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slavery and confusion, and as often repenting. At last they chose rather to have a master over them, than to continue in freedom by faithfully observing the law of GOD.

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Their liberty, reduced to these just bounds, consisted in a power to do every thing that was not forbidden by the law, without obligation to do any more than it commanded; or being subject to the will of any particular man, but the fathers of families, who had great power over their servants and children at home. There were some Hebrews slaves to their brethren and the law mentions two cases that reduced them to that condition; poverty, which obliged them to sell themselves; and commission of theft, which they were not able to make amends for. It appears that the second case comprehended debts likewise, by the example of the widow, whose oil Elisha multiplied, that she might have enough to pay her creditors, and save her children from slavery. It is true, these Hebrew slaves might regain their freedom at the end of six years, that is, in the sabbatical year: and if they were then not disposed to make use of this privilege, they might claim their liberty and that of their children in the jubilee or fiftieth year.' It was recommended to them to use their brethren mildly, and rather to make slaves of strangers. We see how submissive their slaves were to them by the words of the Psalmist, As the eyes of servants

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Exod. xxii. 3.

* Exod. xxi. 2.

look unto the hands of their masters, even so our

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eyes wait upon the LORD our GoD. From which we may collect that they often gave orders by signs, and that servants were to watch their least motions.

The Israelites had a power of life and death over their slaves, and this was then common to them with all nations. For slavery proceeded from the right they acquired by conquest in war;" when, instead of killing their enemies, they chose rather to give them their lives, that they might have the use of them. So it was supposed the conqueror always reserved the power of taking away their lives, if they committed any thing that deserved it; that he acquired the same power over their children, because they had never been born, if he had not spared the father; and that he transmitted this power when he alienated his slave. This is the foundation of the absolute power of masters; and they seldom abused it, for their interest obliged them to preserve their slaves, who made part of their riches which is the reason of the law, that he should not be punished who had smote a servant, if he continued alive a day or two after. He is his money,' says the law, to shew that this loss was a sufficient punishment: and one may presume in this case that the master only intended his correction. But if the slave died under the strokes, it was to be supposed the master had a real design to kill him, for which the law declares him punishable;

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in which it was more merciful than the laws of other people, who did not make that distinction. The Romans, for more than five hundred years, had a power to put their slaves to death, to imprison their debtors upon default of payment, and to sell their own children three times over before they were out of their power; and all by virtue of those wise laws of the twelve tables which they brought from Greece, at the time when the Jews were restored, after they returned from captivity, that is, about a thousand years after Moses.

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As to the paternal power of the Hebrews, the law gave them leave to sell their daughters; but the sale was a sort of marriage, as it was with the Romans. We see however, by a passage in Isaiah, that fathers sold their children to their creditors: and in the time of Nehemiah the poor proposed to sell their children for something to live upon, and others bewailed themselves that they had not wherewith to redeem their children that were already in slavery. They had the power of life and death over their children, since the Wise Man says, Chasten thy son whilst there is hope; but persist not in it to cause him to die." Indeed they had not so much liberty as the Romans to make use of this severe privilege without the magistrate's knowledge.*

Instit. de his qui sui vel al. sect. 2. Inst. quib. mod. jud. Part. sect. 6.

• Exod. xxi. 7.

$ Isaiah 1. 1.

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Per Coemptionem. 'Nehem. v. 2, 5.

Prov. xix. 18. See the Hebrew, and the margin of our

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* Liv. lib. ii.

The law of GOD only permitted the father and mother, after they had tried all sorts of correction at home, to declare to the elders of the city that their son was stubborn and rebellious; and, upon their complaint, he was condemned to death and stoned. The same law was practised at Athens,* and founded upon children's lives being derived from their parents, and upon a supposition that none could be so unnatural as to put their children to death, unless they had committed some horrible crimes. Now the dread of this power was of great use in keeping children in perfect subjection.

We see but too many evils proceed from relaxing or rather taking away this paternal authority. Let a son be never so young, as soon as he is married, or knows how to live without his father's assistance, he thinks he owes him no longer any thing but a little respect. Thence comes the infinite number of small families and people that live alone, or in boarding-houses, where all are equally masters. Such young independent people, if they are rich, run into debauchery and ruin themselves. If they are poor, they turn vagabonds whom nobody cares to own, and are capable of all sorts of villany. Besides the corruption of manners, this independency may also occasion great disorders in the state: for it is much more difficult to rule a multitude of single untractable men than a few heads of families, each of whom was responsible for a great number of persons, and was commonly an old man that understood the laws.

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CHAP. XXI.

The Authority of Old Men.

NOT only fathers, but all old men, had great authority among the Israelites, and all the people of antiquity. They, every where, in the beginning, chose judges for private affairs, and counsellors for Thence came the public, out of the oldest men."

the name of Senate and Fathers at Rome, and that great respect for old age which they borrowed from the Lacedemonians. Nothing is more conformable to nature. Youth is only fit for motion and action. Old age is qualified to instruct, advise, and command. The glory of young men is their strength, says Solomon, and the beauty of old men is their grey head. It is not likely that either study or good parts should make up for want of experience in a young man: but an old man, provided he have good natural senses, is wise by experience alone. All history proves that the best governed states were those where old men were in

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Though this perhaps may be true of the original institution of the Jewish sanhedrim and Roman senate; yet it is certain, in process of time, neither assembly consisted of the oldest. Patres and Seniores, as with us aldermen, came to denote rank of dignity, not of age; as Selden observes, de Synedriis, lib. 1. c. 14. p. 1092, and lib. ii. c. 9. § 4. p. 1423. ed. fol.-E. F.

Prov. xx. 29.

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