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sed in the most confined space * What could be more natural than that the very consequences should ensue which are inevitable in such a position , namely , the greatest uncleanliness and contagious diseases ? Here , therefore , was the first foundation laid for the
evil , which even to the present day adheres to the nation , but must then have raged in a fearful degree . The most terrific plague of this climate , leprosy , prevailed amongst them , and was perpetuated in successive generations ; the sources of life and
increase were gradually poisoned , and from an accidental malady there sprung an hereditary predisposition . How general this calamity became , is shewn by a multitude of legislative precautions , while the concurrent testimony of profane writers , of the Egyptian
Manetho , Diodorus of Sicily , Tacitus , Lysimaehus , Strabo , and many others , who knew little of the Jewish people save their national disease , proves how universal and how deep an impression it must have made upon the Egyptians .
This leprosy , therefore , the natural consequence of their confined habitation , their bad and scanty food , and the ill treatment they experienced , became reciprocally cause and effect ; those who , as herdsmen , were despised ,
and as strangers avoided , were now , as tainted persons , shunned and detested . To the fear and dislike , therefore , which had previously been fostered by the Egyptians , were added loathing and
profound , repelling contempt . With respect to beings so alarmingly stigmatized by the Divine wrath , every thing was held lawful ; and no hesitation was felt in setting them without the sacred pale of humanity .
What marvel that barbarity increased in the self-same ratio with the visible effects of barbarous treatment , and that they punished , with everincreasing severity , tlie wretchedness they had themselves created ?
The evil policy of the Egyptians would only remedy the error already committed by means of a new and more gross delinquency . Here Schiller relates the order for
the destruction of the male children , and proceeds In this manner , indeed , the Egyptian government must at length have
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accomplished its purpose , and had no preserver interposed , would have witnessed in a few generations the utter extinction of the Israelites . But whence could this preserver of the Hebrews arise ? Not easily from amidst the Egyptians ; for how should one of these devote himself for a nation
to which he was a stranger ; the language of which he neither understood , nor would take the trouble of acquiring , and which must have appeared to him alike incapable and unworthy of a better destiny ? From amongst themselves still less ; for what had the Hebrews been made in a course of
centuries by the inhumanity of their oppressors ? The rudest , the most ill disposed , abject people of the earth , rendered savage by the neglect of 30 O years , made desponding , and soured
by long and slavish oppression , debased in its own sight by a cleaving hereditary infamy—unnerved , disabled for all heroic enterprises , and finally sunk almost to the rank of the brute
by long uninterrupted stupidity ; how from such a neglected race could there issue a freeman , an enlightened head , a hero or a statesman ? How could one be found amongst them , fitted to
procure respect for so despised a nation of slaves , to inspire self-estimation in a people so long oppressed * and to confer superiority over their refined masters upon so ignorant and rude a horde of herdsmen ? As
impossible was it that a daring and magnanimous spirit should arise amongst the Hebrews of that period , as amongst the most abject caste of Hindoo
Panas . Here must the great hand of Providence , which unties the most complicated knots by the simplest means , overpower us with astonishment j not , however , of that providence which breaks into the oeconomy of nature by the forcible entrance of miracle , but
of that which has prescribed to nature herself an ceconomy operating extraordinary effects with the most noiseless means . A native Egyptian would have wanted the necessary incitement of natural feeling for the Hebrews to induce him to stand forth as their
avenger ; a mere Hebrew must have been deficient in strength and talent for the undertaking . What resource then ( lid destiny employ ? She se-
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196 The Mosaic Mission .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1825, page 196, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2535/page/4/
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