the pictures of war which historians, even down to the middle of this nineteenth century, delight to describe. Man, left to himself without the light of revealed religion, falls a victim to the sword, and hands the weapon down as an inheritance to posterity. It is surely time now to learn the art of war no more, and thereby realise one of the great ends for which revelation was made to man. The first prophetic intimation that is made of the advent of the GREAT DELIVERER, represents his mission as one to bruise the evil spirit, and restore peace to the troubled world; and, as we come down the stream of ages, we find prophecy clearer and brighter in its announcement of the character and designs of Him who is entitled the Prince of Peace, and not as "a warrior with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood." * And in the latter ages, when at length he appeared on the earth, the peaceful shepherds, watching their flocks in the calmness of night, were startled by a heavenly light which suddenly shone around them, and by the song of a multitude of angels in praise of "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.Ӡ

It is necessary to the peace and safety of nations, that men take correct views of the grand aim and tendency of Christianity, divested of theological dogmas, and sectarian crotchets, and priestly pretensions. Contracted views of that religion to serve political systems, and to uphold hierarchal usurpation, have retarded its progress in the world; and, in one sense, as applied to the community of nations, the principles are either suppressed, or have never been understood.

The Jewish history is very significant in many of its passages relating to the desecration caused by war and its instruments. The great temple that was built at *Isaiah ix. 5. + Luke ii. 14.

Jerusalem was designed for the dwelling of God on earth, and the reason given for the building of it by Solomon, instead of by David, was expressive of the true nature and design of a revelation to man. The reason was, that David had shed blood abundantly, and had made great wars; and he was told—“ Thou shalt not build a house unto my name, because thou hast shed much blood upon the earth in my sight. Behold, a son shall be born to thee, who shall be a man of rest; and I will give him rest from all his enemies round about; for his name shall be Solomon (Peaceable), and I will give peace and quietness unto Israel in his days."* The name of Solomon means Peaceable and the Greater than Solomon, was Shiloh and the Prince of Peace. The realisation of those glorious times when "men shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks," and when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, is within the power, under the exercise of free will, of any people who really desire it; and nations, for their own security, may, in those extreme cases of daring, by leading spirits who rise up to disturb the peace of society, pass the sentence on them, "That they who take the sword shall perish with the sword." †

Among the ancient heathens, with whom the Jews came in connection, idolatry went hand in hand with the operations of war in the bloodiest conflict of battle. The standards and ensigns of armies were generally the idols and the gods of the soldiers who fought under them, and priests performed the rites of worship previous to battle. The devotional feelings and enthusiasm thus excited will account for the obstinacy of ancient armies, and for the great slaughter that generally followed. The amount of slaughter in battles

* 1 Chron. xxii. 8, 9.

+ Matt. xxvi. 52.

C

which have taken place in Europe, in the memory of the living generation, may equal or exceed some of the celebrated carnages of ancient times; but it is of another description, and is not the result of an earnest, exciting, hand-to-hand struggle with a foe for liberty or death. In a modern Christian battle, many thousands of simple and passive men are marched in columns to a spot where they are suddenly mown down in hundreds by invisible spheroidical masses of iron and lead, which tear open the bowels or scatter the limbs of the victims, causing instant death or excruciating wounds.

The presence of the Roman eagles and images on the military ensigns of that people in the Holy City of Jerusalem was, on several occasions, the immediate exciting cause of violent commotions among the Jews against the Roman power. But, previous to the appearance of the Romans, the national feeling had been outraged, and its pride deeply wounded by the forcible entrance of idolators within the temple. It was the desecration of the temple and its holy places by Antiochus Epiphanes, and the subsequent idolatrous edicts of that despicable king, that roused the patriotic spirit of Mattathias and his five sons to unfurl and uprear the famous banner, inscribed with four Hebrew letters, Latinized into MACCABEI,* which formed the rallying point of the Jews for the deliverance of their country from foreign and idolatrous tyrants.†

*The four Hebrew letters, in contradistinction to the Roman S. P. Q. R. (Senatus Populusque Romanus), were the initial letters of the words Mi Camoca Beelohim Yehovah: "Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods?"-Exod. xv. 11.Robinson's Calmet.

+ Prideaux's "Connection," vol. iii. p. 193.

When Pilate was first sent to Judea as Procurator, he forwarded, during the night, the Roman ensigns to the City of Jerusalem; and the next day, when the Jews beheld them, they were astonished at an act by which their laws were trodden under foot, for the entrance of images into the city was not permitted. Disorders ensued, and when Pilate had surrounded with his soldiers the excited Jews, he warned them that he would cut them in pieces, unless they would tolerate the images of Cæsar. The Jews then bared their necks, and cried out to the Romans that they were ready to die, rather than that their laws should be transgressed. Pilate was so surprised at this extraordinary resolution and devotion of the Jews, that he immediately gave orders that the military ensigns and images should be carried out of Jerusalem.*

The desecration of holy places was caused also by the presence of persons of a foreign origin, as we perceive by the charge brought by the Jews against Paul, of having "brought Greeks also into the temple, and hath polluted this holy place."

But what need is there for multiplying proofs of the desecration produced by ensigns of war, stained with the blood of man? for we know from the highest authority, that the entrance of the Roman eagles and Labara, called the Abomination of Desolation, in the holy place, was to be the signal of that final ruin, from which all that were in Judea were to flee for safety to the mountains.†

The hard necessity of the original circumstances of the Hebrew people compelled them to form a military organisation. On escaping from the severest slavery that ever crushed a people, their migrations from the * Josephus' "Wars of the Jews," book ii. chap. ix. + Matt. xxiv. 15, 16.

Nile to the Jordan were marches, and their stations encampments; and on crossing the latter river, for the recovery of the country with the landmarks on it, of their great ancestors, they had to fight for every acre they occupied, and afterwards to defend it from numerous foes. This is not the place to describe their military operations, or to justify their wars; and all we have to do is to refer to their ensigns of war. The touching of a dead body made a man unclean, and much more did the blood and dust of battle; and officers and soldiers, therefore, could not approach the temple until they had purified themselves according to law. Their weapons and standards were also necessarily unfit to be admitted within the precincts of the holy places. The standards of their enemies, being idols, when taken in war, were destroyed; but spoils, such as gold and silver, after being purified, were dedicated to the house of God.* The standards and ensigns used by the Jews in battle were not religious banners, but the ordinary banners which distinguished the tribes and their divisions. The colours were white, purple, crimson, and blue. It was the duty of some of the priests and Levites, to accompany the troops to battle, to exhort them to fight, and to give the signal by the holy trumpets and instruments.

It was a general custom among the heathen to deposit their standards, weapons, and ensigns of war, in the temples of their gods, and to dedicate to them the spoils taken from enemies. This custom was quite in keeping with the worship of false gods, among which

* 1 Chron. xxvi. 27.

"The ancient Jewish ensign was a long pole, at the end of which was a kind of chafing-dish, made of iron bars, which held a fire, and the light, shape, &c., of which, denoted the party to whom it belonged."—Robinson's Calmet.