YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY ^ETVEW^ THE LIBRARY OF THE DIVINITY SCHOOL * THE DAY MISSIONS LIBRARY THE PENTATEUCH VINDICATED: The Writings of Moses briefly reviewed, and their ancient place in Sacred Literature maintained against recent objections. REVEREND WILLIAM THOMPSON, Pastor of the Congregational Church, Cape Town. " Suffer me a little, and I will show thee that I have yet to epeak on God's behalf." — Elihtj. " I have enslaved myself to no one ; I bear no one's name ; I trust much to the judgment of great men and demand something for my own.' — Seneca. THIED JEDITI03ST. CAPE TOWN : SAUL SOLOMON & CO., STEAM PEINTEsG OFFICE. 1872. When a point is once certain, we are no ways obliged to satisfy each curious question about it ; and it is allowed in all other cases, that difficulties are of no weight against demonstration." Bishop Conybeare. THIS LITTLE BOOK IS RESPECTFULLY AND WITH CONFIDENCE INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR TO THE PERPLEXED AMONG THE BUST AND THE TOUNG WHO ARE EARNESTLY ASKING WHETHER THERE ARE SUFFICIENT GROUNDS FOR BELIEF IN THE GENUINENESS AND HISTORIC TRUTH OE ^ THE PENTATEUCH. C ft J* " On the other hand, we are to answer every one that inquires a reason, or an account, which supposes something receptive of it. We ought to judge ourselves engaged to give it, be it an enemy, if he will hear ; if it gain him not, it may in part convince and cool him ; much more, should it be one who ingenuously inquires for satisfaction, and possibly inclines to receive the truth, but has been prejudiced by false misrepresentations of it.' — Coleridge. ANALYSIS AND INDEX. Introductory Observations. Design of the work 1 Connection between the Pentateuch and the Gospels 3 Note. — Scepticism carried out : — the American Declaration of Independence, by Theodore Parker 6 SECTION I. Trace the Channel through which the Books bearing, in our authorized version op the Bible, the name of Moses have been transmitted to us Testimony of ancient Heathen authors 9 and 31 Acknowledged by our Lord and His Apostles 11 Known by Josephus, - Onkelos, — Jesus, the Son of Sirach, — and by the Translators of the Septuagint .. 14 Traced to the Captivity, and referred to by the Prophets Daniel, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel ... 16 Ezra and Nehemiah base their Reforms on it ... 16 Samaritan Pentateuch 16 vi ANALYSIS AND INDEX. PASE Traced to the days of Josiah and of Hezekiah ... 18 Known before the Disruption of the Kingdom ... 21 Solomon and David acknowledge it 24 Known before the Monarchy 25 Traced to the days of Samuel's youth, and of Joshua ... .. 29 Testimony of the Books themselves ... ... 30 Note.— Summary of E vidence, by Bishop Browne 3 1 SECTION II The Phenomena which may be observed on a review op their contents call for an inquiry into their character and design. Names of the Books, and their meaning : — Genesis and its contents 34 Chronology adopted ; and Note from " Dic tionary of the Bible" 36 Note:— Use of the sacred Name Jehovah, and of Elohim 36 Eevelation adapted to Man's capacity and need 37 ExoDUS,its subject; and its corroboration ... 38 Note :— What may be learnt from a Brick ... 39 Biography of MOSES. Note: Egyptians a literary people 41 Plight to Midian ... ... 43 Receives his Commission at the Burning Bush... 45 The Israelites, their number and circumstances 49 Miracles defined 53 Note: — Local colouring ... ... ... 55 Aaron's Eod becomes a Serpent 56 The Ten Plagues of Egypt, with Notes ... 66 Note :— The Magicians of Egypt 61 Institution of the Passover 75 ANALYSIS AND INDEX. Vll page Early Egyptian History obscure 76 Reality of the Miracles. Note from Bishop Fitzgerald 78 Patriarchal Government while in Egypt ... 80 The Preparation and Setting out ... ... 81 The Pillar op Cloud — Symbol of Jehovah's presence 82 Note on Miracles as mutually supporting each other, by Penrose ... 83 -Passage of the Red Sea, lines by Moore 85 Manna given ... 86 Murmuring for Water. Note from Bonrienne W Jethro's visit, and advice to appoint Deputies ... 88 Covenant made at Sinai 90 Note from Prof. H. Rogers, on accounting for the supernatural 91 Note : —Nature of the Sinai Covenant, by Erskine 92 The Parenthesis of History between Abraham and Christ 93 Successive renewals of the Covenant, and a new one promised .". 94 Ritual Precepts added 1 95 Note on the Oral Law, by Dr. Townley ... 96 Government the Ordinance of God ... ... 97 The Theocracy: — the special distinction of Israel 98 Leviticus, Numbers, and DEUTERONOMYmade use of -. 99 Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy 100 The Moral Law: The Ten Commandments 101 Note from the Quarterly Review in reply to objections ... ... 104 VUI ANALYSIS AND INDEX. Adaptation to the circumstances of the People necessary 107 The Ceremonial Law: Why given? 108 The Feasts and Offerings regulated by Divine Appointment Ill Moral Education of the People aimed at ... 112 Judaism introductory to Christianity 113 Summary of the uses of the Law, by Milton ... 115 The Law could not be fully kept in the Wilder ness 117 The Judicial or Political Law : Jehovah the Head of the State and Proprietor of the Soil 118 Self-government by Elders and Representatives as in Patriarchal Times 119 The Constitution fixed and well balanced : Levites powerless for revolution: — Note by Lowman 121 The Laws, and their Administration by Judges 123 The sanctions of the Sinaitic Covenant temporal 126 Return to the History : Rebellion punished —Korah, Dathan, and Abiram 127 Aaron the choice of Jehovah 127 The sending and return of the Spies, and punish ment of the People . ... 128 Physical changes in the Desert: —Note from "Speaker's Commentary" ... . ... 129 MOSES — " the spoken to by God " — his distinction as a Prophet 133 Moses taken to his rest : -Lines by Hemans ... 135 Rules of Interpretation, by Dr. Seiler 137 Summary of facts, and Extract from Dr. Jenkin 139 ANALYSIS AND INDEX. SECTION III. The rejection op these Books, or of any Statements they contain (errors op copyists, if any such there be, excepted), would be attended with greater difficulties than their admission. The Books of Moses were acknowledged by Christ and His Apostles 143 Note : — Extract from Dissertation by Sir William Jones ... 144 Undesigned Coincidences between Deuteronomy and preceding Books 145 Note : — Extract from North American Review 146 Note : — On the Inspiration of the O. T., by Bishop Clayton 147 Scripture references 149 Facts to be accounted for on any supposition ... 150 The Israelites take possession of Canaan ... 152 Difficulty of introducing a new Statute-book : — Note from Leslie ... 154 A Constitution accepted by the Israelites — Why 1 155 The Promise of a special Providence — Note by Erskine 156 The Dilemma stated by Bishop Marsh 158 Superiority of the Pentateuch over other Ancient Writings ... 159 Whence did Moses obtain his knowledge 1 ... 1 60 Was it from the Egyptians 1 161 The Question repeated and answered ... ... 163 Forgery of the Pentateuch by the Levites incredible 165 How may attacks on the Pentateuch be accounted for ? 166 ANALYSIS AND INDEX. PAGE Reasons to hope that some Difficulties may be cleared up 168 Note: — On the Moabite Stone 168 Difficulties acknowledged; but not insuperable: — Note by Prof. Moses Stuart 170 They are not without their moral USES : Extract from Bishop Conybeare .. 172 What literary Candour demands 174 The tendency of Scepticism 175 Such Difficulties ought not to disturb our peace 175 Note: A Vindication of Bishop Colenso, a Satire by Prof . H. Rogers 176 Caution: — Bishop Berkeley ... 178 Testimony of Moses and the Prophets not to be set aside as insufficient 179 The Journey to Emmaus 180 The first and the last Testimony to the Writings of Moses by our Lord 180 Ignorance, error, or deception, cannot be imputed to Him ... 181 Jesus possessed perfect knowledge of all things pertaining to His Mission 182 The Testimony of the Writings of Moses to our Lord 183 Our creed and rule of life— Lines by Dr. Watts 183 Extract from Quarterly Review 184 Concluding Words 185 APPENDIX. A.— On Mysteries in Religion 186 B.— The Fundamental Law of the Mosaic Institutions 187 C— The Origin of Sacrifices 190 ANALYSIS AND INDEX. XI D — The Knowledge of God and Religion in Patriarchal Times 191 E. — The Place of the Pentateuch in Judaism and Christianity ... 193 F. — Old Errors reproduced by Bishop Colenso 194 Gr.— On the Imputation to our Lord Jesus Christ of Ignorance and Liability to Error : — Extract from Bishop Ollivant 198 Extract from the Judgment of Bishop Gray, on charges against Bishop Colenso 199 Note on the Character of the late Bishop Gray, and on the Loss occasioned by his Death ... 200 [Note, omitted page 13.] The interesting fact referred to by our "Lord, in the words which have become classic, " And as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up : that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life," John iii. 14, 15,— is alluded to in the Wisdom of Solomon, xvi. 5 — 7, " For when the horrible fierce ness of beasts came npon thy people, and they perished with the stings of crooked serpents, thy wrath endured not for ever. But they were troubled for a small season, that they might be admonished, having a sign of salvation, to put them in remembracce of the commandment of thy law. For he that turned himself towards it was not saved by the thing that he saw : but by thee that art the Saviour of all." PREFATORY NOTE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. The following little work is the Lecture referred to below, in an expanded form, with the addition of what it is hoped will add greatly to its usefulness, of copious notes derived from writers representing different sections of the Church of Christ, and different periods of its history. It is right to mention that the objections brought against the Pentateuch, although not stated, have not been absent from the mind of the Author, but that they have been sought to be met indirectly, nevertheless, it is believed, sufficiently for the object in view. If justification of the course adopted were needed, it might be found, not only in our knowledge of human nature, now fallen and morally weak, but, by inference, in the remark of Bishop Colenso in the Preface, p. xxii, to Part the First of his elaborate work, The Pentateuch and Booh of Joshua critically examined, of which Part the Sixth was published a few months ago, — "and which"— the objections replied to by certain orthodox German writers named by him— "and which," says Dr Colenso, "many an English reader will often learn first from these very attempts to answer them." — If it is unwise to sow tares in a field intended to grow wheat, hoping hereafter to root them out, surely it is not less so to sow the seeds of distrust and scepticism in the minds of the young and the inexperienced, who are to take our place in the Church and in the World ! Nay, more to be blamed is PREFATORY NOTE. Xlli such indiscretion: as it is injurious to, if not positively destructive of, those moral dispositions which are the most favourable to the search after Truth, it involves a grave responsibility. How many things have there been in our own experience, the evils of which we may have, through God's great goodness, overcome, but which have left ugly scars behind them ! We cannot empty the mind of memo ries we would gladly forget ; but which ever and anon come back upon us to our grief and shame. And shall we teach men, albeit inadvertently, things which for their own peace and usefulness they may wish, when troubled thereby, they had never learned ? If it should be said that the cause of Truth demands that the objections urged by others against "the traditionary belief" should be examined and shown to be without force, the reply is that, in the present case, the demand is not intended to be complied with in the following pages, for not only may it be said, in the words of the late Bishop HornS that " pertness and ignorance may ask a question in three lines, which it may cost thirty pages to answer," but, further, so fer as the subject admits of it, or it appears to be neces sary, that such demand has been met by some of the most able men of the present century and of the past, in works within the reach of all thoughtful and earnest students) Moreover, if a precedent were needed, the opponents of the genuineness and authenticity of the Pentateuch adopt a different course, by giving prominence to all that they con sider adverse to its claims, and by carefully avoiding, or we unintentionally do them injustice ! all direct statements of the moral and positive evidence by which it may be shown to be historical and true. The latter description of evidence is now attempted to be supplied for the use of those persons, XIV PREFATORY NOTE. especially the busy and the young, who may wish to have it before them. — "Is there not a cause ? " 1 Sam. xvii. 19. It is not inconsistent with genuine personal modesty to say that our opponents in this controversy are in error, in deep and dangerous error, and that we wish to be the means of reclaiming them ; or if this may not be our privilege and happiness, at least this may be ours, to prevent other persons, such as those for whom we write, from going astray in this age of pretension, of scepticism, and of misbelief. May the God of truth be pleased to bless this unpretending little volume to those for whom it has been prepared, and to Him shall be the praise ! W. T. Cape Town, 23rd August, 1872. PREFATORY NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION. The Committee of the Mechanics' Institute having requested me to deliver, as on some former occasions, a Lecture to its members and friends, leaving to myself the choice of subject, I judged it to be no more incon sistent with the objects of a literary and scientific society to select the writings of Moses for review, than it would have been those of Ccesar, or of Mohammed, or of Confucius. The recent attacks made on the genuineness and historic truth of the Pentateuch, in the neighbouring colony of Natal, give especial appropriateness to a subject, which at any time would be interesting and useful, and furnish an apology, if such be needed, for the introduction of it in the Lecture-hall of the Cape Town Mechanics' Institute. W. T. Cape Town, May, 1863. a*0 The above Lecture, after having been long out of print, was republished, and formed part of " Our Old Bible, with some Reasons for keeping fast hold of it." " It is evident to me that in religion, as in other things, the offers op god are all directed, not to an indolent credulity, but to constant diligence, and to an unwearied search of the truth." — mllton. THE PENTATEUCH VINDICATED ; OR The Writings of Moses briefly reviewed, and their ancient place in Sacred Literature maintained against recent objections. On entering that noble room which the liberality and fine taste of this South African community have provided for the Public Library, the visitor observes on his right hand, and not far from the centre of the room, a case of goodly proportions and workmanship, one of whose shelves is distin guished from the rest by having before it a piece of plate-glass. On drawing near to ascertain what may be thus carefully protected, he will see, along with superb editions of Knight's Shaks peare and of the Pictorial History of England, a unique volume, elegantly bound. That was the first Book put on the shelves of our new Library by His Royal Highness Prince Alfred, on the day of its inauguration, the 18th of September, 1860. What book was selected for this distinc- 2 THE PENTATEUCH VINDiUAXJtS.u. tion as the first in acknowledged importance, and the first to find a place in one of the largest and most valuable of all the colonial libraries, of the British Empire ? It was a rare and costly manu script of the Gospels in Greek, presented, as the choicest of his munificent gifts to the Insti tution, by His Excellency, our late deservedly- popular Governor, Sir George Grey, K.C.B. The act was full of significance : it embodied the personal conviction of the donor of the high value of his gift, the intelligent and devout concurrence of the illustrious Prince's judgment therein, by whose hand it was put into its place, and the belief of each one who took part in this interesting ceremonial, that it would be regarded with satisfaction by the . Boyal Mother of the Prince, and the august Sovereign of the entire assembly. It had the appearance and the effect of our nation's homage to Christianity : the loyal and the trusty Governor of this dependency4of the Empire, being associated thus with a scion of the reigning House, and with Her Majesty herself, in the one great and becoming act of giving the first place in literature, sacred or profane, to the Gospels of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ : a nation the largest, richest, most enlightened, and religious upon earth, in the CONNECTION WITH THE GOSPELS. 3 persons of its noblest representatives, and in the presence of some of the most intelligent of its subjects, declaring that this Book possesses a character and puts forth claims which are pecu liarly its own, and not merely such as it possesses in common with Shakspeare, or the Pictorial History of England, those great exponents of our national genius and literary enterprise, which His Royal Highness added, as his own personal gift, to the rich intellectual stores which that day were begun to be deposited in their new home — our city's pride. If this inference be just — and who can doubt it ? — the subject of our present lecture must be of high importance ; for there is that mutual dependence of one part of Scripture upon another, the Old Testament upon the New, and the New Testament upon the Old — like the two sides of an arch, — and that harmony between them, that unless it shall appear that the Pentateuch is the genuine production of Moses, and that it records undeniable facts, and not myths or poetic fictions, the Gospels, which contain frequent references to the Books of Moses, and proceed on the assumption of their truthfulness, are themselves no longer a trustworthy source of religious knowledge. It will follow that our faith in them b 2 4 THE PENTATEUCH VINDICATED. is misplaced, and that all who took part in the ceremony to which allusion has been made alto gether over-estimated their importance, if even they themselves — pardon the improbable con jecture ! — were not deceivers or deceived ! I trust that it will appear before our examination of these books comes to a close that the converse of this is true — that the noble personages were neither mistaken in their estimate of these Gospels, nor in assigning them a first place in our Public Library did they wish to impose upon others, and, further, that the Pentateuch, which bears so close a relation to the Gospels, is not less worthy of our confidence than these records of the life of Jesus. Let us address ourselves with becoming reverence to the con sideration of a subject in which so much is involved. Our inquiry will embrace the history of the Books, which in the English version of the Bible bear the name of Moses, and the phenomena they present, — the inferences to be drawn from them, and the probable grounds of their being accepted by the Israelites, — the influence of these Books upon different sections of mankind, and the difficulties which must attend the rejection of them, — the general char acter of the attacks to which they have been in THE SUBJECT NOT NEW. 5 all ages exposed, and the effect such attacks should have to strengthen our confidence, in proportion as they may lead to a closer exami nation of the books themselves, — and, lastly, the vast responsibility which the possession of the Pentateuch brings with it. It is proper to remark at the outset of this inquiry, and it should be steadily borne in mind throughout it, that the subject is by no means new, as some recent writers would have us to believe. "We do not come to it for the first time ; neither is it undertaken on account of any misgivings which disturb our peace as to the faith of early or of mature years : it is not a mere apology, or a defence which is now proposed. After an ordeal such as no other book was ever subject to, and an acknowledgment of its claims by the ablest and best of men for more than three thousand years, this ought to be no longer necessary, and in reality it is not, any more than it would be to defend against every objector the Copernican system of Astronomy.* To prevent • See Solar Fictions, a clever brochure which shows to what extent the spirit of Scepticism may be carried by one disposed to puzzle and perplex. Are we not mistaken about the Sun ? May not the so-called science of Astronomy be a delusion ? What next, and next ? Where would such Scepticism end ? 6 THE PENTATEUCH VINDICATED. any misapprehension of the object of this lecture, it is well to state that it is mainly to exhibit the evidence on which the Pentateuch may be re ceived as genuine and authentic, — that is, as the production of Moses, and historically true, and further to show that in doing so we follow not " cunningly-devised fables." The objections brought against the Penta teuch by a hostile criticism have been by many able authors, both ancient and modern, examined in detail, and, as the Lecturer believes,' shown to be untenable. It is for its opponents to justify their position or to abandon it. If they do not, upon them rests the charge of weakness, or of timidity, if not, of dishonesty. Should the exist ence 6f Napoleon Bonaparte, or of the fact of the American Declaration of Independence* give • " The story of the Declaration of Independence is liable to many objections, if we examine it a la- mode Strauss. The Congress was held at a mythical town, whose very name is suspicious, — Philadelphia,— brotherly love. The date is suspicious j it was the fourth day of the fourth month (reckon ing from April, as it is probable the HeraclMse and Scandina vians, possible that the aboriginal Americans, and certain that the Hebrews did). Now four was a sacred number with the Americans ; the president was chosen for four years ; there were four departments of affairs ; four divisions of the politi cal powers, namely, the people, the congress, the executive, and the judiciary, &c. Besides, which is still more incredible, SCEPTICISM CARRIED OUT ! 7 rise to " historic doubts," the student of history- is not bound to answer them : he will continue to believe, notwithstanding what ingenuity may three of the presidents, two of whom, it is alleged, signed the declaration, died on the fourth of July, and the two latter exactly fifty years after they had signed it, and about the same hour of the day. The year also is suspicious ; 1776 is but an ingenious combination of^the sacred number four, which is repeated three times, and then multiplied by itself to produce the date ; thus, 444 x 4 =r 1776, q.e.d StiU farther, the declaration is metaphysical,,and presupposes an acquain tance with the transcendental philosophy on the part of the American people. Now the ' Kritik of Pure Reason ' was not published till after the declaration was made. Still farther, the Americans were never, to use the nebulous expressions of certain philosophers, an ' idealo-transcendental-and-subjective,' but an ' objective-and-concretivo-practical' people, to the last degree ; therefore a metaphysical document, and most of all a ' legal-congressional-metaphysical ' document is highly sus picious if found among them. Besides, Haulteperah, the great historian of Mexico, a neighbouring state, never mentions this document ; and farther still, if this declaration had been made, and accepted by the whole nation, as it is pretended, then we cannot account for the fact, that the fundamental maxim of that paper, namely, the soul's equality to itself—' all men are born free and equal '—was perpetually lost sight of, and a large portion of the people kept in slavery ; still later, peti tions—supported by this fundamental article — for the aboli tion of slavery, were reject ed by Congress with unexampled contempt, when, if the history is not mythical, slavery never had a legal existence after 1776, &c, &c. But we could go on this way for ever."— Theodore Parker quoted in the Quarterly Review, October, 1866, pp. "403, 4U£' 8 THE PENTATEUCH VINDICATED. SECT. devise to shake his confidence, in what hitherto have been received as well-aecredited facts. The same course may be pursued with reference to the Pentateuch ; he may continue to believe in it as a faithful record of facts, the basis of Hebrew history and polity, and as the first portion of the revealed will of God, of which the complete disclosure is in the New Testament ; and all this he may do without any impeachment of intellect or of heart. SECTION I. in pursuance of our desion, let us trace the channel through which the - books bearing, in our authorized version of the blble, the name of Moses have been transmitted to us. 1. A few words respecting Moses himself ere proceeding to an examination of the Canonical authority of his writings. What do we know of him ? And whence do we derive our infor mation? Let us gather up those ascertained historical facts relating to his life and character, which, had the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, through some terrible calamity, not come down I, 1. TESTIMONY of the ancients. 9 to us, would still have been within our reach. One thing is evident, that he was no mythological personage : he has a history rich in facts, and these are abundantly corroborated. The Ancients revered his memory; it was reserved for the perverted ingenuity of the Moderns to endeavour to load it with suspicion and contempt. The direct statements and allusions of ancient heathen writers are evidence of the existence and celebrity of Moses : they " testify that Moses was leader of the Jews, and the founder of their laws." The Egyptians, we are told by Josephus, " ac knowledged him to have been a wonderful and a divine person." Mohammed maintained that Moses was inspired, and the Jewish law divine. The most acute and determmed opponents of Christianity, in the earlier periods of its history, admitted that Moses was prior to the Trojan war, and was the author of the Pentateuch, This of itself is sufficient reason for us to ex amine the books which bear his name as we would the writings of Caesar, or of Mohammed, or of Confucius, or of Veda Vyasu, Have the genuine books — if such ever existed ! — really come down to us? Or are those now in our possession spurious productions of a later age? and are their contents unhistorical and 10 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. fictitious ? The' inquiry, even if it had no bear ing on religion, would be interesting to lovers of literature, as the members of this Mechanics' Institution profess to be ; but as it has such bearing, — the result to which it leads affecting in reality the foundation of the whole system of revealed truth, in the Old Testament and in the New, — it is of the highest importance. 2. The history of the copy of the Bible I hold in my hand is soon told : it was purchased of Bagster, the distinguished London publisher^ He would be able to tell us from what edition it was printed, and it might easily be traced to the days of the first James> King of England, a.d. 1611, when the present version was put forth by Royal authority. If we could summon the learned and venerable translators before us, they could tell us from what copies of the original Scriptures it was made, and how they came into possession of them. A few steps more, involv ing no difficulty — some of the most inveterate enemies of Christianity admitting the integrity of the Old Testament, — and we reach the first century of the Christian era. It would -then be seen, as it is now, that the former divisioii df the book, the Old Testament, was- in the; hands I, 2. ACKNOWLEDGED BY OUR LORD. 11 of both Jews and Christians, between whom there existed strong enmity, and, therefore, no possi ble ground of collusion in imposture. They had little in common, save their veneration for this earlier volume of the Bible, and its teachings ; and this was such as never has been surpassed by any people for books esteemed by them sacred. The Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms were the divisions of the Old Testament which were received from ancient times, and accepted in their uncorrupted integrity by our Lord and His inspired Apostles. — Ignorance on their part was impossible ! They appealed to the Law as the writings of Moses — the ultimate and un challengeable standard of doctrine as yet made known — the foundation of Judaism, and part of that great system of revealed mercy which was tben being consummated, the record of which, in the words of the celebrated John Locke, " has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth without any mixture of error for its matter." — The supposition that they would give the high sanction of their authority to counte nance error and deception in order to conciliate the people, or in accommodation to their alleged prejudices, is perfectly incredible : and as it involves the impeachment of Him who is empha- 12 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. tically the God of truth "Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth,"* — it is at once gratuitous and absurd ! 3. The following passages will show how the ancient Lawgiver and his Writings were re garded by the Great Teacher Himself, and by those Disciples He commissioned and qualified, to carry on His work : — Jesus "saith unto them, Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, suffered you." Mat. xix. 7, 8 ; xxii. 24, 31, 32, 40. — "For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother." Mark vii. 9—13 ; x. 3—5 ; xii. 19, 26.—" The law and the prophets were until John They have Moses and the prophets ; let them hear them." Luke xvi. 16, 29, 31 ; xx. 28, 37 ; xxiv. 27, 44, 45.— "We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write." John i. 17, 45. — "Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me : for he wrote of me." John v. 46, 47 ; vii- 1 9 ; viii. 5. — " For Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren." Acts iii. 22 ; vii. 35—37.—" Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogue every Sabbath day." Acts xv. 21 ; xxvi. 22 ; xxviii. 23. — " For Moses describeth the righteous ness which is of the law." Rom. x. 5. 19.— "For it is written in the law of Moses." 1 Cor. ix. 9; x. 2 — 11. — " But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is * 1 Peter ii. 22, I, 4. IN THE HANDS OF THE APOSTLES. 13 upon their heart." 2 Cor. iii 7— 15.— "He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses." Heb. x. 28; vii. 14; xi. 23—29 ; xii. 18—21. — "And they" — the saints long oppressed, but now triumphant — " sing the song of Moses the servant of God," — such as he and the people sang after the destruction of Pharaoh and his proud hosts, — and to celebrate a still more glorious deliverance from all the powers of evil, they sing " the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty ; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints," or of nations. Rev. xv. 3. — These testimonies are incidental, and are not of set purpose in vindication of the genuineness and truth of the Pentateuch. Their evidential value is enhanced thereby. 4. With the attestations thus given to these books — to their Author and aim — by Jesus Christ and His inspired Apostles, we may well rest con tent. There is, however, a further and altogether distinct line of argument which may be pursued to advantage by the student of Sacred history. It is seen in an unbroken chain of evidence, however far apart the joining of the different links may appear to be ! — evidence of the existence of these books from the time of Christ down to the entrance of Israel into Canaan, a period of 1,450 years, according to the Bible chronology, or 1,608 years, according to Hales. — Josephus speaking of the Sacred Books says, "Five of 14 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. them belong to Moses." About 50 years before the commencement of the Christian Era, Onkelos wrote a Targum on the Pentateuch. In like manner the prologue of the Wisdom of Jesus, the Son of Sirach, although uncanonical, may be used, as any other ancient writing, as a wit ness to fact: it contains references to the Law, which imply that it was then well known. — The Greek version of the Old Testament, called the Septuagint, and containing the books of Moses, was made about 280 years before Christ : and is not a translation proof of there having been an original from which it was made ? — After the Babylonian Captivity, B. C. 445, the " Law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded to Israel," was read before the people, religious festivals were held, and important reformations relating to genealogies and marriages were effected on its authority. With reference to the latter, is it credible that men could have been brought to submit to the regulations contained in a book now first or but recently introduced, and which so seriously affected the present con venience and happiness of so many of all classes ? The only tenable explanation is that it was the old statute book recognized anew and as of highest authority, and from which there was no I, 5. KNOWN BEFORE THE CAPTIVITY. 15 appeal ! The people had brought it with them from Babylon, and Jeshua and Zerubbabel and their brethren " builded the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings thereon, as it is written in the law of Moses the man of God."— About twenty years after this, " Ezra went up from Babylon ; and he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the Lord God of Israel had given ; . . . . for Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments." — ¦ Copies of the Law evidently existed both in Babylon and in Jerusalem. 5. What evidence have we that the Pentateuch was known before the Captivity ? We have a touching scene recorded by Ezra, which shows that many persons were alive at the close of the Captivity, who had themselves previously lived in Judea. " And all the people shouted with a great shout when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the priests and Levites, and chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice ; and many shouted aloud for joy ; 16 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. so that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people ; for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the noise was heard afar off." 6. The existence of the Samaritan Pen tateuch shows that the Law was Teceived by them before the Captivity. Is it credible that the people of a rival State would have received as the rule of their religion, a new compilation formed by their enemies at the very moment when they rejected their alliance, and would not acknowledge them as adherents of their religion, or admit them to worship at their Temple ? — Moreover, Daniel expressly mentions "the law of Moses." To this we may add, that " it is now admitted that the writings of Jeremiah are thoroughly impregnated with the language of Deuteronomy- . . . Ezekiel prophesied during the Captivity. Chapters xviii. and xx. contain references and quotations innumerable ; chap. xx. being a recapitulation of all that happened in the wilderness."* — Do we not regard quotations from, or allusions to Shakspeare or Milton as evidence of the influence of these writers on our literature, and therefore as proofs of their * Speaker's Commentary, vol. i, 13. I, 7. THE PROPHETS. 17 existence ? And when we see in our religious literature frequent allusions to the facts, doc trines, and precepts of our English Bible, and its very language tinged thereby, although it may not be referred to by name, is not the existence of such a book the legitimate inference ? The Pentateuch has left its impression on the entire literature of the Jewish people, as may be seen in the book of Psalms, in the Prophets, and, if we may name them together, in the Talmud and the Targums. Eepekences : Ezra ii. 62, 63 ; iii. 2, 10—13 ; vi. 18 ; vii. 6, 10 ; x. 3. Neh. viii. 1 — 8, 18 ; ix. 3; xiii. 1—3. Dan. ix. 11 -13. See also, Mai. iv. 4. 7. The Jewish history is artless, brief, unequal, and fragmentary ,• its place in the Sacred Writ ings is evidently subordinate to a design more important to be handed down to posterity than itself. Even that design is not systematically unfolded. We are not surprised to find that it was in special circumstances only, or when the occasion arose to make it necessary, direct reference is made to the Law, and that often very incidentally, as Englishmen would refer to 18 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. the Norman Conquest, or to Magna Charta, or to aught else in their history or jurisprudence equally well known. 8. In passing up the stream of time, we come to the days of Josiah, B. C. 623. His reign, which followed a long period of national calamities and the neglect of the worship of Jehovah, and which must have been most unfavourable to the study of Sacred literature, and, as a consequence, to the preservation of the Books containing it, was rendered memorable by the discovery in the Temple, as it was undergoing repairs, of the "Book of the Law of the Lord, given by Moses :" this was by the High Priest Hilkiah, and probably in a part of the Temple not usually frequented, and then only by himself. This cir cumstance, and the very low state of pure religion among the people, would account for this copy remaining so long concealed as to have passed out of remembrance. — What book is referred to ? The language is very explicit — " of the Law of the Lobd given by, or by the hand of, Moses." The peculiarity of the expression, the place where the book was found, its remaining un noticed, and tfie way in which it was brought to light by the High Priest himself, give coun- I, 8. DAYS OF JOSIAH. 19 tenance to the opinion that it was the original autograph copy of the Pentateuch written by Moses that was now discovered. But whether the reference is to the whole Law, or only to the book of Deuteronomy, is still an open, but is not of itself an important, question, as it pre supposes the existence of the first four books, and is itself incomplete, and indeed unintelligi ble, without them. Moreover, it is evident from the language of Hilkiah that the book of the Law was well known to himself and his asso ciates, and, from the way in which the Passover was soon after kept, that it was used to regulate the interesting ceremonial. — What could be more grand and impressive than this solemn convoca tion ! The King himself, with " all the men of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the priests, and the Levites, and all the people," bowed to the authority of this "book of the covenant that was found in the house of the Lord." The Israelites, who were not a barbarous people, easily imposed upon ! — must have had good reasons for doing so, and what could they be but such as arose out of the conviction that the book was the genuine production of their ancient Lawgiver, and the basis of their national constitution, civil and religious ? C 2 20 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. 9. Isaiah the prophet B. C. 698, after a sublime description of the triumph of Jehovah, or Messiah, takes a retrospective view of His past compassionate dealings with His people, and asks, " Where is he that brought them up out of the sea that led them by the right hand of Moses with his glorious arm, dividing the water before them, to make himself an everlasting name." The prophet Micah, speaking in the name of Jehovah, challenges the obedience of the people, and rebukes them for their unkindness : — "For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants ; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam." Refekences : 2 Chron. xxxiv. 14, 15, 19, 21, 30, 31 ; xxxv. 1—19. 2 Kings xxiii. 24. Isaiah viii. 20; lx;ii. 11 — 14. Mic. vi. 4. 10. A few years earlier, B. C. 726, in the reign of Hezekiah, we have a ' striking proof of the existence of the Pentateuch, and of the homage paid to it. The King on his accession to the throne began to remove the high places, and to break down the images, and as far as possible to oblit erate every vestige of the idolatry of the pre ceding reigns. — This accomplished, he addressed I, 11. DAYS OF HEZEKIAH. 21 himself to the sanctification of the Temple, and to the restoration of its magnificent worship, the Passover being observed with unusual solemnity, — in all which he followed the direction of " the law of Moses the man of God." — Not the least remarkable is the fact that he invited the people of the neighbouring kingdom of Israel to unite with him in what must have been regarded as an act of contrition for past neglect, and of a returning desire to render present obedience to the ancient ritual ; and, further, that many of them complied with the invitation, — Hoshea their king making no opposition thereto, although its tendency could not fail to have been foreseen, and at an earlier period of their history such worship at Jerusalem had been resolutely guarded against, and virtually prohibited. References : 2 Kings xviii. 4, 6. 2 Chron xxix. xxx. 1, 6, 11, 16, 25. 11. After the disruption of the kingdom of Re hoboam, the Pentateuch was found in the hands of both the men of Judah, who still clung to the house of David, and the men of Israel, who formed a separate kingdom under Jeroboam the son of Nebat. Strong presumptive evidence of this is seen in the fact that its authority was not at 22 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. any time called in question, although its require ment of all the males to go up to Jerusalem three times a year, to join in a common worship, under the presidency of one High Priest, was seen to be very unfavourable to the political designs of the kings of Israel. — What said Jeroboam, the Machiavel of his day ? " If this people go up to sacrifice in the house of the Lord at Jerusulem, then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their lord, even unto Rehoboam King of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to Rehoboam King of Judah. Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem : behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And he set the one in Bethel, and the other put he in Dan." This was a master-stroke of policy, and more likely to succeed than to run counter to the general belief in the Divine authority, of the Mosaic ritual. The counsel of the higher criticism of modern times, if we may thus antedate its development! would have been to reject the Pentateuch altogether, and with it the obligation to keep the appointed feasts in Jerusalem.— Proof, moreover, that the Pentateuch was ac- I, 12. DISRUPTION OF THE KINGDOM. 23 knowledged by all the tribes of Israel previously to their separation into two kingdoms is found in the additional fact that their descendants, the Samaritans, and the Jews of the present day have a common interest in it, and preserve it with the most scrupulous care, which would not have been the case if it had not been received by them previously to the existence of that bitter hostility between them, dating from the disruption of the kingdom, for since then it is incredible that the one would have received it from the other ! This brings our history of the transmission of the five books of Moses down to B.C. 975, or 990, and about 600 years of the time when they appear to have been written. — Jehoshaphat, B.C. 912, anticipated the practice of modern times, and employed Bible readers. " And they taught in Judah, and had the book of the law of the Lord with the m, and went about throughout all the cities of Judah, and taught the people." References : 1 Kings xii. 26—28. It is evident that the ten tribes considered the religion of Jehovah as the true religion, notwithstand ing that they i.ften lapsed into idolatry— 2 Kings iii. 2, 3 j x. 21— 28 ; xvii. 28 2 Chron. xx?v. 18. 2 Chron. xvii. 9. 12. The references to the Law, under its various divisions and titles, in the book of Psalms, may 24 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. be said to be innumerable ; nor is this to be ' wondered at when we call to mind who were the authors. One of these, David, was called "the sweet singer of Israel ; " his dying charge to his son Solomon is very tender and affecting : — "I go the way^ of all the earth; be thou strong therefore, and show thyself a man ; and keep the charge of the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, to keep his statutes, and his command ments, and his judgments, and his testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses, that thou mayest prosper in all that thou doest, and whithersoever thou turnest thyself, that the Lord may continue his word, which he spake concerning me." — O that Solomon had followed the paternal counsel ! References: Psalm i; lxxviii; xcix; cv; cxix; cxxxv; cxxxvi. 1 Kings ii. 2 — 4. Comp. viii. 53, 61. 13. Circumstantial evidence is sometimes more valuable than direct, inasmuch as it is less liable to the suspicion of being fabricated, or got up fbr the occasion. That the Law was in the hands of the Israelites before the time of Samuel, B.C. 1140, appears from the fidelity with which he addressed them when they desired a king, and I, 13. BEFORE THE MONARCHY. 25 described the burdens their kings would impose upon them. In judging of this request we are in danger of being unduly influenced by the opinions of our country and age. It was not a matter of offence that the Israelites merely wished to be " like all the nations " in Jheir form of government : the act of the people had a deeper significancy. " They have not rejected thee," said Jehovah, " but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them :" it was held to be a renunciation of the Theocracy ! The Law, however, in anticipating their request and in providing for it, placed the kings under restrictions which must have been very irksome to some of their number, and from the strong condemnation of which they could at once have freed themselves by denying its authority. Had the Law not been recognized before the estab lishment of Monarchy, the kings would, in self- justification or defence, have resisted its intro duction, even if higher considerations had not influenced them. — Is it credible, we may ask, that they would have permitted the insertion in the national records of such a paragraph as that referred to ! Not less incredible would be the supposition that they would permit the insertion, in what purported to be a manual of the Law 26 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. of the State, of the prohibition to multiply to themselves wives or horses, or silver and gold, and of the injunction to write out for themselves, or cause to be written, a copy of that Law which imposed upon them such restrictions, and such a task, and which might be quoted so often to their own condemnation ! In such circumstances they would demand as full and clear evidence of authority, as we ourselves should do if we were in similar circumstances. References : 1 Sam. viii. 6—18. Deut. xvii. 14—20. 14. But Samuel was an old man when the people asked for a King, and the immediate occasion, as narrated by himself, was the misconduct of his own sons, who " walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgment." — What evidence have we that the Law existed more than half a century before ? It is of the same indirect and circum stantial character as the preceding, and not less painful. Samuel informs us that "the sons of Eli were sons of Belial; they knew not the Lord. And the priests' custom with the people was, that when any man offered sacrifice, the priest's servant came, while the flesh was in I, 14. IN THE YOUTH OF SAMUEL. 27 seething, with a flesh-hook of three teeth in his hand, and he struck it into the pan, or kettle, or caldron, or pot; all that the flesh-hook brought, up the priest took for himself." More over, their flagitious conduct " at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation " caused " the Lord's people to cry out." Is it likely that priests at a later date would fabricate such a statement as this to the disparagement of their own order ? To ordinary candour it will appear as evidence of the impartiality of the historian ! Its importance, however, in our present inquiry arises from its allusions to the sacred books evidently then existing. Would the people have assembled at " the door of the tabernacle," or would they have offered sacrifice and submitted to what they regarded as an abuse on the part of the priests, unless they had been assured that these customs were founded on what they be lieved to be the ancient Law ? On reference to it they would find " the priests' due " provided for, and that from the first "the door of the tabernacle of the congregation" had been the place " of the women assembling." References: 1 Sam. viii. 3—5; ii. 12—14, 22—24. Compare with Deut. xviii. 3; Exod. xxxviii. 8. 28 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. 15. If the Pentateuch, as has been shown, existed before the time of Samuel, there is no period between that and the time of Moses when it could have been for the first time introduced. There does not appear to have been one who had the ability to forge a spurious document of such character and aim, nor the influence neces sary to obtain for it acceptance with the people. The moral character of Joshua stands too high to admit of a supposition so derogatory to him self; and let it be borne in mind that he uni formly attributes the authorship to "Moses the servant of the Lord." Had such a person arisen — the prototype of a Psalmanazer, or of a Chatter- ton — the difficulties in the way of his success must have been insurmountable. How could he have obtained credence when he affirmed that the ancestors of the people — and those, too, only a few generations back — had come from beyond the flood — the Euphrates — where they served other gods, — that they afterwards were in bondage in Egypt, where they did in like manner — that they were delivered by the hand of Moses, — were led by him across the Red Sea and through the wilderness, — were sustained by a constant mira cle, — that they received their laws, civil and sacred, from him, as the prophet of God, the 1.16. TESTIMONY OF THE BOOKS THEMSELVES. 29 Living and the True, " The God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob," — and that, brought by his successor Joshua into Canaan, the land was divided according to his directions, and his book — in one respect the Domesday-booh of Israel ! — containing this parcelling out of the newly- acquired territory, was the tenure by which they continued to hold " every man his inheritance ! " REFERENCES : Joshua i. 7, 8 ; viii. 30, 31 ; xi. 15; xiii. 15, 24, 32, 33 ; xxii. 2, 4, 5 ; xxiii 6 ; xxiv.— throughout. 16. What is the testimony of the Books them selves as to their author? "In the narrative, the phrase is constantly recurring, ' The Lord spake unto Moses,' ' Moses spake unto the chil dren of Israel.' In the traditions of the desert, whether late or early, his name predominates over that of every one else. ' The Wells of Moses ' on the shores of the Red Sea. * The Mountain of Moses ' (Jebel Musa)— near the convent of St. Catherine. 'The Ravine of Moses (Shuk Musa)— at Mount St. Catherine. < The Valley of Moses ' (Wady Musa)— at Petra. ' The Books of Moses' are so called (as after wards the Books of Samuel), in all probability, from his being the chief subject of them. The 30 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. very word 'Mosaic' has been in later times applied (as the proper name of no other saint of the O. T.) to the whole religion."* — There is Scripture testimony still more explicit : — '•" And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in the book. And Moses wrote their goings out according to their journeys by the commandment of the Lord. When Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book until they were finished, that Moses com manded the Levites which bare the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, saying, Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee." — And it was so kept : copies of it being made for use. References : Exod. xvii. 14; xxiv. 4—7; xxxiv. 27; Num. xxxiii. 2j Deut, xxxi. 24—26. 17. Vastly more is needed to justify scepticism than has yet been adduced by the impugners of the Pentateuch: credulity may be said to be entirely their own, and by no means is shared by * Dean Stanley, in Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Moses, vol. ii, 428. I. 18. TESTIMONY OF HEATHEN AUTHORS. 31 them who, on the grounds given above, hold by "the traditionary belief" that the writings of Moses are historical and that they are inspired.* 18. The testimony to the writings of Moses of ancient heathen authors was adduced, not as being superior to that contained in the sacred books themselves, in numerous passages both direct and indirect, but because, although outside of that testimony, and on that account less liable to the suspicion of opponents, it is, nevertheless, found to be collateral therewith, and in corrobor ation of it. On the same ground it may be continued. "The Egyptians," says Bishop Stillingfleet, " accounted him " — Moses — " one of their Priests (which notes the esteem they had of his learning) as appears by the testimonies * Bishop Browne has with great clearness, shown—" That Moses could have written the Pentateuch : that the concur rent testimony of all subsequent times proves that he did write the Pentateuch : and that the internal evidence points to him, and to him only, as the writer of the Pentateuch. — Let it be unierstood, in limine, that this authorsh'p thus claimed for Moses is not inconsistent with certain admissions. For instance, it is not necessary to insist, that every word of the Pentateuch was written down by the hand of Moses in his own autograph. It is not necessary to deny that Moses had certain documents or traditions referring to the ratriarchal ages, which he incorporated into his history."— Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 2. Compare, AlTAx's Reflexions, 32 ITS TRANSMISSION TRACED. SECT. produced out of Chasremon and Manetho by Josephus. Diodorus Siculus speaks of him with great respect among the famous Legislatours, and so doth Strabo, who speaks in commendation of the Religion established by him. The testimony of Longinus is sufficiently known, that Moses was no man of any vulgar wit and others whose evidence is clear and full, to make us undoubtedly believe that there could never have been so universal and uninterrupted a tradition concerning the writings and laws of Moses, had they not been certainly his, and conveyed down in a continual succession from his time to our present age."* * " Io the Mosaic writings we have the native truth, from which the Gentiles were continually receding. They varied so much, and every representation was so extravagant, that at flrst sight there seems scarce any similitude of the object from whence they drew. All appears dark and confused, so that we almost despair of an explanation. But upon a nearer inspection there is a more favourable appearance. For though the copy is faded, and has been abused, yet there are some traces so permanent, some of the principal outlines so distinct, that when compared with the original, the true character cannot be mistaken. I do not here mean, that the ancients copied from the Scriptures. I am speaking of primitive tra ditional histories, to which in their mythology they continually referred ; those histories which were everywhere corrupted, excepting in the writings of Moses."— Analysis of Ancient Mythology, by Jacob Bryant, Esq., vol. iii. 436, 7. I, 18. CONCLUDING STATEMENT. 33 What ancient history has been so authenti cated ? It is not too much to say with Dr. Kitto, that — "We have all the evidence for the au thenticity of the Pentateuch which the nature of the case admits, and ten-fold more than that which satisfies us in regard to the writings of Homer and Herodotus, or even more than we have for the genuineness of the most distinguished writings of a former age in our own language." References : Origines Sacra— Book n. chap, i., sect. 7. See also Graves'" Lectures on the Pentateuch, pp. x — xv. SECTION II. The transmission of the Books of Moses being thus accredited to us, the Phenomena WHICH MAY BE OBSERVED ON A REVIEW OF THEIR CONTENTS — historical, legislative, theological? and ecclesiastical — CALL FOR AN INQUIRY INTO THEIR CHARACTER AND DESIGN. 1. These books, five in number, are respectively designated by the first word or words of the Hebrew original, with the exception of the fourth book, where the title is taken from the fifth 34 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. word. The Septuagint version adopted titles from which the English are derived, descriptive of the leading incident, or the general character of the books : thus, Genesis means production, as referring to the origin of all things, — Exodus going forth, as Israel from Egypt, — Leviticus refers to the Levitical priesthood, and by the later Jews was called the "Law of Offerings," — Numbers records the numbering of the people, — and Deuteronomy is the second or repeated Law. These books are so intimately connected as to show unity of plan and of aim, and that they proceeded from a single author. 2. First in order of place and of time is Genesis, which, it must be admitted, is a remark able book. A child, it has been said, may learn more from it in half an hour than all the philoso phers in the world learnt without it in a thousand years. The creation both of the material universe and of man, — the longevity of the most ancient race, — the deluge, — the confusion of tongues and consequent dispersion of mankind, with the origin of nations, — the separation of one family from the rest, — and the destruction of the Cities of the Plain, whatever difficulties they may present to our ignorance or to our scepticism, are indubitable facts. Some of the alleged difficulties have arisen II, 2. GENESIS AND CHRONOLOGY. 35 out of the adoption of the shorter system of chro nology, framed by Archbishop Usher from the Hebrew text, and usually given in our English Bibles, instead of the longer one, founded on the Septuagint and Josephus, by Dr. Hales, and acoepted as substantially correct by the most eminent critics. According to the latter, the Creation is to be assigned to B.C. 5411, — the Deluge B.C. 3155,— the Call of Abraham, B. C. 2093, — and the Exode B.C. 1648.* 3. Take these facts as recorded, the difficulties attending them notwithstanding, how strikingly do they stand out in contrast to the cosmogonies of the most polished nations of antiquity, or to those of India or of China at the present day, or to any of the early historical records of mankind * " The Bible does not give a complete history of the times to which it refers : in its historical portions it deals with special and detached periods. The chronological information is, there fore, not absolutely continuous It is rather his torical than strictly chronological in its character, and thus the technical part of the subject depends, so far as the Bible is concerned, always wholly upon inference. It might be supposed that the accuracy of the information would com pensate in some degree for its scantiness and occasional want of continuity. This was, doubtless, originally the case, but it has suffered by designed alteration and by the carelessness of copyists."— Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Cbkonologt, vol. i. 311. D 2 36 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. which have come down to us ! * How graphic, simple, artless, and self-evidencing of tmthful- ness are these accounts ! None but one taught of God, and under His special direction, could have written or edited such a book. And if, as we believe it to be, inspired, whether made up from pre-existent documents or not,f we are enabled thus, but not otherwise, to account for its wonderful composition; and, its inspiration being admitted, we may receive, without doubt or misgiving, its smallest statement, the carpings of a minute and hostile criticism notwithstanding. — But what if we should reject the inspiration of ' * See that very learned work and great repertory of facts, The Origin of Pagan Idolatry, by George Stanley Faber, B.D., 3 vols, quarto, London: Rivingtons. 1816. t Very undue importance has been attached to, and unwar ranted inferences drawn from, the interchange of the sacred names of Jehovah and of God. The following appears to be the correct statement:- "The word" — Elohim, or God— -'is a title rather than a name. It is applied to false gods, as well as to the true Jehovah, on the contrary, is as clearly a proper name, as Jupiter or Vishnu. Elohim and Jehovah are therefore as distinguishable as Deus and Jupiter; the difference being only in this, that, whereas the worship pers of Jupiter admitted 'gods many and lords many,' a multitude of Dii, the worshippers of Jehovah, on the other hand, believe in no Elohim, except Jehovah."— Bishop H. Brown, in Speaker's Commentary, vol i, 24—29 II, 4. ADAPTATIONS TO MAN'S NEED. 37 the book, which some men ask us to do ! Then we cannot account for the phenomena it presents: they are inexplicable on any other supposition whatever. Myths, indeed ! Then how do we dis tinguish realities ? — how may we know what are facts ? 4. The sentiment is at once beautiful and true — " It is the glory of God to conceal a thing." As a Sovereign, or even a parent, frequently acts from reasons existing indeed in his own mind, but which he does not at once make known, so Jehovah frequently acts in a way that finite minds cannot at once, if at all, penetrate His reasons, or see the wisdom of His procedure. When He graciously makes them known to us, they must ever appear worthy of His infinite wisdom and love. At other times, in the state ment of doctrine, or of fact, by His inspired servants, we have the most marked adaptations to the popular mind, the language of loving con descension to man's circumstances — the things of God made known to us by figures borrowed from ourselves, and the facts of nature by their ap pearances. — What other mode of representation would have been intelligible in the one case, or would not have anticipated the discoveries of science in the other ? Even as it is, great is the outcry, and most unjustly! against the Bible, 38 character and design ? SECT that it stands in the way of the progress of science. In truth, science comes not within its province. Why should it? Man does not need a revelation of such subjects as are within his own reach, and the Infinite One does nothing in vain. Unaided man, however, could never have dis covered how the life that now is may be deprived of its deepest sorrows and be followed by unending bliss. This the Bible teaches. 5. In Exodus we have a continuation of the history, and formation into a nation, of the Hebrews, the descendants of Abraham, "the friend of God," and with whom He was gra ciously pleased to enter into covenant, and to make free promises of blessings, temporal and spirituaj. Moreover, we have historical facts relating to one who has left, beyond most men, his deep "footprints on the sands of time." Moses is the centre figure of the picture of Israel in Egypt and in the wilderness for more than a century of years, and around him we may group all that is most memorable in connection with God's chosen people during that period. Enslaved and oppressed by the new king " which knew not Joseph," we are told that " the Egyp tians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour: and they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all II, 5. EXODUS CORROBORATED. 39 manner of service in the field." — And as an " unanswerable proof of this we refer to . . . a design copied from the tomb of Rek-share, the chief architect of the temples and palaces of Thebes, under Pharaoh Moeris. Never, perhaps, has so striking a pictorial comment as this upon the sacred text been before recovered." * • The Antiquities of Egypt, pp. 220, 221, letter-press and plate. Religious Tract Society. 1841. " Who would suppose that an humble brick could be capable of imparting valuable and important information, even to corroborate the sacred writings ? But an Austrian savant has discovered, by means of a microscope, in a stone taken from the pyramid of Dashour, many interesting particulars connected with the life of the ancient Egyptians. The brick itself is made of mud of the Nile, chopped straw, and sand, thus confirming what the Bible and Herodotus have handed down to us as to the Egyptian method of brickmaking. Besides these materials, the microscope has brought other things to light — the debris of river shells, of fish, and of insects, seeds of wild and cultivated flowers, corn and barley, the field pea, and the common flax, cultivated probably both for food and textile purposes, and the radish, with many others known to science. There were also manufactured products, such as fragments of tiles and pottery, and even small pieces of string made of flax and sheep's wool. It has been truly said that the antiquities of Egypt 'have not only confirmed Scripture history in the most .complete manner, but revealed such subtle harmonies of geography, habits, manners, customs, and language, as prove that that history must have proceeded from contemporary writers.' " — Mercantile Advertiser, 21st August, 1872. 40 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. 6. A brief biographical sketch of the deliverer and future lawgiver of Israel will not be without interest, but as we can add nothing to the clear ness or to the beauty of the narrative, we con tinue it in the words of Scripture : " In which times (B.C. 1768 ?) Moses was born, and was exceeding fair, and nourished up in his father's house three months." Why this minuteness of statement? It is suggestive of something un usual, and needing specially to be mentioned. We refer to the history, and find the reason for the concealment of his birth thus stated, " Pharaoh charged all his people, saying, Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river." When his parents could no longer hide him, Moses was thus exposed, in obedience to the despotic decree ; but the eye of Him who is the " Governor among the nations " was upon him, and by a wonderful providence, acting through a mother's sagacity and love, he was placed once more under her care. — May we not suppose that the Hebrew child would receive instruction in the knowledge of the living and true God, the valued birthright of the descendants of the Patriarchs, with whom were the promises, and of whom as concerning the flesh the future Deliverer, the Christ, should come! — Happy II, 6. BIOGRAPHY OF MOSES. 41 family circle, where the example of Abraham is followed, and the blessing of Abraham's God is realized ! — The time, however, arrives when the youth must enter a new home, the palace of royalty, where he should be trained for the glorious future which seemed to be stretching before him. His education was confided to the Priests, and embraced the knowledge of all the mysteries of history, philosophy, and art, of which they held the monopoly. We have the highest authority for stating that " Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds."* What * " The Egyptians were a very literary people, and time has preserved to us, besides the inscriptions of their tombs and temples, many papyri, of a religious or historical character, and one tale. They bear no resemblance to the books of the O. T., except such as arises from their sometimes enforcing moral truths in a manner not wholly different from that of the Book of Proverbs. The moral and religious sys tem is, however, essentially different in its principles and their application. Some have imagined a great similarity between the O. T. and Egyptian literature, and have given a show of reason to their idea by dressing up Egyptian documents in a garb of Hebrew phraseology, in which, however, they have gone so awkwardly that no one who had not prejudged the question could for a moment be deceived. In science, Egyptian influence may be distinctly traced in the Pentateuch. Moses was 'learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians,' and probably derived from them 42 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. was left him to desire ? Was he not the adopted son of Pharaoh's daughter, and heir to her father's throne ? Once more we consult the inspired narrative, and learn the facts of, and the principle which regulated, all his conduct : " By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter ; choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the plea sures of sin for a season ; esteeming the reproach of Christ* greater riches than the treasures in Egypt : for he had respect unto the recom pense of the reward." Notwithstanding this act the astronomical knowledge which was necessary for the calendar. His acquaintance with chemistry is shown in the manner of the destruction of the golden calf. The Egyptians excelled in geometry and mechanics: the earlier books of the Bible, however", throw no Ught upon the degree in which Moses may have made use of this part of his knowledge." — Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Egypt, vol. i. 505. * " The writer calls the reproach which Moses suffered, the reproach of Christ, as Paul (2 Cor. i. 5 ; Col. i. 24) calls the sufferings of Christians the sufferings of Christ, i.e., of Christ dwelling, striving, suffering, in His Church as in His body; to which this reproach is referred according to the idea of the unity of the Old and New Testaments, and of the eternal Christ [the Logos] already living and reigning in the former.'' — De Wette, quoted in Alford's Greek Testament, vol. iv. 225. II, 6. BIOGRAPHY OF MOSES. 43 of self-denial, so great and rare, with the impa tience so common to us all, he waited not for the special commission from the God of his fathers, nor yet for the unfolding of His providence, but supposing that " his brethren would have under stood how that God by his hand would deliver them," in avenging one of them, he rashly com mitted homicide. This act, although proceeding from a good motive, was unjustifiable. Moses, however, faithfully records it,* without aught of explanation on his own part, and states that it was the cause of his flight to the land of Midian. There, in the tents of Jethro, who became his * " Where now, in all history, can we find an instance of the like nature ? A wise man would not indeed be so vain as to wish to have a lustre given to his actions which they will not at all bear; and yet it is natural for an honest man, if he is to be known to those who are to come after him, to wish to be seen in the best light; to desire to have the good which may be said of him mentioned as much to his advantage as the cause of truth can fairly admit, and as much of what may be Said to his disadvantage not told, as may be omitted concerning him. This was the sentiment of the younger Pliny; and un questionably Moses would not have treated his own character with a greater rigour, if he had not made it the great princi ple of his work, to write with all truth a full account of the proceedings of God's dispensations, rather than his own his tory." — The Sacred and Prof une History of the World connected, by S. Shuckford, D.D., vol. iii. : 96, 397. 44 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. father-in-law, a new phase of the " wisdom of the ancients " would be opened up to him, such as we find recorded, and not improbably by his own pen, in the book of Job ; and, moreover, while tending his flocks, he would become personally acquainted with the country and its resources. — Thus in the land of the Arab, retired from the busy and exciting scenes of Pharaoh's court, and free from its interruptions, he would enjoy that opportunity for calm meditation, and for living over again the past, and in preparation for the future, which a pastoral life affords. Surely the hand of God appears in all this ! On a review of life, he who trusts in God can sing : — " Good when He gives, supremely good, Nor less when He denies ; E'en crosses from His sovereign hand Are blessings in disguise." Heevey. References: Exod. i. 9—14, 22. Acts vii. 18—29. Heb. xi. 23—27. 7. It is sometimes said that men make the age ; but it is not less true that the age makes the men. More correctly it may be said that God in His allwise providence adapts the one to the other, and thus it is seen that the great turning II, 7. THE BURNING BUSH. 45 points in the lives of individuals become the epochs in the history of a people : the events, indeed, are contemporaneous, and their influence is mutual. Another such event now occurred. Moses, whilst keeping the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, " came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb." An unwonted sight met his eye, " and Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And He said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover He said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of , Jacob." — There are times when the unexpected mention of the name of a departed friend, especi ally of an ancestor, would call up the most tender and hallowed associations. And may we not sup pose that such would be the case in the incident before us, when the names of the three great Patriarchal heads of the Hebrew people were thus solemnly pronounced by God Himself in making known His own character, and His far- reaching gracious designs ? The knowledge com- 46 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. municated to him from childhood and upwards, together with his own chequered personal experi ence, would be reproduced in an instant, as if by the lightning flash, and he would read it in a new light. In some way, as it would seem, the present was to be considered as connected with the past, and both with the coming future, the dim and distant indeed, but the glorious. — We are not unprepared for the statement — " And Moses hid his face ; for he was afraid to look upon God." 8. A man of learning and of varied experience as Moses, who had received the education we now know from recently deciphered papyri, was within his reach in Egypt, and devoid of superstition, as his whole life shows him to have been, was not likely to have been deceived. When " the Angel of the Lord ap peared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush," he looked that he might he assured of the reality of the object, and then turned aside for the purpose of investigating ita nature. It was no delusion, — his senses had not betrayed him, — neither had a wayward imagina tion led captive his judgment. The voice of Jehovah made known to him the presence of the Invisible, and he was afraid. Can we entertain a doubt of the power of God to make use of an II, 9. THE COMMISSION GIVEN. 47 intelligible voice, whatever may have been its precise nature and sound ! Men can communi cate with each other, and " He that planted the ear, shall He not hear ? He that formed the eye, shall he not see ?" Psalm xciv. 9. May we not add, He that gave man speech, shall he not be able to use it ? How we know not. 9. Moses then received his commission to deliver Israel. " And God said unto Moses, I am THAT I AM : * and He said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. And God said, moreover, unto Moses .... this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." He shrank from the task, and well indeed he might ! Had he not attempted it in the prime of life, and when surrounded by all the prestige of his exalted position, and if we may credit Jose- * This has been rendered, I will be who I will be. The object of the small volume Yahveh Christ, or the Memorial Name, is to show " That this Name, having been deprived of its true vowels through a superstition of the Jews, is not ' Jehovah,' but Yahveh ; that it is not properly rendered ' I am,' but He who will be ; that it is the Great Messianic Name of the Old Testament, and there represeots the same Divine Person, who afterwards appeared in the world's history under the name of Chbist."— Yahveh Christ, by A. MacWhorter, Boston. 1857. 48 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. phus, when success had crowned his arms as the leader of Pharoah's host against the Ethiopians ? He was now 80 years of age, was reduced to a private station, and, moreover, a fugitive from justice, and having expatriated himself for so long a time, even if his crime had been forgotten, he could not hope to have personal influence equal to that he possessed before his flight to Midian. — He would gladly have excused himself. "Who am I," said he with his characteristic modesty, " that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt ?" Would an impostor, or the writer of a spurious history, speak of him self or of his hero, in terms of disparagement ? The narrative is simple, natural, and consistent; it has all the marks of truth, and as such is enti tled to our credence. The objections of Moses are overruled. Aid is promised to him, and with it an infallible token of success. Aaron, his brother, becomes by Divine appointment his coadjutor, and they go down to the land of the Nile, whose remains, existing to this day, of palaces, of pyramids, and of temples coeval with and prior to the sojourn of the Israelites, show the inhabitants to have been among, if not the most advanced of the nations of the earth. Egypt II, 10. NUMBER OF THE ISRAELITES. 49 has been correctly described as " the mother of science, and the house of gods." — Who shall estimate the difficulty of the enterprise under taken by these two feeble men ! Was it enthu siasm or the assurance of Divine assistance that nerved and sustained them ? We shall see. Fanatics, however, act not thus and succeed ! References : Exod. iii. 1 ff. Josephus, Book n., chap. x. 2. 10. Who were the people to be rescued, and what were their number, circumstances, and character? We may safely infer that the Israelites were a very numerous people, or their taskmasters, eighty years before, would not have expressed their fears lest, in the event of war, they should join their enemies. Can we account for a num ber so great as the Sacred History leads us to expect? The immediate descendants of Jacob on his coming down to Egypt — probably during the rule of the Shepherd kings ! — were only threescore and ten souls ; but at a time when polygamy was practised — in violation, however, of the law indicated by the creation of one only of either sex — Matt. xix. 4,— it is highly probable that his grandchildren may have taken foreign wives ; and this, taken in connection with the E 50 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. especial blessing of Jehovah already promised to the Patriarchs, — even, as some careful writers have shown, without the supposition of proselytes to their faith at an early period of their history being included in the enumeration, — is sufficient to account for the increase at the time of the migration, 215 years afterwards: — adopting the reading of the Samaritan Pentateuch, "Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, and of their fathers in the land of Canaan and in the land of Egypt, was 430 years." With this agrees the Septuagint and the language of the Apostle Paul.* Gal. iii. 17. * Professor Rawlinson has remarked : " We have no need to suppose the 600,000 who quitted Egypt, though they were all called Israelites, to have been all descendants of Jacob. The members of the Patriarch's family came down to Egypt with their households. What the size of patriarchal households was, we may gather from that of Abraham, whose trained servants born in his house, amounted to 318. Nor was this an exceptional case. Esau met Jacob on his return from Fadau- Aram, with 400 men, who were probably his servants ; and Jacob, at the same meeting, had such a number, that he could divide them into two bands or armies. It is not unlikely that the whole company who entered Egypt with Jacob amounted to above a thousand souls. As all were circumcised, all would doubtless be considered Israelites, and their descendants reckoned to the tribe of their masters."— " Aids to Faith— the Pentateuch— p. 280. II, 11. BONDAGE OF THE ISRAELITES. 51 11. It is highly probable that the decree for the destruction at birth of the male children, un doubtedly " more honoured in the breach than in the observance," was not long in force — and could not indeed have been, as the subsequent history shows. Self-interest, ever powerful, to say nothing of humanity, may have led to a change of this cruel policy ; and it could not fail to be discovered that the Israelites were valuable as serfs or slaves, who, in periodical rotation, might be drafted off in gangs to build the " treasure cities Pithom and Raamses," both probably in or near the land of Goshen, the district assigned to them in happier days, and to perform " all manner of service in the field." That their services might be of more value to their oppressors, we are informed by Josephus — and this we can readily believe from what has prevailed elsewhere ! — that many of them were compelled to learn handicraft employments, and this is con firmed by the art of the potter,* the manufacture of cotton, and other useful arts required in the erection of the Tabernacle being found among them. Bezaleel and Aholiab were indeed "filled with wisdom of heart, to work all manner of * Exod. i. 14 : Compare Psalm lxxxi. 6 ; Ixviii. 13. E 2 52 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. work, of the engraver and of the cunning workman" — the skilled weaver — " and of the embroiderer, in blue, and in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen, and of the weaver." Exod. xxxv. 35. The rudiments of this knowledge and experience were, however, probably acquired in Egypt, but these were perfected by special inspiration. Thus in God's allwise providence were the Israelites being prepared for their high destiny. In pro portion as they were able to render him good service, and his fears of their joining his enemies gave way, Pharaoh (was he an Assyrian? Isaiah lii. 4, implies it) — we may suspect he was a slave holder of the genuine type, who believed that the thews and sinews of the Israelites were his property — refused to let them go. Can we wonder at this ! He had no more of the ignor ance and selfishness of human nature in him than had the planters in the West Indies, or in the Southern States of America, or the slaveholders in this Colony. An Oriental despot is not accustomed to brook opposition to his will. Pharaoh, in reply to the entreaty of Moses, " Let us go, we beseech thee, three days' journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God," said : "Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go ? I II, 12. WHAT IS A MIRACLE? 53 know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." But Jehovah had decreed their deliver ance ! Now for the contest — " man striving against God :" the sequel shows him in the bold and dangerous attitude of " defying the Omnipo tent to arms !" Was there ever folly comparable to this? " The Lokd is King ; who then shall dare Kesist his will, distrust his care, Or murmur at His wise decrees, Or doubt His royal promises ?" Conder. Reterences: Exod. i. 7—10. Gen. xv. 5 ; xlvi. 3. Exod. v. 2. Josephus B. n. ch. ix. 1 12. Let us try to realize the circumstances. It is seen that Jehovah asserts His claims upon the obedience of Pharaoh, and of His own people Israel, by a series of the most extraordinary acts, the proofs of His miraculous interposition. Do you ask — " What is meant by a miracle — how may it be defined ?" We may borrow the definition of our great lexicographer, Dr. John son: It is " an effect above human or natural power, performed in attestation of some truth :" or better still, that given by the Hebrew Ruler 54 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. Nicodemus, when he came to Jesus by night, a "work which no man can do, except God be with him." — And it may be safely assumed that God will not be with any man, in the perform ance of " works involving a temporary suspension of the known laws of nature, or a deviation from the established constitution and fixed order of the universe," or of so much of it as is known to us, except in the cause of truth ! It is not too much to say that He cannot deny Himself nor sanction imposture ; neither will He be prodigal of power, nor do what is unnecessary in providence, any more than in the ordinary operations of nature, nor interpose for that which is trivial in itself and unbecoming His own infinite wisdom and glorious majesty. When it pleases God to arouse the attention of men, or to establish His own authority over them, He can never be at a loss for the means, nor is it for us to say how He should use them. When the results of His operations are immediate and follow no law known to ourselves, we regard them as miraculous. All are not of the same outward form, neither are they all brought about by the same means. There are not only miracles of fact but of time and of circumstance. Of one or of another of these characteristics were those now to be described. II, 13. AARON'S ROD BECOMES A SERPENT. 55 "They," says Canon Cook, "were supernatural in their greatness, in their concentration upon one period, in their coming and going according to the phases of the conflict between the tyrant and the captive race, in their measured grada tion from weak to strong, as each weaker wonder failed to break the stubborn heart. And king and people so regarded them."* 13. We transport ourselves in thought to Tanis, or Zoan, the royal city in Lower Egypt. In the palace of Pharaoh, Moses and Aaron present themselves in the name of Jehovah, and give the first proof that He has sent them. Aaron's rod becomes a serpent. " The symbol of royal and * A weighty argument is drawn from the accounts of the miracles by which Moses was expressly bidden to attest his mission, and by which he was enabled to accomplish the deliverance of his people. One characteristic, common to all scriptural miracles, but in none more conspicuous than in those recorded in the book of Exodus, is their strongly marked, and indeed unmistakable, local colouring. They are such as no later writer living in Palestine could have invented for Egypt. From beginning to end no miracle is recorded which does not strike the mind by its peculiar suitableness to the place, time, and circumstances under which it was wrought. The plagues are each and all Egyptian ; and the modes by which the people's wants are supplied in the Sinai tic peninsula recall to our minds the natural conditions of such a journey in such a country. We find nature everywhere, but nature in its Master's hands, — Speaker's Commentary, vol, i. 241. 56 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. divine power on the diadem of every Pharaoh." The Magicians " did in like manner with their enchantments ;" they appear to have known the mode of causing " suspension of vitality," as is now done by serpent-charmers in the East, and of restoring " to active life by liberating or throwing* down." Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods," a proof of superiority, and Jehovah conquers "the great typical personification of the protecting divinity of Egypt." Pharaoh remained unyielding and obdurate, and " refused to let the people go." Exodus vii. 1 — 13. And yet he must have been afraid of some dread power, real but invisible, or he would have sum marily punished the two bold men who had assumed so much in his presence. THE FIRST PLAGUE. 14. On a subsequent morning, about two months after the first interview with the King, about the middle of June, Moses went forth to meet Pharaoh on the banks of the Nile, and warn him of the consequences of despising Jehovah. "In this thou shalt know," was to be his message, "that I am the Lord :" and then the coming plague was to be foretold. And the waters of "the Most Holy River," the river which was deified by the people, and was thus invoked, " Hail, O Nile ! thou II, 14. FIRST PLAGUE. 57 comest forth over this land, thou comest in peace, giving light to Egypt, O hidden God!" — which had its appointed priests, festivals, and sacrifices, and to whose waters Egypt owes all its fertility, and which its inhabitants esteem the sweetest and most wholesome of all waters ! — the waters of the Nile itself, which they worshipped — "as an emanation of Osiris" — and of its branches, and canals leading from it, and of the reservoirs and pools of water in the fields, and that reserved for domestic and personal use in vessels of wood and stone ; all these waters, on Aaron stretching out his hand were turned to blood, or to the appearance of blood, and became loathsome.* — Nor was this * " It is well known that before the rise, the water of the Nile is green and unfit to drink. About the 25th of June it becomes clear, and then yellow, and gradually reddish, like ochre ; this effect has been attributed to the red earth brought down from Sennaar, but Ehrenberg proves that it is owing to the presence of microscopic cryptogams and infusoria. The depth of the colour varies in different years ; when it is very deep the water has an offensive smell. Late travellers say that at such seasons the broad turbid tide has a striking resemblance to a river of blood. The supernatural character of the visitation was attested by the suddenness of the change ; by its immediate connection with the words and act of Moses, and by its effects. It killed the fishes, and made the water unfit for use, neither of which results follows the annual dis coloration." — Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 277. 58 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. all : a principal article of the food of the country was lost to it. " All the fish that was in the river died." — What effect had this judgment? Did it cause relentings of spirit? Hear the sequel : " And Pharaoh turned and went into his house, neither did he set his heart to this also." — The trick of the Magicians may have contributed to this, for upon water obtained by digging " round about the river " they were enabled to produce a similar appearance. Exodus vii. 14—25. THE SECOND PLAGUE. Once more, after seven days, spake Moses unto Pharaoh : " Thus saith the Lord, Let my people go, that they may serve me ;" and the penalty of disobedience is again announced. Alas ! the command and the threatening were alike unheeded. " And Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt ; and the frogs came up, and covered the land of Egypt. — The frog, as a type of Pthah, the creative power, was one of the sacred animals of the Egyptians, and in this plague, as in others, the object of super stition was made an instrument of punishment. The production of frogs, also, was simulated by the Magicians, their loose robes giving them II, 14. SECOND AND THIRD PLAGUES. 59 facilities for practising on the credulity of spec tators who, there can be Uttle doubt, were desirous to believe in their power. Pharaoh gives signs of repentance ; but they are like " the morning cloud and the early dew," and quickly pass away. Physical judgments do not change the heart ! Exodus viii. 1 — 15. THE THIRD PLAGUE. There are few of us, probably, who have not had some personal acquaintance with that pest of warm climates, the mosquito. Wearied with the labours of the day, rendered more oppressive by the summer's heat, we are not sorry when the shades of evening close upon us, and invite us to "Nature's kind restorer, balmy sleep." We stretch ourselves upon our beds, with as little covering as possible, and yield to the grateful provision of Him " who knoweth our frame." One sense after another drops into a state of obliviousness, a moment more — and instead of our desires being consummated, an unmusical, exciting, singing noise, as if conscious of the power to annoy, falls upon our ears ; sad expe rience teaches us that it is the sound of an approaching enemy ; despair creeps over us ; our insignificant foe alights upon our face ; per- 60 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. chance upon the nose ; ere he inserts his dreaded proboscis we drive him off, and vainly think we shall now sleep in peace. The war is not over ; our enemy returns to the combat again and yet again, until overcome with sleep we resist no longer, and leave him in undisturbed possession of the field. In the morning the stinging sen sation, and the marks upon our hands and face, and upon every exposed part of the body, show how successfully our tiny foes have taken advan tage of our helplessness and revelled in our blood. And yet they were not more than half a dozen in number ! — What must have been the annoy ance caused by immense swarms of these tormentors — for with the Septuagint translators, who, living in Egypt, were likely to know what was intended by the original word, I think we must understand mosquitos, and not that loath some parasite the venerable translators of the English version took them to be — which were upon man and beast throughout all the land of Egypt ! And from these Baalzebub, the god of flies, was unable to deliver them. The produc tion of either mosquitos or lice in such immense numbers, and bringing them thus to plague the Egyptians, was a miracle. The Magicians essayed to do as before with their enchantments, but the II, 14. FOURTH PLAGUE. 61 objects being so minute and unmanageable, they had not scope for the exercise of their sleight of hand, and they said unto Pharaoh, " This is the finger of God." — The futility of their, arts was manifest. Henceforth they made no further attempt to imitate the supernatural.* We are surprised to learn that, notwithstanding this confession of failure on the part of the Magicians, Pharaoh still refused to yield. Exod. viii. 16 — 19. THE FOURTH PLAGUE. The next exhibition of Almighty power — " at the end of October or early in November " — on behalf of the Hebrews consisted in sending " swarms of flies," or, as the margin of our Bible reads, " a mixture of noisome beasts," &c, upon the Egyptians, which is supposed, and not without * " After this we hear no more of the Magicians. All that we can gather from the narrative is, that the appearances produced by them were sufficient to deceive Pharaoh on three occasions. It is nowhere declared that they actually produced wonders, since the expression ' the scribes did so by their secret arts' is used on the occasion of their complete failure. Nor is their statement that in the wonders wrought by Aaron they saw the finger of God any proof that they recognized a power superior to the native objects of worship they invoked, for we find that the Egyptians frequently spoke of a supreme being as God. It seems rather as though they had said, ' Our juggles are of no avail against the work of a divinity ! ' " — Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Magic, vol. ii. 198. 62 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. strong reason, to be the beetle, an object of religious worship, as is evident from the figures of this disgusting insect so frequently found in Egyptian sculpture, and of which there are many specimens, some of colossal size, in the British Museum. " The beetle was reverenced by the Egyptians as the symbol of life, of reproductive or creative power." That this plague did not proceed from merely natural causes, or that they were under the direct control of Jehovah, is shown by the fact that in the land of- Goshen, the district in which the Israelites dwelt, no such swarms appeared. Pharaoh saw it was in vain any longer to resist, and he said, " Go ye, sacrifice to your God in the land." — This Moses showed could not be done without running the risk of being stoned, as the bull under the name of Apis, Mnevis, or Basis, when selected for the purpose, the cow consecrated to Athor, and the sheep and the goat, were among their most sacred animals. The judgment removed, "Pharaoh hardened his heart at this time also." Exod. viii. 20—32. THE FIFTH PLAGUE. Those persons who have passed through the interior and frontier districts of this Colony II, 14. FIFTH PLAGUE. 63 when the lung-sickness, that much dreaded bovine plague, was stalking over the land, and have seen a dead carcase here, a bleached skeleton there, and beyond and around, what until recently had been the pride of the span or of the kraal, strewed in every direction, and in every stage of decomposition, tainting the air and filling it with pestiferous vapours, and pro ducing gloom and despair in every farmer's homestead, will be able to form a conception, although a very inadequate one, of the distress occasioned in Egypt by the "very grievous murrain "* spoken of in Exod. ix., by which, as an act of judgment from Jehovah, "all the cattle * " In 1863 the murrain began in November, and was at its height in December." Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 283. " We may observe a particular scope and meaning in this calamity, if we consider it in regard to the Egyptians, which would not have existed in respect to any other people. They held in idolatrous reverence almost every animal, but some they held in particular veneration ; as the ox, cow, and ram. Among these Apis and Mnevis are well known ; the former being a sacred bull, worshipped at Memphis, as the latter was at Heliopolis. A cow or heifer had the like honours at Momemphis ; and the same practice seems to have been adopted in most of the Egyptian nomes. By the infliction of this judgment, the Egyptian deities sank before the God of the Hebrews."— Bryant, quoted, in substance, in The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. 64 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. of Egypt died," or, as we probably may under stand, all such as were left in the open fields. Again was the distinction made between the Israelites and the Egyptians — " But of the cattle of the children of Israel died not one." Was not this also in proof that "the Lord is in the midst of the earth?" — But great as was the plague, it failed to soften and subdue the 'heart of Pharaoh. THE SIXTH PLAGUE. By a wise and beneficent arrangement of our colonial authorities, the unhappy sufferers by leprosy are removed to Robben Island, and are duly cared for. Where it is otherwise, the general community, by keeping aloof from such pitiable objects as they feel they cannot relieve, and from contact with whom danger may be apprehended, inadvertently aggravate their con dition. — The disease which came upon the Egyp tians, when taking of the ashes of the furnace, and standing before Pharaoh, " Moses sprinkled it up toward heaven " (probably in allusion to the inhuman practice by which the Egyptians sought to propitiate Sutech or Typhon, or the evil print ciple, and by which the Israelites themselves may have suffered)—" and it became a boil breaking II, 14. SEVENTH PLAGUE. 65 forth with blains upon man and upon beast," — appears to have been a species of leprosy, at once painful and loathsome to the last degree, and a disease which, in addition to the personal wretch edness it occasions, would incapacitate for many of the duties of • life, civil and sacred. The priests, who were obliged to pay the most minute attention to personal cleanliness, and were re quired to shave off all their hair and to wear clean linen garments, would by this plague, be disqualified for office. Pharaoh's heart remained unchanged. How much longer will he hold out ? Exod. ix. 8—12. THE SEVENTH PLAGUE. It is evident from the narrative that these successive plagues were producing an effect upon the minds of the people of Egypt, for when hail, such as had not been seen before, was threatened, accompanied, however, by the advice to bring home such cattle as were in the field, their herds having, as we may presume, been replenished from those of the Israelites by purchase or by force — then "he that feared the word of the Lord among the servants of Pharaoh made his servants and his cattle flee into the houses ; and F 66 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. he that regarded not the word of the Lord left his servants and his cattle in the field." — Hail is not, in the southern as in the northern part of Africa, unusual. Our fellow-colonists, in some districts of the country, are occasionally visited by storms of hail which prove very destructive to buildings, to vegetable and to animal life. It is not easy for persons who were never exposed to them to conceive of their violence, and of their effects. The author was once thus exposed when travelling in the Bombay Presidency of India. The hail fell in masses, conglomerations of smaller pieces, unshapen lumps of ice, equal in bulk to ordinary hen eggs ; we were on a vast plain of the nature of a jungle, but fortunately not distant from a temple, where we were able to take shelter, or the consequences might have been serious. As it was, the top of the palankeen was indented, and the shoulders of the bearers much bruised. — In the judgment brought upon the Egyptians there were " mighty thun derings," "fire mingled with the hail very- grievous," destructive to all that was in the field, smiting man and beast, and every herb, and breaking every tree of the field. Pharaoh knew that the land of Goshen had been spared this dire visitation, and at length he confessed, II, 14. EIGHTH PLAGUE, 67 " I have sinned this time." But his humiliation was not yet complete ; its cause being removed his heart was still hardened. Exod. ix. 13—35. It was now the month of February, or perhaps early in March, as the effects produced on the standing crops" appear to indicate, for the barley and the flax are then far advanced, the former being in the ear and the latter boiled or in stalk, and the wheat and the rye, or millet, have not grown up. — The resources of Egypt were now being fast destroyed. THE EIGHTH PLAGUE. And yet another plague, the eighth of the series of the miracles of Omnipotence directed against the presumption of Egypt's proud king ! " How long," say Moses and Aaron, " wilt thou refuse to humble thyself before the Lord God of the Hebrews ?" It may be remarked that moral suasion in general preceded the judgment. The people themselves were now alarmed, and remonstrated with their king : "Let these men go, that they may serve the Lord their God ; knowest thou not yet that Egypt is destroyed ?" — No wonder at their earnest deprecation of their F 2 68 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. Sovereign's folly ! The threatening of a visi tation of locusts was sufficient to fill every mind with alarm, and to cover every face with black ness. — Once more the mention of an incident in my own personal observation and experience may be permitted. About ten years ago,* an opportunity was afforded me of observing the effect of countless myriads of these individually insignificant destroyers upon this country and its people. I was travelling towards the northern frontier, and soon after leaving Graaff-Reinet a swarm of locusts made their appearance. They were seen all the way to Colesberg, and were committing great ravages ; but it was not until reaching "the Philippolis district that the extent of their mischief could be realized. In company with my friend, the Rev. E. Solomon, I visited some of the outlying farms, where the crops of corn were among the finest I had ever seen, and were almost ripe for the sickle. It may be truly said that "the inhabitants of the land trembled;" every heart seemed sad, and upon every counte nance sat despondency and woe. The vivid and masterly description of these invaders by the Prophet Joel came forcibly before the mind ; it *Now, 1872, nearly 20. II, 14. EIGHTH PLAGUE. 69 was felt to be minutely, painfully true — 'a photo graph by a skilful artist. Their nnmbers were so great that they baffled every attempt to arrest their progress. On they came with a most determined will, and still on, on, on ; there seemed to be no end to their long line, no diminution of their numbers. Branches of trees were used by all available hands to beat them off, and in one place immense fires were lit across their line of march to divert them from their course, and to save, if possible, the standing corn. It was all in vain. The number of these insects was so great as to deaden, and in some cases, even to put out the fires. Never had I seen such an illustration of the Prophet's words : " The land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness." They commenced with the ear, and before long the spectacle was presented of the whole being cropped off, the stalk followed down to the root, and not a vestige remained to tell what there had been, save the droppings of the locusts themselves. — This plague must have been terrible to the Egyptians, and from it Serapis, or their reputed protector, was utterly powerless to deliver. Exod. x. 1 — 20. Joel ii. 2—11. 70 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. THE NINTH PLAGUE. How vain was it for Pharaoh to "stretch out his hands against God, and to strengthen him self against the Almighty !" The conflict was utterly unequal, and the issue could not be un certain. The plague of locusts was followed by a preternatural darkness,* a darkness which might be felt, the "palpable obscure" of our great epic poet, extending over three days, most distressing to Pharaoh and his people, but partial * "Its suddenness and severity in connection with the act of Moses mark it as a preternatural withdrawal of light. Yet it has an analogy in physical phenomena. After the vernal equinox the south-west wind from the desert blows some fifty days, not however continuously, but at intervals, lasting generally some two or three days. It fills the atmosphere with dense masses of fine sand, bringing on a darkness far deeper than that of our worst fogs in winter. While it lasts no man 'rises from his place, men and beasts hide themselves : people shut themselves up in the innermost apartments or vaults.' ' So saturated is the air with the sand that it seems to lose its transparency, so that artificial light is of little use.' The expression ' even darkness which might be felt ' has a special application to a darkness produced by such a cause. The consternation of Pharaoh proves that, familiar as he may have been with the phenomenon, no previous occurrence had pre pared him for its intensity and duration, and that he recog nized it as a supernatural visitation." — Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 289. II, 14. NINTH PLAGUE. 71 in its extent, for " all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings." The contest had been protracted and severe, and was now drawing to a close. Pharaoh's heart, although at times dur ing the continuance of the judgments apparently softened, remained obdurate as before : judg ments are as the fire which melts the wax, and hardens the clay ! — But the resources of Jeho vah were not yet exhausted. Once more He had triumphed over their presiding deities (the Sun-god, Ra, was the father of the whole mytho logy, the dread protector of the oldest and most venerated of the cities of Egypt). — Jehovah had shown their helplessness, or made them the instruments of their worshippers' punishment. Another demonstration of His superiority must be given ere Pharaoh, softened and subdued, will bid his captives go free. Exod. x. 21—29. THE tenth and last plague. Is it not said that "the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let them. go?" So reads the narrative here and at the commencement of these Plagues, and it is im plied throughout. We are thus brought face to 72 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. face with the inscrutable sovereignty of God. The Apostle Paul makes use of this fact as an illustration of the deeply mysterious subject: — "For the Scripture" — identified with God, its Author — "saith unto Pharaoh, Even for for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath He mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth." Rom. ix. 17, 18. — The following judicious remarks of the late Dean Alford are deserving of close attention : — " Whatever difficulty there lies in this assertion, that God hardeneth whom He will, lies also in the daily course of His providence, in which we see this hardening process going on in the case of the prosperous ungodly man. The fact is patent, whether declared by revelation or read in history : but to the solution of it, and its reconciliation with the equally certain fact of human responsibility, we shall never attain in this imperfect state, however we may strive to do so by subtle refinements and distinctions." * Timely, four days', notice by Jehovah to " bring one plague more upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt" was given. This was in April. The * Greek Test., vol. il, f .urth edition, p. 410. See Appendix A. II, 14. TENTH PLAGUE. 73 people and the Israelites were alike forewarned. The latter had instructions to prepare for their deliverance, and the former were told before hand of the greatest calamity which had yet befallen them as now about to be inflicted. Their firstborn, "the beginning of their vigour and strength, the excellency of dignity and the excellency of power," — their firstborn, who pre sided in the council and who commanded in the field, — their firstborn, the joy of the family and the hope of the nation, — " from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maid-servant that is behind the mill, — and all the firstborn of beasts," should die, in one night, and by an unseen hand should die ! Will this further threatening be despised ? Yea, even so ; despised as the others had been. The Divine forbearance, however, had now come to an end ; the crushing stroke fell. " And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he, and all his servants, and all the Egyptians ; and there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was not a house where there was not one dead." — Consternation and alarm took hold of the Egyptians, and they were urgent upon the Israelites to leave the country forthwith, a movement for which doubtless they had been 74 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. long preparing,* — months, at least, in a more general manner, Exod. iii. 16 — 22, and more particularly from the time when direction was given them to observe the Passover, xii. — and located as they were upon its north-eastern border, they had no insurmountable difficulty in commencing their march that night. — What proof have we of the great fact which preceded the Exode ? This has been provided : — the institu tion of the Passover, and the consecration of the firstborn to Jehovah, were to be perpetual memorials of this grand event ! They are still kept up by the descendants of the men over whose houses, marked by the appointed sign, "blood upon the lintel and on the two side posts," the destroying Angelf passed on his * " We have thus throughout the characteristics of local colouring, of adaptation to the circumstances of the Israelites, and of repeated announcements, followed by repeated post ponements, which enabled, and indeed compelled, the IsraeUtes to complete that organization of their nation, without which their departure might have been, as it has been often repre sented, a mere disorderly flight."— Speaker's Commentary) vol i. 243. t "It is to be observed that although the Lord Himself passed through to smite the Egyptians, He employed the agency of 'the destroyer,' in whom, in accordance with Heb. xi. 28, all the ancient versions, and most critics, recognized an Angel ; II, 15. INSTITUTION OF THE PASSOVER. 75 vengeful errand. — If these observances did not originate then, and out of the circumstances narrated, when could they have been introduced with success ? Provision was made by Jehovah through the natural curiosity of the young, for their being kept in remembrance: — "And it shall be when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What is this ? that thou shalt say unto him, By strength of hand the Lord brought us out from Egypt, from the house of bondage: and it came to pass, when Pharaoh would hardly let us go, that the Lord slew all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the first born of man, and the firstborn of beast : there fore I sacrifice to the Lord all that openeth the matrix, being males ; but all the firstborn of my children I redeem." Exod. xiii. 14, 15. 15. Let us once more pause for a few moments and try to understand the relative position of the two nations, — the oppressors and the op pressed ; the one striving to retain in bondage, and the other, assisted by an Almighty arm, striking for freedom. Egypt ranks with the as 2 Kings xix. 35 ; 2 Sam. xxiv. 16. The em ployment of angelic agency, however, does not always exclude the operation of physical causes."— Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 298. 76 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. most ancient of kingdoms, its founder being a grandson of Noah, the second father of the human race ; and although now, in fulfilment of prophecy, and as my own personal observation testifies, one of " the basest of kingdoms," it was then the most civilized known ; famous for its commerce, arts, well-constituted government, and prosperity. Its history, however, in common with the early records of all other ancient nations, is beset with chronological difficulties, arising, in part, from contemporaneous reigns being viewed as successive. I can adopt the language of Dr. Kitto, and say:* "After an anxious survey of the thick clouds which hang over the chronology of this period for some ray of light which might guide through its utter darkness, we turn away as disappointed as all our prede cessors. Nothing, therefore, remains for us but to make such accommodations, and so to balance the various difficulties as to obtain the result which, without being certain of its truth, seems the best and the most probable under all the circumstances." — The materials for the historical chronology of Egypt are scanty and obscure; » Palestine : the Bible History of the Holy Land, p. 147, Knight, London, 1841. 11,15. RELATIVE POSITION OF THE PEOPLES. 77 they are existing monuments, most of them recently brought to light, and the remains of the historical work of Manetho, which commences with Menes, about 2700 B.C., according to Mr. R. Stuart Poole, of the British Museum, and comes down lower than the Exodus. Mr. Poole observes : " According to the scheme of Biblical Chronology, which we believe to be the most probable, the whole sojourn in Egypt would belong to the period before the eighteenth dy nasty. The Israelites would have come in and gone forth during that obscure age, for the his tory of which we have little or no monumental evidence. This would explain the absence of any positive mention of them on the Egyptian monuments."* — May we not add that nations erect monuments to commemorate their national victories, their prosperity, and glory, and not their humiliation and shame. Is it likely that the remembrance of any of the ten plagues would be perpetuated in mural tablets, or, re corded on the papyri found in the tombs of Egypt, or, that we should find engraven in characters which exist to this day, a narrative of *Dr. W. Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Egypt* vol. i., p. 509. 78 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. the departure of the Israelites from their house of bondage, and the destruction of Pharaoh and his hosts at the Red Sea ? — The gentleman re ferred to, one of our highest authorities in such matters, names the year B.C. 1867 as that in which Jacob and his family went down to Egypt, and B.C. 1652 as the period of the Exodus. This agrees, within four years, with the calcula tion of Dr. Hales. 16. The Egyptians suffered long and severely at the hands of two old men, who, furnished with credentials of a most extraordinary character, came in the name of a God they refused to acknowledge, and made demands with which they were unwilling to comply. The reality of the miracles* wrought by Moses and Aaron was *"With respect to the character of the Old Testament miracles, we must also remember that the whole structure of the Jewish ceconomy had reference to the peculiar exigency of the circumstances of a people imperfectly civilized, and is so distinctly described in the New Testament, as dealing with men according to the 'hardness of their hearts,' and being a system of ' weak and beggarly elements,' and a rudimentary instruction for 'children' who were in the condition of ' slaves.' We are not, therefore, to judge of the probability of the miracles wrought in support of that oeconomy (so far as the forms under which they were wrought are concerned) as if those miracles were immediately intended for ourselves. We II, 17. REALITY OF THE MIRACLES. 79 self-evidencing ; it was seen that God was with them. On any other supposition it is incredible that they would have given freedom to their bondsmen, and it is equally incredible that unless the Israelites had been very numerous, — "the people of the children of Israel," said Pharaoh, " are more and mightier than we " — and unless their services had been valuable, the Egyptians would have suffered so much to retain them. 17. Granted that the narrative is extraordinary ; but so were the circumstances and their issues : — the one not more so than the other. Who can deny that the Israelites were once in Egypt in a servile condition, and that they were either driven out on account of their leprosy, as some writers allege, or that they came out with or without the consent of their oppressors. Their exodus is a fact to be accounted for. Let objec- are not justified in arguing either that these miracles are in. credible because wrought in such a manner as that, if addressed to us, they would lower our conceptions of the Divine Being ; i r, on the other hand, that because those miracles— wrought under the circumstances of the Jewish oeconomy — are credible and ought to be believed, there is therefore no reason for objecting against stories of similar miracles alleged to have been wrought under the quite different circumstances of the Christian dispensation.'' — Bishop Fitzgerald in Smith's Dic tionary of the Bible, Art. Mibacleb, vol. ii. 383. 80 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. tors to the writings of Moses try to impose on an enlightened people like the Egyptians, in a way similar to that herein recorded, either by a skilful use of natural causes, or by counterfeit miracles ; or, let them tell us how a small body of poor, diseased people, driven out from Egypt, which had long been their abode, were able to march through the wilderness, unsupplied with the means of defence or of support, take posses sion of Canaan, and after dispossessing the inhabitants, subsequently grow up to be a great, ' a moral, and prosperous nation, and with refer ence to the knowledge of the One, Living, and True God, far in advance of their times ! Other explanations assuredly are needed. 18. The number of the Israelites is given as 600,000 able-bodied men, "from twenty years old and upward, all that were able to go forth to war," giving an aggregate population of between two and three millions. They had been under their own long-established gov ernment, — the patriarchal; each tribe acknow ledged a prince as its ruler, the office being at first hereditary, and afterwards, perhaps, elec tive ; the tribes were divided into collections of families, whose officers were heads of houses of fathers, and these again were subdivided into II, 19. PATRIARCHAL GOVERNMENT. 81 clans, with heads of thousands as their imme diate rulers, the two latter being subordinate to the former. " They were fathers rather than magistrates," says Dr. Jahn, "governing ac cording to the regulations established by custom, according to the principles of sound reason and natural justice. They provided for the general good of the whole community, while the con cerns of each individual family still continued under the control of its own father. In general, those cases only which concerned the fathers of families themselves came under the cognizance of the seniors."* From this it will appear that when the Israelites commenced their march they were not an undisciplined, migratory horde, as we are wont to imagine them to have been ; but a huge caravan that could be directed by one presiding mind acting through subordinate offi cers. Moses communicated with the people, as the taskmasters had been accustomed to do, through their elders, their acknowledged authorities. 19. " It is anight," says the sacred historian, "to be much observed unto the Lord for bringing them out from the land of Egypt; this is that night of the Lord to be observed of all the children * The History of the Hebrew Commonwealth, vol. i. 25, 26. G 82 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. of Israel in their generations." And no wonder. The event which then occurred stands alone in the history of our race for its nature, magnitude, and importance. The setting out — what a sight! The people with their numerous flocks and herds were spread over a vast extent of country, not indeed a disorderly rabble, but an organized host, with a common aim, actuated by one spirit, and, in general, cheerfully submitting to regula tions which their new circumstances made neces sary, and above all possessing the consciousness of the Divine presence and blessing in the symbol which accompanied them, — " by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them in the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light." * On * " However incontrovertible the evidence of any particular miracle, God has not allowed us to repose the credit of mira cles altogether on the particular evidence of one miracle only, or of a few miracles. It is plain' .... that a single miracle, if sufficiently proved, may establish the validity of all other miracles which are affirmed or asserted by the same agent, unless we can show that he must exceed his commis sion. Thus the one miracle of the pillar of fire and cloud, proved, as I apprehend it to be, beyond suspicion (Exod,. xiv. 19, 20 ; xxxiii. 9, 10 ; xl. 34—38 ; Num. ix. 15—23 ; x. 11,12, 34 j xiv. 14; Deut.i. 33 ; Neh. ix. 12, 19) proves all the miracles which Moses wrought before Pharaoh, proves the miraculous ness of the passage of the Red tea, proves the miraol§*i|! giving the Law from Sinai, proves the miraculousness of the II, 19. PHARAOH PURSUES THE ISRAELITES. 83 and still on they went, the rays, perhaps, of the pale moon also illuminating the scene, and cheer ing the hearts of the pilgrims, — the stronger help ing the weaker, — the young, the aged, and the sick duly cared for ; and all under the direction of a Leader fitted by God for his onerous duties. The first encampment, the striking of the tents, the onwardmarch — whatscenes for the artist ! But they were pursued by Pharaoh and his proud hosts. There seemed no way of escape, — the sea was before them, the army of Egypt behind them, the wilderness had shut them in ! How was this ? Did not Moses follow the direction of Je hovah when he " turned and encamped before punishment of Korah, and of everything else which is related by Moses as miraculous. But then, too, on the other hand, every particular proof of the real performance of these mir acles reflects in the same manner on the particular evidence of that miracle. And this must be the case also, even though the specific proof of the miracles may in particular cases be somewhat tinged with suspicion. I do not mean by this observation to throw suspicion on any one of them ; but only to observe that this is a case in which a number of histories which converge to one point (that point being here the mir aculous attestation given by the Almighty to the mission of Moses) derive from their very number a greater strength and importance than that which we might be entitled to claim for them singly." — A Treatise on the Evidence of the Scripture Miracles, by John Penrose,.MA., p. 120, 121— London, 1826. G 2 84 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, over against Baal-zephon." We are prone to mis interpret the experience which is painful to us. True christian philosophy is found in the lines of the poetj: — " Judge not the Loed by feeble sense, But trust Him for His grace : Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face."— Cowpeb. ' 20. The deliverance was to be complete, no room was to be left for compromise, or accommodation, and return to Egypt ; and above all, the people were to be taught to confide implicitly in Moses, as the servant of Jehovah. — Yet one other signal display of Divine power, and the Israel ites will have clean escaped from thraldom. They had said in the despondency of their souls, " Let us alone, that we may serve the Egyp tians," and now they remind Moses of the words they had spoken. He replies, "Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you to-day : for the Egyp tians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more for ever. The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace." Exod. xiv. 13, 14. And so, indeed, it came II, 20. PASSAGE OF THE RED SEA. 85 to pass. — This was most likely at that part of the Red Sea to the south of Suez indi cated by the name Ain Mousa. Israel pro ceeded safely over, on Moses, in obedience to the Divine command, stretching out his hand over the sea, while the host of Pharaoh, in attempting to follow, was overwhelmed and destroyed, a broken and scattered host, if any, returning to Egypt to tell of the unparalleled disaster. — Moses and the people celebrated the deliverance in an ode of incomparable beauty,* and one of the most gifted of Erin's bards has put into modern verse the triumphal responsive song on this occasion of Miriam, the sister of Moses : " Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea ! Jehovah hath triumphed ! His people are free! Sing, for the pride of the tyrant is broken ; His chariots, his horsemen, all splendid and brave, — How vain was their boasting ! the Lord hath but spoken, And chariots and horsemen are sunk in the wave. Who shall return to tell Egypt the story Of those she sent forth in the hour of her pride ? The Lord hath looked out from his pillar of glory, And all her brave thousands are dashed in the tide ! Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea ! Jehovah hath triumphed ! His people are free !" — Moobe . * Exod. xv. 1 — 19. The passage of the Red Sea, and other great facts in the Israelitish history, from Abraham downwards > are poetically described in Psalms cv. and cvi. 86 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. 21. And why was all this ? The only reply that would be suitable is — "He, Jehovah, saved them for His name's sake, that He might make His mighty power to be known." The Israel ites were fairly in the wilderness, and free from their oppressors. It is not easy to trace their wanderings. At Marah, the bitter waters are sweetened and made fit for use. They journey on, that immense host ! and their bread- stuffs are exhausted, and in the wilderness of Sin commences that miraculous supply of manna which was continued forty years, "until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan." — Now water, the most important of the neces saries of life, fails them. What can be done ? What distress can be so great as this ? Ask the traveller in our South African deserts, in Na- maqualand or in the Kalahari ; and drawing upon his own painful remembrance of personal suffer ings, he will say it is better, anfd more easy to be borne, to be without solid food than to be without water.* This emergency, than which, in the cir- * The difficulties which Moses would have to encounter may be inferred from the following extract by Dr. Shuttle worth from the Memoirs of Napoleon, by Bourienne :— "Bourienne gives a no less striking delineation of that atrocity of feeling which almost invariably accompanies the extremity of human mise y, where the counteraction of religion is wanting. The narrative II, 21. MURMURING FOR WATER. 87 cumstances, we can conceive of none greater ! is met by Moses under Divine direction smiting refers to the disastrous retreat of the French army from Syria after their discomfiture before the walls of Acre. " A most intolerable thirst, the total want of water, an exces sive heat, and a fatiguing march over burning sandhills, quite disheartened the men, and made every generous sentiment give way to feelings of the grossest selfishness, and most shocking indifference. I saw officers with their limbs ampu tated, thrown off the litters, whose removal in that way had been ordered, and who had themselves given money to recom pense the bearers. I saw the amputated, the wounded, the infected, or those only suspected of infection, deserted and left to themselves. The march was illumined by torches, lighted for the purpose of se'ting fire to the little towns, villagf s, and hamlets which lay in their route, and the rich crops with which the land was then covered. The whole country was in a blaze. Those who were ordered to preside at this work of destruction seemed eager to spread desolation on every side, as if they could thereby avenge themselves for their reverses, and find in such dreadful havoc an alleviation of their sufferings. We were constantly surrounded by plunderers, incendiaries, and the dying, who, stretched on the sidei of the road, implored assistance in a feeble voice, saying, ' I am not infected, I am only wounded ; ' and to convince those whom they addressed, they re-opened their old wounds, or inflie'ed on themselves fresh ones. Still nubody attended to them 'It is all over with him' was the observation applied to the unfoitunate beings in succession, while every one pressed onward. The sun which shone in an unclouded sky in all its brightness was often darkened by our conflagrations. On our right lay the sea, on our left and behind us the desert made by ourselves, before were the privations and sufferings which awaited us."— The Consistency of Revelation, $c, p. 147, 148. 88 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. a rock in Horeb, when the limpid stream gushes forth to refresh man and beast. — The Amalekites of the desert attack the pilgrim caravan, and, by a mode of warfare without a parallel, are put to the rout. The oft-repeated lesson to the people was — Trust in the Lord, stay yourselves upon your God. — Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, avails himself of their proximity to his own homestead, and visits the encampment of the Israelites. His practical good sense is seen in the advice he gives to his unnecessarily bur dened relative, to appoint assessors, or rather deputies, to assist him in judging the people. If he is the same as Hobab, which is not improbable, he was invited to accompany the Israelites as their friend and ally. The tracks and passes of that "waste, howling wilderness" were all familiar to him, as an experienced Bedouin Sheikh, and he might be " instead of eyes," in pointing out grass and water. This will not appear strange to those, who, like Moses, believe that the promise of Divine guidance and protec tion is never to supersede the exercise of our own good sense, and the putting forth of our own exertion. The intelligent use of means on man's part is never dispensed with in subduing to himself the kingdom of nature, or in relying on the conduct of Divine providence, or in seeking II, 22. MOUNT SINAI REACHED. 89 an interest in the dispensation of Grace ; but of themselves they are not sufficient to secure the wished-for end. The visible manifestation of Jehovah, in the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night, was not intended to render unnecessary the practical knowledge, forethought, and industry of the people. 22. On the third month after leaving Egypt, Mount Sinai was reached, and Moses receives instruction to prepare the people for the descent of Jehovah on Mount Sinai. This is done, and the time arrives for the one event that finds its counterpart on Calvary, — the former the giving of the Law, and the latter the exhibition of the central truth of the Gospel. The descrip tion is awfully grand, — nothing can be added to it to help us to realize the scene, and the pregnant words in which it is conveyed do not admit of abridgment. " And it came to pass on the third day, in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud ; so that all the people that was in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God ; and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, 90 CHARACTER AND DTSIGN ? SECT. because the Lord descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice."* " The voice of God To mortal ear is dreadful. They beseech That Moses might report to them His will, And terror cease. He grants what they besought, Instructed that to God is no access Without Mediator, whose high office now Moses in figure bears ; to introduce One greater, of whose day he shall foretell, And all the Prophets in their age, the times Of great Messiah sing." — Milton. * " Of the mode of accounting for the supernatural occur rences in the Scriptures by the illusion produced by mistaken natural phenomena (perhaps the most stupidly jejune of all the theories ever projected by man), Quinet eloquently says, • the pen which wrote the Provincial Letters would be neces sary to lay bare the strange consequences of this theology. According to its conclusion, the tree of good and evil was nothing but a venomous plant, probably a manchineal tree, under which our first parents fell asleep. The shining face of Moses on the heights of Mount Sinai was the natural result of electricity ; the vision of Zachariah was effected by the smoke of the chandeliers in the temple ; the Magian kings, with their offerings of myrrh, of gold, and of incense, were three wander ing merchants, who brought some glittering tinsel to the II, 23. COVENANT made AT SINAI. 91 23. What a spectacle! Jehovah was graciously pleased to receive the Israelites into Covenant with Himself, to be unto Him " a peculiar trea sure above all people ; a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation," on the simple condition of obeying His voice. The elders of the people responded on their behalf, "All that the Lord hath spoken we will do." — The Israelites volun tarily accepted of the Sinaitic Covenant. — What was its nature and design, and what were its conditions, its obligations, and sanctions ? We must avoid a merely commercial view of it, as if it were a transaction between man and man for mutual benefit. " Can a man be profitable unto God ?" — The term " Covenant " was evidently borrowed from ourselves, in condescension, and is to be understood figuratively. When it is used in connection with Adam, or Noah, or Abraham, we understand nothing more than God's promise, freely made, of blessing, to which He was pleased to attach some token of acquiescence or consent Child of Bethlehem ; the star which went before them, a servant bearing a flambeau ; the angels in the scene of the temptation, a caravan traversing the desert laden with pro visions ; the two angels in the tomb, clothed in white linen, an illusion caused by a linen garment ; the Transfiguration, a storm.' Who would not sooner be an old-fashioned infidel than such a doting and maundering rationalist ?"— Prof. Henkt Rogers. 92 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. on man's part. — It was thus with the Covenant at Sinai. Jehovah promised the Israelites the possession of Canaan, and the blessings of peace, good seasons, and of general temporal prosperity, so long as they were loyal to Him, as their King, and obeyed His laws.* — What of the * " This was no other than an abstinence from servile work on the Sabbath ; freedom from legal impurities and gross vices; and offering the sacrifices prescribed in the Law; in time of war, the depending on God alone for success, and not hav ing recourse to horses, chariots, or alliance with idolatrous States ; and, in general, obedience to the letter of the Law, even when it did not flow from a principle of faith and love." . . . . " Heart sins were no breach of the Sinai covenant, seeing they were neither punished by death nor expiated by sacrifice." .... "We must not imagine that everything in Moses's writings relates to the Sinai covenant. Some things in them were intended as a republication of the law of nature. And they contain many passages which evidently relate to the duties and privileges of those interested in the Gospel covenant." .... These are the words of the covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.' (Deut. xxix. 1 — xxx.) Renewing an old covenant, is not making another beside it, which yet is here said to be done. A covenant was therefore at that time set before them, and tbey urged to enter into it distinct from the Sinai covenant, even that covenant which God had confirmed by oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which we know was no other than the gospel obscurely revealed." (Gal. iii. 16, 17.) The Nature of the Sinai Covenant, by John Erskine, M.A.,pp. 37, 44, 50. II, 23. THE PARENTHESIS OF HISTORY. 93 covenant made with Abraham? Was it done away with or suspended during the continuance of that made with his posterity ? By no means. The land, as promised, was given to his seed. The covenant at Sinai formed a parenthetic chap ter in the history of Jehovah's dispensations of mercy towards mankind. The covenant with Abraham, in reality the Gospel covenant, was not disannulled, Gal. iii. 17, or made of " none effect" by that which was given 430 years after ; but co-existed alongside of it, and formed its true spiritual and hopeful element. It required^ in order to the enjoyment of its blessings, more than outward obedience, — even that of the heart, and faith in the promise made to that Patriarch. — The special arrangement made with Israel at Sinai was to meet the circumstances of the time then present, and was intended to be of only temporary duration: it prefigured, however, a dispensation superior to itself, universal and ever-enduring. — It was several times renewed, as by Moses himself, Exod. xxx. 10, by Joshua in the land of Canaan, Josh. xxiv. 25, by Josiah, 2 Kings xxiii. 1 — 27, and by Nehemiah, Neh. ix. 38, and x. 39 ; but these renewals were without permanent effect. — The Prophets rebuked the people for their formalism and hypocrisy, and 94 CHARACTER and design? sect. taught them to look forward to the days of the Messiah, when they would be granted a new cove nant, with its priceless blessings, Jer. iii. 16, and xxxi. 31 — 34. Then would be the fulfilment of the promise — " I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts ; and will be their God, and they shall be my people." This is referred to and reasoned upon by the writer of the inspired commentary on the Levitical dispensation, the epistle to the Hebrews, and shown to be fulfilled under the Gospel. Heb. viii. 6 — 13. Hence the pearl of sentences : — " For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by jesus Christ." — John i, 17. 24. The Israelites appear to have remained in the neighbourhood of Sinai several months, during which Moses was receiving from Jehovah direc tions for the Priesthood, the Tabernacle, and the Ritual, and that constitution, civil and ecclesias tical, under which they were to live until " the fulness pf time, when the Messiah should appear." It was during this period of inactivity that occur red one of the saddest portions of their history — the making of the golden calf, Exod. xxxii, in II, 24. RITUAL PRECEPTS ADDED? 95 imitation of Apis, the sacred bull of the Egyp tians. — This was the occasion of " a variety of burdensome ritual precepts afterwards enacted, to punish the idolatry of the golden calf, Heb. viii. 9; Gal, iii. 19; to preserve from the cor rupt religion and profligate manners of neigh bouring nations ; and to typify better things to come under the Messias. In the mean time, these laws, though wisely calculated to restrain from idolatry and other gross sins, could not make perfect as pertaining to the conscience." — Paul, a Jew by birth and sympathy, by education, pursued in the most favourable circumstances, and with unwonted success, and, moreover, with his knowledge of the Law and its ultimate design amplified and corrected by inspiration, thus writes of the " ordinances " to which his " brethren, his kinsmen according to the flesh," were subject — " Which are a shadow of things to come ; but the body is of Christ." Col. ii. 17. We are not therefore to suppose that Judaism was intended to be, and assuredly it is not, a perfect religion adapted for universality and permanence. It was like scaffolding, to be re moved so soon as the building was finished ; or as the restraints upon childhood gradually re laxed, and finally to be removed on attaining 96 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. majority. Gal. iv. 1 — 7. It was burdensome only as compared with Christianity. Its ritual was not for a personal worship, — that would be conducted in the family, on the Sabbath, Lev. xxiii. 3, or in the towns and cities throughout the land in the Synagogues, Psalm lxxiv. 8, when the Law was read, Acts xv. 21, — it was for a national worship, except in special cases, and as a system was not, it has been said, "intolerably burthensome ;" it had, however, become so in the time of Christ by the traditions of the Elders.* * " The written Law, contained in the Pentateuch, is distri buted by Jewish lawyers into 613 Precepts. Of these, 365 prohibit unlawful things, and are termed negative; the remain ing 248 enjoin things to be done, and are called affirmative precepts. These only have the power and authority of laWj and form the foundation of the whole Jewish jurisprudence ; but since these could not be applied to every case that might arise, so as to decide correctly in every instance, hence origii nated, as subsidiary aids, the Constitutions of the Prophets and Wise Men, the Decrees of the Sanhedrim, the Deci sions of the Judges, and the Expositions of the Doctors, similar to the Rescripts of the ^Emperors, and the Responsa Prudentium or opinions of the Civilians, of the Roman Civil Law ; or the Legal Reports of British Courts of Judicature.— These subsidiary judgments constitute the Jewish Oral Law, pretended to have been transmitted by Moses to Joshua, and by him to the Elders, and from them conveyed by traditionary relation to the time of Judah Hakkadosh, the compiler of the Mishna." — The Reasons of the Laws of Moses, by Dr. Town- ley, p. 333. 11,25. government the ordinance of god. 97 Returning to the narrative: — in connection with this mournful event, the apostacy referred to, the character of Moses is brought out with peculiar grace and beauty. " And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if Thou wilt forgive their sin ;" forgive, — or the unfinished sentence may show the strength of his emotion, — " and if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book which Thou hast written." The intercession was not in vain. 25. He who gave man being, understood his nature and wants, and by endowing him with certain aptitudes, showed that He intended him to live in society. " It is not good for man to be alone." — Society cannot exist without law. Government considered generically is the ordinance of God ; but the particular form of it is of man. Each nation has its own, more or less perfect in form, and securing to the subject more or less of bene fit. Jehovah gave to the people He graciously took into covenant with Himself a form of government, for the attainment of certain purposes, partly secular, but chiefly religious, and this was to continue until its great ends were accomplished. What was its form, what is H 98 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. contained in its manual ? To " the law and the testimony " we must go for information. 26. The great fundamental principle of the Israelitish constitution was laid in the acknowledg ment of Jehovah as its head : hence it has been called a Theocracy. Such a constitution is altogether unique, and does not admit of being repeated without Divine warrant. Jeroboam was warned not to "think to withstand the Kingdom of the Lord in the hand of the sons of David," — language without meaning, as dis tinguishing Israel from other people, unless the special covenant relationship to Jehovah be understood. Hence the Israelites were to be sub jects of the Great King; — the Tabernacle orthe Temple* was to be His palace — where He dwelt, and whose appearance therein in the most holy place was called the Shechinah; — the Priests and Levites were to stand in relation to Him as officers and attendants ; — the tithes and offerings were as rent of land, or as tribute due to Him ; — * The Transjordanic tribes in the days of Mesha, King of Moab, about B.C. 906, appear to have had a sanctuary of their own, and from it were taken by that monarch " the vessels of Jehovah," which were afterwards " dedicated to Chemosh, the national deity of Moab." For this information we are indebted to the Moabite Stone recently brought to light. — The Moabite Stone, by Dr. Ginsburg, pp. 22, 44. II, 26. THE THEOCRACY. 99 and the sacrifices and worship, the homage which He claimed either as expiatory of transgression — foreshadowing the great sacrifice to be offered by the promised Messiah — or as eucharistical for mercies. — This view of Jehovah's relationship to His people should be steadily kept in mind throughout any inquiry into the form, character, and design of the Jewish polity, lt will be seen that the Law has a two-fold aspect — one towards civil affairs, and the other towards sacred ; or it may be conveniently viewed as Moral, Cere monial, and Judicial or Political : a brief notice of each is all that our space will allow. The last three books of the Pentateuch — Levit icus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, — now lend us their aid. Their names, as already stated, are significant of their character and aim, and with the exception of the book of Deuteronomy, need not be more particularly defended or de scribed. These five books, the " Holy Books of Moses"" as they are called by Josephus, are so intimately connected that they must stand or fall together. An able writer, and one who states his opinions with great freedom, regardless of "traditionary views," says: — " But, in truth, the Book speaks for itself. No imitator could have written in such a strain. We scarcely need the H 2 100 character and design? sect. express testimony of the work to its own authorship. But. having it, we find all the internal evidence conspiring to show that it came from Moses. Those magnificent dis courses, the grand roll of which can be heard and felt even in a translation, came warm from the heart and fresh from the lips of Israel's Lawgiver. They are the outpourings ot a solicitude which, is nothing less than parental. It is the father uttering his dying advice to his children no less than the Prophet counselling and admonishing his people. What book can vie with it either in majesty or in tenderness ? What words ever bore more surely the stamp of genuine ness ? If Deuteronomy be only the production of some timorous reformer, who, conscious of his own weakness, tried to borrow dignity and weight from the name of Moses, then assuredly all arguments drawn from internal evidence for the composition of any work are utterly useless. We can never tell whether an author is wearing the mask of another, or whether it be himself who speaks to us. " In spite therefore of the dogmatism of modern critics, we declare unhesitatingly for the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy."0 27. It is of great importance that the authorship of Deuteronomy should be established, and this, we think, has been done successfully. 28. The Moral Law, originally written on stone by the finger of God, and finding its counter part in the human breast, and as to its substance * Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Pentateuch, vol. ii. 783, 784. II, 28. THE MORAL LAW. 101 the same as the law of nature, contains all the great principles of morals, and is of perpetual obligation. "For though," says Archbishop Seeker,* "indeed, they were then given to the Jews particularly, yet the things contained in them are such as all Mankind from the begin ning were bound to observe. And, therefore, even under the Mosaic Dispensation, they, and the Tables on which they were put, were distin guished from the rest of God's Ordinances by a peculiar regard, as containing the Covenant of the Lord. And though the Mosaic Dispensa tion be now at an end, yet concerning these moral precepts of it our Saviour declares, that one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the Law till all be fulfilled. Accordingly, we find both Him and His Apostles quoting these Ten Commandments, as matters of perpetual obliga tion to Christians : who are now, as the Jews were formerly, the Israel of God." The Ten Commandments are as follows : — " I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage,"] " I. Thou shalt have none other gods [God] but me. * Lectures on the Catechism p 147. •f The Book of Common. Prayer.— The italics are mine, and show what was probably the original form. On such a point 102 character and DESIGN? SECT. "II. Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor worship them : for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, and visit the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, and show mercy unto thousands in them that love me, and keep my commandments. " III. Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord [Jeho vah'] thy God in vain .- for the Lord will not hold him guilt less that taketh his Name in vain. " IV Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath-day. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all that thou hast to do ; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt do no manner of work, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, thy man-servant, and thy maid -servant, thy cattle, and the stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day ; wherefore the Lord blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it. " V. Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. " VI. Thou shalt do no murder. " VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery. it would be rash to spf ak positively. The suggestion is due to Ewald, and Keil seems disposed to agree with him. Sea note in Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, vol iii. 1464 It appears to be concurred in by Canon Cook, as " a conjecture which seems to deserve respect." Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 336. II, 28. THE DECALOGUE. 103 " VIII. Thou shalt not steal. "IX. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. " X. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house ; thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his servant, nor his maid, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is his." The Decalogue is a " kind of digest or sum mary of the leading principles of the law of God — as containing the elements of His will to Israel and to mankind." Like its Divine Author, it is "holy, wise, and good." — It is generally distributed into two divisions, — the former containing the first four command ments, relating more especially to what we owe to God, and the latter division, of six commandments, the summary of our duty to our fellow-men. The whole code bears the ex pressive title of the Ten Words, as marking their excellency and importance, as if all others were insignificant in comparison : — " they constitute the groundwork and sum of all the laws of Moses." As given from Mount Sinai, they were probably, as indicated above, in the briefest form, and the additions afterwards made — not in number, but in phraseology, when the Books containing them were written — were probably intended to be in more full explanation of their reason and d,e- 104 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. sign. — The variations between Exodus xx, and Deuteronomy v, are quite unimportant. The principal one is in the fourth commandment : two reasons are given for the sanctification of the Sabbath, the Creation and the Exodus. Both are valid : the one does not exclude the other ; of both events was it in remembrance. These Ten Words are called " the covenant which Jehovah commanded the people to perform ..... and He wrote them upon two tables of stone."* * Dent. iv. 13.—" Another contradiction is asserted to be found between the accounts given in Exodus and Deutero nomy of the Ten Commandments. Dr. Colenso asserts that each professes to give the identical ' woi ds which were spoken ' by Jehovah Himself at the very same point of time ' Dr. Colenso forgets that in Deuteronomy, Moses is professedly recapitulating the events of the previous forty years ; and if he gave the substance of the Ten Commandme'ts, nothing more was needed to effect the purpose he had in view. These Ten Commandments were matter of notoriety among the Israelites ; and any person professing to give them verbatim could have obtained an exact copy. No man in his sound senses would deem the reflection on the Fourth Command. ment which is inserted in the spoken address of Moses to his people to be intended as part of the two tables. When it is said that God ' added no more,' this applies only to the sub stance of the commandments. The neologists must be in sad want of a few real contradictions to fly to such a miserable refuge as arguments like these!" — The Quarterly Review April, 1863, p. 435. II, 28. THE DECALOGUE. 105 For clearness, applicability, and comprehensive ness, there is only another that can compare with it — the beautiful epitome of itself by the Great Teacher. This has been well stated in the following paragraph — " The manner in which these commandments were de livered is sufficient to prove their pre-eminent importance — being spoken immediately by the voice of God ; while the rest of the Divine directions were communicated privately to Moses, and by him given to the people. They were fundamental laws ; and were selected not only on account of their intrinsic and universal importance, by which they are distinguished from the ceremonial and political regula tions afterwards given; but also 'probably because the Israelites and their Egyptian and Canaanitish neighbours were peculiarly prone to the sins here specifically forbidden. Upon these and other subjects, our Saviour's commandments are contained in the sermon on the mount — Matt. ch. v. — vii. In these commandments a natural order is observable. They present (1) Jehovah as the sole object of worship >" (2) the mode of worship accordant with His spiritual nature ; (3) the intelligent reverence, and (4) the constant regularity required in worship. They then provide rules for our social life; beginning with (5) its foundation in family relations ; and forbidding any actions injurious to (6) the life, (7) the personal purity, (8) the property, and (9) the reputation of others ; as well as (10) all selfish and irregular desires. It is further to be noticed that though most of these laws specify actions, the ninth refers to words, 106 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. and the tenth extends to the thoughts and desires of the heart.'"* 29. In forming our views of the means of benefit ing a people, we should consider not what is absolutely, but relatively the best ; adaptation to circumstances will often be found of more im portance than intrinsic excellence. That philan thropist would manifest little knowledge of human nature, and of the way to elevate barbarous or semi-civilized tribes, who should at once seek to introduce among them the higher arts and sciences, our delicate mechanism, our beautiful painting or sculpture, our chemistry and astrono my, or even our steam-engines, railroads, or electric telegraphs. These things may come by- and-by, but in the meantime our Matebele, Kafirs and Zulus have to be educated. We make use of pictures; we address them through the senses; we lead them on step by step before we introduce them to our higher civilization. It was thus with the religious education of the world. Have we no analogies in nature and in providence of the Infinite One, with wisdom and power unlimited, * The Annotated Paragraph Bible, vol i. 76. — For.a full and beautiful exposition of The Decalogue : its comprehensiveness, permanence, and spirituality, see Dr. Wardlaw's Systematic Theology, vol. iii. 245—267, 371—642. II, 29. ADAPTATION NECESSARY. 107 and in perfect harmony with both, gradually unfolding the riches of His creative energy and the completeness of His superintending care ? — It has been so in religion. — Light was given as men were able to receive it : the most certain history — the Biblical — shows that revelation has been progressive, in analogy with material light, and the wonderful adaptation of the eye to it, from twilight and early dawn to mid-day splen dour. As in the material world, however, there are times when thick clouds pass over the sun and prevent his rays being seen, so it has been in the spiritual. The light enjoyed in the Patri archal times was greatly obscured during the sojourn of the Israelites in Egypt, — " the pomps, processions, and imposing ordinances of the country had usurped an influence over their minds, and had incapacitated them from wholly returning to the plain and unsophisticated system of their ancestors." — What was the remedy? We can be at no loss to discover it in the record of facts. The isolation, and surrounding with restraining and quickening influences, of the Hebrew people were to form the means of edu cation, and to be part of one grand scheme which contemplated not their own benefit merely, but eventually the highest good of the human race : " it was the bringing in of a better hope." 108 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. 30. The Ceremonial Law — " added because -of transgressions,"* — must in justice to itself, be viewed in connection with the circumstances of the time in which it was given, and as intended to be adapted thereto. Was there not danger to be apprehended from the idolatry and supersti tious customs of the neighbouring nations? Hence intercourse with them was forbidden and guarded against. " The restrictions," says Dr. Townley, " which were made with respect to diet, especially by the division of animals into ' clean ' and ' unclean,' were eminently calculated to prevent intimacies with the Egyptians and Canaanites and other idolaters, and to prevent their ' table from becoming a snare ; and that which should have been for their welfare becoming a trap.' Psalm lxix. 22. It has, consequently, been well remarked, that ' this statute, above all others, established not only a political and sacred, but a physical separation of the Jews from all other people. It made it next to impossible for the one to mix with the other, either in meals or in marriage, or in any familiar connection. Their opposite customs in the article of diet not only precluded a friendly and comfortable intimacy, but generated mutual contempt and abhorrence. The Jews religiously abhorred the society, manners, and institutions of the Gentiles, because * Gal. iii. 19. — " The office of the law was to make trans gression palpable, to awaken a conviction of sin in the heart, and make man feel his need of a Saviour. It was thus also necessarily temporary; for when the Seed did' come, higher influences began to work within.'' — Bishop Ellicott. II, 30. THE CEREMONIAL LAW. 109 they viewed their own abstinence from forbidden meats as a token of peculiar sanctity, and of course regarded other nations who wanted this sanctity as vile and detestable. They considered themselves as secluded by God himself from the profane world, by a peculiar worship, government, law, dress, mode of living, and country. Though this sepa ration from other people, on which the law respecting food was founded, created in the Jews a criminal pride and hatred of the Gentiles, yet it forcibly operated as a preservative from heathen idolatry, by precluding all familiarity with idolatrous nations.' 'Ye shall therefore,' said Jehovah, ' put difference between clean beasts and unclean, and between unclean fowls and elean ; and ye shall not make your souls abominable by beast or by fowl, or by any manner of living thing that creepeth on the ground, which I have separated from you as unclean : and ye shall be holy unto me ; for I the Lord am holy, and have severed you from other people that you should be mine.' " Lev. xx. 25, 26.* The Israelites, to use the beautiful figure of Moses, were like the young eaglets, in their inexperience ; for " As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings, so the Lord alone did lead them:" — He led them in this their state of pupilage, and through them His chosen Church upon earth, and prepared them for a more per- * The Seasons of the Laws of Moses from the "More Nevochim" of Maimonides, by James Townley, D.D., pp. 66, 67. 110 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. feet development of religious life, "in the fulness of time." — The Ceremonial Law was intended not only to preserve the people free from the contaminations of heathenism, but to keep up the primeval expectation of a Messiah, by its sacrificial rites. Of these there were several kinds, inasmuch as from the nature of the case the type contains less than the antitype. " Various kinds of sacrifices, with different cere monies, were prescribed, in order to give as complete a representation as possible of all the great truths respecting the sinner's reconciliation to God ; and to afford suitable expression to the diversified wants and feelings of the worshippers." In the book of Leviticus, chapters i. — vii. we have the law of the sin-offering — for " ignorance on the part of the priest, the congregation, the ruler, or of the people :" — of the trespass-offering — for "concealing his knowledge, for touching an unclean thing, or for making an oath :" — of the burnt-offering " which was of pre-eminent dignity . . . . it was the offering of the ancient patriarchs. . . . The entire consuming beto kened the unlimited self-dedication of the offerer to God:"* — of the peace-offering for a thanks- *See the article Offerings in The Treasury of Bible Knowledge, by the Rev. J. Ayre, M.A., pp. 643—645. An II, 30. FEASTS AND OFFERINGS. Ill giving or for a vow : — and of the meat and drink- offerings, unbloody offerings accompanying the burnt-offering and the peace-offering. — Sacrifices were offered according to the prescribed ritual, as the occasion required, or as the feelings of the people prompted. Morning and evening of each day, on the Sabbath, on the new moons, and on the yearly festivals — the Passover, the feast of. Pentecost, and the feast of Tabernacles — Lev. xxiii. — were they offered. The most solemn ceremony of the year was that on the great day of expiation, when the High Priest, clad in sacred vestments, after offering sacrifice first for himself and then for the sins of the people, entered into the inmost sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, and made atonement, by the sprink ling of blood ; and when the scape-goat upon whose head the hands of the priest having been placed, confession was made " over him of all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat," as a type of Him who beareth our iniquities, and the goat was then admirable work, and having this further recommendation, that the price is so low as to place it within easy reach. The sub ject is fully discussed in Fairbairn's Typology of Scripture, vol.ii.p. 317—357. 112 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. " sent away by the hand of a fit man," appointed beforehand, " into the wilderness." Lf v. xvi. — On the evening of that sacred day, once in every fifty years, the silver trumpet was sounded, and the year of Jubilee was proclaimed, and with it was the cancelling of debts, the restoration of inheritances, and the freedom of every Israelite who had been sold into bondage. Lev. xxv. An institution which could have been accepted by the people only before their entrance into Canaan, and on the ground of its appointment by Jehovah ; and an institution that was typi cal of the spiritual liberty proclaimed by Jesus, the Messiah. Isaiah Ixi. 2. Luke iv. 16 — 21. 31. Another object proposed by the Mosaic dis pensation was to educate the people, by the consecration to Jehovah of places, things, sea sons, acts, and persons, and by the frequent purifications it required, — to be a type for all coming time of the Church of the Living God among men. — " It was only the Ritual," says Lowman, "that* was properly the Law of God, by Moses ; the moral was given, together with the very nature of man, at his first creation. Now the Ritual had its own proper sanc tion in temporal rewards and punishments ; the moral Law had, from the beginning, the sanction II, 31. LAW INTRODUCTORY TO THE GOSPEL. 113 of future rewards and punishments ; and so actually had them, at the very time the Law was given, and on the same evidence given to Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and all the pious patri archs."* The full significance of this part of the Mosaic dispensation has been beautifully, and with no less truth, set forth by the Poet Cowper : " Israel, in ancient days, Not only had a view Of Sinai in a blaze, But learned the Gospel too ; The types and figures were a glass In which they saw a Saviour's face." In fact, to quote the language of the Apostle Paul, " the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ." Judaism was introductory to Christianity : they were parts of one vast system of sovereign mercy, embracing all time. " Now this being the case," to use the words of Bishop Sherlock, as quoted by Lowman, " 'tis evident, that the promise of a blessing to all nations subsisted in its full force and vigour during the continuance of the Law of Moses ; for as that promise was not completed by the giving of the Law, in which all nations were not concerned, so neither could so general a promise be annulled or set aside, by a private Law, given to one people only. Hence another question proper to be considered, with respect to the state * On the Fundamental Law of the Mosaic Institutions : see Appendix B. I 114 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. of religion under the Jewish dispensation is this, how far the religion of th'e Jews was preparatory to that new dis pensation, which was in due time to be revealed, in accom plishment of the promises made to all nations. Now, if Abraham and his posterity were chosen, not merely for their own sakes, or out of any partial views or regards towards them, but to be instruments in the hand of God for bringing about his great designs in the world; if the tem poral Covenant was given for the sake of the everlasting Covenant^ and to be subservient to the introduction of it, 'tis highly probable, that all parts of the Jewish dispensation were adapted to serve the same end ; and that the Law, founded on the temporal Covenant was intended, as the temporal Covenant itself was, to prepare the way to better promises. If this appears upon the whole to be a reasonable supposition,, then have we a foundation to inquire into the meaning of the lay; not merely, as it is a literal command to the Jews, but as containing the figure and image of good things to come. It can hardly be supposed, that God intending finally to save the world by Christ, and the preaching of the Gospel, should give an intermediate Law, which should have no respect nor relation to the Covenant which He intended to establish for ever. And whoever will be at the pains to consider seriously the whole administration of Providence together, from the beginning to the end, may see perhaps more reason than he imagines to allow of types and figures in the Jewish Law." "The evidence and use of this important observation plainly appear in the epistle to the Hebrews. None can, I think, observe with any attention, how the rites of the Hebrew worship, as explained and applied to the Christian Covenant, agree so surprisingly in everything with it, but he must be persuaded with the Apostle, that they were II, 32. SUMMARY BY MILTON. 115 designed to be figures, or, in the common expression, types of the good things to come."* 32. The reply to the question — " Wherefore then serveth the Law?" may be given in the fol lowing forcible and instructive lines by our great Epic Poet : — " And therefore was law given them, to evince Their natural pravity, by stirring up Sin against law to fight ; that when they see Law can discover sin, but not remove, * A Rational of the Ritual of the Hebrew Worship ; in which the wise designs and usefulness of that Ritual are explained, and vindicated from objections. By Moses Lowman ; pp. 31, 32, London : 1748.— My revered Tutor, the late Rev. Dr. J. Pye Smith, wrote of this able divine as follows : — " His works were principally directed to the defence of Divine Revelation, especially in its earlier and incomplete stages, against both its disguised and its open adversaries. His books on ' The Civil Polity of the Hebrews ' and ' The Ritual of the Hebrew Worship ' are of great value to the serious inquirer. Though written so long before the time of the thinly veiled infidelity which shows itself in the writings of Eichhorn, "Wegscheider, Gramberg, and other men of our days, they furnish the solid grounds of evidence, and even the elements of specific reply, which are sufficient to show the flimsy foundations of modern Antisupranaturalism. In this view, besides the more comprehensive purposes of Biblical knowledge, those v orks deserve to be attentively studied by the young theologians of our age," I 2 116 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. Save by those shadowy expiations weak, The blood of bulls and goats : they may conclude Some blood more precious must be paid for man — Just for unjust ; that in such righteousness To them by faith imputed, they may find Justification towards God, and peace Of conscience ; which the law, by ceremonies, Cannot appease nor man the moral part Perform, and not performing cannot live. So law appears imperfect ; and but given With purpose to resign them, in full time, Up to a better covenant ; disciplined Prom shadowy types to truth — from flesh to spirit From imposition of strict laws, to free Acceptance of large grace — from servile fear To filial — works of law to works of faith. And therefore shall not Moses, though of God Highly beloved, being but the minister Of law, his people into Canaan lead ; But Joshua, whom the Gentiles Jesus call ; His name and office bearing, who shall quell The adversary — serpent, and bring back, Through the world's wilderness long-wandered man Safe to eternal Paradise of rest."8 — Milton. 33. It would be wrong to suppose that all the Levitical legislation, with its minute and burden some ritual, could be, or, indeed, was intended to be, observed in the Wilderness. The people * Paradise Lost, book xii. 287—314. II, 33. COULD NOT BE KEPT IN THE DESERT. 1 17 had not the means of providing for the offerings, nor the convenience during their state of pil grimage of attending to the rites, required by the Law. These had reference to the future, and contemplated a settled life in Canaan, when the Israelites had ceased from their wanderings, their dangers, and their toils. It is certain that much had been kept in abeyance. — "Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes. For ye are not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the Lord your God giveth you. But when ye go over Jordan, and dwell in the land which the Lord your God giveth you to inherit, and when He giveth you rest from all your enemies round about, so that ye dwell in safety ; then there shall be a place which the Lord your God shall choose, to cause His name to dwell there ; thither shall ye bring all that I command you ; your burnt-offerings, and your sacrifices, your tithes, and the heave offering of your hand, and all your choice vows which ye vow unto the Lord : and ye shall re joice before the Lord your God, ye, and your sons, and your daughters, and your men- servants, and your maid-servants, and the Levite that is within your gates ; forasmuch as he 118 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. hath no part nor inheritance with you." Deut. xii. 8—12. 34. The Judicial, or Political Aspect of the Mosaic Law has been already adverted to. Jehovah was the supreme Head of the Common wealth. He alone exercised the true prerogatives of government. By Him, after the manner of Eastern nations, war was declared, and peace restored. As chief Proprietor and Lord of the soil, the people held their lands under Him, in return for which they paid Him tribute, or rendered Him personal service ; but no taxes could be levied without His authority, nor more than ordinary, routine work entered upon without the sanction which he conveyed by the Oracle — the Urim and the Thummim* probably the twelve precious stones in the Breastplate of the High Priest, on which were engraven the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. The answer to the High Priest consulting it seems to have been by an audible voice from the Presence, or Shechinah; as "Moses heard the voice of one speaking to him from off the Mercy-seat." This * Exod. xxviii. 30. Lev. viii. 8. Num. vii. 29 ; xxvii. 21. Judges'i. 1 • xx. 18, 23, 26, 27. 1 Sam. xiv. 3, 18 ; xxiii. 2, 12 ; xxx. 7, 8.— See Lowman on the Ritual, p. 126—129. 11,34. POLITICAL aspect of THE LAW. 119 was in perfect contrast with the enigmatical and ambiguous answers of the heathen oracles ! All legislation was from Jehovah ; nothing remained to the people but to obey. The Law was the only statute-book ; but it was perfect, and during the Theocracy, needed not, and never received, alteration to adapt it more fully to the circum stances of the people. What human laws were ever thus, and at once, brought to such a state of perfection ? — The oral Law contained in the Mishna was a subsequent growth, and was pro fessedly in explanation of the written Law, — a commentary thereon, a kind of " Coke upon Littleton."* 35. Each tribe, city, and head of a family, as in the patriarchal times, retained self-government ; but in subordination to Jehovah as Chief. The union of the several tribes formed the general * " And Moses' laws, from the beginning, were so perfect that they never need to be changed for the better ; but were contrived with such wisdom from the beginning, although it was in times of the greatest rudeness, that they were brought at once to the utmost height of their perfection, which never happens in human laws. And for this reason, those laws were never changed, which yet is very frequently wont to happen to all laws merely human."— President Edwards, from Turretine, in Misc. Obs., p. 145. 120 CHARACTER and DESIGN ? SECT. government of the Hebrew nation, but without, as intimated above, any proper legislative power. — The constitution was fixed, and so well balanced, that no part of it, and least of all the sacerdotal, could, without the concurrence of the rest, over turn or alter it.* — What revolution can be * " The rank of the Priests and Levites, as ministers of religion, as the men of best understanding and knowledge in the laws, as of great interest in the nation and influence in the administration of justice, might have proved too great a balance of power in one tribe, if they had retained with these advantages a considerable property in land and an united independent Government in themselves, as one of the tribes of Israel, according to the model of the other tribes or provinces. I cannot but look upon it is as a wise intention, and an original design in the constitution, appointed with great political skill to cut off all possible abuse of such power and influence as their character might give them. By these means they were deprived of all power to hurt the liberty of the other tribes, or any ways endanger the constitution by any ambitious views or projects : for not only all the estates of the Levites, but their persons too, were given into the hands of the other tribeB, as so many hostages and as a security for their good behaviour. They were so separated from one another, that they could no way mutually assist each other in any ambitious design. They were so dispersed among the other tribes, that it was absolutely in their power, upon any national quarrel, or even on a suspicion of any ill designs of the Levites, to put a stop to their whole livelihood, and seize on all their persons at once. You may hence perceive, that whatever power or influence the constitution gave the Levites to do good, the same constitution carefully provided to put it out of their power to II, 35. LEVITES POWERLESS FOR HARM. 121 effected in a State without the combination of numbers agreed in their object, and without those " sinews of war," money and arms ? But the tribe of Levi, including the Priests, were only a fraction of the community, and they were so scattered over the land of Israel, on both sides Jordan, in the forty-eight cities allotted them — Joshua xxi. — as to be unable effectually to combine against the liberties, civil, religious, or ecclesi astical, of the other tribes. Moreover, they were dependent for their support mainly on the good-will and right-feeling of the people among whom they dwelt, and to whom they ministered. The Levites threw themselves, to a great extent, upon the generosity and religious willing-hood of those they served, as the appointed means of realizing the faithfulness of Him who said, " Wherefore Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren ; the Lord is his inheritance, according as the Lord thy God promised him." —Deut. x. 9 ; xii. 12, 18, 19 ; xiv. 27, 29. The assembly of the whole people was called do ill, either to disturb the peace or endanger the liberties of their country." — A Dissertation on the Civil Government of the Hebrews in which the true designs, and nature of their Gov ernment are explained. By Moses Lowman, pp. 123, 124. London ; 1740. 122 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. the congregation. There were also the princes of the assembly ; those called to the assembly ; those deputed to the assembly ; and the elders of the assembly, or senators. These assemblies were convened by the actual chief magistrate, by the sound of trumpet, usually at the door of the Tabernacle, or at some spot of more than ordinary celebrity. During the lifetime of Moses he announced to these assemblies the commands of God, and they in turn to the families of the people, until they were universally known : — a plan simple and effective ! 36. The laws respecting persons andproperty — including provision for the stranger, the father less, and the widow, so touchingly commended to sympathy and aid by the motive found in the words, "And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in the land of Egypt ; therefore I command thee to do this thing : — and for the maintenance of individual and social, personal and relative rights — of father and son, of hus band and wife, of master and servant, and of the natural-born subject and the alien : — and for the punishment of crime — of offences against God, and offences against man : — all these laws were, compared with the age, and with the circumstances II, 37. administration of the law. 123 of the people for whom they were designed, eminently wise and beneficent. 37. The laws are administered for the " punish ment of evil-doers, and for the praise of them that do well." With whom rested the duty of enforcing those of Israel, and what were the penalties to be inflicted on transgressors ? The Civil Magis trate, as under all regular governments, had jurisdiction in secular matters, and visited with punishment all infractions of the law. Without including the tribe of Levi, there were Judges of tens, of hundreds, and of thousands. Jeth- ro's advice led to this arrangement. In the directions given to Moses by Jehovah Himself, the provision for the administration of the Law is clearly made known, "Judges and officers shalt thou make in all thy gates, which the Lord thy God giveth thee, throughout thy tribes ; and they shall judge the people with just judgment." Exod. xviii. 19—26. Deut. xvi. 18—20.— Some offences, as Blasphemy, Sabbath-breaking, Unchastity, Idolatry, and some other offences not deemed such by Modern Legislation, were liable to be punished with death : they were considered not merely as against society in general, but especially as against the head of the 124 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. State, Jehovah Himself. There were some offences punished by "cutting off from the people," such as the breach of Morals, of Cove nant, and of Ritual. 38. The question arises, could the Civil Magis trate distrain for tithes, or first-fruits, or for the redemption-money of the firstborn, or could he compel the people to offer the appointed sacri fices, or otherwise to support the worship of God? Where do we find the list of "pains and penalties" to be inflicted on such evil-doers as withheld them ? In one sense they were volun tary, but in another, and in that being the appointment of Jehovah, they were of the highest obligation. — Moreover, and unhappily, there were times in the subsequent history of the Theocracy, when he, the Chief Magistrate, who was the Viceroy of Jehovah, proved dis loyal, and an apostate from the Covenant, and, as may be imagined, the defection became general. — In either case, but more especially that of the nation, Jehovah took the vindication of his claims into His own hands, and avenged His own cause, by withholding temporal blessings, and by inflicting temporal punishments. — The sanctions of the Sinaitic Covenant, of the Mosaics II, 38. sanctions in this life. 125 dispensation as such, and apart from the Abra- hamic or Gospel Covenant, which existed along side of it, as a precious heritage from the past, including the knowledge possessed by the Patri archs of the one, living, and true God, and the promise of a future Deliverer, — such sanctions were confined to this life* The changes introduced into the Hebrew Com monwealth after the death of the great Legislator, by the institution of monarchy, do not come within our present subject. They had, however, been foreseen and provided for. " In conclusion, we may remark, that the more the Mosaic code of Laws is studied, the more fully shall we be con vinced of its Divine origin, and of the wisdom, prudencei and mercy pervading every part of it. The Jews had been in bondage to a cruel and idolatrous nation ; their minds were debased, and their habits were sensualized ; yet they were to become the depositaries of the Divine Law, and the harbingers of the Messiah. Some of the precepts guarded them against idolatrous practices, and inculcated hatred of them; others directed them to the unity, purity, justice, and mercy of Jehovah. Some institutions prefigured the blessings of Messiah's reign ; others symbolized the necessity of atone ment ; and others impressed the conviction of personal sinfulness; whilst, as a whole, they induced humility, elevated the mind to God, promoted holiness, and directed * Lev. xxvi. Deut. xxviii. I Sam ii. 30. What led to the captivity in Babylon ? The reply is given, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21. 126 character and design ? SECT. to the great Redeemer : fully justifying the appeal of Moses: — " What nation is there so great, that hath STATUTES AND JUDGMENTS SO RIGHTEOUS AS ALL THIS LAW, WHICH I SET BEFORE YOU THIS DAY ?" (Deut. iv. 8.)* 39. We now return to the history. — A year had now passed since the Israelites left Egypt, a year of great events and of signal mercies. The Tabernacle had been erected ; — Aaron and his sons had been consecrated to the Priests' office ; — sacrifices of atonement had been offered to Jehovah ; — the second Passover had been cele brated ; — and a second mustering or numbering of the people had taken place ; — and the two sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, had "died before, the Lord" for their presumption in offer ing " strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not." Lev. x. 1 — 5. — Again the camp is in motion, and we read of it in the desert of Paran. — Eight different murmurings of the people are recorded, and as many instances of punishment. At one time, the length of the way is the subject of complaint, and at another the nature of their food, or the want of water. Other trials arose ; and jealousy, as it led to * The Reasons of the Laws of Moses, by Dr. Townley, pp. 433, 434. II, 40. REBELLION PUNISHED. 127 rebellion, or to speaking evil of the constituted authorities, was visited with severe penalties, as in the case of Korah,* Dathan, and Abiram. A decided expression of Jehovah's will with reference to the priesthood was now given by means of the rods of the princes of the different tribes, when the man's rod whom He chose was made to blossom. Aaron's rod was thus dis tinguished, and it was ordered to be kept by the ark of the testimony as " a token against the rebels." — And it was so kept, along with another memorial of the national life, " the golden pot that had manna." Num. xvi. xvii. Heb. ix. 4. 40. About the middle of the second year's pil grimage, twelve men (a representative from each tribe) were sent from Kadesh-Barnea to " search the land of Canaan," and the report brought on their return so discouraged the people, that in their utter despondency of soul they uttered loud * " From some cause which does not clearly appear, the children of Korah were not involved in the destruction of their father, as we are expressly told in Numbers xxvi. II, and as appears from the continuance of the family of the Korahites to the reign, at least, of Jehoshaphat (2 Chron. xx. 1 9), and probably till the return from the Captivity ( 1 Chron. ix. 19, 31)." Compare Num. xvi. 16— 18, 25— Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Korah, vol. ii, 50. See the explanation in Graves on the Pentateuch, pp. 67—71. 128 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. bewailings. " And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt," Once more they had proved themselves unworthy of the good land promised to Abraham and his seed, and naught remained but that they should wander in the wilderness, until the generation which had been debased by servitude had passed away. This would not be until forty years from the Exode. — May not the 90th Psalm refer to this occasion, and be regarded as a "kind of dirge upon those sentenced thus awfully by God to waste away in the wilderness ?" It has been called the "funeral hymn of the world." — It seemed hard for them to submit, and other judgments came upon them ; first a plague, and then discomfiture in an unauthorized war with the Amalekites. With Jehovah there is no respect of persons : not even Moses and Aaron were permitted to enter Canaan, because they had sinned, both in action and language, at the rock Meribah. Is not the impartiality of the narrative an evidence of its truthfulness ? Of Moses, the wise, the patriotic, the disinterested leader, his failings one and all are recorded, and his fond hopes are shown to be blighted! Would fiction deal thus with its hero? — Forty-four stations of the Israelites on their pilgrimage are 11,40. PHYSICAL CHANGES IN THE DESERT. 129 mentioned ; but very few of them can now be identified. The immediate result was that Sihon, King of the Amorites, and Og, King of Bashan, submitted to their victorious arms, and Balak, King of Moab, was no longer able to resist their progress. May not the country have undergone great changes since the wondrous events recorded in the Pentateuch !* — Recent travellers, how ever, have added considerably to our stock of knowledge of the regions traversed by the Israel ites, and have cleared up or greatly lessened the * " Facts can be adduced which confirm, and indeed go far beyond, the conjectures of travellers who have pointed out that the supply of water, and the general fertility of the district, must have been very difEerent before the process of denudation, which has been going on for ages, and is now in active progress, had commenced. We have now proofs from - inscriptions coeval with the pyramids, both in Egypt and in the Peninsula, that under the Pharaohs of the third to the eighteenth dynasty, ages before Moses, and up to his "time, the whole district was occupied by a population, whose resources and numbers must have been considerable, since they were able to resist the forces of the Egyptians, who sent large armies in repeated but unsuccessful attempts to subjugate the Peninsula Every horde of Arabs, who have since been virtually its masters, bent only on sup. plying their own limited wants, cut down without remorse the shrubs and trees, on which the water supply, and consequently the general fertility of the district, mainly depend."— Speaker's Commentary, vol. i. 245, 130 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. difficulties in the narrative at one time felt by the Biblical student. 41. The last stage of the wonderful and deeply interesting biography is reached. Brief glances have been obtained of the child born in troublous times, — of the young man of religious decision, — of the fugitive to Midian, — of the deliverer of his people, — of the wise lawgiver, able general, and disinterested patriot— who, be it remarked, made no provision for his own family, his sons remaining undistinguished among the Levites, and having no civil office conferred upon them ! — and, in short, of Moses, the representative and leading man of that dispensation of sovereign mercy towards the Hebrew nation which has been their glory and the wonder of ages ; for to them, borrowing the words of the Apostle, slightly modified, "pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the Law, and the service of God, and the promises ; whose were the fathers, and of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen." Rom ix. 4, 5. 42. Do we seek further evidence that the subject of this biography was a truly great II, 42. MOSES A GREAT PROPHET. 131 and good man? It is at hand. As the sun descending below the horizon on a calm sum mer evening, appears larger and more glorious than at noon, so it was with Moses. He never appeared greater than just before his mys terious disappearance in the land of Moab. In the last year of his life the prophetic spirit came upon him, and he foretold the rising up of a Prophet from the midst of Israel, one of the brethren, like unto himself, who, as he, should act as Mediator, and be a Legislator, Governor, and Teacher, — one who should introduce a new Dispensation, which should supersede his own, and prove Him, in consequence, greater than his type and forerunner. This likeness to Him- Belf was acknowledged by our Lord, but He said the same of none other of the ancient prophets, although Elijah appeared with Him and Moses at the Transfiguration recorded by the Evan gelists. — Under the same Divine influence, when warning the people of the consequences of dis obedience, that he might induce them to observe the Law, and to fear the name of Jehovah, — their covenant God and King, — he set before them an enumeration of punishments of the most distressing kind, and also of blessings the most signal, all of which have come upon them at one K 2 132 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. period or other of their remarkable history.* — Naught but pure, deep, faithful love could have led the good old man to adopt a course so uncongenial with his general spirit, and now tender leave-taking. The correspondence between the prediction and the event, in so many particulars, establishes the character of Moses as a true Prophet of God. He was moreover, a Prophet in the widest sense, the, "spokesman" of Jehovah. "He is," says Dean Stanley, " the first, as he is the greatest, example of a Prophet in the O. T. The name is indeed applied to Abraham before — Gen. xx. 7, — but so casually as not to enforce our attention. But in the case of Moses, it is given with peculiar emphasis. In a certain sense, he appears as the centre of a prophetic circle, now for the first time named." .... "But Moses rose high above all these. The others are spoken of as more or less inferior. Their communications were made to them in dreams and figures. Deut. xiii. 1 — 4; Num. xii. 6. — But 'Moses was not so.' With him the Divine revelations were made, 'mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches, * Deut. xviii. 15, xxxviii. throughout. II, 42. MOSES SPECIALLY FAVOURED. 133 and the similitude of Jehovah shall he behold.' In the Mussulman legends his surname is 'Kelim Allah,' ' the spoken to by God.' "* — John Smith of Cambridge writes, " The prophetical spirit did not always manifest itself eodem vigore luminis — with the same clearness and evidence, in the same exaltation of its light : but sometimes that light was more strong and vivid, sometimes more wan and obscure ; which seems to be insinuated by that passage, ' God, who in time past spake unto the fathers by the prophets iroXvfiepZs rat TroXvrp&mDs (in many portions and in divers manners). So, we find an evident difference of prophetical illu mination asserted in Scripture between Moses and the rest of the prophets : ' And there arose not a prophet since, in Israel, like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face :' which words have a manifest reference to that which God Himself, in a more public and open way, declared concerning Moses, upon occasion of some arrogant speeches of Aaron and Miriam, who would equalize their own degree of prophecy to that of Moses. "f 43. One of his last acts, after addressing words of encouragement to the people he had served so * Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. MoseS, vol. ii. 429 f Select Discourses, p. 178, 179, Cambridge, 1859. 134 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. long, and so well, was to give over his charge to his attendant Joshua, with the graceful benedic tion pronounced " in the sight of all Israel, Be strong and of a good courage ; for thou must go with this people unto the land which the Lord hath sworn unto their fathers to give them, and thou shalt cause them to inherit it." — The book of the Law was then deposited in the side of— as the two tables of stone, containing the Decalogue had been already been placed within — the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord their God, to be for a witness against the people. After this solemn act, " Moses spake in the ears of all the congre gation of Israel the words" of that inspired song which combines imagination with tender ness and strength, rarely equalled, and fore shadows that happy time, now no longer future, when the nations in general may be invited to rejoice with Israel in the triumphs of Divine mercy over every form of evil, and to be blessed in the great Deliverer. — The blessing of this " man of God " then descends upon the twelve tribes of Israel, severally and unitedly, in terms full of force and beauty; and this over, with his heart still warm as ever towards the people for whom his life had been spent, he went up to the ' top of Pisgah, and saw the goodly land which II, 43. MOSES TAKEN TO HIS REST. 135 had been so long the goal of his desires, and turning away disappointed, yet resigned, " in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth- peor," he was taken to his rest. With slight alteration we may apply to Moses the beautiful words —" Of life's past toils, the fading trace Hath given that aged patriarch's face Expression, holy, deep, resigned, The calm sublimity of mind. Years o'er his snowy head have past, And left him of his race the last, Alone on earth ; but yet his mien Is bright with majesty serene : And those high hopes, whose guiding star Shines from eternal worlds afar, Have with that light illumed his eye Whose fount is immortality ; And o'er his features poured a ray Of glory, not to pass away ; One to sublimer worlds allied, One from all passions purified, — Even now half mingled with the sky, And all prepared, oh, not to die, But, like the prophet, to aspire To heaven's triumphal car of fire!" — Hemans. The unknown chronicler adds, " And Moses was an hundred and twenty years old when he died : his eye was not dim, nor his natural force 136 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. abated." The tendency of the human mind to superstition so likely to be indulged in connec tion with the name of one who stood so high in moral worth, and who had been so great a public benefactor, was, in mercy, without the fostering influence of a visible monument, for " no man knoweth of his sepulchre to this day."* Is not this, by anticipation, a silent rebuke of the practice which has obtained in all ages and in all lands of pilgrimages to alleged sacred shrines, at spots of supposed historic interest ? 44. Here may be introduced from Dr. Seiler the following judicious observations : they are not, however, so complete as the truth of the case demands, unless we understand that by the words " similar objects " there is intended to be a distinct reference to the Messiah whom "Moses did say should come." Of Dr. Seiler it was said by his learned editor, Dr. Heringa, he " appeared to me to incline to, or make too many concessions in favour of, those methods of interpreting the Holy Scriptures, which are now, alas ! so prevalent in Germany, and against which he has himself not only entered his protest in his former writings, but given most appro- * Deut. xxxiv. 6, 7. 11,43. RULES OF INTERPRETATION. 137 priate warnings in some passages of the present work." — It is an Author of such a character who thus writes : — " The christian interpreter is bound to make great dis tinctions in the Mosaical laws. " 1 . The writings of Moses contain the eternal, unchange able moral laws, which define the duty of mankind towards God, their neighbour, and themselves. These lie scattered throughout the whole history, both before and after the giv ing of the law ; they are recommended by examples, and inculcated by forcible admonitions. Exod xxii. xxiii. Levit. xix. xxviii. Deut. vi. vii x. The history of Abra ham, and more especially that of Joseph, recorded by Moses in his first book, abounds in moral principles. " 2. The writings of Moses contain also temporary and local laws, relating partly to the sacrificial worship, and certain other ceremonies, and partly to political objects. These were founded on the peculiar nature, the unrefined sensuousness, and the limited degree of enlightenment, of the people to whom they were given, and, in some measure, on the circumstances of the country in which the Israelites abode for forty years, and the land which was to be their future dwelling-place ; but chiefly on the remarkable designation of the genuine Israelite and true worshipper of God, by whom in the course of time, the knowledge and worship of God were to be preserved to futurity, or again to be restored, and finally spread over all nations." " The following rules are here added, in order to enable fixture interpreters to form more accurate judgments of the intrinsic worth and the true sense of the various laws of Moses. 138 CHARACTER AND DESIGN? SECT. " Many of the ordinances which were given to the Israel ites for a certain definite time were intended to serve, to maintain a perpetual memory of the great truth, that there is but one God. Some, to preserve the people from poly theism, and other heathen abominations. Others, to furnish the Israelites with something similar to, but better than, the external worship of the idolaters, in order that they should feel no inclination to be present at their pompous worship. Many of the ceremonial institutions and religious usages served as a constant stimulus to the practice of their duties towards God, to trusting in his grace, to loving and obeying him. (Hereunto appertain sin and thank-offerings, feasts, new moons, and sabbaths.) Not a few of these ordinances tended to excite the Israelites to works of philan thropy and brotherly love. (For example, the feast-offer ings.) By others the several communities were habituated to cleanliness, and to abstinence from unwholesome food; and these and such like injunctions had the additional object of promoting population in the state. Several ordinances were designed to restrain the Israelites from certain excesses — for instances, incest, — and from cruelty to men and beasts, — and gradually to civilize the rude inhabitants. These, and similar objects of the law of Moses, serve the more strongly to lead the interpreter to observe therein the hidden wisdom of the Deity, which is concealed from the eye of the com mon observer." — Biblical Hermeneutics, pp. 190 — 193. London: Westley and Davis, 1835. 45. The advocate for the genuineness and authenticity of the Pentateuch is not confined to a Bingle line of proof : there are several distmctlines II, 45. SUMMARY OF FACTS. 139 which are mutually dependent and in confirma tion of each other. They may be briefly summed up as follows : — the book of Genesis is its own witness of inspired authorship, and its history of Abraham's family is carried forward in Exodus : — Israel went down to Egypt in favourable cir cumstances, but afterwards was greatly oppressed: — Moses, whose early and later life is described, was not a man likely to mistake the call of God : — the deliverance of Israel from Egypt after 215 years' sojourn, and now become a numerous people, could have been effected only in some such way as described, by the infliction of plagues supernaturally, upon their oppressors : — the sus tenance of this great multitude during the forty years' wanderings in the wilderness is evidence of Jehovah's providential care : — the Covenant made with Israel at Sinai and the Law then given, taken in connection with what preceded and followed, are abundantly established — the Law in its moral, ceremonial, and political aspect being alike worthy of God and beneficial to the people for whom intended, and sustained by sanctions which He alone could enforce : — and finally the remaining books, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, are closely connected in the development of one great subject, and have all 140 CHARACTER AND DESIGN ? SECT. the marks of joint authorship with the preceding. — I trust that it will not be deemed presumptuous to conclude this section in the words of an old, but able author whose writings must ever com mand respect : — " The Divine mission and authority of Moses being fully proved : From thence it will follow, 1 That God having instituted the Jewish Government, was, in point both of wisdom and honour, concerned in the administration of it, and that a more especial and peculiar care and Providence must be watchful over this holy nation and peculiar people. 2. That whatever befel them, either by prophecies or by miracles, and the extraordinary appointments of God, according to the revelations made in the law of Moses, has besides its own proper and intrinsic evidence, the addi tional proof of all the miracles and prophecies of Moses. So that the proof of the divine authority of Moses's Books, is at the same time a proof of all the other Books of Scrip ture, so far as they are in the matter and subject of them consequent to these. 3. That the Pentateuch, and the other parts of the Old Testament (not to mention the New Testament in this place) reciprocally prove each other, like the cause and the effect ; the Pentateuch being the cause and foundation of these ; and these the effect and conse quence of the Pentateuch, and the fulfilling the several predictions of it."s "¦ The Reasonableness and Certainty of the Christian Religion by Robert Jenkin, D.D., p. 188.— Sixth edition, 1734. III. REJECT THESE BOOKS — WHAT THEN? 141 SECTION III. It must not be withheld that the Phenomena of the Pentateuch have received other interpre tations than that now given. Men making large demands on our " faith, hope, and charity," by the assumption of vast scholarship, breadth of view, and acuteness of intellect ; men repudiat ing infidel designs, and professing that love for truth which leads to earnest efforts to free it from the incrustations of ancient prejudices — and it is not intended to call this in question ; men of high station in the Church of God, and of unblamable lives ; these men, themselves mis taken, ask us to reject all other testimony, that of Jews and Gentiles alike for many centuries of years, and to accept of their own, that the Pentateuch is not the production of Moses, and that it is unhistorical and untrue. The thought ful and the candid will, it is believed, find that 142 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. THE REJECTION OF THESE BOOKS, OR OF ANY statements they contain (errors of copyists, if any such there be, excepted),* would be attended with greater difficulties than their admission. 1. We may advert to some of these : If Moses were not the author of the Books which bear his name, how can we account for the belief on the subject which so generally obtains ? Whence could it have arisen, and how came his name to be substituted for that of the real author ? — * Dr. Kennicot, the distinguished editor of the critical edition of the Hebrew Bible, says, as quoted by Dr. Lorimer— " Though these sacred books were at first composed by men who were all directed to truth, and secured from error by the immediate agency of God Himself, yet, what was thus inspired by God was committed to the care of men, and we must acknowledge that we have had this treasure in earthen vessels. To suppose an absolute freedom from error in the transcribers of these books, the most ancient in the whole world, what is it else but to suppose a constant miracle wrought in favour of every such transcriber, and the Divine assistance communi cated in the formation of every letter ? " . . . "Surely, it must be a proper foundation for satisfaction and joy to every friend of Revelation to find, that the difHculties and obstructions which he now meets with in the printed copies of the Old Testament are not so necessarily owing to Moses and the prophets, as to demand his absolute assent and reso lute vindication." — Vide, The State of the printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament considered, pp. 7, 8, 270, 271. Ill, 1. ACKNOWLEDGED BY CHRIST. 143 If Moses were not the author, how can we reconcile with truthfulness his own statements to that effect, the frequent allusions to him as such by subsequent writers in the Old Testament, and the constant references and appeals to his authority by our Lord Himself and His inspired Apostles? It is impossible that they were mistaken. The principle of accommo dation to the opinions and prepossessions of the times, if admitted, would prove utterly subver sive of their claims to be considered as trust worthy, and, indeed, the very highest authorities in matters of religion. Further : if Moses were not the author of these books, who among his contemporaries, or in the long list of worthies future ages produced, so likely as he to have been ? He was the chief actor in the wondrous scenes of the last four books, which he describes as only an eye-witness could have done, and with the most perfect impartiality, even to recording his own failings, — the traditions of the fathers and perchance one or more fragmentary documents, which Genesis contains, would be as open to his use, if Jehovah granted to him the authority and the inspiration to write, as to any one else, — and no one would be better qualified than he — by personal knowledge of the countries referred to, 144 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. and of the manners and customs and of the religious beliefs of their people, and, moreover, by being an educated man — " learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians " — to undertake the task of authorship.* — The later books presup pose the earlier: Exodus carries forward the * The following extract from a dissertation by Sir William Jones, on the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India, written in 1784, will be read with interest: — "I am persuaded that a connection subsisted between the old idolatrous nations of Egypt, India, Greece, and Italy, long before they emigrated to their several settlements, and consequently before the birth of Moses : but the proof of this proposition will in no degree afiEect the truth and sanctity of the Mosaick History, which, if confirmation were necessary, it would rather tend to confirm. The Divine Legate, educated by the daughter of a king, and in all respects highly accomplished, could not but know the mythological system of Egypt; but he must have condemned the superstitions of that people, and despised the speculative absurdities of their priests; though some of their traditions concerning the Creation and the Flood were grounded on truth. Who was better acquainted with the mythology of Athens than Socrates? Who more accurately versed in the Rabbinical doctrines than Paul ? Who possessed clearer ideas of all ancient astronomical systems than Newton, or of scholastical metaphysicks than Locke ? In whom could the Roman Church have had a more formidable opponent than in ChiUingworth, whose deep knowledge of its tenets rendered him so compe tent to dispute them ? In a word, who more exactly knew the abominable rites and shocking idolatry of Canaan than Moses himself ? Yet the learning of those great men only incited them to seek other sources of truth, piety, and virtue, Ill, 1. UNDESIGNED COINCIDENCES. 145 history in Genesis ; and the remaining books are closely connected with it. — Taking these things together, we are shut up to the conclusion that the Pentateuch is the genuine production of Moses, and, marking its unity of object and style, of him alone. The undesigned coincidences between the book of Deuteronomy and the preceding, books confirm the belief that the Pentateuch had but one author, and that Moses was he. Dean Graves, after giving some striking examples, and of such a kind as could only be result of truth, the direct narrative being written at the time of the transactions recorded, or of the occurrence of the event, and the recapitulation at a time long subsequent thereto, observes " The more minute and apparently unimportant such coincidences as these are, the more unlikely is it they should arise from anything but reality." The writer must have been an eye-witness of what he records, or such " unity in diversity " than those in which they had long been immersed. There is no shadow, then, of a foundation for an opinion, that Moses borrowed the first nine or ten chapters of Genesis from the literature of Egypt; still less can the adamantine pillars of our Christian faith be moved by the result of any debates on the comparative antiquity of the Hindus and Egyptians, or of any inquiries' into the Indian Theology."— Asiatic Researches, vol. i. 271, 272. London reprint. L 146 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. would have been impossible.* The account of his own death must, however, have been added by a later hand. — And is there anything improbable, or anything that detracts from the authority of * " For example, the law respecting the Passover is intro duced in Exodus xii. 1 — 28. ; resumed in Exodus xii. 43—51 ; again in chapter xiii. ; and once more, with supplements, in Numbers ix. 1—14. Would a compiler, after the exile, have scattered these notices of the Passover in so many different places ? Surely not ; he would naturally have embodied all the traditions concerning it in one chapter. But now every thing wears the exact appearance of having been recorded in the order in which it happened. New exigences occasioned new ordinances ; and these are recorded, as they were made, pro re nata. In like manner the code of the priests not having been finished at once in the book of Leviticus, the subject is resumed, and completed at various times, and on various occasions, as is recorded in the subsequent book of the Penta teuch. So, the subject of sin and trespass-offerings is again and again resumed, until the whole arrangements are com pleted. Would not a later compiler have embodied these subjects respectively together ? Besides repeated instances of the kind just alluded to, cases occur in which statutes made at one time are repealed or modified at another ; as in Exod. xxi1 2 — 7, compared with Deut. xv. 12—27; Numb. iv. 24 — 33, compared wilh Numb. vii. 1 — 9. ; Numb. iv. 3. compared with Numb. viii. 24. ; Levit. xvii. 3, 4. compared with Deut. xii. 15. ; Exod. xxii. 25. compared with Deut. xxiii. 19. ; Exod. xxii. 16, 17. compared with Deut. xxii. 29. ; and other like instances. How could a compiler, at the time of the captivity, know any thing of the original laws in those cases, which had gone into desuetude from the time of Moses ?" — North Ameri can Revitw, quoted in Home's Introduction vol. i. 53. Ill, 1. NOTES OF EXPLANATION. 147 these books in the supposition that a few notes of explanation, and the substitution of more modern names for the ancient ones, may have been made by Ezra, or by some editor to us unknown, when the canon of the Old Testament was fixed ? Our own literature furnishes many illustrations of a similar mode of dealing with the writings of a distant age for the benefit of the present. But who regards such verbal alterations as destructive of the claims of the writers whose names they bear, to being the original and proper authors ! " And here," in the words of the Bishop of Clogher, in 1 752, " I must take leave to add, that when we speak of inspired writers and inspired writings, we do not mean that every word or every thought is directly and immediately inspired by God. When Moses wrote the history of the Exodus he wrote what he saw, and what he knew of it, as any other man would have done. When he was informed by God, either in vision or by inspiration, of any thing which he could not otherwise know, he likewise wrote this, or spoke it in his own words, unless where the words, as in a few cases, were dictated unto him ; and it is enough for us that he has told us what he knew either of his own know ledge or by inspiration, with truth and fidelity. And this was also the case with the rest of the Prophets, whose minds Almighty God might please to illuminate, either by showing them visions, or by impressing and communicating ideas immediately to their thoughts, and yet leave the L 2 148 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. inspired person to the exercise of his own natural faculties in relating this vision, or discovering those thoughts to others. So that, when the person thus inspired came to describe the vision, or explain his thoughts, he would unfold his mind in his own language, in the same words and images that he would naturally use either in common conversation, or in any literary composition. And hence it comes to pass that those Scriptures which are sard to be inspired by God, are written in such a great variety of styles, according to the different natural or improved abili ties of the person inspired. Thus, for example, the language in which the Prophet Isaiah writes, who was of royal ex traction, and was bred at a court, is lofty and high, his metaphors strong, and his images sublime : whereas, on the other hand, the language of the Prophet Amos, who was by profession a shepherd, and bred in the country, is humble and low, his sentiments easy, and his images frequently pastoral ; and therefore the style of. the Scriptures must be liable to all the mistakes and incorrectnesses of that kind with which other human compositions abound. " Nor is it to be supposed that there was any need for the Spirit of God to inspire the sacred writers with the know ledge of those things which their own eyes, or their own ears, or their own judgment could inform them in without such inspiration. It is sufficient that in such cases the sacred writers should say nothing but the truth, as it appeared unto them. As in the case of the extraordinary continuance of the light of the sun, which Joshua mentions as the effect of the sun's standing still, because it appeared unto him so to do ; which, although not physically true, was undoubtedly a moral truth. And hence it is, that St. Paul frequently makes a distinction between those precepts Ill, 1. SCRIPTURE REFERENCES. 149 which he had received by inspiration, and those that arose from the result of his own prudence. . . . Something of the same nature happened to Moses in the case of the man that was found gathering sticks on the Sabbath Day, and in the case of the daughters of Zelophehad ; which cases Moses not being able to determine by his own private judgment, went to consult the Lord, and had his doubts accordingly resolved. So that when any person, under the influence of the Spirit of God, declares any thing as a truth, we may safely acknowledge it as such, although he was not particularly inspired with it; because, we may depend upon it, that the Spirit of God, were it otherwise, would, in that case, overrule him, and correct his judgment, and make him cry out with St. Paul, Yet not I, but the Lord."® References : Deut xxxi. 9, 22, 24. Compare Exod. xvii, 14 — write in the book, not indefinite, as in the English version ; xxiv. 4, 7, xxxiv. 27. Num. xxxiii, 2. Deut. xxviii. 58, 61 ; xxix. 21, 29. Josh. i. 7, 8 ; viii. 31, 32, 34, 35 ; xi. 15 ; xxiii. 6. 1 Kings ii. 3. Compare Deut. xxix. 9. 2 Kings xxi. 8 ; xxiii. 25. 2 Chron, xxiii. 18. 2 Kings xiv. 6. Compare Deut. xxiv. 16. 2 Chron. xxx. 16. 2 Kings xviii. 6, 12, Dan. ix. 11, 13. Ezra iii. 2 ; vi. 18 ; vii. 6. Mai. iv. 4. — Psalms lxxviii, cv., and cvi., are founded on the facts of the Mosaic and following history, and other Psalms con tain distinct allusions to facts which must have been well known to the people to warrant such use of them; xliv., lxvi., Ixviii., lxxiv., lxxvii., lxxx., lxxxi., xcv,, xcix., * A Vindication of the Histories of the Old and New Testa ment, in Answer to the Objections of the late Lord Boling- broke,in Two Letters to a Young Nobleman: by the Right Eev. Dr. Robert Clayton, pp. 28—31. 150 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. cvii., ex., cxiv., exxxiii., and cxxxv. Luke xvi. 29, 31; xx. 37 ; xxiv. 27, 44, 45. John v. 46, 47. On this latter passage Dean Alford writes :— " This ia an important testimony by the Lord to the subject of the whole Penta teuch ; it is jrtpi i/iov {of me)." " It is also a testimony to the fact of Moses having written those books, which were then, and are still, known by his name."* Acts iii, 22 ; xxviii. 23. Rom. x. 5. 2 Cor. iii. 15. Heb. iii. 2 — 5, 16 ; viii. 5 ; ix. 19 ; x, 28. There are upwards of 200 passages from the books of Moses quoted or alluded to in the New Testament. 2. Let us inquire whatis involvedinthe supposi tion that the Pentateuch is unhistorical and untrue. Is it possible to avoid the conclusion that it is a gross imposture, and one for its magnitude and success without a parallel in history ? Before this, however, can be admitted, it becomes us to pause, and review its contents. Do these bear the stamp of poetic myths, or of artful forgeries, or do they appear as prosaic statements of facts, extraordinary indeed, but not incredible?- Take them in their order as we find them on the record, and submit them to impartial scrutiny, are we prepared for the alternatives which follow ? The most sublime and rational account of the Crea tion ever penned must be set aside as fable, and no cosmogony known is worthy of being substi tuted for it. — That great and overwhelming * Greek Test., i. 710. Ill, 2. FACTS TO BE ACCOUNTED FOR. 151 catastrophe, the Deluge, whether in extent uni versal or partial, matters little ! although sup ported by a widely-spread tradition, and referred to in the New Testament as an incontrovertible fact, must then be accounted fabulous. — The confusion of tongues, the dispersion of mankind, the origin of nations, and other statements of Genesis, however probable in themselves, and corroborated by modern research, must be con signed to the region of the fabulous and the legendary. Sacrifice, a rite which is so revolting to our natural feelings, in some form or other, is well-nigh universal. "Whence did the practice originate ? Can we rationally account for such an observance unless we admit that it points to a time when the families of mankind dwelt in close proximity, as descended from a common pair; and this fact is receiving confirmation from the latest discoveries in language and ethnology. Sacrifice — the shedding the blood of an innocent victim and offering it to God — there is the strong est reason for believing, is not the invention of man to calm his fears as he draws nigh to wor ship, and to propitiate the Deity he is conscious of having offended : it was the appointment of the living and true God, and by its solemn import showed the desert of sin ; and, moreover, it fore- 152 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. shadowed the grand Sacrifice on the Cross through which alone there would be hope for the guilty and undone.* The first book of the Pentateuch is valuable not only as the oldest existing docu ment which offers explanations of phenomena at once natural and credible ; but as the earliest con tribution of Jehovah to that Volume which makes known to man his destiny, and how it may become a blessing for ever. 3. Agreat historical fact has to be accounted for, and we look for the means which will do it satis factorily. Several powerful nations once occu pied Canaan, and were dispossessed by the Israel ites, who afterwards occupied the land for many centuries of years, and established a Common wealth such as, except itself, the world has never seen. If we reject the history given in the Pentateuch, we are bound to substitute another which is more credible. Are we able to do so ? Criticism the most acute entirely fails here. The only explanation of the wonderful success in the invasion of the country is — " The Lord fought for Israel." "We confess," says Mr. Cyril Graham, "we had often wondered how it hap pened that Og had been brought to fight in the * See Appendix C. On the Origin of Sacrifices. Ill, 3. CANAAN TAKEN POSSESSION OF ? 153 plain ; now from a casual notice in other parts of Scripture, Josh. xxiv. 12, we actually find that God sent a special scourge among these Rephaims, in the shape of swarms of hornets, which we may conclude harassed them so much in their stone houses, that they preferred the alternative of meeting the Israelites, to perishing from the stings of these creatures." For a graphic account of the country and cities of Bashan see the very interesting work mentioned below.* No one can read that and similar works without being deeply impressed with the truth of the Scripture history. " I sent," said Jeho vah, " the hornet before you, which drave them out before you, even the two kings of the Amorites ; but not with thy sword, nor with thy bow. And I have given you a land for which ye did not labour, and cities which ye built not, and ye dwell in them; of the vineyards and oliveyards which ye planted not do ye eat." Nor was this all * then and subsequently, His favour was the source of the national prosperity, and both were contemporaneous with the people's fidelity to the Covenant by which they had been distinguished. * See Giant Cities of Bashan, by the Rev. J. L. Porter, A.M. London : Nelson, 1869. Also, Stones crying out, by L.N.R. 154 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. 4. It must be further remarked that there is more than history in these Books, and that this would make the work of a forger more difficult : there is also a Constitution, civil and ecclesiastical.* He must have a strong arm and determined will who attempts to enforce new laws upon an ignorant people. How often, even in our own day, do men rebel against measures of municipal and sanitary reform ! The Israelites had a body of laws different from those of any other people, and vastly superior thereto, when viewed in connection with their ultimate design, but, in some of their arrangements, very restrictive and irksome, and demanding implicit faith in the * " That the book which relates the facts contains likewise the law of that people to whom it belongs, and be their statute-book by which their causes are determined. This, will make it impossible for any to coin or forge such a book, so as to make it pass upon any people. For example, if I should forge a statute-book for England, and publish it next.term, could I make all the judges, lawyers, and people believe that this was their true and only statute-book by which their causes had been determined these many hundred years past. They must forget their old statute-book and believe that tbis new book, which they never saw or heard before, was that same old book which has been pleaded in Westminster Hall for so many ages, which has been so often printed, and the originals of which are now kept in the Tower, to be consulted as there is occasion." — The Truth of Christianity demonstrated, by the Rev. Charles Leslie, in The Scholar Armed, vol. i. 223. Ill, 4. ISRAELITISH CONSTITUTION. 155 special providence of God; — which who could promise unless so commissioned? The Ritual, viewed apart from its true intention as the vehicle of religious instruction until the fulness of time, was burdensome : it was a yoke hard to be borne ; more especially had it become so by the adding thereto the traditions of the elders. — The injunction to go thrice a year to Jerusalem to attend the solemn festivals involved great sacrifices, and left their frontier periodically exposed to the incursions of their enemies. — The prohibition of cavalry deprived them of an ordinary mode of defence.— Once in seven years their lands were to lie fallow ; and after seven times seven years a jubilee was to be proclaimed, which would loosen every bond, on person and property, setting free every captive, cancelling every debtj and restoring to every man his inheritance. Is it credible that a people would submit to regu lations such as these unless they had been assured that he who introduced them was provided with a commission from Heaven, attested by miracles such as those wrought in Egypt and in the Wilderness, of which the ever-speaking memorials were the private and public observances, the annual feasts, and within the Sanctuary of Jehovah, in the most holy place, " the Ark of 15fr DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. the Covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenants ; and over it the cherubim of glory shadowing the mercy seat ; of which," says the inspired Commentator, "we cannot now speak particularly;" — thatis, this is not the time to dwell upon them minutely, one by one, Heb. ix. 4, 5, — and of the whole of which the signification, with the knowledge of the history and the Law, was appointed by the Legislator to be handed down from sire to son through all coming time ?* The * " If the above account of the Sinai Covenant is true, it is a demonstration of its Divine original. Moses assures the Israelites, that their prosperity should be invariably determined by their observance or neglect of his laws ; that, when they were faithful to these, everything should go well with them ; and that, when unfaithful, a flood of calamities should over whelm them. No principles of human policy could have dictated such assurances. So wise a Lawgiver would never have made them, had he not known that the hand of God should visibly appear, bestowing blessing, and inflicting pun ishments, in execution of these promises and threats. Far less would he, under pretence of these extraordinary providences, have deprived his people of the natural means of their security and defence. I shall say nothing of the years of jubilee and sabbatic years, or of the obliging all the males thrice in the year to come up to Jerusalem, and thus to leave their frontiers exposed to hostile invasion. I shall confine myself to one law. Though their neighbours were powerful and ambitious, and well provided with horses and chariots of war, in which the Ill, 4. THE LAW TO BE READ PUBLICLY. 157 Law was never to be lost sight of; hence the instruction to teach it to the children, and at the end of every seven years to read it " before all Israel." Deut. xi. 18—21 ; xxxi. 9—13. The latter "was evidently," says Mr. Espin, "a symbolical transaction, intended, as so many others were, to impress on the people the condi tions on which they held possession of their privileges and blessings." — The Israelites, from their personal knowledge of the Author, and from the notoriety of the historical facts recorded — the ordinary and the miraculous being' mutu ally dependent — must have believed that the Pentateuch was authentic, or they would not have allowed themselves to be bound by the laws it contained : and the Jews of the present day, who are as acute critics as the men who profess to have discovered that it is unhistorical and strength of the ancient militia chiefly consisted, God prohibited them the use of these dreadful engines of destruction, and enjoined them, when they should prevail agamst their enemies in battle, to hamstring their horses and burn their chariots with fire, assuring them that His protection, while they thus manifested their trust in it, should more than supply the place of both. Deut. xvii. 16. John xi. 6. Deut. xx. 1. Had Moses been an impostor, he was not mad enough to have encumbered his body of laws with a constitution, obedience to which must have infallibly bewrayed the deceit." — The Nature of the Smai Covenant, pp. 59, 60. 158 .-- DIFFICULTIES INCREASED! SECT. untrue, retain the belief of their forefathers ; and — so may we ! 5. The following observations are so appropriate to the object now in view, that the transference of them to these pages will be more than justi fied by a regard for the reader's benefit : — " We are therefore," says Bishop Marsh, " reduced to this dilemma, to acknowledge either that these laws were actually delivered by Moses, or that a whole nation during fifteen hundred years groaned under the weight of an im posture, without once detecting or even suspecting the fraud. The Athenians believed that the system of laws by which they were governed was composed by Solon ; and the Spartans attributed their code to Lycurgus, without ever being suspected of a mistake in their belief. Why, then, should it be doubted that the rules prescribed in the Penta teuch were given by Moses ? To deny it, is to assert that an effect may exist without a cause, or that a great and im portant revolution may take place without an agent We have therefore an argument little short of mathematical demonstration, that the substance of the Pentateuch pro ceeded from Moses ; and that the very words were written by him, though not so mathematically demonstrable as the former, is at least a moral certainty. The Jews, whose evidence alone can decide in the present instance, have believed it from the earliest to the present age : no other person ever aspired to be thought the author, and we may venture to affirm that no other person could have been the author. For it is wholly incredible that the Jews, though Ill, 5. CONTENTS OF THE PENTATEUCH. 159 weak and superstitious, would have received, in a later age, a set of writings as the genuine work of Moses, if no history and no tradition had preserved the remembrance of his having been the author."* 6. No one acquainted with the most ancient history can read the Pentateuch without being struck with the immense superiority of the writer to the age in which he lived. Granted that the narrative is sometimes broken, and that we meet with repetitions ; may not these be accounted for by its being composed in detached fragments, as the events occurred, and that after wards these separate parchments, after slight revision, were brought together to form one roll or volume ! In the records outside of the Bible, of what people, down to the Christian era, do we find such clear, natural, impartial, and credible historical notices ? — Where shall we look for a theology so rational and glorious, the rich inheritance from the Patriarchs ! — for a jurispru dence so enlarged and beneficent, and for a code of morals so equitable and pure as that contained in the writings of Moses? How noble and sublime are those passages which provide for the poor, the stranger, and even for the ox, the ass, * Quoted in Home's Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, vol. i. 48. 160 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED.' SECT: and the birds ! Deut. xxii. 1 — 7 ; xxiv. 14 — 22. And yet the Hebrew people, among whom all these were found, were much inferior to co-eval nations in commercial enterprise, in the culti vation of general literature and the fine arts, and in the prosecution of the natural sciences. How do we account for this great anomaly? 7. The attempt has been made to show that " Moses, learned in all the wisdom of the Egyp tians," borrowed from them his Theology, Ritual, and Laws, and incorporated so much as suited his purpose into the system he gave to the Israel ites. This plausible opinion has been strenuously advocated by some writers of repute, and, indeed,^ one of them anticipates that he has made a notable discovery, viz., " the tables of the old Egyptian law," containing thirty commandments, and among them the Mosaic Decalogue. We need not to feel surprised if this latter announcement should prove correct, but we wait for its confir mation. — " The first settlers on the banks of the Nile were probably present at the building of Babel, and therefore something of that know ledge of God of which Noah, the preacher of righteousness, and his family, were evidently possessed, would have extended traditionally, at Ill, 1. ORIGIN OF IDOLATRY. 161 any rate, to them also." " The dogmas of religion, which are taught in the papyri and other remains, are assuredly those which prevailed in Egypt in the times of Abra ham."* — The men who built the tower of Babel showed by this act that they were disobeying the Divine command to spread themselves, and " Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth."f Already defection of heart had begun, and they were lapsing into idolatry, if, indeed, the tower of Babel was not intended to be the temple of * " Without entering into any discussion on the subject, the writer may be allowed to express his conviction, that it is much more probable that, whatever ceremonies were practised by the Egyptians similar to those existing among the Israelites were originally derived either from patriarchal tradition and usage, or from the influence and religious services of ' Joseph and his Brethren,' during the period of their power and popularity, than that the Israelites adopted any of their sacred institutions from a nation whose chief deity was an ox, and their inferior deities, cats, and beetles, and onions ; — who, notwithstanding all the eulogiums passed upon them, never attained in literature to the use of simple alphabetical characters, nor in architecture, to the use of the arch in any of their buildings, sacred or domestic ;— and whose existing monuments are distinguished by massiveness and Cyclopean smagnitude, and not by taste and elegance, either of form or sculpture."— The Reasons of the Laws of Moses, by James Townley, D.D., pp. 348, 349. See, however, note on p. 41. ¦f Gen. ix. 1; xi, 1—9. M 162 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED! SECT. Baal, or the Sun. The worship of the heavenly bodies was the earliest form of idolatry, and had its origin and seat in the Plain of Shinar or Chaldea. It soon spread over the earth. 8. At the Dispersion, B.C. 2554, the Egyptians, the descendants of Mizraim, carried with them, along with that which is true and good, this tendency to idolatry, and this was subsequently developed into a most monstrous system, in which " the lion, wolf, dog, cat, ape, and even frogs, otters, rats, beetles, and flies, as well as serpents and fishes, were held in idolatrous veneration." It may be said of them in the words of the Apostle that " when they knew God, they glori fied him not as God, neither were thankful ; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing them selves to be wise they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and to four-footed beasts, and creeping things."* Such men were not likely to be the schoolmasters and guides in sacred things of the great Legis lator ! — except we can believe that water can * Rom. i. 21, 23. See Appendix D. The Knowledge of God and Religion in Patriarchal times. 111,9. WHENCE MOSES' KNOWLEDGE? 163 rise above the level of its source ; or that the infinitely wise and holy God would sanction the borrowing from idolators, opinions and practices which had become so corrupted and overladen with all that is vile and contemptible. 9. Whence, then, did Moses derive his know ledge ? In addition to that traditionary know ledge of the true God, and the mode of worship by means of a widely-spread symbolism, derived from the great progenitors of the human race in general, and from the ancestors of the Hebrews in particular, and which, as in the case of the Ten Commandments, was not set aside, but was introduced afresh, and with increased clearness, and with more solemn sanctions, we know of but one solution — suggested and confirmed by the subject-matter of the five books of Moses, the mode of its presentation, and its unhesi tating acceptance by the people who were the best qualified to judge of its claims — that the writer was under the full and proper inspi ration of the Holy Ghost ! Any other hypo thesis is insufficient to account for the facts. This, therefore, is the true one ! That which attributes the framing of the Levi tical code to the Sacerdotal class itself during M 2 i64 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED! SECT. the Captivity in Babylon is utterly incredible. It supposes them guilty of a gigantic fraud, and a fraud without any adequate object, and a fraud that carried with it the means of its own detection. What would any section of the com munity gain by divesting themselves of all claim to an equitable partition of the land, reserving to themselves not more than a two-hundredth share of the whole, and that not in one spot, but dis tributed over the country ? The tithes did not compensate for the want of fixed property under their own absolute control ! — What would the Priests and Levites gain by voluntarily assign ing to themselves duties at the Temple, in the name and on the behalf of the rest of the people, in addition to the office of public instructors in the different cities, and for which, if temporal advantage was all that they sought, the personal remuneration was so scanty, and even that depending on the continued good-will of those whom they served? "For though there were," says Lowman, "some other payments by the people, as the Firstfruits, "the redemption of the First-born, the half-shekel Poll-tax, and the like ; yet these were not to be divided among the Levites as a tribe. They were all appropriated to other uses, and were assigned to answer the Ill, 10. FORGERY BY THE LEVITES ? 165 expenses and constant charge of the Tabernacle, of the public and national sacrifices, and other parts of the public Worship of the Church ; or for Tables in honour of the Court, House, and Residence of the King of Israel." — Yet this was the position in which, on the hypothesis referred to, the Priests and Levites fraudulently placed themselves, among a people whom they had power thus easily to deceive ! Who can believe aught so improbable ? 10. The argument is cumulative, and gathers strength as it proceeds. It would be impossible to account for the influence these books have exerted, and continue to exert, on the largest and most enlightened sections of the human race; on the life of ancient Israel, personal, domestic, social, political, and ecclesiastical ; and on the life of the modern Jews ; and on the life of Christians (to say nothing of the Samaritans and the followers of the Man of Mecca), except on the supposition that they are, what they pro fess to be, the writings of Moses, are historically true, and are Divinely inspired ! They are as inti mately connected with every subsequent portion of the Word of God as the root is to the stem and branches of a fine old tree ; or, as the foun- 166 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. dation is to the superstructure raised thereon ; or, as the laws of Alfred (Liber Judicialis) and of Edward the Confessor are to the British Constitution and its present laws.* 11. A Hindu once described a Brahmin as " an ant's nest full of lies and imposture." Was Moses in character a Brahmin, or may this be said of Samuel, or of Ezra, or of any one else whose name has been associated with the alleged composition of the Pentateuch? This is not pretended by its opponents ; but if it is not as represented by the evidence shown in these pages, genuine and authentic, the description would be just and appropriates No honest and true men could attempt a deception so monstrous as is supposed ; and what motive could induce such an attempt as the forgery of a Book in which without securing any advantage to them selves, their own alleged conduct is so strongly condemned ? Deut. xviii. 20. 12. Can we account for the attacks which have been made upon this portion of the ancient Scriptures ? It is not, it is believed, * See Appendix E. The place of the Pentateuch in Judaism and Christianity. Ill, 12. SOURCES OF THE ERROR. 167 too much to say that they have overlooked, or very insufficiently estimated, the moral and the positive arguments which have been, or which may be, adduced in support of its authorship and truth, — they have, in general, proceeded from the fragmentary and brief nature of. its narratives, — or, from ignorance of its chronology, of its geography, of the manners and customs seen therein, and especially of its language, with its Oriental and archaic tinge, — or, from bringing our modern light, secular and religious, to the interpretation of it, as if forgetful of the fact that what was suited to a special state of things nearly 3500 years ago, should be equally adapted to the world at large in our own day, — or from viewing it apart from the general system with which it is connected, — and, more than from all other causes combined, from the undue exaltation of human reason, a phase of the enmity of the heart, which exaggerates difficulties, and is re luctant to admit the supernatural. — Is there not reason to suspect that the chief and most potent opposition to the claims of this wonderful book arises from a desire to get rid of " the offence of the Cross," of the doctrine of the Atonement prefigured in its sacrificial system ? It is now, as of old, " unto the Jews a stumbling block, 168 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. and unto the Gr,eeks foolishness." Gal. v. 11. 1 Cor. i. 23.* This offence will one day cease ! 13. May we not hope that some of the subjects referred to above, such as have to do with the intellect rather than with the heart, will receive elucidation from the labours of the Palestine Exploration Society ; and from their co-workers in the same interesting field of research ? Already their toil and expense have been amply compen sated, and still greater results may be expected. Take a single illustration : — " The Theological Importance of the Moabite Stone," says Dr. Ginsburg, " can hardly be overrated, though the contribution which it yields to this department consists in an incidental statement of a few words. In lines 14 — 18 where Mesha records his march against, assault on, and capture of Nebo, he tells us that he took from the captured city 'the vessels of Jehovah,' and dedicated them to Chemosh, the national deity of Moab. As these vessels of Jehovah must have been in a sanctuary devoted to the service of the God of Israel, we have here for the first time the positive information that the Transjordanic tribes, who were too far removed from the central place of worship in the metropolis of Palestine, had a separate stated ritual. The fact that * " May I, without offence, be permitted to record the very appropriate title with which a stern humorist lettered a col lection of Unitarian Tracts ?— ' Salvation made easy ; or, Every Man his own Redeemer.' " — Colebidge. Ill, 14. DIFFICULTIES ACKNOWLEDGED. 169 these 'vessels' used in the service of Jehovah could so easily be converted into the worship of Chemosh shows beyond doubt that the special part of the ritual for which they were designed was common to the religion both of the Hebrews and the Moabites. And as the sacrificial cult was the most primitive and common to all nations, we are justified in assuming that these vessels consisted of valuable altars, bowls, and musical instruments, used from time immemorial at the offering up of sacrifices Henceforth, the treatment of the Jewish pre-exile mode of worship will be materially influenced by the statement in this Inscription Another point of great importance to the theology and archaeology of the Bible, is the mention of the name Jehovah on this Stone.* Compare 1 Kings xvi. 16 ff. ; 2 Kings iii. 4—27. 14. That there are difficulties connected with the Pentateuch it would be uncandid and useless to deny.f They have been felt by men who were * The Moabite Stone, p. 22. f '• My experience," says, that veteran in Sacred Literature, Professor Moses Stuart, " my experience has taught me some thing in relation to such subjects. In the early part of my biblical studies, some thirty to thirty-five years ago, when I first began the critical investigation of the Scriptures, doubts and difficulties started up on every side, like the armed men whom Cadmus is fabled to have raised up. Time, patience, continued study, a better acquaintance with the original Scripture languages, and the countries where the sacred books were written, have scattered to the winds nearly all these doubts. I meet, indeed, with difficulties still which I cannot solve at 170 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED! SECT. not hostile to revelation, and in whose minds they have produced real distress : for such men we have naught but deep sympathy — as we would have for a person with any other idiosyncrasy, or for one labouring under a painful monomania, or afflicted with general imbecility. But it is submitted that these difficulties are not more, nor greater, than the nature of the subjects on which it treats, and the age in which it was written, once ; with some, where even repeated efforts have not solved them. But I quiet myself by calling to mind, that hosts of other difficulties, once apparently to me as formidable as these, have been removed, and have disappeared from the circle of my troubled vision. Why may I not hope, then, as to the difficulties that remain? Every year is now casting some new light on the Bible, and making plain some things which aforetime were either not understood, or were misunderstood. Why may not my difficulties be reached by some future pro gressive increase of light ? At least, in the revolution of the sun, the dark spots will sooner or later disappear1 . And, what is more than all considerations of this kind — speedily the whole will be known. In the light of heaven no darkness is intermingled. Soon the anxious and devoted inquirer after truth, will, if a true Christian, enjoy the opportunity of asking the writers themselves of the books of Scripture, what they intended, and what they designed to teach. It is good, I do believe, both to hope and patiently wait for the light of eter nal day, if, after all our efforts to clear up a few difficulties in Scripture that remain, we do not succeed to our utmost wishes." —Critical History and Defence of the Old Testament Canon, p. 16. Ill, 15. DIFFICULTIES OF REJECTION. 171 would lead us to expect. Shall we reason from our ignorance, or await the revelations of time ? The missing links of history may yet be restored. The difficulties which now press, and, upon some minds, heavily, may disappear before fuller and more accurate knowledge. We can afford to wait. Thoughtful reader, — " Wait the result, nor ask with doubting mind Why God permits such things ? His ways though now Involved in clouds and darkness, will appear All right, when from thy eyes the mist is cleared ; Till then, to learn submission to His will More wisdom shows, than vainly thus t' attempt Exploring what thou canst not comprehend." 15. On the other hand, it may be said that they are trivial, indeed, compared with those which attend the rejection of the books, or of Moses as the reputed author, or which press on the unjus tifiable assumption that they are unhistorical and untrue. Sober investigation and trust in God (in such a case as this, faith is the highest act of reason !) will remove these difficulties altogether, or will so reduce them in number and force that they will be felt only as limitations of our knowledge, and conducive to that most healthful of all states of mind, genuine humility. 172 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED! SECT. The words of Bishop Conybeare, one of the most acute writers of the last century, are so appropriate that these pages will be greatly en riched, and the advantage of the reader corres pondingly promoted, by transferring them from his admirable discourse on " Scripture Diffi culties :" — "However, though we readily confess that difficulties occur in the sacred writings, yet this will be no matter of wonder to sober and thinking men. It is no more than might reasonably be expected in books of so old a date ; and especially, where so many aids are wanting fully to explain them. The books themselves were doubtless composed with as much clearness as was proper ; and these perplexities arise, not from any original obscurity in the writers, but from the nature of the subjects concerning which they treat, and the infelicity of the present times. " It is remarkable that difficulties, more or less, occur in all ancient writings whatsoever. The errors of transcribers are sometimes impossible to be corrected. Dead languages cannot be so perfectly understood as those which are in common use. A bold and figurative manner of expression, familiar to some of the ancients, is remote from the com mon forms of writing. And the memory of some things alluded to, and well known in the author's times, may be entirely lost to us. These, and several other causes, must unavoidably spread some sort of darkness on ancient wri tings ; and prevent our accounting for each particular with the same exactness, as though we lived when these books were wrote. So that difficulties are far from being peculiar Ill, 16. MORAL USES. 173 to the sacred Scriptures : they are common to all ancient books whatsoever ; and must arise from the ordinary cir cumstances and conditions of things." * * * « st " But yet, after all, there are some things in the sacred writings which exceed our capacities ; and those which are less arduous cannot be surmounted without the aids of grace. This consideration suggests to us another rule, viz.: That we apply ourselves to this work with the prof oundest humil ity of mind. Of other books we are judges ; and decide concerning them according to the several notions we embrace : but here we come to be judged ourselves, and must submit our most favourite sentiments to the trial. God's Word is entire truth; — not to be measured by the prejudices we entertain, nor the scanty reason of which we are masters. In these great points we must submit without reserve ; for divine mysteries are not to be disputed, but adored."** 16. May it not be supposed, seeing that the present state is one of trial and of discipline, that the difficulties which we meet with in God's Word have their moral uses, and that as it was said of the Incarnate Word that He was set for the fall and the uprising of many in Israel (Luke ii. 34 — compare Is. viii. 14. Rom. ix. 33), that so it may be said of the Written Word ? Apart from this consideration, and regarding merely their human authorship, it is not too much to ask that we should treat these books fairly,'as we would any * Enchiridion Theologicum, vol. iii. pp. 306, 307, 349, 350. 174 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. other writings of remote antiquity, — say those bearing the names of, or by universal consent attributed to, Homer, Hesiod, or even of Xeno- phon, Plato, Csesar, Plutarch, and of others less ancient, — and that we should repress that spirit of scepticism which, if applied to them, or even to events contemporaneous with the times in which we live, would overwhelm us with universal doubt. True philosophy admits that "every reasonable hypothesis should be supported on a fact." And here are facts numerous and trust worthy, or all history is uncertain and disputable, and we have no test to distinguish the fabulous from the true : — albeit there may be in the Pentateuch statements "hard to be understood," and facts not within the range of ordinary ex perience. Literary candour, until he forfeits it, gives an author credit for consistency ; it seeks to clear up what is obscure in his writings, to harmonize apparent discrepancies of statement, and of several interpretations of language or views of fact, to suggest that which best agrees with the context, or with his probable design — in other words, to render him that measure of justice all men claim for themselves. " True fortitude of understanding" says one of the clearest thinkers and writers of the last Ill, 16. WHY BE DISTURBED THEREBY? 175 century, Archdeacon Paley, "consists in not suffering what we know to be disturbed by what we do not know. If we perceive a useful end, and means adapted to that end, we perceive enough for our conclusion. If these things be clear, no matter what is obscure. The argument is finished."* — Let these judicious observations be extended to the writings of Moses, and to that dispensation of sovereign mercy they make known to us. It will be seen that, notwithstanding difficulties arising from what we do not know, we have abundant evidence in what we do know to lead us to accept them, without any misgivings as to their genuineness and authenticity, and further to lead us to regard Judaism as eminently adapted to the end for which it was introduced : — " So then the Law hath been our schoolmaster unto Christ, that we maybe justified by faith." Gal. iii. 24. The former has given place to the latter ! 17. Painfully conscious as every one must be who knows himself, and the many causes of error to which he is exposed, of having the judgment and the will perverted, and influenced, it is hoped, by an earnest desire to speak of other persons with candour, and with the charity that * Natural Theology, ch. v. 7. 176 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. thinketh no evil, it is difficult for the author to think otherwise than that the very converse of all that is becoming and fair has been dealt out to Moses and his writings in works recently published.* If, as we believe, the tendency of this much-vaunted " free-handling of Scripture " is to surround everything with distrust, and to unsettle the minds of men in things hitherto regarded as sacred ; if by the arrogance of its pretensions it is to deteriorate sound knowledge and literature ; and if it is to give currency to principles which, if carried out in every-day life, would sap and destroy the very foundations of society : — then, however harsh and uncharitable may appear the expression of belief it must not be withheld, the writers are mischievous and sin against good morals. And if these men unite in themselves all that is gentlemanly in deport ment, with an accomplished scholarship and high ecclesiastical position, as their power of unsettling, by injecting doubt and fostering infidelity in the minds of the young and unestablished, is in creased thereby, the inference is clear that they incur a fearful responsibility when such is the result of their labours.f * See Appendix F. Old errors reproduced by Bishop Colenso. t Under the title of "A Vindication of Bishop Colenso; a Satire in Twelve Letters, by the Author of "Eclipse of Ill, 18.UNDUE INFLUENCE OF GREAT NAMES.177 18. Lest we should be unduly influenced by the authority of great names, we need only to refer, for lessons of caution, to what has been termed Faith,"— we have the following striking introductory .obser vations : — "The following ' Letters to a Friend' were written on a first perusal of Bishop Colenso's book, doubtless with the charitable design of proving either that it was not written by the Bishop at all, or that if written by him, was written like the Amber Witch, to test the gullibility of scepticism. It may perhaps be plausibly said, that there is little in the shape of absolute proof, even now, to show that the first hypothesis may not be true. Few, it may be presumed, have seen the Bishop, or had oral testimony to his authorship of the book ; while we have frequent proofs that even the most respectable publishers may unsuspectingly give to the world MSS. under the name of authors who never wrote them. Still less is there any proof that, if written by the Bishop, it was written with any serious design to demolish the historic character of the Pentateuch. At all events, it seems clear that the alternative of the writer of the following 'Letters' may be logically argued. If the Pentateuch, which has so long imposed upon the world, and imposes on it still, be really not historic, it is not wonderful if some one has fathered this brochure on an obscure colonial bishop ; on the other hand, if, in spile of the proofs of the enormous a priori improbability, not to say incredibility, of his being the author, he really is the author, people will be apt to imagine that whatever the difficulties which he may point out in the history of the Pentateuch, it may well be history notwithstanding."— Good Words for 1863 pp. 85—92, 205— 219 —These admirable Letters, like all the writings of Professor Rogers, will amply repay an intelligent and candid perusal. Would that they might receive such from Bishop Colenso, and from all who follow in his steps ! N 178 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. the Augustan age of English literature. Last century a xjlever author, Bishop Berkeley, wrote "A Treatise concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge," in which he affirmed that "those things which are called sensible, material objects are not external, but exist in the mind." — But notwithstanding the plausible demonstration that matter is non-existent, men continued to believe in the evidence of their senses; and to ourselves and others, it is really no matter what the accom plished Bishop thought, believed, and wrote on the subject of matter. — It is so of the Penta teuch ! We shall continue to hold it fast. 19. The review proposed in this lecture — now swollen to a little hook — is ended. The con clusion in which judgment the most careful, and inclination the most free from improper bias alike find repose is, that our confidence in the books of Moses — books which have had so important a place in the disclosures of God's mercy to mankind, and which have stood the test of the most rigid scrutiny in all ages— instead of being withheld, as in the progress of science and dis covery we have the better means of ascertaining their character, should be yielded with the more unfaltering implicitness and reverential regard. The, words of the Grea,t Teacher have to us Ill, 19. CONCLUSION REACHED. 179 solemn import — " If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." When He thus spake of these books forming a part of the Canonical Scriptures received as such by the Jews whom He addressed, and whose mistakes on other points He had so freely corrected, — and, moreover, that these books carried with them this weight of responsibility, — is it possible that He who came " to bear witness of the truth," to be " the way, the truth, and the life," the Great Teacher of the whole human race, could have been perpetu ating a mischievous error, and trifling with men's dearest interests !* — What credulity can compare * " But any accommodation to erroneous opinions, any positive yielding to them which would amount to an approval and confirmation of them, is, in the view of any impartial person, a tendency very far removed from the character of our Lord, as manifested in His mode of action. In everything He desired to point out the path, and not to follow others ; and in every case, when the truth and falsehood were in question He was wont to express Himself frankly, even when most in opposition to the mightiest among the people,— always, how ever, with that didactic wisdom which befitted the Man and the Son of God, but always, too, with the veracity which put aside everything which favoured error and falsehood." — Biblical Theology of the New Testament, by C. F. Schmid, D.D. pp. 193, 194. Clark's Edition.— " And thus," says Sack quoted by Macdonald, " the dawning of literature in its oldest productions, which are otherwise, from the nature of the case, N 2 180 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. with that of the man who attributes to our Lord Jesus Christ, in his office as Mediator — in whom, be it remembered, dwelt bodily all the fulness of the Godhead ! — ignorance on so important a subject, much less error, or unfaithfulness. Yet this is the alternative to accepting the Penta teuch as the genuine production of Moses, and as an authentic record of the dealings of Jehovah with mankind from the earliest ages, and with the Israelites from the commencement of their national history to their entrance into Canaan. — It is a significant fact that it was after His resur rection that Jesus, to the wondering disciples journeying to Emmaus, began " at Moses and all the prophets, and expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself." At the commencement of His public ministry Jesus, when repelling the subtle temptations of the great adversary the Devil, quoted from the writings of Moses, as Scripture ; and now His work being finished, by the decease accomplished Involved in obscurity, may be proved by the words of Him who claimed the name of the Truth, to be even still the first and surest testimony for all inquiry which retains confidence in the words of Christ."— Introduction to the Pentateuch, vol. i. 367. * See Appendix G. On ignorance and liability to error imputed to our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Ill, 20. LATEST TESTIMONY BY JESUS. 181 at Jerusalem, He employs the ordinary designa tion for books in the sacred Canon, and speaks of them again as Scripture, thus giving them His own high sanction. Ignorance, error, decep tion of our Lord, INCREDIBLE — IMPOSSIBLE ! 20. Itis difficult to write on such a theme without incurring the risk of seeming irreverence. The mind shrinks from any supposition derogatory to Him who spake as never man spake, — who spake with an authority exclusively His own, and not as the Scribes. May the good Lord pardon the bold, but, to us, the painful inquiry — If the writings of Moses are unhistorical and untrue, what is the value of their testimony ? Yet it was adduced as testimony to Himself by One who " knew no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth." And in what circumstances, we may ask, was it brought forward, and to whom? Can we conceive of aught more solemn and affecting ? Jesus had " finished the work given Him to do," and that work had been accepted by the Eternal Father. Can we suppose it possible that He had entered upon it without needful preparation, of which accurate knowledge of that Dispensation He had come to supersede would form an im portant part, and that He had prosecuted that work, and finished it, whilst Himself was under a popular delusion as to the genuineness and 182 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. authenticity of the Books which make it known ? It could not so have been. He had been anointed with " the Holy Ghost and with power." Acts x. 38. The Spirit had descended upon Him at the commencement of His public ministry : " He whom God sent spake the words of God; for God gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him." John i. 32 — 34 ; iii. 34. Are we not warranted in claiming for Jesus perfect knowledge of all things pertaining to His mission ? "All treasures of wisdom and knowledge are " — and indeed must be — "in Christ :" or, we are undone ! Col. ii. 3. Let this also be taken into consideration and have due weight: on the third day after his crucifixion and death He drew near to two men whom He, of course, recognized, "but their eyes were holden that they should not know Him." These men had left their all to follow Him, the man of Nazareth indeed, but, as they believed, the Christ of God. Like their fellow- disciples, they had indulged bright hopes of the future, when their Master and Lord should " restore the kingdom to Israel." And now in their communications together the past seemed to them as a dream from which they were awaking : and they were sad. It was only for a time. What produced the reaction, and caused their hearts to burn within them, and soothed thus their Ill, 20. TESTIMONY TO JESUS. 183 sorrows ? The supposed Stranger opening up to them the Scriptures, and making such appli cation of them as pointed Him out to them as their risen Lord ! But if the writings of Moses are not a part of the Scriptures, His reference to them was irrelevant and misleading, and to these simple-minded men was a cruel deception and wrong. And if, as they had been instructed, they were to carry on His work upon earth, all this would be indefinitely perpetuated, for they would mislead others. — We may with confidence and thankfulness accept the alternative, these writings of Moses are historical and true, and their testimony to Jesus is their grand feature, as it is, indeed, that of the Prophets generally. Rev. xix. 10. Our creed and rule of life, are briefly summed up in the familiar lines of one of the oldest and best Poets of the Christian sanctuary: — " The law by Moses came ; But peace and truth and love Were brought by Christ, a nobler name, Descending from above. " Amidst the house of God Their different works were done ; Moses a faithful servant stood, But Christ a faithful Son. 184 DIFFICULTIES INCREASED ! SECT. " Then to His new commands Be strict obedience paid ; O'er all His Father's house He stands The Sovereign and the Head " — Watts. We adopt the words of an able writer: — " Across the gloom of near three thousand years one beam from the first fountain of light has been transmitted to us through the great lawgiver of the Jews But for that single ray of light, all history, until a very late period of the world, would be a perfect blank That ray of light has revealed to us the origin of man and his religious framing under the hand of God. The book in which this record of our race is kept contains a series of documents which close almost before profane history begins. There is an unity in the history which cannot escape our notice — it is the history throughout of God's dealings with man. There is nothing besides like it in the world. That history has been the moral and re ligious teaching of the world ; it has been the source of the national life of the most remarkable people on the face of the earth — a people which has maintained an existence, separate from all nations, for upwards of three thousand years, and which still dwells in mysterious isolation, await ing some final act of God's providence commensurate with such a career. The history of that people, traced for eighteen centuries before the birth of Christ, is one har monious message to the world. Amidst the sickening im purity of the heathen world, that volume taught the utmost purity of morals ; amidst polytheism and idolatry, it taught the Unity and the Majesty of God. And yet this is the volume which modern illumination would teach us to regard as the production of rank impostors and obscure compilers ! Ill, 21. CONCLUDING WORDS. 185 The very statement of such a theory would seem sufficient to condemn it ; but its advocates perpetually complain that their arguments are never met, and raise a cry of victory and triumph to which they really possess no claim."6 21. A few concluding words may be permitted to the Author ere he lays down the pen he has felt constrained to take up in this Colony for the exposition and defence of the truth. If in thoughtlessness or excess of zeal a single sentence, or even a word, should have escaped him that has the appearance of harshness, or want of con sideration towards those persons from whom he differs, and to whose errors he has wished to furnish a corrective, let such be regarded as unintentional and unwritten. He meant not to disparage the judgment, to call in question the sincerity, nor in any way to wound the feelings of those who differ from himself on the momentous questions at issue : "to err is human." With deep personal humility and reverence he would breathe the prayer that all who have missed the truth may be led to it, and that all who possess it may enjoy its blessings, both in this life and in that which is to come. The Great Teacher said, " Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth." May His aid be the rich possession of every reader of these pages ! * The Quarterly Review, April, 1863, pp. 445, 446. 186 APPENDIX. A: p. 72. — On Mysteries in Religion. " That we may have demonstrative evidence of the truth of some propositions, concerning which very perplex ing difficulties may be raised; and so, may have the strongest proof that some things are, and yet be utterly incapable of comprehending the manner how the things so proved can be ; i e., we may have, in some cases, demonstra tive evidence of doctrines mysterious. " It is a point capable of rigid demonstration, that matter is not a necessarily existing being, nor eternal. It must therefore have been, strictly speaking, created: and yet we are incapable of comprehending the manner how a thing can be created " We are, I conceive, very certain, that mere matter is incapable of any active powers ; and, consequently, cannot put itself into motion. Whenever, therefore, it is put in motion, it must be acted upon, either immediately or mediately by some other being which is immaterial. But who can frame a notion how an immaterial being can act upon that which is material? " Further : It is capable of certain proof, that whatever being is endued with absolute knowledge must be endued with a certain foreknowledge of all future events. For, whatever certamly exists at any time, may at that time be MYSTERIES IN RELIGION. 187 the object of certain knowledge : whatever at any time cer tainly exists, was from all eternity certainly future : and what ever was from eternity certainly future, might from eternity be certainly foreknown. The consequence is plain, that God, as being endued with absolute knowledge must be endued with a certain foreknowledge of all future events. It is on the other hand certain, that we have a liberty of action. This we experience in ourselves ; and whatever arguments are urged against it, will equally conclude against placing liberty in any other being ; and yet it is strictly demonstrable, that there must be Liberty somewhere or other. But whosoever shall attempt to clear up all difficulties about these truths, and distinctly to reconcile them with each other, will find himself engaged in an insu perable work. We cannot conceive how a thing can be certainly foreknown, and yet contingent ; how a thing can be certainly future, and yet such as may be, or may not be. The points, however, before mentioned are doubtless really consistent with each other : and the appearing difficulties about reconciling them arise from nothing but our present imperfect views of things." — Bishop Conybeare on Scripture Mysteries, in Enchiridion Theologicum, vol. iii. 21 3-215. B. p 113. — The Fundamental Law of the Mosaic Institutions. " The posterity of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were set apart and destined to the great object of preserving and trans mitting the true religion, Gen. xviii. 16—20. Comp. Gen. xvii 9— 14; xii. 3; xxii. 18; xxviii. 14. Having increased in numbers, it appeared very evident that they could not live among nations given to idolatry without running the hazard of becoming infected with the same evil. They were, there- 188 FUNDAMENTAL LAW OF fore, in the providence of God, assigned to a particular country, the extent of which was so small that they were obliged, if they would live independently of other nations, to give up in a great measure the life of shepherds, and devote themselves to agriculture. Further, very many of the Hebrews during then- residence in Egypt had fallen into idolatrous habits. These were to be brought back again to the knowledge of the true God, and all were to be excited to engage in those undertakings which should be found necessary for the support of the true religion. All the Mosaic institutions aim at the accomplishment of these objects. The fundamental principle, therefore, of those institutions was this, that the true God, the Creator and Governor of the Universe, and none other, ought to be worshipped. To secure this end the more certainly, God, through the instrumentality of Moses, offered Himself as king to the Hebrews, and was accepted by the united voice of their community. Accordingly, the land of Canaan, which was destined to be occupied by them, was declared to be the land of Jehovah, of which He was to be the king, and the Hebrews merely the hereditary occupants. In con sideration of their acknowledgment of God, as their ruler, they were bound, like the Egyptians, to pay a two-fold tithe, Exod. xix. 4— 8. Lev. xxvii. 20— 34. Num. xviii. 21, 22. Deut. xii. 17 — 19 ; xiv. 22, 29 ; xxvi. 12 — 15. In compliance with the duties which naturally fall to the immediate ruler of a people, God promulgated, from the clouds of Mount Sinai, the prominent laws for the government of the people> considered as a religious community, Exod. xx. These laws were afterwards more fully developed and illustrated by Moses. The rewards, which should accompany the obedient, and the punishments, which should be the lot of the trans- THE MOSAIC INSTITUTIONS. 189 gressor, were at the same time announced, and the Hebrews promised by a solemn oath to obey, Exodus xxi— xxiv. Deut. xxvii — xxx. "In order to keep the true nature of the community fully and constantly in view, all the ceremonial institutions had reference to God, not only as the sovereign of the universe, but as the king of the people. The people were taught to feel, that the tabernacle was not only the temple of Jehovah, but the palace of their king ; that the table, supplied with wine and shew-bread was the royal table, that the altar was the place where the provisions of the monarch were pre pared : that the priests were the royal servants, and were bound to attend not only to sacred but secular affairs, and were to receive, as their salary, the first tithes, which the people, as subjects, were led to consider a part of that revenue, which was due to God, their immediate sovereign. Other things of a less prominent and important nature had reference to the same great end. Since, therefore, God was the sovereign, in a civil point of view as well as others, of Palestine and its inhabitants, the commission of idolatry by any inhabitant of that country, even a foreigner, was a defection from the true king. It was in fact treason, was considered a crime equal in aggravation to that of murder, and was, consequently, attended with the severest punish ment. — Whoever invited or exhorted to idolatry was consi dered seditious, and was obnoxious to the same punishment. Incantations also, necromancy, and other practices of this nature were looked upon as arts of a kindred aspect with idolatry itself, and the same punishment was to be inflicted upon the perpetrators of them as upon idolaters. The same rigour of inquiry after the perpetrators of idolatry was en forced that was exhibited in respect to other crimes of the deepest aggravation ; and the person who knew of the 190 ORIGIN OF SACRIFICES. commission of idolatry in another was bound by the law to complain of the person thus guilty before the judge, though the criminal sustained the near relationship of a wife or a brother, a daughter or a son. " The law with the penalty attached to it, as may be learnt from other sources, had reference only to the overt acts of idolatry ; it was rather a civil than a religious statute, and the judge who took cognizance of the crime, while he had a right to decide upon the deed, the undeniable act in any given instance, evidently went beyond his province if he under took to decide upon the thoughts and feelings of a person implicated, independently of an overt commission of the crime, Deut. xiii. 2 — 18 ; xvii. 2 — 5. " It has been observed that the law was not so much a religious as a civil one. The distinction is obvious. A religious law has reference to the feelings, and those laws, consequently, which command us to love God, to exercise faith in Him, and to render him a heartfelt obedience are of this nature. Deut. vi. 4 — 9; x. 12; xi. 1, 13. It ought to be remarked, that the severe treatment of idolatry, of which we have given a statement, was demanded by the condition of the times. That was an age in which each nation selected its deity, not from the dictates of conscience, but from the hope of temporal aid . It was an age when idolaters were multiplied, and when nothing but the utmost severity in thfe laws could keep them from contaminating the soil of the Hebrews." — John's Biblical Archceology, by Pro fessor JJpham, § 214. C. p. 152. — Origin of Sacrifices. " The origin of sacrifices we have good reason to regard as from Heaven, and not of men. In the institutes of the Levitical law, the express divine sanction is indisputable •. ORIGIN PF SACRIFICES. 191 and if we go back to the remotest times, we shall find indi cations of the same authority. The approbation of God is solemnly recorded to the sacrifices of Job and Abraham, Noah and Abel. But, in religious institutions, the Most High has ever been jealous of His prerogative. He alone is competent to prescribe the terms on which He will hold communion with sinful beings ; and He regards as vain and presumptuous every pretence of honouring Him which He hath not warranted. The sacrifice of blood and death, if an idea so revolting could have sprung up in a sinner's mind, could not have been offered to God without impiety, nor would He have accepted it, had not His own authority pre viously pointed the way by an explicit prescription. " The goodness which pitied our first parents, in their fallen and degraded condition, furnished them with clothing from the skins of animals. It cannot by any reasonable pre sumption be supposed that those animals had been killed for food. The strong probability, therefore, is that the gracious Being who promised the Messiah as the woman's seed, confirmed the promise, and illustrated the doctrine of forgiveness through him, by the institution of sacrifices. "Now all divine institutions are marked by the wisdom of their Author. The sabbath, the passover, the rite of bap tism, and all other ordinances of worship, are significant and instructive : it is fair to infer that sacrifices were so too." — Four Discourses on the Sacrifice and Priesthood of Jesus Christ, &c, by John Pye Smith, D.D., F.K.S., pp. 10, 11,— and Supplementary Note iv, pp. 230—242. D. p. 162.— Knowledge of God and Religion in Patriarchal times. "It is a common, but very palpable mistake, to imagine that the short account of the patriarchal times which com- 192 KNOWLEDGE OF. GOD IN mences the Old Testament embodies all that was known of true religion in those days: this is contrary to the tenor of the inspired narrative, which speaks of some communications between God and man, of which it has given us no account ; it was written many ages afterwards, primarily for the use of the children of Israel, and introduces the minute details of a religion of rites and ceremonies which was to replace the ritual of the patriarchs. So that there was neither the necessity for, nor the opportunity of dwelling upon the particulars of the older form which was about to be abolished, or of recording the full extent of the knowledge relative to divine things possessed by those to whom it had been communicated. God, who had imparted the patriarchal dispensation, was about to replace it with another, which was to convey Divine knowledge, primarily in types and figures, and ultimately in fulfilment and reality, to the whole extent to which mankind required it. When, there fore, it is supposed that the portion of Holy Writ which treats of the antediluvian and patriarchal times contains a full account of the rites and doctrines of the known religion, there is an entire mistake of its intention. Some account it a whole in itself, whereas it is really but a small part of the whole. It is merely the introductory chapter to the com plete revelation. The first eleven chapters of Genesis contain the whole inspired record of the events of 2,000 years. It is therefore perfectly comprehensible that the Scrip ture account of the patriarchs should by no means detail all that was then known of true religion ; but we cannot under stand how mankind could at any time have believed unto righteousness without some knowledge of the scheme of sal vation which is set forth in the Bible as the object of then- faith. It is written regarding many individuals, both before PATRIARCHAL TIMES. 193 and after the Flood, that they were the children of God, that they walked with God, that they were the friends of God. The same authority also informs us that these were all originally inheritors of the corruption of our common parents ; that they were by nature dead in trespasses and sins; and that every imagination of the thoughts of their hearts had been once only evil continually. What, then, produced this holy change in them ? Whence were the new principles derived which now actuated them ? The same unerring authority answers this question also. By the grace of God, through faith in Christ, who was hereafter to die for sinners, and to be raised from the dead, and by that alone, can they who are dead in trespasses and sins have been quickened at any time ; for there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved, nor could they have believed in him of whom they had not heard. It appears, therefore, that the knowledge of divine things, which we discover in so unexpected a quarter that mankind really did possess in the patriarchal times, is no more than the Scripture account necessarily supposes them to have possessed ; for otherwise they must have believed without knowing wherein they believed, which is in itself a contradiction." — The Antiquities of Egypt, pp. 146, 147. — Religious Tract Society, 1841. E. p. 166. — The Place of the Pentateuch in Judaism and Christianity. " In a word, the Pentateuch was the history, the theology, and the law of the Israelites, setting forth their origin and high calling, and offering instruction for their attaining that end by the rule of life which it set before them, both indi- O 194 THE PLACE OF THE vidually and as members of the theocratic commonwealth. So fully, indeed, were its claims in these various respects felt, and even acknowledged, that however the Jewish nation may have misunderstood the spirit of the law, or proved disobe dient to its fundamental principles, they never questioned the authority of Moses as the founder of their polity, or his divinely accredited commission, nor indeed could they do so without questioning the entire history and institutions of the State, and whatever constituted its sole distinction among the nations of the earth. For the Jew to reject the autho rity of Moses, or dispute the authenticity of his writings, was a virtual abnegation of his character as a Jew or member of the covenant people. It was not merely casting away the traditions which connected the nation with the past through its illustrious founder Abraham: it was also a renunciation of the immunities and promises pertaining to the present and the future ; and more than that, or any private interest whatever, such scepticism was, under the theocratic consti tution, rebellion against all public order and authority. " But it is not only the claims which the Pentateuch made on the Hebrew nation and their unqualified acquiescence therein, as the authoritative produetion of their divinely commissioned lawgiver, that have to be considered ; there are also its claims on the faith of Christians, who, it will be found, whatever assertions may be advanced to the contrary, or as to the New Testament being independent of the earlier records and dispensations, are equally concerned with the Jews in all that conduces to authenticate its historical credi bility and its inspiration, and to illustrate the system which it embodies. " The relation of the Pentateuch to Christianity and the New Testament Scriptures is particularly intimate as it is PENTATEUCH. 195 also varied. To advert to only one or two particulars: first, there is an historical relation in which the authenticity of the Pentateuch affects the New Testament, particularly the historical appearance of Christ. Thus, at the very outset of the Gospels, a close connexion between the Mosaic history and the New Testament is clearly assumed. The genea logical tables in Matthew and Luke, of our Lord's descent from Adam through Abraham and the other Israelitish patriarchs, take for granted the authenticity of Genesis, the only record of these early ages ; and of course the character of these genealogies must be injuriously affected by any doubts cast on the credibility of the original document. Another consideration belonging to the historical aspect of the case, is the sanction given by Christ and His apostles in a multitude of instances to the truth of the Mosaic writings. Our Lord in particular intimated to the Jews, that if they had believed Moses — referring, as is evident from the context, not to any doubt on their part as to Moses' authority, but to a misapprehension of or disobedience to his declarations and doctrines — they would have believed Himself as the Person o whom Moses wrote. John v. 46. Further, the Great Teacher gave unqualified sanction to the history and economy of the Pentateuch by declaring that His own mission had for its object, not the abrogation, but the fulfilment of the law. Matt. v. 17. The sanction of the apostles, also, to the his torical statements of the Pentateuch, is equally explicit ; and this not merely in writings and discourses directed to their own countrymen, but in such also as were addressed to Gentiles — a fact of itself sufficient to dispose of the common rationalistic charge that these views were simply an accom modation to Jewish prejudices. " Again, not less intimate is the connection between the 196 ITS PLACE. Mosaic writings and the New Testament in respect to doc trine. The New Testament is not only historically a con tinuation of the scheme of which the Pentateuch contains the commencement, it also purports to be doctrinallythe develop ment of the older dispensation— the realization of its types, and the fulfilment of its promises and prophecies. Even the historical narratives of the Pentateuch are made to assume in the New Testament a doctrinal connexion with the Gospel The account of the creation, for instance, has its parallel • and complement in the New Testament intimations of a "new creation," — a process rendered necessary by the disorder introduced into God's works according to the narrative of the fall, which immediately succeeds that of the material creation, and the truth of which change in man's moral rela tion is so fully assumed, that it is assigned as the necessi tating cause of the Gospel provision. Rom v. 12 — 21. The deliverance of the Israelites, too, from the bondage of Egypt, in order to their entering into covenant with God, their introduction into, and occupancy of the land of promise, with all the correlative arrangements and institutions, as priesthood, sacrifice, and purifications, are all represented by the New Testament writers as having their several counter parts, but in a higher and spiritual form in the Christian economy, which, it is explicitly declared, has taken the place of the Mosaic dispensation. But, in short, the very arguments used in proof of the ceremonial observances being now utterly nugatory, emphatically accredit their divine origin and spiritual import. So much, in fact, is this assumed or affirmed throughout the New Testament, that its language in every important particular is moulded after the ordinances of the law ."— Introduction to the Pentateuch, by the Rev. D. Macdonald, M.A., vol. i. 6—8. Edinburgh ; Clark. OLD ERRORS. 197 F. p. 176. — Old Errors reproduced by Bishop Colenso. " The other case which serves to prove that error is almost as old as truth, and that there is little which is new in the modern weapons employed agamst our faith, will be found in the speculations of Colenso. It is a case of critical scep ticism. He assails, not the articles of our faith, but the records in which they are contained. The method adopted is the summation of passages which are alleged to be in open discrepancy or contradiction. That there are passages the reconciliation of which has occasioned difficulty need not be denied. It is a well-known fact. We might even concede that, in regard to some of these instances the proper recon ciliation has not yet been discovered. But there is no reason to feel alarm at the announcement of such difficulties in Scripture. They have been recognized centuries before Colenso was born, and recognized even more fully than by Colenso himself. In 1632 Manasseh Ben Israel published his learned work, entitled the " Conciliator," in which he endeavours to overtake a complete discussion of these alleged contradictions. Under the Pentateuch alone he travels over no fewer than 189 instances, and supplies expla nations of the difficulties raised by them, which, if not always conclusive, evince, at least, care and learning, with a spirit of candour in recognizing difficulties. So familiar have the more scholarly Jews been for ages with the discussions to which Colenso's volumes relate, that the work of Dr. Benisch in reply to them is one of the ablest and most satisfactory among the various answers which the reasonings of the Bishop have received. One of the great advantages of a complete theological education, we may remark in passing, is, that on the revival of any error or heresy, we 198 ON THE IMPUTATION are enabled to identify it with some past manifestation of the same tendency, and we are reminded where the weapons are to be found by which it may be most successfully re butted. So prone is error in the long history of the world to repeat itself!" — On the Supernatural in Christianity : a Lecture by the Rev. W. H. Goold, D.D., p. 6, 7. G. p. 1 80. — On the imputation to our Lord Jesus Christ of ignorance and liability to error. " Under such circumstances," says Bishop Ollivant, " we cannot believe that our Lord, as man, was left in ignorance of any thing which it would be of importance to His future Church to know ; and, supposing a Revelation to have been given by God to man, it must have been of vital importance that it should know where that Revelation was to be found. When our Lord was upon earth, the Jews, the peculiar peo ple of God, were in possession of certain books to which they believed that Revelation to have been consigned. Is it possible to imagine that He could have been ignorant whether this opinion was true or false ? Familiar as He must have been with that injunction, which He found addressed to the im mediate successor of Moses, ' This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth ; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein ; for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success,' is it possible to believe that He did not know whether the book that was thus commended was the same that He then found acknowledged as the Law of Moses ; and whether it really did contain the records of Divine Revelation under the Patriarchal and Mosaic dispensations, or was a mixture of true history and a fabulous tale ? The Apostles, it is clear, OF ERROR TO JESUS. 199 had no doubts about the matter. That the Pentateuch, as it now exists, formed a portion of that collection, to which, in common with our Lord Himself, they assign the name of TpaQal, implying by that name ajpeculiar sanctity, is uni versally acknowledged. St. Paul, at least, professed to know, respecting the whole collection, that every single ypapr) was Btorrvcvo-roQ. And to this collection our Lord Himself not only gave the sanction of His authority, but when He was about to leave them, He opened their under standing;— apparently on that same occasion when he breathed on them, and said, ' Receive ye the Holy Ghost ;' — so that this opening of the understanding was an exercise of Divine Power, that they might understand the Scriptures ; — those Scriptures respecting which, if the Bishop is right in his views, our Lord Himself was under the same delusion as any other Jew." A Letter to the Clergy, pp. 19, 20. " The question which the Bishop has raised is not a light one- It is not a mere question of words. If, as he affirms, our Lord, while on earth was ignorant and liable to error, — if He quoted fiction for fact, legends for history, — if He mistook altogether the character of the Bible, — believed a mere human composition to be the Word of God, — believed that God really had spoken to Moses, when he had not, — made blunders about the most important matters, as to which it has fallen to the lot of Bishop Colenso to set Him right, — then, if these things be so, we have no sure ground for our faith. Mistaken on one point, He whom we call Lord may have been so on every matter. We could not admit the Bishop's statements without shaking to its very foundation the whole Christian faith as arevelation from God. "I must decide that in imputing to our Blessed Lord ignorance, and the possibility of error, the Bishop has 2.00 BISHOP GRAY. committed himself to a most subtle heresy, destructive of the reality of the Incarnation, and that he has departed from the Catholic faith, as held in the Church from the beginning, and as expressed in the second Article, and in the Creeds." — Bishop Gray in Trial of the Bishop of Natal for erro neous teaching, p. 395. Note. — During the passage of this little work through the Press the Most Reverend Dr. Gray, Bishop of Cape Town, has rested from his labours, and this Colony, and especially the Church over which his Lordship was placed, have lost one whose name ever suggested high intelligence, unflinching courage, a zeal that never tires, and the character of a most self-denying and consistent Churchman. The Author, al though belonging to another Christian communion, offers this humble tribute to the memory of a great and good man. To say less in the circumstances would seem insensibility to sterling worth, and indifference to a dispensation of Divine providence which has deprived a large section of his fellow Christians of a Chief Pastor, and plunged them into grief; whereas to say more might be deemed incompatible with his own sincerity. — The volume from which the above extract has been taken contains much valuable matter ; but not, I suspect, in a form that will secure for it, in this busy, money-getting, and pleasure-loving age, the attention which it deserves. Is it too late to eliminate the extraneous matter, and otherwise to reduce the size of a work which contains the protest against subtle and dangerous error of that portion of the Church of Christ in this country of which its propounder, and advocate, Dr. Colenso is a Bishop ? WOEKS SAME AUTHOR. Our Old Bible, with some Reasons for Keeping Fast Hold of It, in Lectures for the Times. Second Edition; Pages 250, bound in Cloth and Lettered. Price 2s. 6d. CONTENTS : 1. The Position which our Young Men may take up with respect to some of the Speculations of the Day on Biblical and Theological Science. 2. A Brief Review of the Writings commonly at tributed to Moses, and the conclusion to which it leads. 3. A Brief Statement on the Inspiration, Unerring Character, and Divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures. 1 4. The Testimony of Jesus, or the Central Truth of Revelation and the way in which it has been developed. 5. The Promise of the Father, the Strength of the Believer, and the Hope of the Church : an Outline. 6. The Divine Remedy for Human Restlessness and Inquietude during the Controversies now agi tating the Church of Christ. 11 WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. II. T$te Truth-seeker directed; in Two Dis courses, addressed to the Thoughtful and Perplexed in these Times. Being Numbers 6 and 3 of the above. Price 9d. III. Theology: the Old briefly stated with a Glance at the New. Third Edition. Pages 304. — Cloth and Lettered. — Price 3s. 6d. IV. Church Tracts, Price 2s., bound. 1. The Christian Church, as represented in the Scrip tures, with a Glance at some Modern Views of it- 2. The Position, Aims, Re sources, and Prospects of Voluntary Churches in general, and of Con gregational Churches in particular. 3. The Special Advantages of Self-sustained Congre gational Churches for the preservation among themselves of Religious Truth and Life, and for their extension in tha World. . The Future of the Church of Christ upon Earth, a source of Hope and of Strength to the Christian- An unproductive Minis- "* try the Pastor's Dread. A Father's Counsel to a Beloved Son, with respect to his future Work : A Charge to Mr. Ralph Wardlaw Thompson, at his Ordination to the Pastorate of the Church assembling in Ewing Place, Glasgow. Price 6d. WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. iii VI. A Friendly Talk with our Young Men in relation to their Country and Times, and on the way to meet what is expected from them. Price 6d. VII. Our Young Men, in relation to some Things Secular and Religious. Being the above, and " The Position which our Young Men may take up," &c. (I. i.) Price 9d. VIII. The Sabbath Restored to its Original Design. Price 6d. IX. Christian Missions : the place they should have in the cherished sympathies and practical ar rangements of Colonial Churches. Price 6d. X. The Reviewer Reviewed. Price 6d. XI. Calvin : his Life, Principles, and Mission : with some reasons for observing in Cape Town the Tercentenary of his Death. To which is added an Introductory Note on the Recent Assumptions of the Church of Rome. Second Edition — pp. xx. 120. Price Is. : in Cloth, Is. 6d. IV WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. Note. — For the information of personal friends who desire a list of his publications in Cape Town, but now out of print, Mr. Thompson appends the following : On the attempt to introduce Convicts into this Colony, a Sermon on Nehemiah ii. 19, 20 : — The Destiny of Nations, a Sermon on Isaiah lx 12 : — Obstacles to the spread of the Gospel in Heathen Lands, and the Guilt of those who in crease them, a Sermon on Matthew xviii. 7: — The Warning Voice, a Sermon on Revelation xxii, 12 : — The Call to Re membrance, a Sermon on Heb. x. 32, 33, on occasion of the Bicentenary, 24th August, 1662 : — Reply to " Suum Cuique " parts 1 and 2 : — The Pope's Encyclical Letter, 1864. A Word on Behalf of the Down-trodden in South Africa : — The Griquas, as " Her Majesty's Special Commissioner for the Settlement of the Affairs of the Orange River Sovereignty " found them, and as he left them : a chapter for the history of our dealings with weak tribes: — Appen dix to do. -.—The Boers of the Transvaal Republic and the Mission Stations at Kuruman : — South- Central Africa and its Explorer, Dr. Livingstone : Report of Public Meeting. The following edited, with introductions, &c. The Trial of Andries Botha:— The Kat River Settlement in 1851, a series of Letters, by the Rev. James Read: — Light and Shade : as shown in the character of the Hot tentots of the Kat River Settlement, and in the conduct of the Colonial Government towards them, a speech by the Hon'ble Sir Andries Stockenstrom, Bart., M.L.C.