I do not hear Moses say to his Joshua, | plagues, and of the quails, and of the rock, Amalek is come up against us, it matters he was commanded to take the rod in his not whether thou go against him or not; hand; now he doth it unbidden. He doth or if thou go, whether alone or with com- it not now for miraculous operation, but for pany; or if accompanied, whether with encouragement. many or few, strong or weak; or if strong men, whether they fight or no; I will pray on the hill: but, "Choose us out men, and go fight." Then only can we pray with hope when we have done our best. And though the means cannot effect that which we desire, yet God will have us use the likeliest means on our part to effect it. Where it comes immediately from the charge of God, any means are effectual: one stick of wood shall fetch water out of the rock; another shall fetch bitterness out of the water; but in those projects which we make for our own purposes, we must choose those helps which promise most efficacy. In vain shall Moses be upon the hill, if Joshua be not in the valley. Prayer without means is a mockery of God. Here are two shadows of one substance: the same Christ in Joshua fights against our spiritual Amalek, and in Moses spreads out his arms upon the hill; and, in both, conquers. And why doth he climb up the hill rather than pray in the valley? Perhaps that he might have the more freedom to his thoughts, which, following the sense, are so much more heavenly, as the eyes see more of heaven. Though virtue lies not in the place, yet choice must be made of those places which may be the most help to our devotion; perhaps that he might be in the eye of Israel. The presence and sight of the leader gives heart to the people: neither doth any thing more move the multitude than example. A public person cannot hide himself in the valley; but yet it becomes him best to show himself upon the hill. The hand of Moses must be raised, but not empty; neither is it his own rod that he holds, but God's. In the first meeting of God with Moses, the rod was Moses', it is like, for the use of his trade; now the propriety is altered: God hath so wrought by it, that now he challenges it, and Moses dare not call it his own. Those things which it pleases God to use for his own service, are now changed in their condition. The bread of the sacrament was once the baker's; now it is God's: the water was once every man's; now it is the laver of regeneration. It is both unjust and unsafe to hold those things common wherein God hath a peculiarity. At other times, upon occasion of the For when the Israelites should cast up their eyes to the hill, and see Moses and his rod (the man and the means that had wrought so powerfully for them), they could not but take heart to themselves, and think, There is the man that delivered us from the Egyptian; why not now from the Amalekite? There is the rod which turned waters to blood, and brought varieties of plagues on Egypt; why not now on Amalek? Nothing can more hearten our faith, than the view of the monuments of God's favour: if ever we have found any word or act of God cordial to us, it is good to fetch it forth oft to the eye. The renewing of our sense and remembrance makes every gift of God perpetually beneficial. If Moses had received a command, that rod, which fetched water from the rock, could as well have fetched the blood of the Amalekites out of their bodies. God will not work miracles always; neither must we expect them unbidden. Not as a standard-bearer, so much as a suppliant, doth Moses lift up his hand. The gesture of the body should both express and further the piety of the soul. This flesh of ours is not a good servant, unless it help us in the best offices. The God of spirits doth more respect the soul of our devotion; yet it is both unmannerly and irreligious to be misgestured in our prayers. The careless and uncomely carriage of the body helps both to signify and make a profane soul. The hand and the rod of Moses never moved in vain; though the rod did not strike Amalek, as it had done the rock, yet it smote heaven, and fetched down victory. And that the Israelites might see the hand of Moses had a greater stroke in the fight than all theirs, the success must rise and fall with it. Amalek rose, and Israel fell, with his hand falling; Amalek fell and Israel rises with his hand raised. O the wondrous power of the prayers of faith! All heavenly favours are derived to us from this channel of grace. To these are we beholden for our peace, preservations, and all the rich mercies of God which we enjoy. We could not want, if we could ask. Every man's hand would not have done this, but the hand of a Moses. A faithless man may as well hold his hand and tongue still: he may babble, but prays not; he prays ineffectually, and receives not: only the prayer of the righteous availeth much; and only the believer is righteous. There can be no merit, no recompense answerable to a good man's prayer; for heaven, and the ear of God, is open to him; but the formal devotions of an ignorant and faithless man, are not worth that crust of bread which he asks: yea, it is presumpnon in himself; how should it be beneficial to others? It profanes the name of God, instead of adoring it. But how justly is the fervency of the prayer added to the righteousness of the person! When Moses' hand slackened, Amalek prevailed. No Moses can have his hand ever up; it is a title proper to God, that his hands are stretched out still, whether to mercy or vengeance. Our infirmity will not suffer any long intention, either of body or mind. Long prayers can hardly maintain their vigour, as in tall bodies the spirits are diffused. The strongest hand will languish with long extending: and when our devotion tires, it is seen in the success; then straight our Amalek prevails. Spiritual wickednesses are mastered by vehement prayer, and, by heartlessness in prayer, overcome us. Moses had two helps-a stone to sit on, and a hand to raise his; and his sitting and nolpen hand is no less effectual. Even in our prayers will God allow us to respect our own infirmities. In cases of our necessity, he regards not the posture of body, but the affections of the soul. Doubtless Aaron and Hur did not only raise their hands, but their minds with his. The more cords, the easier draught. Aaron was brother to Moses: there cannot be a more brotherly office, than to help one another in our prayers, and to excite our mutual devotions. No Christian may think it enough to pray alone. He is no true Israelite, that will not be ready to lift up the weary hands of God's saints. All Israel saw this: or if they were so intent upon the slaughter and spoil, that they observed it not, they might hear it after from Aaron and Hur. Yet this contents not God: it must be written. Many other miracles had God done before, not one directly commanded to be recorded: the other were only for the wonder; this for the imitation of God's people. In things that must live by report, every tongue adds or detracts something. The word once written is both unalterable and permanent. As God is careful to maintain the glory of his miraculous victory, so is Moses desirous to second him; God by a book, and Moses by an altar, and a name. God commands to enrol it in parchment; Moses registers it in the stones of his altar, which he raises not only for future memory, but for present use. That hand which was weary of lifting up, straight offers a sacrifice of praise to God. How well it becomes the just to be thankful! Even very nature teacheth us men to abhor ingratitude in small favours: how much less can that fountain of goodness abide to be laded at with unthankful hands! O God, we cannot but confess our deliverances! Where are our altars? Where are our sacrifices? Where is our Jehovah-nissi? I do not more wonder at thy power in preserving us, than at thy mercy, which is not weary of casting away favours upon the ungrateful. CONTEMPLATION V.-OF THE LAW. IT is but about seven weeks since Israel came out of Egypt: in which space God had cherished their faith by five several wonders: yet now he thinks it time to give them statutes from heaven, as well as bread. The manna and water from the rock (which was Christ in the gospel) were given before the law; the sacraments of grace before the legal covenant. The grace of God preventeth our obedience; therefore should we keep the law of God, because we have a Saviour. O the mercy of our God, which, before we see what we are bound to do, shows us our remedy, if we do it not! How can our faith disannul the law, when it was before it? It may help to fulfil that which shall be; it cannot frustrate that which was not. The letters which God had written in our fleshy tables, were now (as those which are carved in some barks) almost grown out: he saw it time to write them in dead tables, whose hardness should not be capable of alteration. He knew that the stone would be more faithful than our hearts. O marvellous accordance betwixt the two testaments! In the very time of their delivery, there is the same agreement which is in the substance. The ancient Jews kept our feasts, and we still keep theirs. The feast of the passover is the time of Christ's resurrection; then did he pass from under the bondage of death. Christ is our passover; the spotless lamb, whereof not a bone must be broken. The very day wherein God came down in fire and thunder to deliver the law, even the same day came also the Holy Ghost down upon the disciples in fiery tongues, for the propagation of the gospel. That other was in fire and smoke; obscurity was mingled with terror: this was in fire without smoke, befitting the light and clearness of the gospel; fire, not in flashes, but in tongues; not to terrify, but to instruct. The promulgation of the law makes way for the law of the gospel. No man receives the Holy Ghost, but he which hath felt the terrors of Sinai. God might have imposed upon them a law by force; they were his creatures, and he could require nothing but justice. It had been but equal, that they should be compelled to obey their Maker; yet that God which loves to do all things sweetly, gives the law of justice in mercy, and will not imperiously command, but craves our assent for that, which it were rebellion not to do. How gentle should be the proceeding of fellow-creatures who have an equality of being, with an inequality of condition! when their infinite Maker requests, where he might constrain! God will make no covenant with the unwilling; how much less the covenant of grace, which stands all upon love? If we stay till God offer violence to our will, or to us against our will, we shall die strangers from him. The church is the spouse of Christ: he will enjoy her love by a willing contract, not by a ravishment. The obstinate have nothing to do with God. The title of all converts is, a willing people. That Israel inclined to God, it was from God. He inquires after his own gifts in us, for our capacity of more. They had not received the law, unless they had first received a disposition fit to be commanded. As there was an inclination to hear, so there must be a preparation for hearing. God's justice had before prepared his Israelites by hunger, thirst, fear of enemies; his mercy had prepared them by deliverances, by provisions of water, meat, bread; and yet, besides all the sight of God in his miracles, they must be three days prepared to hear him. When our souls are at the best, our approach to God requires particular addresses; and if three days were little enough to prepare them to receive the law, how is all our life short enough to prepare for the reckoning of our observing it? And if the word of a command expected such readiness, what shall the word of promise, the promise of Christ and salvation? tified. As sin is always dangerous, so most when we bring it into God's sight: it envenometh both our persons and services, and turns our good into evil. As, therefore, we must be always holy, so most when we present ourselves to the holy eyes of our Creator. We wash our hands every day; but, when we are to sit with some great person, we scour them with balls. And if we must be so sanctified only to receive the law, how holy must we be to receive the grace promised in the gospel? Neither must themselves only be cleansed, but their very clothes: their garments smelt of Egypt, even they must be washed. Neither can clothes be capable of sin, nor can water cleanse from sin. The danger was neither in their garment nor their skins; yet they must be washed, that they might learn by their clothes with what souls to appear before their God. Those garments must be washed, which should never wax old, that now they might begin their age in purity; as those which were in more danger of being foul than bare. It is fit that our reverence to God's presence should appear in our very garments, that both without and within we may be cleanly; but little would neatness of vestures avail us with a filthy soul. The God of spirits looks to the inner man, and challenges the purity of that part which resembles himself: "Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purge your hearts, ye double-minded." Yet even when they were washed and sanctified, they may not touch the mount, not only with their feet, but with their eyes. The smoke keeps it from their eyes, the marks from their feet. Not only men, that had some impurity at their best, are restrained, but even beasts, which are not capable of any unholiness. Those beasts which must touch his altars, yet might not touch his hill. And if a beast touch it, he must die; yet so, as no hands may touch that which hath touched the hill. Unreasonableness might seem to be an excuse in these creatures; that, therefore, which is death to a beast, must needs be capital to them, whose reason should guide them to avoid presumption. Those Israelites which saw God every day in the pillar of fire, and the cloud, must not come near him in the mount. God loves at once familiarity and fear; familiarity in our conThe murrain of Egypt was not so infec-versation, and fear in his commands. He tious as their vices; the contagion of these stuck still by Israel. All the water of the Red Sea, and of Marah, and that which gushed out of the rock, had not washed it off. From these they must now be sanc loves to be acquainted with men in the walks of their obedience; yet he takes state upon him in his ordinances, and will be trembled at in his word and judgments. I see the difference of God's carriage to men in the law, and in the gospel. There, the very hill where he appeared may not be touched by the purest Israelite. Here, the hem of his garment is touched by the woman that had the flux of blood; yea, his very face was touched with the lips of Judas. There, the very earth was prohi- | bited them, on which he descended. Here, his very body and blood is proffered to our touch and taste. O the marvellous kindness of our God! How unthankful are we, if we do not acknowledge this mercy above his ancient people! They were his own; yet strangers, in comparison of our liberty. It is our shame and sin, if, in these means of entireness, we be no better acquainted with God than they, which in their greatest familiarity were commanded aloof. God was ever wonderful in his works, and fearful in his judgments; but he was never so terrible in the execution of his will, as now in the promulgation of it. Here was nothing but a majestical terror in the eyes, in the ears, of the Israelites, as if God meant to show them by this how fearful he could be. Here was the lightning darted in their eyes, the thunders roaring in their ears, the trumpet of God drowning the thunder-claps, the voice of God out-speaking the trumpet of the angel; the cloud enwrapping, the smoke ascending, the fire flaming, the mount trembling, Moses climbing and quaking, paleness and death in the face of Israel, uproar in the elements, and all the glory of heaven turned into terror. In the destruction of the first world, there were clouds without fire; in the destruction of Sodom, there was fire raining without clouds: but here was fire, smoke, clouds, thunder, earthquakes, and whatsoever might work more astonishment than ever was in any vengeance inflicted. And if the law were thus given, how shall it be required? If such were the proclamation of God's statutes, what shall the sessions be? I see and tremble at the resemblance. The trumpet of the angel called unto the one: the voice of an archangel, the trumpet of God, shall summon us to the other. To the one, Moses (that climbed up that hill, and alone saw it) says, "God came with ten thousands of his saints." In the other, "Thousand thousands shall minister to him, and ten thousand thousands shall stad before him." In the one, mount Sinai only was on a flame; all the world shall be so in the other. In the one, there was fire, smoke, thunder, and lightning; in the other a fiery stream shall issue from him, wherewith the | heavens shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt away with a noise. O God, how powerful art thou to inflict vengeance upon sinners, who didst thus forbid sin! And if thou wert so terrible a lawgiver, what a judge shalt thou appear! What shall become of the breakers of so fiery a law? O where shall those appear, that are guilty of the transgressing that law, whose very delivery was little less than death? If our God should exact his law but in the same rigour wherewith he gave it, sin could not quit the cost. But now the fire, wherein it was delivered, was but terrifying; the fire, wherein it shall be required, is consuming. Happy are those that are from under the terrors of that law, which was given in fire, and in fire shall be required! God would have Israel see, that they had not to do with some impotent commander, that is fain to publish his laws, without noise, in dead paper, which can more easily enjoin than punish, or descry than execute; and therefore, before he gives them a law, he shows them that he can command heaven, earth, fire, air, in revenge of the breach of the law, that they could not but think it deadly to displease such a lawgiver, or violate such dreadful statutes; that they might see all the elements examples of that obedience which they should yield unto their Maker. This fire, wherein the law was given, is still in it, and will never out: hence are those terrors which it flashes in every conscience that hath felt remorse of sin. Every man's heart is a Sinai, and resembles to him both heaven and hell: "The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law." That they might see he could find out their closest sins, he delivers his law in the light of fire from out of the smoke. That they might see what is due to their sins, they see fire above, to represent the fire that should be below them. That they might know he could waken their security, the thunder and louder voice of God speaks to their hearts. That they might see what their hearts should do, the earth quakes under them. That they might see they could not shift their appearance, the angel calls them together. O royal law, and mighty lawgiver! how could they think of having any other God, that had such proofs of this! How could they think of making any resemblance of him, whom they saw could not be seen, and whom they saw, in not being seen, infinite! How could they think of daring to profane his name, whom they heard to name himself, with that voice, Jehovah! How could they think of standing with him for a day, whom they saw to command that heaven which makes and measures day! How could they think of disobeying his deputies, whom they saw so able to revenge! How could they think of killing, when they were half dead with the fear of him that could kill both body and soul! How could they think of the flames of lust, that saw such fires of vengeance! How could they think of stealing from others, that saw whose the heaven and the earth were, to dispose of at his pleasure! How could they think of speaking falsely, that heard God speak in so fearful a tone! How could they think of coveting others' goods, that saw how weak and uncertain right they had to their own! Yea, to us was this law so delivered, to us in them. Neither had their been such state in the promulgation of it, if God had not intended it for eternity. We men, that so fear the breach of human laws, for some small mulcts of forfeiture, how should we fear thee, O Lord, that canst cast body and soul into hell! CONTEMPLATION VI.-OF THE GOLDEN CALF. It was not much above a month since Israel made their covenant with God; since they trembled to hear him say, "Thou shalt have no other God but me;" since they saw Moses part from them, and climb up the hill to God; and now they say, "Make us gods: we know not what is become of this Moses." O ye mad Israelites, have ye so soon forgotten that fire and thunder which you heard and saw? Is that smoke vanished out of your mind, as soon as out of your sight? Could your hearts cease to tremble with the earth? Can ye, in the very sight of Sinai, call for other gods? And for Moses, was it not for your sakes that he thrust himself into the midst of that smoke and fire, which ye feared to see afar off? Was he not now gone after so many sudden embassages, to be your lieger with God? If ye had seen him take his heels, and run away from you into the wilderness, what could ye have said or done more? Behold, our better Moses was with us awhile upon earth: he is now ascended into the mount of heaven to mediate for us: shall we now think of another Saviour? Shall we not hold it our happiness, that he is for our sakes above? And what if your Moses had been gone for ever? Must ye therefore have gods made? If ye had said, Choose us another governor, it had been a wicked and unthankful motion: ye were too unworthy of a Moses, inat could so soon forget him. But to say, "Make us gods," was absurdly impious. Moses was not your god, but your governor; neither was the presence of God tied to Moses. You saw God still, when he was gone, in his pillar, and in his manna; and yet ye say, "Make us gods." Every word is full of senseless wickedness. How many gods would you have? or what gods are those that can be made! Or, whatever the idolatrous Egyptians did, with what face can ye, after so many miraculous obligations, speak of another god? Had the voice of God scarce done thundering in your ears? Did ye so lately hear and see him to be an infinite God? Did ye quake to hear him say, out of the midst of the flames, "I am Jehovah thy God; thou shalt have no gods but me?" Did ye acknowledge God your Maker; and do ye now speak of making of gods? If ye had said, Make us another man to go before us, it had been an impossible suit. Aaron might help to mar you and himself; he could not make one hair of a man: and do ye say, "Make us gods?" And what should these gods do? "Go before you?" How could they go before you, that cannot stand alone? Your help makes them to stand, and yet they must conduct you. O the impatient ingratitude of carnal minds! O the sottishness of idolatry! Who would not have said, Moses is not with us; but he is with God for us? He stays long. that called him withholds him. His delay is for our sakes, as well as his ascent. Though we see him not, we will hope for him. His favours to us have deserved not to be rejected: or, if God will keep him from us, he that withholds him, can supply him. He that sent him, can lead us without him; his fire and cloud is allsufficient. God hath said, and done enough for us, to make us trust him. We will, we can, have no other God; we care not for any other guide. But, behold, here is none of this. Moses stays but some five and thirty days, and now he is forgotten, and is become but " this Moses ;" yea, God is forgotten with him; and, as if God and Moses had been lost at once, they say, "Make us gods." Natural men must have God at their beck: and if he come not at a call, he is cast off, and they take themselves to their own shifts; like as the Chinese whip their gods when they answer them not: whereas his holy ones wait long, and seek him; and not only in their He |