Page:The old paths, or The Talmud tested by Scripture.djvu/98

 have left the leaven in a hole or a window, and these crumbs were there before; he must therefore search again. If he find nothing, then he must search the whole house; but if he find the bread with which the mouse went off, then no further search is necessary." Another case of equal importance, and more ingenuity, is the following:—

"If a mouse enter a house with bread in his mouth, and a mouse also go out of the same house with bread in his mouth, one may conclude that this is one and the self-same mouse, and it is not necessary to search. But if the former that entered was black, and the latter that went out white, a search is necessary. If a mouse went in with bread in his mouth, and a weasel come out with bread in her mouth, it is necessary to search. If a mouse and a weasel both go out, and bread in the weasel's mouth, there is no search required, for this is the identical bread that had been before in the mouse's mouth." (Hilchoth Chometz, c. ii.) We do not mean to say that this sort of wisdom was never found in Christians. We are well aware that the scholastic divines display much of the same perverse ingenuity, and the achievements of mice have figured in Gentile theology too, but we have renounced that whole system as contrary to the Word of God. You still adhere to the theology of the Scribes, and are now about to keep a solemn festival according to their ordinances. And yet you see how poor their view of true piety, and how perverse the application of their time and their ingenuity. The most unlearned Israelite who has read the law of Moses in its simple dignity, will know very well that when God commanded the Israelites to remove leaven from their houses, he did not mean that they should go and rummage out the mouse-holes, or spend their time looking after mice and weasels. If, instead of the oral law, you had read this in the New Testament, would you not have taken it as complete evidence against the claims of that book? and if St. Paul or St. Peter had given such commands to the Gentile converts, would you not have said, these men were either fools or knaves? But in the New Testament nothing like it is to be found. The precepts there given, and the instruction there conveyed, is all of a noble and dignified character, whilst the