lamentation and he made a mourning for his father 11 seven days. And when the inhabitants of the land, the Ca- . naanites, saw the mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, This [is] a grievous mourning to the Egyptians: wherefore the name of it was called Abel mizraim, that is, the mourning 12 of the Egyptians, which [is] beyond Jordan. And his sons did 13 unto him according as he commanded them: For his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelab, which Abraham bought with the field for a possession of a burying place of Ephron the Hittite, before Mamre.

14

15

And Joseph returned into Egypt, he, and his brethren, and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father.

And when Joseph's brethren saw that their father was dead, they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us, and will certainly requite us all the evil which we did unto him. They had no reason to imagine this; but a guilty conscience causes fear, and 16 is never fully at rest. And they sent a messenger unto Joseph, saying, Thy father did command before he died, saying, 17 So shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin; for they did unto thee evil:* and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father. This may be des gned to intimate their repentance, and show they were of the same religion with him. And Joseph wept when they spake unto him, pitying their perplexity, and grieving at their doubts of his good 18 will. And his brethren also went and fell down before his 19 face; and they said, Behold, we [be] thy servants. And Jo

seph made a noble reply, and said unto them, Fear not for [am] I in the place of God, to punish the injury done to me? Ought I not rather to remember that I am mortal and accountable, and need forgiveness? Am I not under God, (as others 20 read it) under his eye, and subject to him? But as for you, ye thought evil against me; [but] God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as [it is] this day, to save much people alive. 21 Now therefore, fear ye not: I will nourish you and your little ones. And he comforted them, and spake kindly unto them, mentioned their fault very gently, and fromised them his favour and protection.

22

And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house: and Joseph lived an hundred and ten years: having been 23 eighty years governor of Egypt. And Joseph saw Ephraim's children, of the third [generation :] the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were brought up upon Joseph's

This was probably a false story; Jacob knew Joseph too well to suspect that he would bear ill will to his brethren, or he would have given the charge to Joseph, and not to them.

24

knees; he took pleasure, in their infancy, to let them sit on his lap, and dandle them on his knees.

And Joseph, finding his end draw near, took a solemn farewell of, and said unto his brethren, I die and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. Thus he expressed his faith in God's promise, and his full assurance 25 that he would accomplish it. And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, in some extraordinary manner, and deliver you from this land, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.*

26

ì.

So Joseph died, [being] an hundred and ten years old; and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt. Thus this Book concludes with the death of these eminent men. A.M. 2369.

WE

REFLECTIONS.

E see that mourning and death invade the houses of the most eminent saints, and the palaces of the greatest princes. Neither piety nor grandeur can be secure from this there is no discharge in this war; death makes no distinction, but comes to all.

2. When eminent saints are taken away, the forms of mourning are peculiarly proper, both on account of the loss which the world sustains, and out of respect to the pious dead. It is fit that we should lament the death of good men, and lay it to heart; when the righteous perish, the excellent of the earth are taken away. Decent funerals, according to persons' circumstances, are very commendable. Thus devout men carried Stephen to his burial, and made a great lamentation over him. The bodies of the saints are under Christ's care; he will watch over them, and put honour upon them another day.

3. How restless does guilt make the mind! After so many years of kind and generous treatment, it is strange that Joseph's brethren should suspect that any degree of resentment or revenge was harboured in his breast. They knew they had done iniquity, and therefore suspected him. See the importance and necessity of keeping a good conscience; fear and suspicion arise from a guilty mind.

4. How beautiful does generosity and kindness appear! Joseph was remarkable for this; the belief of Providence led him to it. He not only pardoned and excused his brethren, but nourished them as his own children. He spoke kindly to them, spoke to their hearts, removed their fears, and did not keep them in suspense. We learn from so bright an example, to forgive them

Accordingly, when they went out of Egypt, we are expressly told they carried Joseph's bones with them, as Stephen intimates they did the bones of the other patriarchs ja vii. 16.

that injure us. Let the remembrance of Joseph excite us to this, that we be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good; thus let us be imitators of God as dear children, and walk in love.

5. Let us labour and pray that we may die in faith, as Joseph did. So the apostle says, Heb. xi. 22. By faith Joseph when he died, made mention of the departure of the children of Israel ; and gave commandment concerning his bones. Let us exercise faith in God's promises; believe that it shall be as he hath declared; trust in his mercy and faithfulness, and quietly wait for his salvation.

6. When our pious friends are taken away, it is a very great satisfaction to think, that God will visit us, and fulfil all his gracious promises. This hath often been the language of good men to their survivors, I die, but God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land, to the land he hath promised. Whatever friends die, God lives; though we should be disappointed in our hopes from them, or they be taken away from us, God will surely visit us; visit us with the tokens of his presence and favour, and make up the want of all earthly comforts; he will visit us in our retirements and solitude, and bring us out of this house of bondage, to the heavenly Canaan, to the land which he hath promised; he will bring us to that better country, which the patriarchs sought, even an heavenly one. There we shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Joseph, and other saints, who are gone before us to the kingdom of God: wherefore comfort one another with these words.

The Second Book of MOSES,

CALLED,

EXODUS.

WE

INTRODUCTION.

are now entering on the second Book of MOSES, called, ExODUS, that is, The going out, or, The departure. It contains the history of the Israelites for the period of one hundred and forty five years, from the death of Joseph to the buildnig of the Tabernacle; including an account of the increase and oppression of Israel in Egypt; of Moses being sent to deliver them; of the ten plagues; of their deliverance with a strong hand; of their passing through the Red Sea, and the destruction of Pharaoh and his host there; of their safe conduct through the wilderness for forty years; of the covenant between God and them at Sinai; of his giving them laws and judgments; of his ordaining the priesthood; and the erection of the Tabernacle.

CHAP. I.

Contains an account of the increase of the Israelites; the oppression they underwent ; and of the destruction of their children.

1

OW these [are] the names of the children of Israel,

N°

complishment of the promises in their great increase; every man and his household, that is, his children and nephews, 2 but not servants, who came with Jacob. Reuben, Simeon, 3 Levi, and Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin, Dan, and 4 Naphtali, Gad, and Asher. And all the souls that came out 5 of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls for Joseph was in 6 Egypt [already.] And Joseph died, and all his brethren, and 7 all that generation. And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, like the fish of the sea, and they multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty, had strong and healthful children; and the land was filled with them; so that in two hundred and fifteen years they amounted to six hundred thousand men. Numb. xxvi. 51. VOL. I.

8

Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, of a different race, or family, which knew not Joseph, regarded not himy nor any of his kindred, though he had deserved so well of the 9 whole kingdom. And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel [are] more and mightier than we; their country is more populous, wealthy, and fruitful. Upto on this he called his counsellors, and said with violence, Come on, let us deal wisely with them ;† lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, as it is natural for people in such circumstances to do, and [so] get them up out of 11 the land, to Canaan, which they are often talking about. Therefore they did set over them task masters to afflict them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh, which was a common name for all the kings of Egypt, treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses, strong fortified cities to lay up their stores in.‡ 12 But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew, through the overruling providence and blessing of God. And they, that is, the Egyptians, were grieved, through 13 envy and fear, because of the children of Israel. And the

Egyptian's made the children of Israel to serve with rigour : 14 And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field, building those cities, making brick, digging trenches for rivers to convey the water through the land: and all their service, wherein they made them serve, [was] with rigour, that they might reduce their numbers, and more easily keep them in slavery.

15

And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, the midwives who attended the Hebrews, but were themselves Egyp tians, of which the name of the one [was] Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah these were the chief, to whom, no 16 doubt, great rewards were promised: And he said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see [them] upon the stools; if it [be] a son, then ye shall kill him, let him be strangled frivately: but if it [be] a daughter, 17 then she shall live. But the midwives feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them, it would have been

Probably one of the shepherd kings who came from Arabia, according to Manetho, as quoted by Josephus, and who about this time invaded Egypt; or the Horites, whom the descendants of Esau drove out. Deut. ii. 12,22.

+Or, craftily; so Stephen. Acts vii. 19, The same dealt subtilly with our children, &c. or formed crafty and treacherous designs against them.

The first was called Tanis, and the latter thought to be Pelusium, which in Ezek. xxx. 15. is called the strength of Egypt, and by historians, the key of Egypt. These were on the borders of Syria, which kept them from the encroachments of their enemies on that side, and prevented the Israelites from returning back to Canaan.

Well might Egypt be called an iron furnace, an house of bondage! but God appointed all this as a punishment for their growing idolatry, to awaken their desires to return to Canaan, and to make their national deliverance the more remarkable.

tigus.

They preserved the females, who were in general more beautiful than the Egyp