tiality of God's conduct with his own Scriptural declarations of the eternal and immutable rectitude of his juftice? XXIII. ONE evidence more,, drawn from the fame fcriptural fource of conviction, will, I hope, be fufficient to evince the irreproachablenefs of Jofeph's conduct in the tranfaction now before us. Every body knows, who knows any thing of Scripture, that the fpeeches made to their Children by the holy Patriarchs of old, prior to their departure from this world, called in the language of Scripture Blessing the Children (0), were fo many prophetic declarations of the Word of God, predicting to them the future events that should diftinguish them and their families, and entailing upon them and their pofterity that portion of happiness or mifery, to which their moral or immoral conduct entitled them. This being an undoubted truth, let us now examine with an attentive eye fome of the most material circumstances of that folemn Bleffing, which Jacob bestowed on Jofeph and his Brethren a little before his death (p). 1. This Bleffing was bestowed on Joseph and his Brethren about ten years after Joseph had enslaved all the inhabitants of Egypt, excepting thofe of the Sacerdotal Order (q). 2. Jacob in this Bleffing reproaches Reuben, his eldest fon, with the infamy of his inceftuous crime in the strongest terms; and declares, that, in punishment of it, he should not excel, but should be as unstable as water. 3. Simeon and Levi are branded by the holy Patriarch with being Inftruments of cruelty; he abhors their counfels; calls their company difhonourable; curses (0) Gen. 27. v. 4, 7, 10, 12, 19, &c. (p) Gen. 49. v. I, &c. curfes the fierceness of their anger, and the cruelty of their wrath, because in their anger, fays he, they flew a man; meaning Shechem the Hivite and his father Hamor, together with all his male fubjects, whom they flew with the fword (r); and, as a punishment of their barbarous cruelty, he declares they thould be divided and scattered in the land of Promise. 4. When the Holy Patriarch comes to blefs his fon Jofeph, he expreffes himself in the following emphatic and divine ftrain. "Jofeph is a fruitful bough; even 66 a fruitful bough by a well, whofe branches run "over the wall. The archers have forely grieved him, "and fhot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode "in ftrength, and the arms of his hands were made ftrong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob: "from thence is the Shepherd, the ftone of Ifrael; "even by the God of thy father, who fhall help thee, "and by the Almighty, who fhall blefs thee with blef fings of heaven above, bleffings of the deep that "lieth under, bleffings of the breast, and of the womb. "The bleffings of thy father have prevailed above "the bleffings of my progenitors: unto the utmost "bounds of the everlasting hills, they fhall be on the "head of Jofeph, and on the crown of the head of him, that was separate from his brethren (s)." IN these prophetic and beautiful expreffions, exhibiting in the most pleafing colours the perfonal character of Jofeph, and the bleffings entailed on his pofterity, literally fulfilled afterwards, we can perceive nothing but what neceffarily supposes in Jofeph the greatest innocence of heart, the most unimpeachable rectitude of conduct, and the most gracious acceptance with his Creator. No part of his conduct is here branded (r) Gen. 34. v. 25, 26. (s) Gen, 49. v. 22—27. 18. When that year was ended, they came unto him the second year, and faid unto him: we will not hide it from my Lord, how that our money is spent ; Lord alfo hath our herds of cattle; there is not aught left in the fight of my Lord, but our bodies and our lands. my 19. Wherefore fhall we die before thine eyes, both we and our land? Buy us and our land for bread, and we and our land will be fervants unto Pharaoh: and give us feed, that we may live and not die, that the land be not defolate. 20. And Jofeph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh for the Egyptians fold every man his field; because the famine prevailed over them: fo the land became Pharaoh's. 21. And as for the people, he removed them to cities, from one end of the borders of Egypt, even unto the other end thereof. 22. Only the land of the Priests bought he not; for the Priests had a portion affigned them of Pharaoh, and did eat their portion which Pharaoh gave them; wherefore they fold not their lands. 23. Then Jofeph said unto the people: behold, I have bought you this day, and your land, for Pharaoh : lo, here is feed for you, and ye fhall fow the land. 24. And it fhall come to pafs in the encrease, that ye shall give the fifth part unto Pharaoh, and four parts fhall be your own, for feed of the field, and for your food, and for them of your housholds, and for food for your little ones. 25. And they said: thou haft faved our lives: let us find grace in the fight of my Lord, and we will be Pharaoh's fervants. 26. And Jofeph made it a law over the land of Egypt unto this day, that Pharaoh fhould have the fifth 14 part; part; except the land of the Priests only, which became not Pharaoh's. XX. THE tranfactions related in this portion of Jofeph's history, afford us a confiderable number of very pertinent reflections on the SLAVE-TRADE: the following appear to me very remarkable. 1. Here is a whole Nation of free and independent Africans, one only defcription of men excepted, inhabiting the richest, the most populous, and the most civilized part of Africa, or, perhaps, of any other part of the Globe at that period, all made SLAVES in one day by a moft explicit, deliberate, and for'mal contract. 2. Allowing, the Kingdom of Egypt at that time to have extended no farther than it does at prefent; that is, 600 miles from North to South, and 250 from Eaft to Weft, it must have contained, on the most moderate computation, as many inhabitants, at least, as the Kingdom of Great Britain does at this prefent time; Egypt was then the Emporium of the whole world, where all arts and fciences, commerce, agriculture, and polity flourished in a degree of perfection and refinement, fuperior, perhaps, to that of any part of Europe in our days. Accordingly, the number of Africans purchafed by Jofeph in one day, at the very moderate price of one year's maintenance per head, including their land, amounted, at leaft, to feven or eight millions of perfons: a number not unequal, perhaps, to all the purchases of the kind ever made by English Merchants fince the commencement of the GUINEA-TRADE. 3. The happy condition of these Africans, prior to Jofeph's purchase, is a circumftance worth obferving: it differed in every refpect from that of most of their prefent countrymen purchased by our European Merchants. The latter are generally Slaves, or Cap D tives, 1 tives, in their native land; the former were all free and independent fubjects: thofe, when purchased by our African Merchants are in a state of abfolute indigence and poverty; whereas the latter were all people of property, and, indeed, of landed property; for it is very particularly fpecified in the fcriptural account, that the Egyptians fold every man his field; that is, his landed estate. 4. The circumftance of transporting Slaves from their native foil into a diftant Country, is also very obvious in the conduct of Jofeph, fubfequent to the purchase he had made; for, as for the people, fays the Scripture, he removed them to cities, from one end of the borders of Egypt, even unto the other end thereof: by which expedient he deprived them of every profpect of ever re-enjoying their refpective paternal Eftates, and the places of their nativity. And is it not more than probable, that, in the execution of fo extenfive a plan, as removing fo many millions of inhabitants of every age, fex, condition, and rank, infants at the breaft, young children, old and decrepit people, infirm and delicate, from one end of the borders of fo extenfive a Country as Egypt, even unto the other end thereof, many muft have inevitably perished in paffing through the fcorching fands of a Country defolate with famine, and parched up, as it were, by an uninterrupted drought of fix confecutive years, whatever wife regulations we may naturally suppose were made by Jofeph to accommodate fuch an extraordinary number of Slaves? 5. This numerous multitude of free and independent Africans, become now by contract menial Slaves to Pharaoh, are immediately fent by Jofeph to cultivate their Mafter's Eftates throughout all Egypt, for the land became Pharaoh's: fo, that we may confider them with the utmost propriety, as fo many Slaves, transported 16 |