*
_________
* Some appear to require in a religious system, or in the books which
profess to deliver that system, minute directions for every case and
occurrence that may arise. This, say they, is necessary to render a
revelation perfect, especially one which has for its object the
regulation of human conduct. Now, how prolix, and yet how incomplete and
unavailing, such an attempt must have been, is proved by one notable
example: "The Indoo and Mussulman religions are institutes of civil law,
regulating the minutest questions, both of property and of all questions
which come under the cognizance of the magistrate. And to what length
details of this kind are necessarily carried when once begun, may be
understood from an anecdote of the Mussulman code, which we have
received from the most respectable authority, that not less than
seventy-five thousand traditional precepts have been promulgated."
(Hamilton's translation of Hedays, or Guide.)
_________
The parables of the New Testament are, many of them, such as would have
done honour to any book in the world: I do not mean in style and
diction, but in the choice of the subjects, in the structure of the
narratives, in the aptness, propriety, and force of the circumstances
woven into them; and in some, as that of the Good Samaritan, the
Prodigal Son, the Pharisee and the Publican, in an union of pathos and
simplicity, which in the best productions of human genius is the fruit
only of a much exercised and well cultivated judgment.
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