nduced Aaron to make them a god, in the shape of a golden calf, to
go before them. This image they were worshipping as Moses approached the
camp, and his anger waxed so not that he threw down the tables and broke
all the Ten Commandments at once. He then burnt the calf in fire and
ground it to powder, mixed it with water and made them drink it. He also
sent the Levites among them, who put three thousand men to the edge of
the sword. God wanted to destroy them altogether, but Moses held him
back. "Let me alone," said the Lord. "No, no," said Moses, "just think
what the Egyptians will say; they'll laugh at you after all as a poor
sort of a god; and remember, too, that you are bound by an oath to
multiply your people and to let them inherit the land of promise." So
the Lord cooled down, and wrote out the Decalogue again on two fresh
tables of stone. This Decalogue is supposed to be the foundation of
morality. But long before the time of Moses moral laws were known and
observed in Egypt, in India, and among all the peoples that ever lived.
Moral laws are the permanent conditions of social health, and the
fundamental ones must be observed wherever any form of society exists.
Their ground and guarantee are to be found in human nature, and do not
depend on a fabulous episode in the history of the Wandering Jews.

THE TOWER OF BABEL.

BIBLE ROMANCES.--VIII.

By G. W. FOOTE.

The Bible, it is frequently asserted, was never meant to teach us
science, but to instruct us in religion and morality; and therefore
we must not look to it for a faithful account of what happened in
the external world, but only for a record of the inner experiences of
mankind. Astronomy will inform us how the heavenly bodies came into
existence, and by what laws their motions are governed; Geology will
acquaint us with the way in which the earth's crust was formed, and with
the length of time occupied by the various stages of the process; and
Biology will tell us all about the origin and development of living
things. God has given us reason, by exercising which we may gather
knowledge and establish sciences, so as to explain the past, illustrate
the present, and predict the future; and as reason is sufficient for all
this, there is no need of a divine revelation in such matters. But
as reason is insufficient to teach the will of God and the laws of
morality, a divine revelation of these is necessary, and the Bible
contains it.

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