Lord of Hosts," lest the word of man be received
as the Word of the living God, for this produces
the same practical effect as when the divine, au-
thority of God's Word is denied. . It is the more
necessary to be watchful on this point because
most of the great corruptions of the truth have
arisen in the first instance from a confusion of
this nature. It was by adding the services of
Baal to that of Jehovah that Israel first trans-
gressed, and provoked the Lord to anger, and it is a
remarkable feature in the whole history of pagan-
ism that, with few exceptions, there were always
traces of one supreme God to which the multi-
tude of inferior deities were not only accessory
but subordinate. It is well known also that in
the religious books even of the Hindoos, poly-
theism is condemned almost as distinctly as in
the Bible. So also idolatry was not, usually,
the actual worship of the material idol, but the

c South Indian Sketches, p. 19. ' The Vedas must have been
compiled at least 1,400 years before Christ, that is, in the time
of the Judges: and about 500 years after, or near the time of
Jehoshaphat, a code of laws was drawn up, bearing the name of
" Menu." Both of these give much insight into the state of re-
ligion and polity in those distant ages; and though the doctrine
in the code of Menu is less pure than that of the Vedas, yet in
both, we may find proofs that the knowledge of God was not then
quite extinct. There is in both of them a distinct acknowledg-
ment of one Supreme Being, the Creator of heaven and earth,
while the use of images is discouraged and the form of worship
seems to have been patriarchal, the head of each family officiating
as its priest.
