, whom they call the Everlasting God and Father of the universe.

GOD (T. good), the great creating, sustaining, and governing Mind of the universe, is the idea around which revolves the entire circle of thoughts and feelings which enter into and constitute the religion of the Bible. In the clear, full, and truthful disclosures which that truly sacred book makes regard. ing God, is found at once its chief distinction and its highest merit; for here we find the Bible superior to all the sacred books of other nations, since in it the idea of God, so far as human conceptions may be supposed to do, corresponds with the august and awful reality, and is kept free from the mythological depravations and philosophical conceits that disfigure the representations of Deity prevalent in other ancient writings. The simple yet sublime account given in Genesis of the creation of the world, is sufficient in itself both to exhibit the Mosaic conception of God, and to prove its incomparable superiority over the polytheistic or philosophical views on the subject which prevailed of old. With the extension of men's knowledge of the universe, their idea of God must in modern times have become more comprehensive, but the change is a growth, not an alteration; the ground idea remains the same: Newton worshipped the Being whom Moses revealed, namely, the Great Spirit who called all things into existence.

The idea of God presented on the first page

of the Bible is as majestic as that which is presented on its last page. From the eternity in which God dwelt He comes forth in the first verse of Genesis and creates the universe. Thus manifest it is that the idea of God is not a deduction of reason, it is a revelation; or if it be affirmed that this idea is an intuition, yet the God of the Bible is a revelation. In its opening chapter He is seen as a Being possessing independent and eternal existence, and unbounded in his power, wisdom, and goodness, and the author of all other being. The Bible's idea of God rises aloft in its sublimity, not only far above the ideas of the pagan nations, but above the common ideas and modes of thinking of God, which were prevalent in the first ages, even anong the chosen people themselves. The tenor of this remark may throw some light on a notion which in modern times bas found much acceptance, especially among German divines, namely, that the Biblical idea of God was gradually developed, rising by degrees into the grand thought of a Universal Creator, from the narrow view which regarded him as the God first of the family of Abraham, and then of the Jewish people. That the Deity is represented under these characters there can be no doubt. But this representation is justified by the peculiarly intimate moral relation into which God, for his own gracious purposes, was pleased to enter with the patriarch and his descendants, and by no means excludes that wider relation which he bore to mankind and the universe, as declared in the earliest of the Biblical records. Even if it could be proved that any one of the patriarchs or Hebrew worthies held the Deity to be exclusively their God, it by no means follows that the Bible is answerable for so limited a notion. Indeed, unless it can be proved that Genesis, instead of being the oldest book in the Hebrew Canon, is one of the most recent, the evidence afforded by its opening words as to the spirituality of the Biblical conception of God, must be held to prove that the purest ideas were prevalent in the earliest ages. the fact, it follows that the Biblical idea of God did not follow the ordinary process of social progress and moral development, but was an anticipation of men's knowledge many centuries before, in the natural order of things, such knowledge could have come into existence. Indeed, the Mosaic or Biblical conception of Deity is an anticipation of modern discoveries; for in truth may it be said that philosophy has never yet developed a loftier or more worthy idea of God than is found in the first chapter of Genesis. But what is such an anticipation, if not the special act of God in making himself known to man? Thus, on a primitive revelation rest men's conceptions of God

This being

and their best means of progress. The history of man has a revelation for its starting point. The cradle of our race was watched by the eye of Omnipotent Goodness.

It is by several names that God is spoken of in the Sacred Scriptures. These names are not unattended with difficulty, though in general they confirm the statements already made. One cause of difficulty arises when we attempt to determine the earliest conception of God by fixing on the earliest prevalent appellation. Here it is more easy to indulge in conjecture than to gain accurate knowledge. Nor is the question of great importance; for could we succeed in showing what idea was first held of God by any particular man or class of men, it would not follow that this was the earliest conception that existed, much less would the idea necessarily have the sanction of Moses or the religion of the Bible. What conception of God they set forth is made evident in the first page of that divine book.

The name which God in a peculiar sense vindicates to himself in the Old Testament, and for which the religion of Moses is answerable, we find declared in Exod. iii. 13— 16. When about to go to Pharaoh in order to demand the liberation of the children of Israel, Moses, knowing that the Egyptian prince had 'gods many,' asked by what name he should speak to Pharaoh of the Creator? The answer bad him say, I am hath sent me unto you.' The name, Jehovah, may have been expressly chosen because, at least, allied to one (Jao, compare the Latin Jovis) with which there is reason to believe the Egyptians were acquainted, and which probably was the denomination of a deity held by them in special honour. However this may be, 'Jehovah' has for its essential import the idea of existence, of self and necessary existence. Accordingly, we here find God described as the living one, in contradistinction to all the pretended divinities of idol worship (Deut. v. 26. Dan. vi. 26), the ever-existing source of life, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty (Rev. i. 8), the eternal and unchangeable Creator. The name of the Deity thus solemnly originated or adopted, has ever, among the Jews, continued to be held in the deepest veneration. They therefore, lest they might profane it, instead of Jehovah, used the word Adonai, or Lord If, now, to this representation of God we add the emphatic words found in Deut. vi. 4-Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our God is one Jehovah,' or, ' Jehovah is our God, Jehovah is one'-we learn that Moses taught his people the sublime doctrine that there is one self-existent Creator and Guardian of the universe, who alone is to be worshipped, served, obeyed, and loved. This is the fundamental truth of the religion of the Bible and of the Mosaic institutions. Such are the words which to the

present hour the Israelite repeats in his prayer morning and night-words which have often accompanied him to martyrdom, and which he piously pronounces on his death-bed. And to give effect, and, in the final issue, universal prevalence to the sublime doctrine that they teach, was the grand and the common aim of the law, the prophets, and the gospel, which will then only have their main purpose fulfilled when the sole Creator of heaven and earth shall be adored and obeyed in the heart and life of every intelligent creature.

In Gen. xvii. 1, God reveals himself to Abraham by a name, shady, which some hold to be the most ancient appellation of the Deity, and which signifies Almighty. Comp. Exod. vi. 3.

Ehl, which, according to Gesenius, comes from an obsolete root signifying strong,' powerful,' is a very common appellation of God (Gen. xxviii. 3; xxxv. 1); which, being probably derived from polytheism, denotes, as the Greek theos, a divine being, and is accordingly applied to the imaginary deities of heathenism (Dan. xi. 36).

Elohah-which some hold to be of the same root and signification as the preceding name, and others, deriving it from the Arabic, describe as signifying to be astonished,' to worship,' and hence the awful Being who is to be adored-is applied to Jehovah in the later, particularly the poetical books, being, as a general denomination, found in the plural form Eloheem. This plural form may be explained either as the plural of dignity, according to a rule of Hebrew grammar by which names denoting eminence are put in the plural number, or by the supposition that the appellation was borrowed from polytheistic usages of language. It is employed as a general term for the divinity, or what is divine. Hence are explained the forms, 'Jehovah God' (Eloheem, Gen. iii. 1), ‘Jehovah God of the Hebrews' (Exod. iii. 18), 'Jehovah thy God' (Deut. xxvii. 5, 6; comp. Deut. vi. 4). As the radical idea of the word is either power or worship, it is applied to rulers and false gods (Exod. xxi. 6, ' judges.' Ps. xcvii. 7). In union with other words, it sometimes denotes what is very great; as in Gen. xxx. 8, great wrestlings' are in the Hebrew, 'wrestlings of Eloheem' (Jonah iii. 3).

There are some individual descriptions of God which merit attention, such as the Judge of all the earth' (Gen. xviii. 25), the God of the spirits of all flesh' (Numb. xvi. 22), 'Jehovah, God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is none else' (Deut. iv. 39; comp. xxxii. 39, seq.). The union of God's universal dominion with his special relation towards the Israelites, is well marked in Deut. x. 14-16. The continuation of the passage displays in a striking manner the moral attributes of Jehovah, as a Being 'who