More than ever it invoked the Messiah as judge and avenger of the people.

A complete renovation, a revolution which should shake the world to its very foundation, was necessary in order to satisfy the enormous thirst of vengeance excited in it by the sense of its superiority, and by the sight of its humiliation.[2] [Footnote 1: The whole book of Esther breathes a great attachment to this dynasty.] [Footnote 2: Apocryphal letter of Baruch, in Fabricius, _Cod.

pseud., V.T._, ii.p.147, and following.] If Israel had possessed the spiritualistic doctrine, which divides man in two parts--the body and the soul--and finds it quite natural that while the body decays, the soul should survive, this paroxysm of rage and of energetic protestation would have had no existence.

But such a doctrine, proceeding from the Grecian philosophy, was not in the traditions of the Jewish mind.

The ancient Hebrew writings contain no trace of future rewards or punishments.