rdy of their lives;" "the Lord God
_is_ a sun and a shield;" "God _is_ love;" "the seven good ears _are_
seven years, and the seven good kine _are_ seven years;" "the tree of
the field _is_ man's life;" "God _is_ a consuming fire;" "he _is_ his
money," &c. A passion for the exact _literalities_ of the Bible is so
amiable, it were hard not to gratify it in this case. The words in the
original are (_Kaspo-hu_,) "his _silver_ is he." The objector's
principle of interpretation is a philosopher's stone! Its miracle touch
transmutes five feet eight inches of flesh and bones into _solid
silver!_ Quite a _permanent_ servant, if not so nimble with
all--reasoning against "_forever_," is forestalled henceforth, and,
Deut. xxiii. 15, utterly outwitted. The obvious meaning of the phrase,
"_He is his money_," is, he is _worth money_ to his master, and since,
if the master had killed him, it would have taken money out of his
pocket, the _pecuniary loss_, the _kind of instrument used_, and _the
fact of his living some time after the injury_, (if the master _meant_
to kill, he would be likely to _do_ it while about it,) all together
make a strong case of presumptive evidence clearing the master of
_intent to kill_. But let us look at the objector's _inferences_. One
is, that as the master might dispose of his _property_ as he pleased, he
was not to be punished, if he destroyed it. Whether the servant died
under the master's hand, or after a day or two, he was _equally_ his
property, and the objector admits that in the _first_ case the master is
to be "surely punished" for destroying _his own property!_ The other
inference is, that since the continuance of a day or two, cleared the
master of _intent to kill_, the loss of the slave would be a sufficient
punishment for inflicting the injury which caused his death. This
inference makes the Mosaic law false to its own principles. A _pecuniary
loss_ was no part of the legal claim, where a person took the _life_ of
another. In such case, the law spurned money, whatever the sum. God
would not cheapen human life, by balancing it with such a weight. "Ye
shall take NO SATISFACTION for the life of a murderer, but he shall
surely be put to death." Num. xxxv. 31. Even in excusable homicide,
where an axe slipped from the helve and killed a man, no sum of money
availed to release from confinement in the city of refuge, until the
death of the High Priest. Numb. xxxv. 32. The doctrine that the loss of
the