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    Noah , of dominion over the world and its inhabitants , and commenting on various provisions of the Mosaic law , Dr . Drummond thus introduces the further scriptural illustration of the subject ; we regret that our limits will not allow us to quote , as we intended , the whole passage from p . 4 to p . 11 : " As animals occupy no unimportant place in the Bible , I trust I may be excused if I endeavour to shew a few of the valuable purposes which they serve in its hallowed pages ; under the hope that my observations may help

    to remove that contempt in which they are held by many , and procure for them a larger portion of sympathetic regard than they generally enjoy . If all notices of animals were removed from that volume , what a comparatively dull and uninteresting work would it become ! Half of that beauty and sublimity , in which it so eminently excels , would disappear- The poet ' s song would lose its spirit , and the prophet ' s iire seem almost extinct . But they are brought continually before us , as if to impress us with a sense of their importance , and a consequent regard for their rights . They furnish the

    inspired authors with the richest and most varied imagery , and the allusions to them are innumerable . They are connected with all states and conditions of spciety ; with morals and government ; with the habits and affections of the mind ; with the security of the good , and the terror of the wicked ; with the past , the present , and the future ; with the rise and fall of empires , the economy of Providence , aud the attributes of God . In the order of creation they had precedence of man ; and in the government of nature their agencies

    are combined with the human and divine . Many of the works of God were created and adapted to their peculiar use . The great Jehovah himself is represented by Moses as saying , ' I have given them every green herb for meat / Ana this idea is beautifully amplified in other passage ! of the sacred volume . Thus David , in the 104 th Psalm , says , that God ' sends the springs among the valleys , and they give drink to every beast of the field . The birds build their nests in the cedars of Lebanon—as for the stork the fir-trees are

    her house . The high hills are a refuge for the wild goats , and the rocks for tlie conies . The young lions roar after their prey , and seek their meat from God . In the great ana wide sea are creeping things innumerable ; ' and if it bears the fleets of nations on its bosom , the leviathan plays therein , and claims its recesses as his dominion . * These all wait upon God that they may receive their meat in due season . That thou givest them , they gather . Thou openest thy hand , they are filled with good . ' " Animals are of very frequent occurrence in the language of prophecy . Tlius , when Jacob , at his last hour , foretells the future character and fortune

    of his descendants , he says of Judah , that he is a lion ' s whelp — Iss&ehar is a strong ass—Dan a serpent by the way—Naphtali a hind let loose—and Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf . " Thus , also , are other characters in Holy Writ justly and forcibly described Jesus is the lamb of God—idle , avaricious watchmen arc dumb , greed y dogsthe Scribes and Pharisees serpents , and a generation of vipers—Herod is a fox —and the devil a roaring lion .

    " Two of the most beautiful similes in Holy Writ are taken from the tenderness of birds for their young . When JVloses informs the Israelites with what care Jehovah had watched over them and protected them , he says , ' As an eagle stirreth up her nest ; ' , aa it may be better rendered than in our common version , ' As an eagle with affection watcheth over her young , and cherisheth and spreadeth her wings over them , so he ( Jehovah ) took him ( Israel ) and bore him on his wings . ' Deut . xxxii . 11 . *

    " Our Saviour ' s commiseration of Jerusalem , for the calamities which he foresaw impending over her devoted walls , is pathetically heightened by the comparison to a hen ' s protection of her brooa : ' O Jerusalem , Jerusulem ,

    * " See Robertson ' s Clavis IVntateuchi , Note pp . <;< J 0 , 691 . "

    Untitled Article

    Humanity to Animals * 317

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1830, page 317, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2584/page/29/