der of fact is not the
same. In actual fact man began with God and ends with a clearer
perception of Duty. Hence in all the earlier stages the morality is
imperfect. The profaneness of Esau is a serious offence. The ungenerous
temper, the unfairness and duplicity of Jacob are light in comparison.
Truth is not an essential. Blood-shedding and impurity when in horrible
excess are treated as most grievous sins; but restrained within limits
are easily condoned. Women are placed below their true and natural
place; polygamy if not distinctly allowed is certainly condoned; divorce
is permitted on one side, not on the other. Slavery is allowed though
put under regulation. But the unity and spirituality of God are guarded
with the strongest sanctions, and nothing could be said against idolatry
and polytheism now, in sterner and clearer language than was used then.
The reverence for God required then was as great as the reverence
required now. But the conception of the holiness which is the main
object of that reverence has changed; has in fact been purified and
cleared. And the change is traceable in the Old Testament. The prophets
teach a higher morality than is found in the earlier books. Cruelty is
condemned as it had not been before. The heathen are not regarded as
outside God's love, and the future embraces them in His mercy even if
the present does not. Conscience begins to be recognised and appealed
to. Idolatry is not merely forbidden, its folly is exposed; it is
treated not only with condemnation, but with scorn. Individual
responsibility is insisted on. Children are not held responsible for
their fathers, though the inheritance of moral evil and of the
consequences of moral evil is never denied. And even trust in God rises
to a higher level in Habakkuk's declaration that that trust shall never
be shaken by any calamity that may befall him, than in the earlier
belief that calamities would never befall those who held fast that
trust.

If we review this progress in moral teaching we recognise that it
corresponds to the natural and for the most part unconscious working of
that instinctive test which, as was pointed out before, we apply to all
moral questions, the test of universality. The pivots of all the
prophetical teaching are the incessant inculcation of justice and mercy;
justice which requires us to recognise the rights of others side by
side with our own; mercy which demands our sympathy with the feelings of
other