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From all the reft, of whom to be invok'd,

A nation from one faithful man to spring:
Him on this fide Euphrates yet residing,
Bred up in idol-worship; O that men

(Canft thou believe?) should be so stupid grown, While yet the patriarch liv'd, who feap'd the flood, As to forfake the living God, and fall

To worship their own work in wood and ftone

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For Gods! yet him God the most High vouchsafes 120 To call by vision from his father's house,

His kindred and falfe Gods, into a land

Which he will fhew him, and from him will raise
A mighty nation, and upon him shower
His benediction so, that in his feed

All nations shall be bleft; he strait obeys,
Not knowing to what land, yet firm believes :
I fee him, but thou canst not, with what faith

He leaves his Gods, his friends, and native foil
Ur of Chaldæa, paffing now the ford
To Haran, after him a cumbrous train

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Of herds and flocks, and numerous fervitude;
Not wand'ring poor, but trufting all his wealth
With God, who call'd him, in a land unknown.
Canaan he now attains; I fee his tents

Pitch'd about Sechem, and the neighb'ring plain
Of Moreh; there by promise he receives

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Gift to his progeny of all that land,

From Hamath northward to the defert fouth,

(Things by their names I call, though yet unnam'd) From Hermon east to the great western sea;

Mount

Mount Hermon, yonder sea, each place behold
In profpect, as I point them; on the shore
Mount Carmel; here the double-founted stream
Jordan, true limit eastward; but his fons
Shall dwell to Senir, that long ridge of hills.
This ponder, that all nations of the earth
Shall in his feed be blefs'd; by that feed
Is meant thy great deliverer, who shall bruise
The Serpent's head; whereof to thee anon
Plainlier shall be reveal'd. This patriarch bleft,
Whom faithful Abraham due time shall call,
A fon, and of his fon a grand-child leaves,
Like him in faith, in wisdom, and renown;
The grand-child with twelve fons increas'd departs
From Canaan, to a land hereafter call'd
Egypt, divided by the river Nile;

See where it flows, difgorging at fev'n mouths
Into the sea: to sojourn in that land

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He comes invited by a younger fon

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In time of dearth, a fon whose worthy deeds

Raife him to be the fecond in that realm

Of Pharaoh there he dies, and leaves his race
Growing into a nation, and now grown
Sufpected to a fequent king, who seeks
To stop their overgrowth, as inmate guests

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Too numerous; whence of guefts he makes them flaves
Inhofpitably', and kills their infant males:
Till by two brethren (those two brethren call
Mofes and Aaron) fent from God to clame
His people from inthralment, they return

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With glory' and spoil back to their promis'd land.

But first the lawless tyrant, who denies

To know their God, or meffage to regard,

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Must be compell'd by figns and judgments dire; 175
To blood unfhed the rivers must be turn'd;
Frogs, lice, and flies, must all his palace fill
With loath'd intrusion, and fill all the land;
His cattel muft of rot and murren die;
Botches and blains must all his fiefh imbofs,
And all his people; thunder mix'd with hail,
Hail mix'd with fire, must rend th' Egyptian sky,
And wheel on th' earth, devouring where it rolls;
What it devours not, herb, or fruit, or grain,
A darksome cloud of locufts swarming down
Must eat, and on the ground leave nothing green;
Darkness muft overshadow all his bounds,

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Palpable darkness, and blot out three days;
Last with one midnight stroke all the first-born
Of Egypt must lie dead. Thus with ten wounds 190
The river-dragon tam'd at length submits

To let his fojourners depart, and oft

Humbles his stubborn heart, but ftill as ice

More harden'd after thaw, till in his rage
Purfuing whom he late dismiss'd, the sea
Swallows him with his hoft, but them lets pafs
As on dry land between two crystal walls,
Aw'd by the rod of Mofes so to stand

Divided, till his rescu'd gain their shore:

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Such wondrous pow'r God to his faint will lend, 200 Though prefent in his Angel, who shall go

Before

Before them in a cloud, and pill'ar of fire,
By day a cloud, by night a pillar of fire,
To guide them in their journey, and remove
Behind them, while th' obdurate king pursues:
All night he will pursue, but his approach
Darkness defends between till morning watch;
Then through the fiery pillar and the cloud
God looking forth will trouble all his hoft,

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And craze their chariot wheels: when by command 210 Mofes once more his potent rod extends

Over the fea; the fea his rod obeys;

On their imbattel'd ranks the waves return,
And overwhelm their war: the race elect

Safe towards Canaan from the shore advance

Through the wild defert, not the readiest way,
Left entring on the Canaanite alarm'd

War terrify them inexpert, and fear

Return them back to Egypt, choosing rather
Inglorious life with fervitude; for life
To noble and ignoble is more sweet

Untrain'd in arms, where rafhnefs leads not on.
This alfo fhall they gain by their delay

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In the wide wilderness, there they shall found
Their government, and their great fenate choofe
Through the twelve tribes, to rule by laws ordain'd:
God from the mount of Sinai, whofe gray top
Shall tremble, he defcending, will himself
In thunder, lightning, and loud trumpets found,
Ordain them laws; part fuch as appertain
To civil juftice, part religious rites

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Of

Of facrifice, informing them, by types

And fhadows, of that deftin'd Seed to bruife
The Serpent, by what means he shall achieve
Mankind's deliverance. But the voice of God
To mortal ear is dreadful; they beseech
That Mofes might report to them his will,
And terror ceafe; he grants what they befought
Inftructed that to God is no accefs
Without mediator, whofe high office now
Mofes in figure bears, to introduce

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One greater, of whose day he fhall foretel,

And all the prophets in their age the times

Of great Meffi'ah fhall fing. Thus laws and rites
Establish'd, fuch delight hath God in men
Obedient to his will, that he vouchfafes
Among them to fet up his tabernacle,
The holy One with mortal men to dwell:
By his prescript a fanctuary is fram'd
Of cedar, overlaid with gold, therein
An ark, and in the ark his teftimony,
The records of his covenant, over thefe
A mercy-feat of gold between the wings
Of two bright Cherubim; before him burn
Sev'n lamps as in a zodiac representing
The heav'nly fires; over the tent a cloud
Shall reft by day, a fiery gleam by night,

Save when they journey, and at length they come,
Conducted by his Angel to the land

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Promis'd to Abraham and his feed: the reft

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Were long to tell, how many battels fought,

How

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