We have first a law of purity, which needs no exposition, but in its holy severity (vers. 11, 12) was fitted to check all tendency to lewd practices among the women of Israel. Then Moses passes on to speak of the crime of having divers weights and measures, and the effort to make money by dishonest practices. No blessing from God can rest upon such willfully dishonest ones; if his blessing is to be experienced, it must be by a policy of honesty all round.

I. IT IS APPARENTLY EASY TO MAKE MONEY BY LIGHT WEIGHTS AND SHORT MEASURES. It is not only securing the ordinary profits, but gaining by the deficiency palmed off for the perfect measure. It is a gain by quantity as well as by price. And plenty of people who look only at the surface imagine that they can easily enrich themselves by a little dishonesty, which will never be detected. Inspectors of weights and measures are the embodiment of the suspicions of society.

II. IT IS A SYSTEM OF BUSINESS UPON WHICH NO DIVINE BLESSING CAN BE ASKED. NO better test of the propriety of our procedure can be found than this. Will it stand the test of prayer? Can God, the All-holy One, be expected to bless it? Now, his whole Word shows that such practices are abominations to him. The stars of heaven will at length fight against such a policy.

III. NO TEMPORARY SUCCESS CAN COMPENSATE FOR AN UNEASY CONSCIENCE. Suppose that success waited on dishonesty invariably and proved lasting, life would be made miserable by the uneasy conscience. Stifled for a time, it rises like the furies at last, and makes life a lasting misery. No man ever trifled with conscience anal did not suffer for it. Success becomes in such a case but a whited sepulcher; the experience within is but the rottenness of the tomb.

IV. HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY FOR PERSONAL PEACE AND FOR DIVINE BLESSING. We say that no man should so far outrage his conscience as to be dishonest. Honesty is a policy to be pursued for its own sake, as the only condition of personal peace. Were there no Divine blessing in question at all, conscientious men would be as honest as they are now. At the same time, it makes the honesty all the happier that it lies in the sunshine of the Infinite Presence, and that his radiant smile is on it. There is no danger of a mercenary spirit entering into such a relation with God. He so wraps us round that in his circle of love it would be most ungrateful and most dissonant to practice dishonesty. With people under a theocracy, or reign of God, we should expect to find just weights and full measures. The visits of the inspectors should prove superfluous with all those whose life lies open as the day to the inspection of their King. - R.M.E.

The Jewish law was important to that people as their national code. Its enactments were wisely adapted to their condition and the land they inhabited, and were calculated to secure their prosperity. But these considerations alone would not have justified its adoption in the Word of God. The Divine mind aims at higher objects than those which are included in this world's prosperity. Who can imagine, with a worthy idea of infinite wisdom, the laws of this and the two foregoing chapters to have come from God, unless besides the letter in which they served the Jews, they have some deeper import by which they can give wisdom to Christians? Before proceeding further with the subject before us, let me remind you of that most important fact, which is equally true in vegetable growth and in the growth of religion, that all progress is gradual. It is "first the blade, then the ear, and then the full corn in the ear." But corn, before it is fit for human food, must be brought to the mill and ground; and this operation is more especially connected with the subject before us.

I. THE USE OF GRINDING IS TWO FOLD: FIRST, THE SEPARATION OF THE HUSK AND LESS NUTRITIOUS PORTION FROM THE RICHER INTERIOR SUBSTANCE OF THE CORN; AND SECONDLY, THE TRITURATION AND PULVERISING, WHICH REDUCES THE GRAIN TO FLOUR AND THUS PRESENTS IT FULLY PREPARED FOR THE SUSTENTATION OF MAN. Both these essential services are done by the mill. In ancient times each family had its own mill, and the flour for daily use was ground each day. The mill was composed of two circular flat stones; one the upper, the other the lower. In the upper one there was a hole, in which a wooden handle was fixed, by which it was made to go round. The persons grinding sat to their work, and frequently when women did it there would be two, and one passed the handle round to the other, and so the work went on. To this our blessed Lord alludes when He says, at the end of the Church, meant by the end of the age, or world: "Two women shall be grinding at the mill, the one shall be taken and the other left" (Matthew 24:41). These circumstances all guide us to the correspondence. Corn corresponds to the good in life to which truth leads. The virtues which our views of religion open up to us are a harvest of graces; but, as general principles, they are not quite ready for daily use. They require to be rationally investigated, to be stripped of the forms in which we learned them, and to be accommodated to our own wants and circumstances. This is one of the works of the rational faculty in man. In this respect it is a spiritual mill. To know and understand the truth, that we may love and practise it, this is the spirit in which to read and hear the Word. The wisdom we understand enters into the mind, the wisdom we love enters into the heart. "The opening of Thy words giveth light, it giveth understanding unto the simple" (Psalm 119:130). The words which remain in the memory, and do not enter the intellect, leave us, and have left the world, unenlightened and unedified. The grand use of the rational faculty, then, as a spiritual mill is evident. May we never surrender it, or barter it away. But the mill had two stones, an upper and a nether millstone. Stones represent truths of doctrine, especially in relation to the firmness they afford as a foundation and a defensive wall to our faith. In this sense stones are constantly employed in the Word (Isaiah 28:16; Matthew 7:24, 25; Luke 20:17; 1 Peter 2:5). The two stones of which the mill consists represent the two grand truths into which the whole Word divides itself: those which teach love to God and love to man. The upper stone is the symbol of the first and great commandment. Our Lord refers to this when answering the question, "Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind" (Matthew 22:36-38). The two tables of stone, upon which the Ten Commandments, the first and the essential principles of all the Divine Word, were written, were intended to represent the same two-fold division of all heavenly lessons. The mill, then, with its two stones, represents the rational faculty when it is furnished with these two grand truths. With these two universal principles it can do, and is intended to do, the utmost service to man. Everything that enters the mind should be submitted to its inspection and action. Whatever is taught in relation to God which is inconsistent with love to God and love to man should be rejected; whatever is in harmony with both should be received. All that love would do God will do, for God is love; all that love would reject, God will reject, for God is love. So in relation to man. Our duty in all things is to measure our conduct by the great law, "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets" (Matthew 7:12). Such is the spiritual mill, and such is its operation. What a wide field of use it has; and how essential is that use! To try to sift, to discriminate, to adapt all that we learn, so that fallacy and mere appearance may be rejected, and only what is really conducive to salvation and blessing be retained: "What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the Lord."

II. With this view of the important objects and indispensable character of the millstones, seen in their correspondence, we shall be prepared to see in spiritual light THE REASON OF THE COMMAND IN OUR TEXT: "No man shall take the nether or the upper millstone to pledge: for he taketh a man's life to pledge." The rational faculty, and its two grand essential principles, must never be parted with, nor even be placed in abeyance. Oh! that this great truth that we ought never to suspend, never to forego the use of this grand principle, our rational faculty, were engraven on every heart. In this sublime portion of our nature the essential means of manhood reside. He will never become a man who never thoughtfully dares to reason for himself; who never strives to penetrate the appearances of things, and see with a single eye Divine realities. Here is the judgment seat for each mind. How poor a being he becomes who fears to use this glorious capability, let degenerate millions answer. He has not the fixed instincts of brutes and their obedience to the laws of their order, and while he is born with debased affections, he does not use this grand means of rising forever higher. Without that we cannot free ourselves from our own passions and prejudices, much less from the domination of other men. Without that we cannot rise to the freedom of citizens of heaven. We are things, not men. Let, then, no man take your mill; it is your life. But neither the lower nor the upper millstone must be taken. The two grand essential truths, upon which all others hang, must neither of them be given up. Whatever is not in harmony with them ought not to be received. Whatever is unworthy of our love to God, whatever would lessen our love to man, should be rejected at once. How great a source of elevation should we constantly have, if in all our hearing and reading we should bring our spiritual corn to the mill, furnished with these spiritual stones!

III. Finally, let me earnestly impress upon you all THE IMPORTANCE OF USING THE MILL. There is no possibility of true manhood being attained without a conscientious use of reason in receiving the things of God. Have no fear in employing the glorious faculties Divine mercy has blessed you with Oh! that men would, rise manfully to the dignity of their, high character as rational and immortal beings capable of reserving the truth, judging of it, loving it, and making it their own by practice. Reject every attempt to place this heavenly mill in pledge, for it is your real manhood, your life, that is wished to be taken, when you are told to forego the use of your reason. Above all, let us see well that our mill is ever, in good condition, the nether and the upper stones. Let us receive no instruction that is inconsistent with love to our neighbour, the spiritual nether millstone. Let no sectarian sentiments, no idea that heaven was made just for this small party who think with us, or that gain our assent. Let us unite with men of love and virtue, of every name, assured that "of such is the kingdom of heaven." Let not the upper millstone go into pledge. Let us unceasingly try every sentiment proposed to us as true by the great supreme law of love to God above all things.

(J. Bayley, Ph. D.)