world, than otherwise he might have been. In this, Wisdom is profitable to direct. Friends are too ready to say to us, as Christ's disciples did, Master spare thyself.' There is very little need to enforce this advice in the present day, since it is generally found that more men rust away than wear away; but much need to quicken and stir them up to zeal and diligence.

5. Let us be willing to take advice of those, who in many respects are our inferiors, if they have truth and prudence on their side. Moses was nearly as old as Jethro; though as a friend of God, and a king of Israel, he was much his superior. But Moses was a meek man, glad of advice, and took it; he did not think himself above being advised. Those who do so are very proud, or very ignorant, or both. Others can often better judge what is fit for us than we can ourselves; they are not so much blinded by affection and interest. Let us be ever ready to learn from any one; and show that we are wise, by being willing to hear, and increase in learning and prudence.

6. Let us earnestly pray that our magistrates and governors may be such as Jethro directs Moses to choose; men of clear heads, and honest, generous hearts; men of piety and sagacity; of unwearied zeal, and undaunted resolution. How happy for our Israel, if all its magistrates were such as do not undertake the work for its honour and profit, but out of regard to God's honour, and the benefit of the community. Let us therefore pray for kings, and all that are in authority, that they may be such; then, as Jethro suggests, it will be likely that the people will lead quiet and peaceable lives.

CHAP. XIX.

We have here the people's approach to Sinai, and God's covenant with them there; the directions given to Moses and the people about preparing themselves; and the solemn appearance of God upon mount Sinai, when he delivered the law.

1 IN the third month,* when the children of Israel were

2 they [into] the wilderness of Sinai.t For they were departed from Rephidim, and were come [to] the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness; and there Israel camped before the mount.

3

And Moses went up unto God, to the presence of God where the cloud rested, (v. 9.) and the LORD called unto him

Or the third new moon, called Sivan, including the latter end of May and the former part of June.

It is generally thought to be fifty days after they came out of Egypt: and accordingly the feast of Pentecost, which signifies fifty, is observed in remembrance of this

event.

out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel; (God had a right to give them what law he pleased, but he treats them as rational 4 creatures, and tells them what he had done :) Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and [how] I bare you on eagles' wings,* carried you above all difficulties and dangers, and brought you unto myself, to serve me on this mount, 5 (ch. iii. 12.) and to be my peculiar people. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for, or though, all the earth [is] mine, and I am not confined to this 6 or the other nation: And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, a people near to the Lord, separated from the rest of the world, and to be an holy nation. These [are] the words 7 which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel. And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before their faces all these words which the LORD commanded him, that they might tell them to the people.

And all the people answered together, and said, All that the LORD hath spoken we will do. And Moses returned the words of the people unto the LORD, uttered them before the Lord, to confirm the obligation on the people's part, and to re9 cerve his answer. And the LORD said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee, as the mediator between me and them, and the interpreter of my mind to them, in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee for ever, no longer doubt thy mission. And Moses told the words of the 10 people unto the LORD. And the LORD said unto Moses, Go unto the people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow, abstain from all pollution, and abound in prayer and sacrifices, and holy meditations, and let them wash their clothes, in token of 11 that inward purity which I require from them; And be ready against the third day; for the third day the LORD will come down in the sight of all the people upon mount Sinai. 12 And thou shalt set bounds unto the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, [that ye] go [not] up into the mount, or even so much as touch the border of it: whosoever 13 toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death: There shall not a hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether [it be] beast or man, it shall not live : when the trumpet soundeth long, they shall come up to the mount, to the boundary that is fixed, that they may hear what 14 is spoken, but no further. And Moses went down from the

Eagles carry their young ones on their backs, and spread out their feathers to keep them from falling.

↑ Had any attempted to do so, they would certainly have been struck dead with the lightning.

This was designed to restrain their curiosity, to give them an awe of God, and train them up to obedience.

mount unto the people, and sanctified the people; and they 15 washed their clothes. And he said unto the people, Be ready against the third day: come not at [your] wives; abstain even from lawful enjoyments, that your minds may be wholly intent upon this solemn business.

16

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, out of which the lightnings came, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; the angel, by whose disposition the law was delivered, made a sound like a loud trumpet; so that 17 all the people that [was] in the camp trembled. And Moses

brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God: 18 and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And mount Sinai was altogether on 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 quaked greatly. 19 And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, (the Hebrew is very emphatical, and signifies, when it exceeded itself) then Moses spake, as mediator, and God answered him by a voice, by plain, distinct, audible 20 words, so that the people might hear, v. 9.* And the LORD came down upon mount Sinai, on the top of the mount and the LORD called Moses, to encourage him, [up] to the top of the mount; and Moses went up. This was a remarkable instance of resolution, a great triumph of faith in God, and showed 21 a full persuasion of his mission. And the LORD said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto the LORD to gaze, and many of them perish. (How much tenderness and compassion does God mingle with all his 22 glory and majesty.) And let the priests, also, the firstborn, or some illustrious princes, or heads of tribes, who might officiate on this occasion, which come near to the LORD, sanctify them23 selves, lest the LORD break forth upon them. And Meses said unto the LORD, The people cannot come up to mount Sinai for thoù chargedst us, saying, Set bounds about the mount, and sanctify it. They had been already sufficiently admonished, but God knowing their dulness and hardness of heart, 24 saw it necessary to repeat it again. And the LORD said unto him, Away, get thee down, and thou shalt come up, thou, and Aaron with thee, who is soon to be constituted high priest; and this will prove his mission, and secure the respect of the people to him but let not the priests and the people break through to come up unto the LORD, lest he break forth upon them. 25 So Moses went down unto the people, and spake unto them, stayed with them, or near enough within the bounds to speak to them, while God declared the law, as in the next chapter.

* What a voice must this be, that six hundred thousand men, beside women and chil dren, should hear it so plainly! No wonder it threw them into the greatest consternation. The people trembled before at the sound, but now Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake.

1.

REFLECTIONS.

ET us admire and adore the majesty of God, thus so remarkably displayed. The Son of God, being vested with divine authority, and acting as the ambassador and representative of the Father, came down with such pomp and splendor, to publish the law. The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels: the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, the holy place. Psalm lxviii. 17. Let us reverence the Son of God, who hath such honour conferred upon him; and learn, if Jehovah's representative was so attended on this occasion, how glorious must Jehovah himself be, who dwells in light inaccessible ! Justly may we ask with the Psalmist, What ailed thee, O Sinai, that thou trembledst? Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams ? And ye little hills, like lambs? And justly may we reply, Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob.

2. How terrible will the punishment of those be, who violate the law which was given with such solemnity! He that despised Moses' law, died without mercy; he that came near the mount, was put to death. How awful is God in his judgments, and how careful to maintain the honour of his law! When we consider the breadth and extent of the commands which he now delivered, and which, being of a moral nature, are binding upon us, let us be afraid of his righteous judgments, and labour to continue in all things written in the book of the law, to do them.

3. We should adore the condescension and goodness of God in taking the Jews to be his peculiar people, when all the earth was the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. He had little reason to choose them, for they were a perverse and rebellious people. Let us be thankful, that christians are admitted to the same privileges; that the Gentiles are taken in; that we, in this distant land, are so highly favoured, when all the earth is his. We enjoy nobler privileges than the Jews, are made kings and priests to God, and are brought nigh by the blood of Christ. Let us attend to the apostle's inference from this thought; But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people, that ye should show forth the praises of him, who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light, 1 Pet. ii. 9.

4. Let us consider the obligations which the goodness of God łay us under, to receive the law at his mouth. He hath delivered us from spiritual enemies, out of Egyptian darkness and tyranny. He bears us, as it were on eagles' wings; hath exercised his power and care toward us, and raised us to exalted privileges and hopes. It is therefore reasonable we should say, as Israel did, v. 8. All that the Lord hath spoken we will do.

5. Let us all be solicitous to sanctify ourselves, and prepare for the solemn seasons of approaching to God. We come every sabbath to hear his law; God speaks to us in his word, as plainly as he did on Sinai. Let us be thankful that such favours are conferred upon us, that we are admitted near to God; and therefore cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. He that would profitably worship the gods,' saith an heathen philosopher, must not worship them by the bye, but with previous thought.' We should maintain such a reverent sense of his presence, and of our relation to him, that we may offer a reasonable sacrifice whenever we approach to him. God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of his saints, and to be had in reverence of all them that come nigh unto him.

CHẤP. XX.

The ten commandments are given; the terror of the people, and the address of Moses to them, on that occasion; with some particular cautions and directions about divine worship.

1

A

ND God spake all these words immediately by himself; spake with a voice, which, Paul tells us, shook the earth; this numerous assembly of near two millions of people* heard it, 2 saying, I, the almighty, selfexistent, immutable Jehovah, [am] the LORD thy God and king, and stand in a peculiar relation to thee; which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, and therefore thou art in gratitude 3 bound to obey me. Thou shalt have no other gods before me; thou shalt believe in no other, and worship no other god; prefer none other to me, nor set up any in comparison with me, not even in thy heart; for as all is naked and open before me, I shall see 4 it, and be highly displeased at it. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness [of any thing] that [is] in heaven above, or that [is] in the earth beneath, or that [is] in the water under the earth. Thou shalt make no like

ness of God, or angels, or beasts, or fishes, to worship them.† 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them ; for I the LORD thy God [am] a jealous God, tender of my honour, and will bear no rival, nor give my glory to another, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the

Including men, women and children.

+ The first command forbids all feigned gods, this second forbids all feigned service of the true God; all representations of him, or worshipping him by images. This was a neces sary caution, because the Egyptians worshipped beasts and fishes. This also forbids any pretended medium of worship, any worship of God through images, saints, or angels.

Here is a remarkable gradation. Thou shalt not make them thyself, nor bow to them in other places, though made by other persons; thou shalt not pay them any kind of respect, much less worship them and offer sacrifices to them,