MOSES. Lord slew all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both the first-born of man, and the first-born of beast. Therefore I sacrifice to the Lord all that openeth the matrix," &c. (Exod. 13. 14,16.) All these things have been observed, ever since, and establish the truth of the narrative in the Book of Exodus. In further commemoration of the destruction of the first-born of the Egyptians, the tribe of Levi was set apart; and, besides the passover, the Feast of Tabernacles was instituted, to perpetuate the deliverance of the Israelites and their journeying in the Desert, (Levit. 23. 40 et seq.;) as the Feast of Pentecost was appointed fifty days after the Passover, (Deut. 26. 5-10,) in memory of the miraculous delivery of the Law from Mount Sinai, which took place fifty days after their departure from Egypt. The same remark will hold with respect to the miraculous supply of the Israelites with food, the memory of which was perpetuated by the pot of manna; and to the twelve stones which were taken out of the midst of Jordan, at the time of the miraculous passage of the Israelites over that river, and were set up by Joshua at Gilgal, as a memorial to them for ever. These miracles were commemorated by the Jews throughout all ages of their existence as a nation, and still are commemorated by them in their scattered condition. Thus, as no one could have been imposed on by them at the period of their existence, so it is difficult to conceive when, or how, a report of them could have been published with success, had they really never existed. (2.) The institutions of Moses prove his Divine authority. Not to multiply examples, the institution of the Sabbatical year, during which the Israelites were neither to plough nor sow their lands, and that on the ground of a promise of extraordinary plenty on the sixth year, is a striking proof. For "how incredible is it," observes Dr. Graves, "that any legislator would have ventured to propose such a law as this, or any people have submitted to receive it, except in consequence of the fullest conviction on both sides, that a Divine authority had dictated the Law, and that a peculiar Providence would constantly facilitate its execution? When this law therefore was proposed and received, such a conviction must have existed, both in the mind of the Jewish lawgiver and the Jewish people." See LAW. (3.) The inspiration of Moses was established by a number of predictions.-Events were foretold by Moses which no human sagacity could have conjectured, and no human power could have accomplished. The events are recorded in the history of the Jews. Moses distinetly foretold their captivity in case of their idolatry and disobedience; while, as distinctly, victory was promised over their most inveterate and malignant foes, when they maintained their allegiance to the true God, and their acknowledgment of his claims. There is no obvious connexion between military success, and the practical belief of one God, if we reason only on ordinary principles; but this connexion was so remarkably proved, and the converse of it so often demonstrated in harmony with the predictions of Moses, that the fact is incontrovertible. Forces altogether disproportioned in number, power, training, and military prowess, were subdued by apparently most inadequate means; and superior numbers on the part of the Israelites were vanquished, if they lightly esteemed the Rock of their salvation: their idolatries were followed by the success of their foes. And their captivity in Babylon, and especially their dispersion among all nations of the earth, since their rejection of the Messiah, are powerful confirmations of the truth of their own Scriptures. These facts Moses foretold; other prophets reiterated and 891 enlarged the predictions; and their circumstantial fulfilment can be accounted for on no other principle, than the Divinity of that record, which, amidst all their suffering and crimes, they have so mysteriously assisted to perpetuate and preserve. See CAPTIVITY. (4.) The records of Moses prove his inspiration nɔ less than his predictions.-The facts recorded in the Pentateuch cannot be disproved; but, on the contrary, they are confirmed by the traditionary accounts of almost all nations. That his account moreover should possess the utmost verisimilitude, while the traditions were blended with numerous follies and absurdities, can only be accounted for on the principle that these traditions were only the remains of the truth, with much error superadded by the ignorance and vice of many generations, while the Mosaic account is the truth itself, derived immediately and unalloyed from the fountain of all knowledge. Mr. Hume, indeed, affirmed that the Pentateuch was "wrote (written) in all probability long after the facts it relates." That the Pentateuch was written long after some of the facts which it relates is not denied; but that it was written long after all, or even most of those facts, there is no reason to believe. If, as Dr. Campbell forcibly remarked, this writer meant to signify by the expression quoted, that this was in all probability the case, why did he not produce the grounds on which such probability is founded? Shall a bold assertion pass for argument? or can it be expected that any one should consider reasons which are only in general supposed but not specified? See PENTATEUCH. (5.) The Divine authority of Moses is expressly asserted by the Son of God himself.-Our Lord frequently referred to the character and authority of Moses. "They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." "Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me." (Luke 16. 29,31; John 5. 46.) The inspiration or Divine legation of Moses being satisfactorily established, his conducting the Israelites through the Desert to Canaan is reasonable enough; on any other supposition it is perfectly unaccountable. Nothing less than a miracle in his favour could enable him to deliver them from Egypt, when we take into consideration, that Moses, at the time, was not only without arms but without eloquence and destitute of influence; the latter, among the Egyptians, had been lost by the act for which he was obliged to go into exile, and it is certain that, previously to his flight, he did not possess much influence among his brethren; for when he would have interfered to settle a dispute that had arisen between two of them, they would not allow him; and not having kept up any intercourse with them during its existence, it is not likely that his influence with them would be increased by his exile. Under these disadvantages, he had to secure three objects in order to effect the deliverance of the Israelites. He had to be constituted their leader; a proffer which, when he made it under more favourable circumstances, they rejected with disdain. In the second place, he had to induce the people to demand their liberty, which at any risk they were evidently unwilling to do; their yoke had so galled their spirits as well as their shoulders, that they were incapable even of a struggle to obtain their liberty. In the third place, he had to induce the Egyptians to permit them to depart. His difficulty here would be in proportion to his success in the other cases; for in the event of his being constituted the leader of the Israelites, and commissioned in their name to demand their liberty, he would appear before the king in the character of a rival prince, whom he would deem it expedient to put men." any down by force. The proposal to Pharaoh was treated | received from God the Law which he left his countryby that haughty monarch with disdain; in consequence of it, he increased the burdens of the people; the people again taunted Moses with being the occasion of their increased burdens; and thus the original difficulties of their deliverance were materially increased. At length, however, the king gives the desired permission for the people to go, and the Egyptians themselves entreat their departure. And thus at length they march out of Egypt, six hundred thousand men able to bear arms, besides women and children, under the direction of Moses. His conducting them through the wilderness after they were delivered required Divine aid equally with their deliverance from Egypt. They were probably a body amounting to two millions of souls, and just emerged from a degrading and cruel bondage; with the enjoyment of liberty, they possessed but the spirit and habits of slaves; hence at the slightest provocation or disappointment they exhibited a spirit of insubordination. With unwarlike habits they had to encounter warlike and formidable foes; and thus they were often in circumstances of extreme peril and suffering. Totally destitute of provision for the journey, they were led into a wilderness, in which a single caravan could not subsist for a day, but on the supplies with which it had fur nished itself, previously to entering it. And yet he governed them without the least compromise of his authority, always keeping them in complete subjection, and often even exercising towards them a degree of severity. He not only secured them a triumph over all their enemies, but brought them safely through all their perils. And in a desert where there was no food either for themselves or cattle, a miraculous supply was obtained during the space of forty years. Thus we see that Moses was a divinely inspired person, and that it was by the supernatural powers with which he was endowed that his ministry among the Israelites was conducted. Thus, Cellerier observes, "Every imposture has an object in view, and an aim more or less selfish. Men practise deceit for money, for pleasure, or for glory. If, by a strange combination, the love of mankind ever entered into the mind of an impostor, doubtless even then he has contrived to reconcile at last his own selfish interests with those of the human race. If men deceive others, for the sake of causing their own opinions or their own party to triumph, they may sometimes, perhaps, forget their own interests during the struggle, but they again remember them when the victory is achieved. It is a general rule that no impostor forgets himself long. But Moses forgot himself, to the last. Yet there is no middle supposition. If Moses was not a divinely inspired messenger, he was an impostor in the strongest sense of the term. It is not, as in the case of Numa, a slight and single fraud, designed to secure some good end, that we have to charge him with, but a series of deceits, many of which were gross; a profound, dishonest, perfidious, sanguinary dissimulation continued for the space of forty years. When we consider these several things; when we reflect on all the ministry of Moses, on his life, on his death, on his character, on his abilities, and his success; we are powerfully convinced that he was the messenger of God. If we consider him only as an able legislator, as a Lycurgus, as a Numa, his actions are inexplicable; we find not in him the affections, the interests, the views which usually belong to the human heart. The simplicity, the harmony, the verity of this natural character are gone; they give place to an incoherent union of ardour and imposture, of daring and of timidity, of incapacity and genius, of cruelty and sensibility. No! Moses was inspired by God, and A very eminent writer on the Divine mission of Moses (Bishop Warburton,) has drawn an ingenious argument in its favour, from the circumstance of the lawgiver having apparently felt that it was unnecessary that he should fortify his code with the hope or the fear of other than temporal blessings or punishments, a confidence he could only have derived from his conviction of the reality of his mission; the fact may be so, but we may remark that it was not agreeable to the Mosaic code and its design, as a system of state legislation, to propose motives for its observance, derived from a future state of retribution; and it is going too far to say, that neither in the writings of Moses, nor throughout the entire Old Testament, do there occur any motives whatever derived from a future state, and that in these sacred writings there is not even an expectation held out of more than earthly felicity. We perceive in the writings of Moses the notion of a state of living union in which the children after death will be joined with their fathers. (Gen. 15. 15; 25. 8,9,17; 35. 29; 37.35; Deut. 22. 50.) Some of his laws also are founded on the acknowledged truth that the dead will live again in another state. Of this kind is the prohibition to consult the dead, (Deut. 18. 10,11,) and to show excessive sorrow for their loss, as the Israelites were God's children. (Deut. 14. 1,2.) Also the injunction concerning the bodies of those who were hanged, who were cursed of God. (Deut. 21. 22,23.) Expectations of a better and a happy life are likewise perceptible in the dying Jacob, (Gen. 49. 18,) and the wish of Balaam. (Numb. 23. 10.) Without this belief, the Divine assurance, “I am the God of Abraham," &c., (Exod. 3. 6,) would have no meaning; for, as Our Saviour teaches, (Matt. 22. 31,32,) "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." Without this belief, the pious patriarchs of the Israelitish nation could not have exercised that trust in God which is the soul of all religion, and which is proposed to us as an example. (Heb. 11. 13-16.) No less evident are the prospects of a better state in other books of the Old Testament, such as Psalm 16. 8,11; 73. 24-28; Prov. 14. 32. "The After conducting the Israelites to the borders of Canaan, Moses was not to conduct them into it. triumph of the people," observes Mr. Milman, in his History of the Jews, "was to be preceded by the death of the lawgiver. He was to behold, not to enter the promised land. Once he had sinned from want of confidence in the Divine assistance; the penalty affixed to his offence was now exacted. As his end approached, he summoned the assembly of all Israel to receive his final instructions. His last thoughts were the welfare of the commonwealth, and the permanence of the constitution. He recounted their whole eventful history since their deliverance, their toils, their dangers, their triumphs; he recapitulated and consolidated, in one brief code, the Book of Deuteronomy, the whole law, in some degree modified, and adapted to the future circumstances of the republic. "And now closing at length his admonitions, his warnings, and his exhortations to repentance, having renewed the covenant with the whole nation, from the highest to the lowest, from the prince to the hewer of wood and drawer of water, having committed the Law to the custody of the Levites, and appointed the valiant Joshua as his successor; finally, having enriched the national poetry with an ode worthy of him who composed the hymn of triumph by the Red Sea, Moses ascended the loftiest eminence in the neighbourhood, in order that he might once behold, before his eyes closed MOSES for ever, the Land of Promise. From the top of Mount Abarim, or Nebo, the former of which may be traced in Djebel Attarous, the highest point in the district, the lawgiver, whose eyes were not yet dimmed, and who had suffered none of the infirmities of age, might survey a large tract of country. To the right lay the mountain pastures of Gilead, the romantic district of Bashan; the windings of Jordan might be traced along its broad and level valleys, till, almost beneath his feet, it flowed into the Dead Sea. To the north spread the luxuriant plains of Esdraelon, the more hilly yet fruitful country of Lower Galilee. Right opposite stood the city of Jericho, embowered in its groves of palms; beyond it the mountains of Judæa, rising above each other till they reached the sea. Gazing on this magnificent prospect, beholding in prophetic anticipation his great and happy commonwealth, occupying its numerous towns and blooming fields, Moses breathed his last. The place of his burial was unknown, lest, perhaps, the impious gratitude of his followers might ascribe Divine honours to his name, and assemble to worship at his sepulchre." Beside the Pentateuch several other works have been ascribed to Moses. The Talmudical writers ascribe to him ten Psalms, from 90 to 99 inclusive; the ninetieth Psalm in the Hebrew manuscripts is inscribed with his name, and from its general coincidence in style and manner with his sacred hymns in Exodus 15 and Deuteronomy 32, it is generally considered as his; but Dr. Kennicott and others think that it was written in a later age, because, in the time of Moses, most of the persons mentioned in Scripture lived to an age far exceeding the standard of "threescore years and ten, or fourscore," which in the Psalm is assigned as the limit of human life. But this opinion seems founded on the exceptions from the general rule, rather than on the rule itself. The life of Aaron, Moses, Joshua, and Caleb, unquestionably exceeded the age of fourscore considerably, and ran on from a hundred and ten to a hundred and twenty; but all these were probably instances of special favour. The decree which abbreviated the life of man, as a general rule, to seventy or eighty years, was given as a chastisement upon the whole race of Israelites in the wilderness; and with these few exceptions, none of them at the date of this Psalm could have reached more than seventy, and few of them so high a number. But it does not appear that the term of life was lengthened afterwards. Samuel died about seventy years old, David under seventy-one, and Solomon under sixty, and the history of the world shows us that the abbreviation of life in other countries was nearly in the same proportion. The other nine Psalms are attributed to Moses by the Jews by reason of a canon of criticism which they have established, namely, that all anonymous Psalms are to be referred to that author whose name occurred in the title last preceding them. But for this rule no foundation whatever exists; and it is certain that the ninety-ninth Psalm could not have been written by Moses, for in the sixth verse mention is made of the Prophet Samuel, who was not born till near three hundred years after the death of Moses. Some of the Fathers have thought that Moses was the author of the Book of Job; and Origen, in his Commentary on Job, asserts that Moses translated it out of Syriac into Hebrew; but this opinion is rejected both by Jews and Christians. Besides, if this book had really been composed by Moses, it is not likely that the Jews would have separated it from the Pentateuch. There are, likewise, ascribed to Moses several apocryphal books; as an Apocalypse, or Little Genesis, the Ascension of Moses, the Assumption of Moses, and the Mysterious Books of Moses. The prinipal part of the Little Genesis was transferred by Ce | drenus into his Chronological History. It was extant in Hebrew in the fourth century of the Christian æra, for we find it cited by Jerome. From this book it has been pretended that St. Paul copied Galatians 5. 6 and 6. 15; and it has been imagined that what is said in the Epistle of Jude, verse 9, respecting the archangel Michael's contention with Satan for the body of Moses, was taken from the apocryphal book of the Ascension of Moses. Such was the opinion of Origen, who though he cites it in another place, alludes to it as not being in the canon. All these pretended writings of Moses are confessedly spurious, and are supposed to have been fabricated in the early ages of Christianity. MOTH, y ash, (Job 4. 19; 13. 28; 27. 18; Isai. 50. 9; 51.8;) DD sas, (Isai. 51. 8;) Sept. ons. (Matt. 6. 19,20.) There are many species of moths in the warm climates of the East, but they have not been well discriminated, and therefore it is impossible to state with any certainty what particular species may be denoted by the two words employed in the Scripture; but the DD sas mentioned in Isaiah 51. 8, as corroding wool, and the wy ash, garments in the same verse, are thought to denote two species of tinea, probably Phalaena tinea argentea and Phalana tinea sarticella. "The genus Phalana, or moth," Dr. Mason Good observes, "is divided into plant moths and cloth moths; and the latter have been generally supposed to be those immediately alluded to in Job 4. 19; 13. 28; 27. 18. I have some doubt of this, but the question is not of consequence; the house or building referred to is assuredly that provided by the insect in its larvæ or caterpillar state, as a temporary residence during its wonderful change from a chrysalis to a winged or perfect insect. The slightness of this habitation is well known to every one who has attended to the curious operation of the silkworm, or the tribes indigenous to the plants of our own country, as the emperor moth, tiger moth, willow or poplar moth, &c. Of these some construct a solitary dwelling; while others, as the brown tail-moth, are gregarious, vast numbers residing together under one common web, marshalled with the most exact regularity. The web of the cloth moth is formed of the very substance of the cloth on which it reposes, devoured for this purpose, and afterwards worked into a tubular case, with open extremities, and generally approaching to the colour of the cloth by which the moth-worm is nourished." The young moth upon leaving the egg which a papilio has lodged upon a piece of stuff or a skin well dressed, and commodious for her purpose, immediately finds a habitation and food in the nap of the stuff, or hair of the skin. It gnaws and lives upon the nap, and likewise builds with it its apartment; the whole is well fastened to the ground of the stuff with several cords and a little glue. The moth sometimes thrusts her head out of one opening and sometimes out of the other, and perpetually devours and demolishes all about her; and when she has cleared the place about her, she draws out employed, and were reckoned among the principal members of the family. They are, accordingly, in consequence of the respectable station which they sustained, often mentioned in sacred history. (Gen. 35.8; 2Kings 11. 2; 2Chron. 22. 11.) "A mother in Israel" signifies a woman whom God uses to cherish or deliver his people. This name is given to Deborah in Judges 5. 7. Wisdom, in the Apocrypha, calls herself the mother of chaste love. The earth, to which at our death we must all return, is also termed our mother. (Job 17. 14.) The term mother is also used for a metropolis, the capital city of a country, or of a tribe; and sometimes for a whole people. (2Sam. 20. 19; Isai. 50. 1; Gal. 4. 26; Rev. 17.5.) The sentiment at once so mild and so tender which unites the mother to her child, is often alluded to in the sacred volume to illustrate the love of God to his people. (Isai. 49. 15; 1Cor. 3. 1,2; Gal. 4. 19; 1Thess. 2. 7.) MOULDY. The word "pnikkudim, (Josh. all the stakes of this tent, after which she carries it to some little distance, and then fixes it with her slender cords in a new situation. In this manner she continues to live till she is satiated with her food, at which period she is first transformed into a nymph, and then changes into a papilio or moth. Professor Paxton observes, "The moth forms her cell in the woollen garment; a frail structure, which is soon destroyed by the devouring energy of the builder. Day after day she consumes the stuff in which her dwelling is placed, till both are involved in one common ruin, and reduced to nothing. Such, in the estimation of Job, is the prosperity of a wicked man: 'He buildeth his house as a moth, and as a booth that the keeper maketh.' The term which that afflicted patriarch uses in this passage signifies a moth, and also the constellation Arcturus. Some interpreters accordingly render the words, 'the wicked man shall build his house like Arcturus; shall raise for his accommodation and pleasure a splendid and magnificent abode, bright as the stars of Arcturus in the shining vault of heaven; but it shall speedily rush into ruin like a temporary booth, where the keeper of a vineyard watches his property for a little while, till the vintage is gathered.' But this interpretation by no means accords with the design of the speaker; for it introduces an antithesis into the text, instead of the conjunction, which Job evidently meant, and separates the two comparisons of the same thing, as if they referred to different objects. Hence the common version which unquestionably expresses the true sense of the clause, is to be preferred. The wicked man, like the moth, builds his house at the expense of another. He expels his He expels his neighbours from their possessions, that he may join house to house, and lay field to field, till there be no place for others to inhabit, except as dependants on his forbearance or bounty, that he may dwell alone, as the sole proprietor in the midst of the earth.' The idea of Job is thus expressed by another prophet: 'They covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away; so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.' But his unrighteous acquisitions shall be of short duration; they shall moulder insensibly away, returning to the lawful owner, or pass-flow into the plains. The elevation of mountains, too, ing into the possession of others." The Psalmist says, (39. 11,)" When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth." Upon this passage Roberts says, "The moths of the East are very large and beautiful, but short lived. After a few showers, these splendid insects may be seen fluttering in every breeze; but the dry weather, and their numerous enemies, soon consign them to the common lot. Thus the beauty of man consumes away like that of this gay rover, dressed in his robes of purple, and scarlet, and green." The prophet Isaiah says, (ch. 51. 8,) “The moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool." Roberts informs us, "As the garments of the Orientals never change, they have large stores of them; but they have no little difficulty in preserving them from moths; which circumstance may have occasioned their profuse use of perfumes. MOTHER, ON im. (Gen. 3. 20.) Mothers in the earliest times suckled their offspring themselves, and that from twenty to thirty-six months. The day when the child was weaned was made a festival, (Gen. 21. 8; 1Sam. 1. 22-24;) in case the mother died before the child was old enough to be weaned, or when from any circumstances she was unable to afford the child a sufficiency of nourishment, nurses, ip minikoth, were obtained. In later ages, nurses were more frequently 9. 5,) refers, as Gesenius remarks, rather to crumbs of bread, and instead of, as in our version, "all the bread of their [the Gibeonites'] provision was dry and mouldy," he reads, "all the bread of their travelling provision was dry, and had fallen into crumbs." MOUNTAIN, har. (Exod. 3. 1.) The earth. presents everywhere an undulating surface, consisting of mountains and valleys, the whole having a greater or less elevation above the level of the sea. This inequality of the surface is a necessary provision in its construction, and serves many important uses. Had the earth been of an uniform and level plain, the moisture which falls from the clouds could never have been drained off, but would have remained and formed a stagnant morass over the whole surface. Whereas, mountain ranges serve to direct the currents of clouds in discharging their treasures on the earth, and then drain off the moisture by innumerable rills and streams which expose the various strata and metallic veins to the ope- In the figurative language of Scripture, the governing part of the political world appears under a variety of symbols, being variously represented according to the various kinds of allegories. If the allegory be drawn from the heavens, then the luminaries denote the governing part; if from an animal, the head or horns; if from the earth, a mountain or fortress; and, in this case, the capital city or residence of the governor is taken for the supreme, by which it happens that these mutually illustrate each other. Thus a capital city is the head of the political body; the head of an ox is the fortress of the animal; mountains are the natural fortresses of the earth, and therefore a fortress or capital city, though set in a level plain, may be called a mountain. Thus head, mountain, hill, city, horn, and king, are in a manner synonymous terms to signify a kingdom or monarchy united under one government, only with this difference, that it is to be understood in different respects; for the head represents it in respect of the capital city; the mountain or hill in respect of the strength of the metropolis, which gives law to, or is above, and commands the adjacent territories. Thus, concerning the kingdom of the Messiah, the prophet Isaiah says, "And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it;" (ch. 2. 2;) and in ch. 11. 9, "They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain;" that is, in all the kingdom of the Messiah, which shall then reach all over the world; for it follows, "the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord." So the whole Assyrian monarchy, or Babylon, for all its dominions, is called a mountain, in Jeremiah 51. 25; Zechariah 4, 7; in the former passage, the Targum has "a fortress." Thus, also, in Daniel 2. 35, "the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth;" that is, the kingdom of the Messiah having destroyed the four monarchies, became an universal monarchy, as appears from verses 44 and 45. Mountains are frequently used to signify all places of strength, of what kind soever, and to whatever use applied; mountains being difficult of access to an enemy, and overawing and commanding the country round about, and protecting what is near them. (Jerem. 3. 23.) Among the heathen, persons of great note or eminence 895 were buried in or under mountains; tombs were erected over them in honour of their memory, and, by degrees, their souls became objects of worship. This gave rise to a custom of building temples and places of worship upon mountains; and though these temples were not always, strictly speaking, the very monuments of the heroes deceased, yet the bare invocation was supposed to call the soul thither, and render the place a sepulchral monument. These temples were also built like forts or towers, as appears from Judges 9. 46; 48. 49, where the temple of the god Berith is called, in the original, the tower of the house, or the tower, the house of the god Berith. Thus mountains, in several parts of Scripture, signify idolatrous temples and places of worship. (Ezek. 6. 2-6.) Great disorders and commotions, especially when kingdoms are moved by hostile invasions, are expressed in the prophetic style by carrying or casting mountains into the midst of the sea; thus the Psalmist says, "Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea." (46. 2.) It is said in Revelations 16. 20, " And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found." This phrase appears to be taken from those mighty earthquakes, in which everything is thrown into confusion, and even mountains are swallowed up or change their forms. (Rev. 6. 14.) These mystic mountains, in the Apocalypse, refer to kingdoms and states, which were no longer found, because overturned to make way for the kingdom of Christ, mentioned by the Prophet Daniel, which was to fill the whole earth. MOUNTAINS. See PALESTINE. MOUNT OF OLIVES, or OLIVET, is the name of the high ground on the eastern side of the valley of Jehoshaphat, opposite to Jerusalem, which was the scene of several memorable events in the life of Our blessed Lord. "This mount," observes Stephens, in his Incidents of Travel, "consists of a range of four mountains, with summits of unequal altitudes. The highest rises from the Garden of Gethsemane, and is the one fixed upon as the place of Our Saviour's ascension. About half way up is a ruined monastery, built, according to the monks, over the spot where Jesus sat down and wept over the city, and uttered that prediction which has since been so fearfully verified. The olive still maintains its place on its native mountain, and now grows spontaneously upon its top and sides, as in the days of David and Our Saviour. In a few moments we reached the summit, the view from which embraces perhaps more interesting objects than any other in the world; the Valley of Jehoshaphat, the Garden of Gethsemane, and the city of Jerusalem, the plains of Jericho, the valley of Jordan, and the Dead Sea. On the top of the mountain is a miserable Arab village, in the centre of which is a small octagonal building, erected, it is said, over the spot from which Our Saviour ascended into heaven; and the print of his foot, say the monks, is still to be seen. The print is in the rock, inclosed by an oblong border of marble; and the pilgrims may at any time be seen taking in wax, |