asperated, and uttered this speech, which was thought a great degradation by a king to his subjects in those times; "for in that day thou seest my face thou shalt die." Moses, with all the grandeur of a prophet, with all the dignity that duty ever inspires, said, "Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no more."

CHAPTER XI.

EXPLANATIONS.

THE PROPHECY OF THE LAST PLAGUE.

THE FAIL

URE OF ALL IN SOFTENING THE HEART OF PHARAOH.

You will perceive at once that the first three verses of the chapter I have read, are, not an interpolation by a mere human authority, but an interpolation or a parenthesis clearly and obviously relating to something that had been said before, and to a commission that Moses had received from God on a previous occasion; and you will notice that the 4th verse of this chapter, after making allowance for the parenthesis which recapitulates what evidently had been recorded before, ought strictly to come after the 29th verse of the previous chapter; because in the 28th verse of that chapter, "Pharaoh said unto Moses, Get thee from me, take heed to thyself, see my face no more; for in that day thou seest my face thou shalt die. And Moses said, Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no more." If this chapter which we have read this morning were not connected with the previous chapter, and not evidently a transaction that took place at the very same interview, it would be contradictory to the speech of Moses, "I will see thy face again no more." Evidently after he had uttered that saying, he continued the narrative as it begins in the 4th verse of this 11th chapter, while he still stood before Pharaoh. After having said, "I will see thy face again no more," that is, "This shall be the last interview," in order that that interview might not be spent, if possible, unprofitably, he announces the last and most consuming judgment that God would pour out upon

him and upon his people, if he would not let the children of Israel go. And therefore, the 4th verse of the 11th chapter is the continuation of Moses' statement at the very same interview with Pharaoh, at which he said, "I will see thy face again no more." One proof of this is, that the opening words of the first verse of this chapter might be rendered in the preterpluperfect tense, " And the Lord had said unto Moses, Yet will I bring one plague more upon Pharaoh." It is thus evident that these three verses are divinely interpolated in order to give a full account of the judgments pronounced upon Pharaoh.

Having thus then seen the connection, let us notice that after all the plagues had fallen, and after each had rebounded from Pharaoh's heart like seeds from the hard pavement, like hail upon the flinty rock, God said, "I will add one more judgment, that will have its effect, not indeed in softening his heart, but in emancipating my chosen heritage with a high hand, and an outstretched arm."

There is something very striking in the apparent similarity of the judgments denounced upon Pharaoh, to the plagues given in the Apocalypse, and in the inflictions which God is stated to bring upon a disobedient people in many parts of Scripture. For instance, in the book of Amos, iv. 6-12, God says, in dealing with a people who had transgressed his laws, "I have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered. So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vine

yards and your fig-trees and your olive-trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel; " death being the crowning stroke in the series of plagues denounced upon a guilty people. So in the plagues denounced upon Pharaoh we find that the last is a fatal one

- it comes and smites the first-born, from the monarch upon the throne to the maid-servant who was grinding corn behind the mill.

God says in the 2d verse, "Speak now in the ears of the people, and let every man borrow of his neighbor, and every woman of her neighbor, jewels of silver, and jewels of gold." I explained in a previous chapter that the word here translated "borrow," whilst it is so translated in one, or at most, two other passages in Scripture, is generally and justly translated "ask." For instance, the same Hebrew word is used in the 2d Psalm, where God the Father speaks to the Messiah, and says, "Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance;" and the word rendered here "borrow," ought to be translated as in the 2d Psalm, "ask."

Then you will notice that when they asked for these jewels, the Israelites had favor in the eyes of the Egyptians. We read in the previous chapter that Pharaoh pursued a despotic course, and that some of his ministers, courtiers, and people, remonstrated with him; but his heart was not

only hardened against the administrations of God, but it was also impenetrable to the sound suggestions of his ministers and people. It is plain, therefore, that Pharaoh's career in this matter was not a popular one, and that some of the Egyptians did pity the Israelites: for "the Lord gave the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians ;" and the Egyptians, therefore, when the Israelites asked them for jewels of gold and silver, most abundant in that country, freely gave them, partly, it may be, because they pitied them, and partly because they were glad to get rid of them at any price. Josephus says that the Egyptians honored the Israelites with gifts some in order to get them to depart quickly, and others on account of neighborhood and good friendship. So that the historian, Josephus, gives what would suggest itself to any one as the right reason for the Egyptians giving up their property, in order to oblige the Israelites.

Then this last judgment, which is strictly detailed in the next chapter, for this chapter is the prophecy, the next the accomplishment of it, the one the voice, the other the echo, was evidently the most awful and distressing one that fell upon the whole population of the land. If the whole population had been swept away by some desolating flood, or by the earth opening to receive them, there would have been none left to mourn the catastrophe; but when the firstborn child, the hope of the house, the nearest and dearest to the heart, and in whom the whole progress and expansion of the house, whatever was its position or its rank, was centred

when that first-born one was smitten, from the first-born child of Pharaoh on the throne to the first-born child of the humblest menial in his realm, in a night, the universality of this stroke, and its occurring at midnight, when each would be awakened by the calamity that took place, and the neighbor in one house would rush out to seek sympathy from her next neighbor, and meet her next neighbor coming to