Another source of the power of the priests is their practical
monopoly of learning, and their very considerable astronomical
knowledge, which enables them to keep a hold on the popular mind
by predicting eclipses and even comets. In Zu-Vendis only a
few of the upper classes can read and write, but nearly all the
priests have this knowledge, and are therefore looked upon as
learned men.
The law of the country is, on the whole, mild and just, but differs
in several respects from our civilized law. For instance, the
law of England is much more severe upon offences against property
than against the person, as becomes a people whose ruling passion
is money. A man may half kick his wife to death or inflict horrible
sufferings upon his children at a much cheaper rate of punishment
than he can compound for the theft of a pair of old boots.
In Zu-Vendis this is not so, for there they rightly or wrongly look
upon the person as of more consequence than goods and chattels,
and not, as in England, as a sort of necessary appendage to the
latter. For murder the punishment is death, for treason death,
for defrauding the orphan and the widow, for sacrilege, and for
attempting to quit the country (which is looked on as a sacrilege)
death.
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