'That assistance is perpetually afforded to all endeavours, both of sanctity and impiety.' But Maimonides hath somewhere told us (and, as I remember, in his Sepher Hammedang) how they mince the matter, and mean nothing else by it but this; That when men endeavour after the performance of the law, God, in a way of providence, furnisheth them with external matter and means, giving them peace, and riches, and other outward accommodations, whereby they might have advantage and opportunity to perform all that good to which their own freewill determines them': whereas wicked men find the like help of external matter and means for promoting and accomplishing their wicked and ungodly designs.

Thus we see how the Jews, that they might lay a foundation of merit, and build up the stately and magnificent fabric of their happiness upon the sandy foundation of a dead letter without them, endeavoured to strengthen it by as weak a rampart of their own self

but that we may have leisure to learn wisdom and to fulfil the commandments whereby we may attain to the life of the world to come.'-Maim. Yad Chazakak, Tract. de Pœniten. cap. 9.

הבטיחנו בתורה שאם נעשה אותה 1 בשמחה ובטובת נפש ונהגה בחבמתה תמיד שיסיר ממנו כל הדברים חמונעים אותנו מלעשותה כגון חולי ומלחמה ורעב וכיוצא בהן וישפיע לנו כל הטובות חמחזיקות את ידינו לעשות התורה וכן הודיענו בתורה שאם נעזוב 2 התורה מדעת ונעסוק בהבלי הזמן... כגון שובע ושלום ורבות כסף וזהב כדי שלא נעסוק כל ימינו בדברים שדיין האמת יסיר מן העוזבים כל טובות העולם הזה שהם חזקו ידיהם לבעוט שהגוף צריך להן אלא נשב פנויים ומביא עליהם כל הרעות המונעים אותן ללמוד בחכמה ולעשות המצות כדי שנזכה לחיי העולם הבא: מלקנות העולם הבא כדי שיאבדו

ברשעם :

'He hath assured us in the Law that if we perform it cheerfully and with a good will, and meditate continually on the wisdom thereof, He will remove from us all those things that might hinder us in the performance thereof, such as sickness, war, famine, and the like; moreover that He will plenteously bestow upon us all things calculated to strengthen our hands in the performance of the Law, as plenty, peace, and abundance of silver and gold, so that we may not, all our days, be occupied about the things needful for the body,

'So too He has made known to us in the Law, that if we knowingly forsake the Law, and occupy ourselves with the vanities of time......that He, the Judge of Truth, will deprive those who forsake it of all the good things of this world, which emboldened them to kick (Deut. xxxii. 15); and that He will bring upon them all such evil things as may prevent them from attaining to the world to come, so that they may perish in their wickedness.' -Ibid.

sufficiency, and the power of their own free-will, able, as they vainly imagined, to perform all righteousness, as being adequate and commensurate to the whole law of God in its most extensive and comprehensive sense and meaning; rather looking upon the fall of man as the rise of that giant-like free-will, whereby they were enabled to bear themselves up against heaven itself, as being a great accessory to their happiness, rather than prejudicial to it, through the access of that multitude of divine laws which were given to them; as we shall see afterwards. And, so, they reckoned upon a more triumphant and illustrious kind of happiness victoriously to be achieved by the merit of their own works, than that beggarly kind of happiness (as they seem to look upon it) which cometh like an alms from divine bounty. Accordingly they affirm, 'That happiness—by way of reward—is far greater, and much more magnificent, than that which is 777

.by way of mercy -החסד way-החסד

CHAPTER III.

The second ground of the Jewish notion of a legal righteousness, viz. That the law delivered to them on mount Sinai was a sufficient dispensation from God, and all that needed to be done by him to bring them to perfection and happiness: and that the scope of their law was nothing but to afford them several ways and means of merit. The opinion of the Jewish writers concerning merit, and the reward due to the works of the law. Their distinguishing of men in order to merit and demerit into three sorts, viz. perfectly righteous, perfectly wicked, and a middle sort betwixt these. The mercenary and low spirit of the Jewish religion. An account of what the Cabalists held in this point of legal righteousness.

THE

HE second ground of that Jewish notion of a legal righteousness is this, 'That the law delivered to them upon mount Sinai was a sufficient dispensation

from God, and all that needed to be done by Him for the advancing of them to a state of perfection and blessedness; and, that the proper scope and end of their law was nothing but to afford them several ways and means of merit.' This is expressly delivered in the Mishnah; 'The Holy Blessed One was pleased to increase the merit of Israel', &c.' The meaning whereof is this; that therefore the precepts of the law were so many in number, that so they might single out where they pleased, and in exercising themselves therein procure eternal life; as Obadias de Bartenora expounds it; "That whosoever shall perform any one of the six hundred and thirteen precepts of the law, (for so many they make in number) without any worldly respects, for the love of the precept, behold, this man shall merit thereby everlasting life.' For, indeed, they supposed a reward due to the performance of every precept, which reward they supposed to be increased according to the secret estimation which God Himself hath of any precept, as we find suggested in the Mishnah, in the words of the famous R. Jehuda; 'Be careful to observe the lesser precept, as well as the greater, because thou knowest not the reward that shall be given to the observation of the precepts3.'

Here we must take notice that this was a great debate among the Jews, which precepts they were that had the greatest reward due to the performance of them; in which

1

רצה הקב"ה לזכות את ישראל מעקרי האמונה בתורה כי בשיקיים 2 אדם מצוה מתרי"ג מצות כראוי וכהגון לפיכך הרבה להם תורה ומצות שנאמר ולא ישתטף עמה כונת מכונת העולם ה' הפץ למען צדקו יגדיל תורה ויאדיר: בשום פנים אלא שיעשה אותה לשמה The Holy Blessed One was pleased מאהבה כמו שבארתי לך הנה זכה This is not the בה לחיי העולם הבא:

to increase the merit of Israel. He therefore multiplied for them the Law, and the commandments, according to the words of Isaiah (ch. xlii. 21), "The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness' take; he will magnify the law and make it honourable."-Massec. Maccoth, ad fin.

exposition of Obadias de Bartenora, but of Maimonides.

הוי זהיר במצוה קלה כבחמורה 3 שאי אתה יודע מתן שכרן של מצות:

Massec. Avoth, cap. 2, sub init.

controversy, Maimonides, in his comment upon this place, thus resolves us: That the measure of the reward, that was annexed to the negative precepts, might be collected from the measure of the punishments that were consequent upon the breach of them. But this knot could not be so well solved in reference to the affirmative precepts, because the punishments annexed to the breach of them were more rarely defined in the law: accordingly, he expresseth himself to this sense; 'As for the affirmative precepts it is not expressed what reward is due to every one of them; and all for this end, that we may not know which precept is most necessary to be observed, and which precept is of less necessity and importance'.' And a little after he tells us, that for this reason their wise men said; Qui operam dat præcepto, liber est a præcepto; which he expounds to this sense: "That whosoever shall exercise himself about any one precept, ought, without hesitation or dispute, to continue in the performance of it, as being, in the mean while, freed from minding any other. For if God had declared which precepts Himself had most valued, and settled the greatest revenue of happiness upon, then other precepts would have been less minded; and any one that should have busied himself in a precept of a lower nature, would presently have left that, when opportunity should have been offered of performing a higher. And hence we have also another Talmudical canon for the performing of precepts, of the same nature with the former quoted by our foresaid author: 'It is not lawful to skip over precepts;' that is, as he expounds it, 'When a man is about to observe one precept, he may not skip over and relinquish that, that

מצות עשה לא יתבאר שכר כל 1 העוסק במצוה פטור מן המצוה 2 אחת מהן מה היא אצל השי"ת וכל מבלתי הקשה בין המצוה אשר הוא זה כדי שלא נדע איזו מצוה צריך מתעשק בה ובין האחרת אשר תבצר מאד לשמרה ואיזו מצוה למטה הימנה: ממנה :

so he may apply himself to the observation of another'?' And thus, as the performance of any precept hath a certain reward annexed to it; so the measure of the reward they suppose to be increased according to the number of those precepts which they observe; as it is defined by R. Tarphon in the foresaid Mishnah: 'If thou hast been much in the study of the law, thou shalt be rewarded much: for faithful is thy Lord and Master, who will render to thee a reward proportionable to thy work". And, a little before, we have the same thing in the words of another of their masters: Qui multiplicat legem, multiplicat vitam3. And, lest they should not yet be liberal enough at God's cost, they are also pleased to distribute rewards to any Israelite that shall abstain from the breach of a precept: for so we find it in the Mishnah Lib. Kiddushin: 'Whosoever keeps himself from the breach of a precept, shall receive the reward, as if he had kept the precept.'

But this which hath been said concerning the performance of any one precept, must be understood with this caution, that the performance of such a precept be a continued thing, so as that it may compound and collect the performance of many good works into itself; otherwise, the single performance of any one precept is only available, according to the sense of the Talmudical masters, to cast the scale, when a man's good works and evil works equally balance one another, as Maimonides telleth us in his comment upon the forenamed Mishnah, where the words of the Jewish doctors are these: 'He

אין מעבירין על המצות ר"ל כשיזדמן 1 .87 .Ibid מרבה תורה מרבה חיים : 3 לך מעשה מצוה לא תעבירהו ותניחהו

4 These words are erroneously stated in the text as occurring in the treatise Kiddushin. The proper reference is Massec. Maccoth, cap. 3, § 15.

לעשות מצוה אחרת :

2

אם למדת תורה הרבה נותנין לך שכר הרבה ונאמן הוא בעל מלאכתך

,Pirke Avoth שישלם לך שכר פעלתך : הא כל היושב ולא עבר עבירה נותנין

לו שכר כעושה מצוה:

cap. 2, ad fin.