enacted after the patriarchal age had ceafed, and many ages before there was a king in Ifrael. That law is framed in general terms, fo as to include any and every man-that has two wives :-it does not fay, if a patriarch or king hath two

-כי תהיין לאיש שתי נשים-wives-but

literally" if there be to a man".

-or

as we translate it—" if a man have-two ❝ wives." It is apparent, then, that the law being general, it was meant to regulate a general practice. It is alfo untrue in point of fact, that " polygamy

was partly indulged only to patriarchs " and fome of the kings;" witness Elkanah, who was neither patriarch nor *king, and yet we find, by his history, 1 Sam. i. 1. &c. that polygamy was indulged to him as evidently as to any patriarch or king that ever lived. From all which it appears, that our author's conclufion-therefore, under the gospel,

polygamy ceafes, and but one wife is al"lowed"-falls to the ground. But let us look back again to Deut. xxi. 15.

So it is faid of Gideon-He had feventy fons of his body begotten, for he had many wives. Judg. viii. 30. Of fair, he had thirty fons. Judg. ix. 4. Ibzan of Bethlehem had thirty fons and thirty daughters. Judg. xii. 9. Abdon had forty fons, ver, 14. These were all judges of Ifrael, and muft, by the numbers of their children, be concluded to have been polygamifts as well as Gideon.

That

That law was evidently made to regulate the difpofal of a man's inheritance who had two wives, and to prevent the difherifon of the firft-born through favour and affection towards the child who was not fo, because born of the favourite wife. This could not concern the patriarchs, who had all been long dead-nor (immediately at leaft) the kings, who did not exift till near four hundred years afterwards-nor the priests and Levites, who could have no inheritance to difpofe of. Numb. xviii. 20, 21.-If then it did not concern the people at large, it was nugatory, for it concerned nobody at all. This is furely a very fufficient proof that polygamy was an allowed practice of the Jews *in general. The all-wife GOD cannot

be

*The modern Jews forbid polygamy among the people, and this from the authority of fome paffage in the Talmud; but the reafons affigned to me, on difcourfing with a learned few on this fubject, were of the prudential kind; fuch as the people in general being too poor to maintain more than one wife, the quarrels it occafioned, and the like.-I asked him if he looked upon it as forbidden by the law of GOD?" No, God forbid," replied he earneftly; "what then must be the cafe of Abraham, * Jacob, David, &c.?" He likewife told me, that this prohibition was "not univerfal, for that in fome countries polygamy was ftill practifed among the Jews." He added," that even here, if a few married a woman, and had no children by her,

T 4

after

be fuppofed to enact so positive a law, if there were no perfons who could be objects of it; and this law to regulate certain circumftances which did not exist; nor is it easy to imagine, that if those circumftances were finful, they would not have been as explicitly condemned, as they are here plainly allowed and regulated. What has been obferved above, concerning the law of Deut. xxi. 15. holds equally true of Exod. xxi. 10. which had as little to do with patriarchs and kings as

the other had.

I cannot conclude this part of my fubject without mentioning a cafe, which those would do well to confider, who confound polygamy with adultery, and plead the authority of the great and infallible interpreter of God's mind and will for fo doing; I mean the cafe of Abime

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"after ten years he might marry another wife." So, where a man defiles a virgin, She shall "be his wife, agreeable to Exod. xxii. 16. and "Deut. xxii. 28, 29." I take the truth to be, that the Jews, as to the bufinefs of polygamy, ufually conform to the custom of the country where they live." As for the modern Jews," fays Leo Mutinenfis, "thofe of them who live in the East, still "keep up their antient practice of polygamy s "whereas in Germany they are not allowed this "privilege, and in Italy very rarely, and only in

cafe a man hath lived ten years with his wife "without iffue." See Puffend. book vi. ch. 1. § 16.

lech,

lech, King of Gerar; who, having already a wife of his own, fent and took Sarah, the wife of Abraham, Gen. xx. 2. But GOD came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and faid to him-Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou haft taken-for he is a man's wife. Here GOD plainly fet forth his thoughts of adultery, or taking a man's wife; that it is a fin to be punished with death.-However, Abimelech had not actually defiled her, and fhews that, if he had not been deceived by Abraham's faying that Sarah was his fifter, he would not have taken her at all.-Said he not unto me, She is my fifter? and fhe, even she herself faid, He is my brother. In the integrity of my heart, and innocency of my hands, have I done this. And God faid unto him in a dream, yea, I know that thou didst it in the integrity of thine heart, for I also witheld thee from finning against me, therefore fuffered I thee not to touch her. The fin of adultery is certainly marked very strongly, but here was a fair opportunity to have as strongly marked polygamy, if that was a fin alfo. How could Abimelech, having a wife, ver. 17, take any other woman innocently? and yet God allows this to have been done, in his answer to the plea of Abimelech. Though he was innocent as to

5

an

an intentional adultery, being ignorant that Sarab was Abraham's wife, yet Abimelech must know that he had a wife of his own, and therefore could not innocently, and in the integrity of his heart, take any other woman of any kind, if polygamy was a fin.. But fuppofing this poor heathen was ignorant, and therefore faid this knowing no better, yet God could not be ignorant of His own mind and will, when he faid-Yea, I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thine heart, for I alfo witheld thee from finning against Me. Rather, why did he not fay"Thou wicked wretch, how canft thou "dare to talk of the innocency of thine "bands, and of the integrity of thine "heart?-fuppofing thou didst not know "Sarah to be another man's wife, yet the taking any woman, as thou haft already a wife of thine own, is against the law of marriage, and therefore a mortal fin.” Inftead of this, GoD allows his plea, and the moment Abimelech restored Sarah to her husband, GOD graciously removes every mark of his difpleasure, ver. 17, 18.

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"It appears by this whole history of Abimelech, "that he was a man of great virtue in thofe days; "not an idolater, but a worshipper of the true GOD, "as Melchizedeck, the bigh priest of that country, was." Patrick on Gen. xx. 7.

So