might be entailed upon every place to which an atom of the consecrated dust might be wafted. By the direction of Jehovah, Moses took a handful of ashes of the furnace, that is of the sacred furnace, and casting them into the air, there came, instead of a blessing, boils and blains, of a peculiarly obnoxious description, upon all the people of the land. Neither priests nor magicians escaped, and thus was the absolute inability of Typhon to protect his worshippers effectually shown.

In the seventh plague, that of the lightning and hail, Isis and Osiris, the one the god of water, the other the god of fire, were made the active instruments. That this must have affected the Egyptians with more than ordinary horror, every one may perceive who remembers, that Egypt is blessed with a sky uncommonly serene; that in the greatest part of it, no rain falls from one end of the year to the other; and that even in such districts as are watered from on high, a slight and transient shower is all that the inhabitants ever witness. The eighth plague was that of the locusts, a judgment, which, whilst it afflicted the country with a serious evil, exhibited the weakness of the gods Isis and Serapis, whose province it was to keep these terrible insects from the land.

The ninth plague was directed against that species of superstition, which, as it first broke in upon true religion, so it seems to have held throughout the highest place in the estimation of the heathen. Light, that great god of Chaldea, was shown to be a mere creature in the hands of the Most High, and both the sun and the moon were veiled during three days and nights, from the eyes of their astonished worshippers.

The tenth and most tremendous judgment of all was, as indeed it is represented to be, a perfect application of the law of reprisal to the stubborn and rebellious Egyptians. "Thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn. Let my son go, that he may serve me, and if thou refuse to let him go, behold I will slay thy son, even thy firstborn." Before this threat was carried into execution, every effort had been made to subdue the obstinacy of Pharaoh. Judgment after judg ment had been sent upon him and his subjects, by none of which were the children of Israel affected. His gods were shown to be no gods-his sacred river was made the source of defilement to him. The sun refused him its light, the locusts devoured his crops, yet none of all these things suc ceeded in convincing Pharaoh that Jehovah was supreme

throughout the universe, and that it was his wisdom to obey. Then, and not till then, God raised his arm to strike, and the strength and the pride of Egypt perished in one night. "Other miracles might have been wrought," says the divine, from whom we lately quoted, "equally well calculated to prove the existence and power of that God, in whose name Moses wrought them, but I do not think that it could ever have entered into the heart of man to conceive a series of miracles so well adapted to prove the unity of the Godhead, and the impious folly of polytheism, as were the ten plagues sent upon the idolatrous Egyptians; and he, who does not view them in this light, cannot feel half the force of the evidence which they afford of the divine origin of the Mosaic dispensation."

There is but one other matter recorded in Holy Writ, of which we consider it necessary, previous to the continuation of our narrative, to take notice. It is asserted by Moses, that "the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years," and that "at the end of the four hundred and thirty years, even the selfsame day, it came to pass, that all the hosts of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt." How are these statements to be reconciled, first with the promise of God to Abraham, that his descendants should be afflicted for four hundred years; and secondly, with the well-established fact that the sojourn of the children of Israel in the district of Goshen included only two hundred and fifteen years.

With respect to God's prediction, it may suffice to observe, that there neither was, nor could be any intention on the Divine part to specify to a day, or an hour, the exact portion of time referred to. It is customary still, as it probably has been ever since language was first granted to man, to speak of periods of time loosely and generally, more especially when these include, not one or two, or twelve or twenty years, but centuries. Hence God's assurance to Abraham, that "his seed should be a stranger in a land, not theirs, and should serve the inhabitants thereof, and that they should afflict them four hundred years," but that in the fourth generation they should return again to Canaan.

In reference to the second difficulty, it is worthy of notice, that though the sacred history certainly does state that "the sojourning of the children of Israel in the land of Egypt was four hundred and thirty years," we are by no means VOL. I.-R

bound to receive this as a declaration, that they dwelt in Egypt during the whole of that time.

The Israelites came into Egypt, with Jacob, their father, A. M. 3548, and quitted it, A. M. 3763, consequently they dwelt there exactly two hundred and fifteen years; we are therefore compelled to believe that the expression of Moses refers to the entire period of their existence, as strangers and wanderers, as well in Canaan as in Egypt. Nor are authorities wanting to support us in this opinion. In the Samaritan text, for example, it is said, "now the inhabiting of the children of Israel, whereby they inhabited in the land of Canaan and in the land of Egypt, were four hundred and thirty years," upon which Dr. Prideaux has observed, that "the additions herein, do manifestly mend the text; they make it more clear and intelligible, and add nothing to the Hebrew copy, but what must be understood by the reader to make out its sense." Is it not in the highest degree probable, that the words which we find in the Samaritan copy, once held their places in the Hebrew also, and that they were dropped only by the hurry or carelessness of transcribers.

The following abstract of periods will show at a glance how God's predictions to Abraham were verified:

From the time of the promise, when Abraham was
in his seventy-fifth year, to the birth of Isaac
From the birth of Isaac to the birth of Jacob
From the birth of Jacob to his descent into Egypt
with his family

Years.

25

60

130

-215

71

From the death of Joseph to the birth of Moses
From the birth of Moses to the Exode

64

80

-215

The Israelites sojourned in Egypt during Joseph's life

Making in all, from the granting of the promise to the day of its fulfilment, exactly

430

CHAPTER XI.

Departure of the Israelites.-Passage of the Red Sea.Delivery of the Law.-Apostacies of the Israelites.-Rebellions of Korah and Miriam.-Wars with the Nations on the borders of Canaan.-Balaam's Prophecy.-Objections stated and answered.

A. M. 3763 to 3803.-B. C. 1648 to 1608.

THE first march of the Israelites, which was necessarily both an abrupt and a disorderly one, carried them no further than to Succoth, a town distant about twelve miles from Rameses, and on the outskirts of Goshen. Here two of their sacred ordinances, the feast of unleavened bread, and the dedication of the firstborn of man and beast to the Lord, were instituted. At the same time, the people were mustered, when the total number of men, independently of women, children, and followers, was found to amount to 600,000; after which they again set forward, the angel of God going before them in a pillar of cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night. Instead, however, of taking the direct route, which would have led them through the country of the warlike Philistines, they bent their steps towards the extreme part of the Arabian gulf, where, at a place called Etham, on the borders of the wilderness of Shur, they again halted.

Thus were they circumstanced, when Pharaoh, recovering from the panic with which late occurrences had affected him, and repenting of the facility with which he had yielded to the entreaties of his subjects, determined to follow the fugitives, and bring them back, at all hazards, to their old settlements. With this view, he ordered a numerous and select body of troops, chiefly cavalry and war-chariots, under arms, and putting himself at their head, began a fierce and rapid pursuit after the Israelites. Nor was he unsuccessful in his efforts to overtake them. Having moved from Etham, they had, by God's especial direction, travelled down the channel of the bay as far as Pi-hahiroth, where, in a valley, hemmed in on two sides by mountains, and blocked up on the third by the sea, they once more pitched their tents. Here Pharaoh came up with them, and seizing the only outlet, that by which they had penetrated, he calculated, not

without great show of reason, that his rebellious slaves lay absolutely at his mercy.

Great was the alarm throughout the Hebrew camp, when Pharaoh's armed bands made their appearance. Unaccustomed to war, and broken in spirit by long years of slavery and oppression, the Israelites dreamed not of the possibility of standing on their own defence, but upbraided Moses, as if he had brought them out from the land of Egypt, only that they might perish by the sword in the wilderness. Moses, however, so far from resenting their injustice, only entreated them "to stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he should show them that day ;" and he had scarcely said so, when the pillar removed from the head of the Israelites' camp to the rear, thus interposing an impassable barrier between them and their enemies. At the same time, the prophet stretched out his rod towards the sea, which was immediately divided into two parts, whilst a strong east wind blowing, dried up the channel, after which the people were again put in motion, and advanced towards the edge of the gulf. It was night, and among the Egyptian columns, a night of profound darkness; but the Israelites, guided by the refulgence from the pillar in their rear, saw plainly the way which had been miraculously opened for them. They entered upon it without apprehension, the waters standing like a wall on their right hand, and on their left; and they continued their journey along the bottom of the deep, free from every accident or hinderance. It was not so with the pursuers. They likewise plunged into the tract, not doubting that where footmen could travel with security, horses and chariots might be trusted; but no great while elapsed ere they learned to repent their rashness. "It came to pass," says the inspired historian, "that in the morning watch, the Lord looked into the host of the Egyptians, through the pillar of fire, and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians." The chariots drove heavily, broke down, or upset, the horses floundered in pools, or sank in quicksands, till the whole were thrown into irremediable confusion, and a horrible dread fell upon them. They would have fled from the presence of the men, whose destruction they had vowed, but it was now too late. No sooner were the Israelites safely landed on the opposite shore, than Moses again stretched forth his rod over the sea, and the waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh, so that there remained not so much as one of them."

The joy of the Israelites at this unlooked-for deliverance