Heroes of Israel

rew fathers had this peculiarity?they were related to eacli other as father, son, and grandson. No other triad resembles that of Abram, Isaac,and Jacob. The heroes of the " Iliad"?Agamemnon, Achilles, and Ulysses?have no such relation. Sometimes brothers were associated in the honours of heroship, as in Indian legends, Rama and Lakshmana, Krishna and Bala; and again, Judhishthira, Bhima, and Arjuna ?a circumstance that may remind us of the " three brothers " that figure so largely in the traditions of modern Americans on the origin of their families. But there is no other instance of a great nation sprung from three men who "were the single representatives of three successive generations. The family, it is said, is the root of the state, and the best states are those which have most of the family character. The Jewish nation was designed to have much of the family character, and this peculiar feature of its ancestry contributed to this result. Necessarily the history of the first period of the Hebrew race is the history of a family. And while every feature of family life is introduced, each member is marked by so strong an individuality as to seem designed to be a type of his species. In nearly everyfeature Abram is a model father and Isaac a model son. Sarai, notwithstanding her impatient temper, is a faithful, affectionate wife, who accepts her husband's rdle, and is his attached and beloved companion to the end. Isaac is like his father in many ways, but la...