fiftieth day after the departure from Egypt, God gave to our fathers that treasure which hallows them above every other people, the law upon mount Sinai. Yonder in the desert, in the midst of a sandy and naked region, rises a mountain, with two summits, of which the lower is called Horeb, the higher Sinai. Northward from them are two valleys, terminating in a plain, in which the people were encamped. In this impressive solitude, cut off from all other nations of the earth, surrounded with steep and pointed rocks, beneath a burning sky, amidst the thunders and the lightnings of Jehovah's presence, they received the law.

"Jehovah declared to Moses that Israel should be to him a kingdom of priests and a holy people.* For this purpose they were commanded to wash their garments and keep themselves holy to the third day, and it was forbidden that man or beast should ascend the mountain, or even touch it with his foot. The third day came. Early in the morning '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 were in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet God; and they stood at the lower part of the mount. And mount Sinai was altogether in a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount trembled greatly. And the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and grew louder, and Moses spake, and the Lord answered him with a voice.'

"Awful preparations! symbols of the presence of Jehovah! who drew near to give the law. While he thus displayed himself in all the terrific majesty of heaven on the loftiest pinnacle of the land: and the people, overwhelmed with terror, felt their own feebleness before him, he gave to Moses the tables with the ten commandments, and afterwards the rest of the law; and all was concluded with a promise to the obedient, and the threat, Cursed he he that

* Exod. xix. 6.

fulfilleth not all the words of this law to do it. And all the people shall say Amen.'

"The whole constitution and legislation of Israel rests on the relation of the people to God as their king. From the covenant between them arose a twofold authority. Aaron was the first high priest and Moses the first chief. The high priest conducted the worship of the people before Jehovah; the chief directed their civil and military affairs. Their employment in the land which they were to occupy was to be agriculture.

"But the Jews, who had been corrupted by living in Egypt, were not fit subjects for such a constitution. It was necessary that a new generation should arise, and for this purpose Moses led them forty years backward and forward in the wilderness, and only two, of whom he himself was not one, came into the promised land. Forty-four stations in the desert are reckoned up, in which they successively encamped, as we do now; and it was only by the severest discipline that they could be retained in obedience. Often was Jehovah compelled to visit them with heavy calamities, and sweep them away by thousands. Yet he never ceased also to perform miracles of mercy and almighty power upon them.

"Amidst all these sins of the people, in their forty years' wandering in the wilderness, Moses was the representative of the divine authority, and the medium of divine communication. Against him the fury of the rebellious people was vented, and by him Jehovah both blessed and punished them. Moses stood among them, like a rock in the desert, a wonder or rather a miracle of firmness combined with meekness, steadfast resolution, with wise indulgence, absolute submission to God, with boldness and determination in the guidance of the people. In the long and unhappy period of forty years of wandering, he displayed the aptitude for command which his kingly education had given him, joined with that love to his suffering countrymen, with which he could only have been inspired by being a native Jew.

"He died on mount Nebo, in the sight of that land for

which he had done and suffered all to which human strength was equal. His eye was permitted to behold it, but not his foot to tread its soil. Firm as he was in acting and in suffering, he had once allowed himself to be overcome, and therefore he was not permitted to attain the end of his journey, or go to his rest in Canaan. Perhaps it was also the will of God, that the hands which had been stretched out over the Red Sea, which had received the tables of the law from Jehovah, and had built his tabernacle, should not be stained by the blood of the Canaanites. Even in the battle with Amalek, these hands were only lifted up in the attitude of prayer.* This is the first period of the history of our people."

“Our best thanks belong to thee, venerable old man,” said Myron, "for the relation of it, and I can readily believe, that the history of thy nation has more in it than is commonly supposed. It was, I must confess, in a very different way that Lycurgus, Solon, Numa Pompilius, and even Pythagoras himself, gave their laws. There is something grand, exalted and divine, in the manner in which Moses speaks and acts. But permit me to remind you, that though you mentioned his being brought up at the court of Pharaoh, and instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, you have given us no hint that he may have learned much from the pillars of Isis, and that an initation of the Egyptian polity is everywhere conspicuous in your law, especially in the double power of the king and the priest, the institution of the sacerdotal caste, the encouragement given to agriculture, your festivals, and many other particulars."

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I gave no hint of it," said Elisama, "because in this sense it does not exist. To say nothing of its being as yet an undetermined point, whether the Jews learned these things from the Egyptians, or the Egyptians from the Jews; I will suppose that the wisdom of the Egyptians is of that high antiquity which you ascribe to it, and maintain that Jehovah wisely chose institutions for his people not too remote from those

*Exod. xvii. 11.

to which they were accustomed; that some things, which were for higher reasons essential in the Jewish economy, have an accidental coincidence with circumstances of the Egyptian customs. But disregarding outward and accidental things, let the spirit of the two systems be compared, and you will find that one is the spirit of God, and the other the spirit of the world. In our religion there is no worship of animals or of images, no polytheism, no secret doctrines of the priests. These are essential points, which show that the legislation of Moses must have had a higher origin, and was not learned by him from any other nation. Would it, besides, be surprising if, in giving a divine revelation to his people, Jehovah should have chosen a form for its communication, in which, as being familiar to them, they would more readily adopt it? Though this form was of human invention, it was purified and hallowed by God's adoption of it."

CHAPTER V.

THE HALT A T OSTRA CINE.

THE march began, as usual, about midnight, and terminated at Ostracine. They had not proceeded far from Casium, when they reached the lake Sirbonis, whose surface was so covered with the drifted sand, that they had difficulty in distinguishing it, in the darkness, from the surrounding wilderness. A few Sabbath-days' journeys further on, they came to a green, fertile and blooming vale, called Larish, in the midst of the desert, like a flower growing in the sand. A small brook discharges itself by this valley into the lake Sirbonis. In summer, it is commonly dry; now its clear waters were flowing, and the stars were reflected in them. Elisama checked his horse, as they were about to cross it, and called

to Helon, "Farewell to Egypt! this is the boundary; I cross the river of Egypt!"

There seemed to be something melancholy in his tone, as if the parting were painful, notwithstanding his approach to the Holy Land. The ominous anticipations of Helon's mother occurred to him, and though at Alexandria he had despised them as female weakness, he could not shake them off. Helon called aloud, with an animated voice, so that all before and behind might hear him, "Farewell, Egypt; I see thee not again— or only as a new man!" He rode forward, giving himself up to the imaginations of his own mind, to which there was something of a fascinating interest in this nightly procession, amidst songs near and distant, the measured tinkling of the bells, beneath the glimmering light of the stars, and ruddy gleams of pitch-kettles, which deepened the surrounding shadows. He felt now more than ever that he had left Egypt behind, and was surprised at the almost poetical enthusiasm which began to be awakened within him.

Two hours after sunrise, they arrived at Ostracine. No one was wearied. The tent was pitched, and they laid themselves under it. Helon was full of the animating reflections which the journey in the night had excited in him; and Elisama still under the influence of the melancholy which had seized him at the river of Egypt. All emotions are durable in the mind of an oriental, and he does not quickly part either with his sorrow or his joy. Yet all were full of alacrity, and Myron, as usual, the first to speak, began thus:

"I shall rejoice, Elisama, to hear the continuation of your narrative. I presume we would all rather speak and hear, than sleep."

"Listen, then," said Elisama, "and perhaps the narrative may enable me to throw off the melancholy that weighs upon me. I related to you, at Casium, that Jehovah had given the law to our nation, in preference to every other, as their inheritance, and their treasure. But though given, much was yet necessary in order that the law should be obeyed. It was not in every land, nor under all circumstances, practicable to walk