and there destroy them for their ingratitude and distrust, yet He said, "Because all those men which have seen my glory, and my miracles, which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, have tempted me now these ten times, and have not hearkened to my voice, surely they shall not see the land which I sware unto their fathers, neither shall any of them that provoked me see it. Your carcases shall fall in this wilderness; doubtless ye shall not come into the land, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun. And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years." And, in fact, they did die in the desert of Mount Sinai -all except Joshua and Caleb.

We have a long account of the first six months of the wanderings of the Israelites after leaving Egypt, but a very short one of their journeys in the wilderness for the next forty years. When Caleb was eighty-five years old, and the land had been conquered by a younger generation, he said, "And now, behold, the Lord hath kept me alive, as He said, these forty and five years, ever since the Lord spake this word unto Moses, while the children of Israel wandered in the wilderness; and now, lo, I am this day fourscore and five years old, and yet I am as strong this day as I was in the day that Moses sent me; as my strength was then, even so is my strength now for war, both to go out and to come in.” was said afterwards, "But my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit with him, and hath followed me fully, him will I bring into the land whereunto he went, and his seed shall possess it."

It

THE SENTENCE ON MOSES.

EVEN Moses himself, the great lawgiver and deliverer of the people, was not to conduct the Israelites to their promised inheritance. When wandering in the desert of Zin, there was no water to be had. The people became half-mad with thirst, and said to him, "Would God that we had died when our brethren died before the Lord! Why have ye brought up the congregation of the Lord into this wilderness, that we and our cattle should die there? Wherefore have ye made us to come up out of Egypt, to bring us in unto this evil place? It is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates, neither is there any water to drink."

God then told Moses to speak to the rock, which should bring forth water; but he was irritated beyond his own control. "Hear now, ye rebels," he said, “must we fetch you water out of this rock ? And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock twice, and the water came out abundantly." Therefore the sentence went forth against him. He had spoken unadvisedly with his lips; he had not been obedient to the God who had done such great things by his hand, and God told him he should not bring the people to the promised land.

After this he assembled the nation. He reminded them of all the wonders of their deliverance; he entreated them to obey God, and told them of the blessings that depended upon their faithfulness: 'Blessed," he said, "shalt thou be in the city, and

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blessed shalt thou be in the field; blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou be when thou goest out. Thou shalt lend unto many

nations, and shall not borrow." But awful were the threatenings if "they went after strange gods to worship them." Then he made preparation for his successor, Joshua, telling him that he was to conduct the people to the land flowing with milk and honey, ending with, "And the Lord, He it is that will go before thee; He will be with thee; He will not fail thee, neither forsake thee. Fear not, neither be dismayed." Then he called all the elders of the tribes, and the officers, that he might speak his last words to them, and call heaven and earth to record them.

And then he taught them that wonderful song, beginning, "Give ear, O ye heavens! and I will speak; and hear, O earth! the words of my mouth." He tells them to "remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations. Ask thy father, and he will show thee, thy elders, and they will tell thee. O that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end!" After blessing each tribe separately, he added the assurance, "The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms."

It was with this confidence in his God that he prepared to obey the command, "Get thee up unto this mountain Abarim, unto Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, and behold the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for a possession, and die in the mount whither thou goest up,

and be gathered unto thy people, as Aaron thy brother died in Mount Hor. Because ye trespassed against me among the children of Israel in the wilderness of Zin, because ye sanctified me not in the midst of the children of Israel. Yet thou shalt see the land before thee, but thou shalt not go thither unto the land."

And now his work was done. He had led the Israelites out of Egypt; he had gone with them through the dreary wilderness; he had borne many provocations; he had given them God's commandments; he had directed their worship, and had set apart their priests; and now the time came, that he should enter into the rest prepared for the people of God. He was an hundred and twenty years old when he died; "his eye was not dim, nor was his natural force abated." Obedient to the command of God, he began to ascend from the plains of Moab to the top of Pisgah. Thence the Lord showed him all the land, and said unto him, "This is the land which I sware unto Abraham, saying I will give it unto thy seed. I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither."

And now, the last prayer breathed, the last sight seen on that mountain-top, far above the sounds of earth, the solitary man lies him down in stillness and in light, to yield up to his Creator and Redeemer the great spirit which He had so nobly trained, through manifold discipline and unequalled heavenly communings. No hand of man closed his sinking eyelids, no tool of man dug that unknown grave, or traced over it an earth-born memorial. From first

"Moses,

to last, God and he were alone together. the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. And He buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth-peor; but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day."

On looking back to the story of the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, their wanderings in the desert, and their arrival at last at the promised land, we may see a sort of shadow of our own journey through this world of trial and of difficulty, towards that better country which God has promised shall be the inheritance of his faithful servants, those who are led by the Captain of their salvation-a greater lawgiver than Moses. It is true that we do not hear the voice of God sounding from Mount Sinai amidst thundering and lightning; but He speaks to us as certainly in the revelation which He has given to man; and if we wilfully disobey his word, we are even more to blame than the Israelites, as we walk in a brighter light than they did.

JOSHUA.

THE Book of Joshua is the next in the Bible to Deuteronomy, and describes the arrival of the Israelites in the land flowing with milk and honey, which was the object of their hopes. Moses before his death gave Joshua a charge from God, saying, "Be strong and of a good courage; for thou shalt