explorer Eyre must be classed in the highest rank, but opinions are always likely to differ as to his action in the Jamaica rebellion. He died on the 30th of November 1901.
EYRE, SIR JAMES (1734–1799), English judge, was the son of
the Rev. Thomas Eyre, of Wells, Somerset. He was educated at
Winchester College and at St John’s College, Oxford, which,
however, he left without taking a degree. He was called to the
bar at Gray’s Inn in 1755, and commenced practice in the lord
mayor’s and sheriffs’ courts, having become by purchase one of
the four counsel to the corporation of London. He was appointed
recorder of London in 1763. He was counsel for the plaintiff in
the case of Wilkes v. Wood, and made a brilliant speech in condemnation
of the execution of general search warrants. His refusal to
voice the remonstrances of the corporation against the exclusion
of Wilkes from parliament earned him the recognition of the
ministry, and he was appointed a judge of the exchequer in 1772.
From June 1792 to January 1793 he was chief commissioner of
the great seal. In 1793 he was made chief justice of the common
pleas, and presided over the trials of Horne Tooke, Thomas
Crosfield and others, with great ability and impartiality. He
died on the 1st of July 1799 and was buried at Ruscombe,
Berkshire.
See Howell, State Trials, xix. (1154–1155); Foss, Lives of the Judges.
EYRIE, the alternative English form of the words Aerie or
Aery, the lofty nest of a bird of prey, especially of an eagle,
hence any lofty place of abode; the term is also used of the
brood of the bird. The word derives from the Fr. aire, of the
same meaning, which comes from the Lat. area, an open space,
but was early connected with aërius, high in the air, airy, a
confusion that has affected the spelling of the word. The
forms “eyrie” or “eyry” date from a 17th century attempt
to derive the word from the Teutonic ey, an egg.
EZEKIEL (יחזקאל, “God strengthens” or “God is strong”;
Sept. Ἰεζεκιήλ; Vulg. Ezechiel), son of Buzi, one of the most
vigorous and impressive of the older Israelite thinkers. He
was a priest of the Jerusalem temple, probably a member of
the dominant house of Zadok, and doubtless had the literary
training of the cultivated priesthood of the time, including
acquaintance with the national historical, legal and ritual
traditions and with the contemporary history and customs
of neighbouring peoples. In the year 597 (being then, probably,
not far from thirty years of age) he was carried off
to Babylonia by Nebuchadrezzar with King Jehoiachin and
a large body of nobles, military men and artisans, and there, it
would seem, he spent the rest of his life. His prophecies are
dated from this year (“our captivity,” xl. 1), except in i. 1,
where the meaning of the date “thirtieth year” is obscure;
it cannot refer to his age (which would be otherwise expressed
in Hebrew), or to the reform of Josiah, 621 (which is not elsewhere
employed as an epoch); possibly the reference is to the
era of Nabopolassar (626 according to the Canon of Ptolemy),
if chronological inexactness be supposed (34 or 33 years instead
of 30), a supposition not at all improbable. That the word
“thirtieth” is old, appears from the fact that a scribe has added
a gloss (vv. 2, 3) to bring this statement into accord with the
usual way of reckoning in the book: the “thirtieth” year,
he explains, is the fifth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin. The
exiles dwelt at Tell-abib (“Hill of the flood”), one of the mounds
or ruins made by the great floods that devastated the country,[1]
near the “river” Chebar (Kebar), probably a large canal not
far south of the city of Babylon. Here they had their own
lands, and some form of local government by elders, and appear
to have been prosperous and contented; probably the only
demand made on them by the Babylonian government was the
payment of taxes.
Ezekiel was married (xxiv. 18), had his own house, and comported himself quietly as a Babylonian subject. But he was a profoundly interested observer of affairs at home and among the exiles: as patriot and ethical teacher he deplored alike the political blindness of the Jerusalem government (King Zedekiah revolted in 588) and the immorality and religious superficiality and apostasy of the people. He, like Jeremiah, was friendly to Nebuchadrezzar, regarding him as Yahweh’s instrument for the chastisement of the nation. Convinced that opposition to Babylonian rule was suicidal, and interpreting historical events, in the manner of the times, as indications of the temper of the deity, he held that the imminent political destruction of the nation was proof of Yahweh’s anger with the people on account of their moral and religious depravity; Jerusalem was hopelessly corrupt and must be destroyed (xxiv.). On the other hand, he was equally convinced that, as his predecessors had taught (Hos. xi. 8, 9; Isa. vii. 3 al.), Yahweh’s love for his people would not suffer them to perish utterly—a remnant would be saved, and this remnant he naturally found in the exiles in Babylonia, a little band plucked from the burning and kept safe in a foreign land till the wrath should have passed (xi. 14 ff.). This conception of the exiles as the kernel of the restored nation he further set forth in the great vision of ch. i., in which Yahweh is represented as leaving Jerusalem and coming to take up his abode among them in Babylonia for a time, intending, however, to return to his own city (xliii. 7).
This, then, was Ezekiel’s political creed—destruction of Jerusalem and its inhabitants, restoration of the exiles, and meantime submission to Babylon. His arraignment of the Judeans is violent, almost malignant (vi. xvi. al.). The well-meaning but weak king Zedekiah he denounces with bitter scorn as a perjured traitor (xvii). He does not discuss the possibility of successful resistance to the Chaldeans; he simply assumes that the attempt is foolish and wicked, and, like other prophets, he identifies his political programme with the will of God. Probably his judgment of the situation was correct; yet, in view of Sennacherib’s failure at Jerusalem in 701 and of the admitted strength of the city, the hope of the Jewish nobles could not be considered wholly unfounded, and in any case their patriotism (like that of the national party in the Roman siege) was not unworthy of admiration. The prophet’s predictions of disaster continued, according to the record, up to the investment of the city by the Chaldean army in 588 (i.-xxiv.); after the fall of the city (586) his tone changed to one of consolation (xxxiii.-xxxix.)—the destruction of the wicked mass accomplished, he turned to the task of reconstruction. He describes the safe and happy establishment of the people in their own land, and gives a sketch of a new constitution, of which the main point is the absolute control of public religion by the priesthood (xl.-xlviii.).
The discourses of the first period (i.-xxiv.) do not confine themselves to political affairs, but contain much interesting ethical and religious material. The picture given of Jerusalemite morals is an appalling one. Society is described as honeycombed with crimes and vices; prophets, priests, princes and the people generally are said to practise unblushingly extortion, oppression, murder, falsehood, adultery (xxii.). This description is doubtless exaggerated. It may be assumed that the social corruption in Jerusalem was such as is usually found in wealthy communities, made bolder in this case, perhaps, by the political unrest and the weakness of the royal government under Zedekiah. No such charges are brought by the prophet against the exiles, in whose simple life, indeed, there was little or no opportunity for flagrant violation of law. Ezekiel’s own moral code is that of the prophets, which insists on the practice of the fundamental civic virtues. He puts ritual offences, however, in the same category with offences against the moral law, and he does not distinguish between immorality and practices that are survivals of old recognized customs: in ch. xxii. he mentions “eating with the blood”[2] along with murder, and failure to observe ritual regulations along with oppression of the fatherless and the widow; the old customary law permitted marriage with a half-sister (father’s daughter), with a daughter-in-law, and with a father’s wife (Gen. xx. 12, xxxviii. 26; 2 Sam. xvi. 21, 22), but the more refined
