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"On the assumption of those princesses being identical," says Dr. Nolan ", "not only the preceding difficulty disappears, but every other difficulty in the account of the princess and her ward, which is preserved on native monuments, or inserted in the Sacred records. I have elsewhere undertaken to prove them the same person, from an examination of the monuments, which appear, from the inscriptions upon them, to have been erected in the reign of Amense. The investigation terminated in eliciting such evidence of her religious opinions, as left no reasonable ground for doubt on her personal identity. hostility with which these monuments were treated by her successor, by whom they were obliterated and effaced, was traced to a probable motive; and other difficulties in her history were satisfactorily explained, which had involved the antiquaries, who undertook to remove them, in hopeless contradiction.

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"There is not a circumstance, on the contrary, which is related of Pharaoh's daughter, which may not be verified in the short account which we have received of Amense. Even to her latest years this Egyptian queen appears to have been distinguished by the title which she exclusively receives from Moses (Exod. ii. 5). On an obelisk which was raised by her at Thebes, and which is one of the most splendid of the monuments which attest her taste and munificence as a patroness of the arts, she is repeatedly termed

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Pharaoh's daughter.' When she recovered Moses from the Nile, she must have arrived at maturity, from the attendants with which it appears she was then surrounded; but nine years had then elapsed from the death of her father, under whom that title, which is equivalent to princess,' was acquired, which had become by this time fixed by custom. The circumstances which led to the choice of Moses as her successor, are discussed page 293. While his adoption to the throne proves that she had no child to succeed her, it verifies the account of her having been prevented from nominating Moses to that honour solely through his disinclination to become her successor (Heb. xi. 24, comp. Exod. ii. 10). The preference thus shown to him above Moris, his competitor for the throne, will serve to account for the disrespect manifested by that prince to her memory, and which was principally directed towards those monuments which possessed records of her superiority to the errors of the national superstition. she imbibed purer religious notions from her Hebrew ward, the difference in her opinions must have still further exasperated a prince whom she had alienated by her preference for a rival and an alien."

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during the whole of Amense's reign, from the time of his attaining the age of twelve, to his reaching thirty-four, to acquire a knowledge of the learning and religion of the Egyptians. Of his acquaintance with them he has left unquestionable evidence in the code which he promulgated, and which exhibits a studied opposition to many of their rites and ceremonies. In little more than six years from the death of the queen, his patroness, he was compelled to flee from Egypt, his life having been menaced by her successor, who, as his early competitor for the throne, had manifested a hostile spirit to the memory of his royal mistress. Whatever might have been the provocation, or the palliation, of his offence, it is plain he had no hopes from the mercy of a king who had sentenced him to death on the bare report of his criminality. This circumstance may be mentioned, as it authenticates by its consistency and verisimilitude the notices respecting the early life of Moses, which have reached us from pagan sources 2.

I commend the whole work of Dr. Nolan to the notice of the student. It affords, like Layard's Nineveh, another and most wonderful proof that, in proportion as we can redeem from the depths of time the hidden treasures of antiquity, precisely in the same proportion we discover new arguments, new proofs and evidences, to confirm the truth of the Scriptures, and to assure us of the certainty of Revelation.

The next observation I shall make on the death of Moses is, that whereas in this Section (Deut. xxxiv. 10) he is said to have died he is said in a former chapter (Deut. xxxii. 50) to be "gathered to his people." The same expression is used in many places-Gen. xxv. 8. 17; xxxv. 29; xlix. 29. 33. Numb. xx. 24. 26. 28, &c. &c.-to describe the cessation of the present life, and Bishop Warburton therefore considers the two phrases to be synonymous, and to denote only the death of the body.

I will not again discuss the question whether the doctrine of the immortality of the soul was taught in the Old Testament. I have endeavoured, in many places, in the course of these humble pages, to show that, though it was not made the foundation and sanction of the Mosaic Law, the belief in an invisible world, from which the angel Jehovah appeared to Adam, to Noah, and to the Patriarchs generally, was uniformly taken for granted; and that we have sufficient proof to warrant the conviction, that the ancient Church of God believed that the souls of men should exist in that world after the dissolution of the body 3. When I remember that 2 Nolan on the Egyptian Chronology, p. 404, et seqq.

3 I am sorry that Dr. Lee, in his Lexicon, art. has adopted the opinion of Schroeder and of War

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the doctrines of Scripture are best explained by the facts of Scripture, and that the spirit of Moses appeared in glory at the transfiguration of Christ; that is, that he was manifested to the disciples in the same form in which Christ shall again come forth from the same state; I cannot believe that the death of Moses denoted only that his body was committed to the grave, and that the thinking soul, which had been clothed with that body, slept with it till the day of the transfiguration. Christian Church has never taught the doctrine that the soul ceases to exist, because the body dies. The question-whether the soul be immortal, is widely different from that, whether it ceases to live, because the present organization of the body has ceased. The original word, "to collect or gather," is applied to the plucking of fruit for use, or preservation. When united with p, "the person, or breathing frame of man," it preserves the same meaning. The person of man consists of two parts, the body, which is gathered to the grave among the bodies of those who died before it; and the thinking soul, which is gathered, in some unknown manner, to the souls of those who were disembodied before it. In both senses the dying are gathered to their people. In whatever sense the word bis, "the grave, or the state of death," be interpreted, we cannot exclude from its meaning the twofold senses of the former words,

and . The person, therefore, of the man who dies, being compounded of body and soul, is united to, or gathered to, the grave where his body shall rest; and to the invisible state, where his soul shall continue in the manner which the Creator has ordained. So

it was with the leader of Israel: so will it be with all mankind. His body died. His spirit was received into the invisible state from which the angel Jehovah was accustomed to speak to him, and from which He was manifested. There, in some mode, which we shall all understand when we ourselves become separated from the bodies which now enclothe the soul, Moses remained till the day when he was permitted to become visible to the disciples of Christ, and thus anticipate their future more continued communion with him after the death of their own bodies. There we shall live after our own death, till the day when our souls at the resurrection shall enter upon the third stage of their endless existence. The present life is the first stage; the intermediate state from which Moses came at the transfiguration is the second; the third commences with the resurrection, and continues for ever. Nothing is worthy

burton on this point. The faith of Abel and of the Patriarchs cannot be comprehended, if they had no belief in another life after death.

4 Isa. xxxii. 10; Exod. xxiii. 16.

the serious regard of a man when compared with such subjects as these. The argument of Bishop Warburton has always appeared to me to be both unfair and unphilosophical.

1. "The objectors to his interpretation that 'to be gathered to his people' merely signified to die, do not," he says, "reflect upon the genius of the Eastern speech, which gives action and motion to every thing; in which being reduced to one common lot and condition is called being gathered to their people.

2. "The objectors forget, too, the peculiar genius of the Hebrew tongue, that delights so much in pleonasms; in which to die, and to be gathered to their people, are but two different phrases for the same thing. At the same time I am ready to allow that this latter phrase originally arose (whatever people first employed it) from the notion of some common receptacle of souls. But we know how soon, and from what various causes, terms and phrases lose the memory of their original.

3. "The truth of this interpretation is confirmed by the several contents, where all these expressions occur; the historian's purpose being evidently nothing else than to record the period of their existence here on earth."

I do not recollect to have seen any where else, within the same compass, a collection of remarks so calculated to mislead. While the Bishop is professedly defending the Scripture against its adversaries, he admits that one error, which is the foundation of nearly all the falsehood of the rationalistic and neologian infidelity of the day. We are told by these writers, that the language of the Holy Book, which we who welcome the common Christianity regard as a revelation from God, is notoriously figurative: and they then proceed to resolve both the facts and doctrines of Scripture into Oriental metaphors If we concede to those writers Warburton's principle, we give them the means of overthrowing every truth which Christians regard as the very charter of their salvation. Warburton ought to have laid down his principle broadly, that all Scripture is figurative; or, that in Scripture there are many figurative expressions, and that this phrase in question is one of them. But he affects to adopt the latter principle, and adroitly avails himself of the former. Secondly, he represents the Hebrew language as delighting in pleonasms; in which to die, and to be gathered to their people, are but different phrases for the same thing, thus begging the very question in dispute. It was the learned writer's business to prove this; not to take it for granted. But, indeed, the invalidity of this reasoning is its least defect: it is openly and intolerably mischievous. Apart from the structure of Hebrew poetry, in which the iteration of the

5 Divine Legation, book vi. sect. 3.

same sentiment in varied phrase is a wellknown characteristic, and in apophthegmatic compositions, as in the death-bed speeches of the Patriarchs, and in the Proverbs, I know of no writings so free from pleonasm as the Hebrew Scriptures. I cannot, too, but regard the remark with which the learned and ingenious author of the Divine Legation follows up and illustrates the foregoing argument, as most indefensible. "At the same time," are his words, "I am ready to allow that this latter phrase ['to be gathered to their people'] originally arose (whatever people first employed it) from the notion of a common receptacle of souls. But we know how soon, and from what various causes, terms and phrases lose the memory of their original." The reader of Scripture, however, will deduce from this an inference directly opposite to that drawn by the learned prelate. Warburton would persuade us that a principle, or a tenet, of an antiquity so remote, that its source is lost to view, must be false; that in course of time it works itself true; and that the words and phrases, which once embodied or expressed those principles, have irrecoverably lost their original meaning. Now (setting aside the physical sciences) in morals, or, rather, in the memorials of great religious truths, the progress is always not from what is false to what is true, but directly the reverse. Truth is older than falsehood. Falsehood is the corruption of pre-existing truth. And the terms which still survive, so far from clouding the view of what is thus debased, are often the most precious instruments which time has preserved to us, to enable us to feel our way back to those great truths, of which more recent opinions are but perversions.

Thirdly, when the Bishop says that "the objectors overlook the context, in which the writer's design is plainly seen to be nothing else but a purpose to record the period of the patriarch's existence here on earth," he again begs the question, and also employs an argument utterly unfounded. If I were to read in an inscription upon a tomb, that the deceased died; and then read,-" in the sure and stedfast hope of immortality," the inscription could not be called pleonastic, and be said to denote that the epitaph meant only to tell us how long the deceased lived in this world. I consider the whole theory of Warburton, as he has proposed it, popular as his learned work has long been, to be most untenable, and most injurious to Christianity. It has long been used by the opponents of the spiritual religion of revelation as an objection to the inspiration and divinity of Scripture; and it is most especially refuted by the fact we have considered, that the appearance of Moses at the transfiguration demonstrates that the expression, "to be gathered to his

VOL. II. PART VI.

fathers," denoted that the spirit of the person of whom these words were used, was united to the spirits of his fathers in the world of souls.

It cannot be now necessary to prolong this inquiry. I will merely observe, that one of the chief arguments in favour of Bishop Warburton's theory is derived from 2 Tim. i. 10 1, which in our version is translated, "brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." The translation is erroneous. The original words, φωτίσαντος ζωὴν καὶ ἀφθαρσίαν διὰ TOU Evayyελíov, mean that Christ, by His Gospel, illustrated and made plain and clear the truths respecting the future life, the incorruption of the body, and the continued existence of the soul, which had previously been comparatively obscure. It does not mean that Christ was the first discoverer or revealer to the world, that man was compounded of a body which should die, and of a soul which should live. He demonstrated by the transfiguration the existence of the world of souls. He demonstrated by His resurrection the incorruption of the body, and its reunion with the soul. He demonstrated by His ascension the continuance of His holy love, as the High Priest, to intercede for His Church. All,all were component parts of His Gospel, illustrating and proving the true nature and dignity of man. Very remarkable, I may here too observe, was the conversation which took place at the transfiguration, between Moses, and Christ, and the spirit of the other Hebrew servant of the King of kings; who, having been taken, without passing through death, into the invisible world, now appeared again to the witnesses of this wonderful transaction. The last act of the life of Moses was the transferring to Joshua, the type of Christ, the completion of the Exodus from Egypt to Canaan. The subject of the conversation at the transfiguration was the better Exodus which Christ should accomplish at Jerusalem, when He should overcome the sharpness of death, and open the true Canaan the kingdom of heaven-to all the tribes of the true Israel, to all believers in the atonement of Christ. And such, we may believe, will be our conversation when our bodies are gathered to the bodies of our fathers in the grave, and our spirits are gathered to the spirits of believers in the world of souls. We shall talk of the work of Christ. We shall ponder the eternity that is past, and the eternity that is to come; and the work, and mercy, and wonders of the eternal Saviour shall be the theme of our contemplation and communion. Where, and what was the state of existence in which Moses lived between his death and the transfiguration; and where, and what is the place and manner

1 Divine Legation, book ix. cap. 2.

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of his existence at present, we cannot tell till ourselves are united with the souls of the just made perfect. But that the lawgiver of Israel is not merely dust and ashes; that he does not merely exist with the loathsome worm, may be firmly believed. And where he, and Elias, and Christ, and the faithful live now, we also may hope to live. The voice which came from heaven at the transfiguration terminated the mission of the religion of Moses, as the faith of the Universal Church: "This is my beloved Son; hear Him:"hear no longer, as your only faith, the words of Moses e lawgiver, nor of Elias the prophet; but hear Him, who is the greater Lawgiver, and the nobler Prophet. In the presence of the three chosen witnesses,-the number required by the Law,—the spirit of Moses may be said to have resigned the sceptre over the conscience of the Jewish believer to the promised Messiah, in whom the Jew and the Gentile are one. Then the work of Moses was over, when, in conjunction with Elijah and with Christ, He confirmed the faith of the disciples, that the Old Dispensation was ending. His office was to continue but for a time-and God summoned his spirit from the world of disembodied spirits to appear once more to the embodied spirits of the men who followed Christ; that he might be a witness to the fact, recorded by one of their number for our benefit for ever, that "the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." The kingdom of Moses ended: the kingdom of Christ shall never end. Of that kingdom Moses is still a servant in heaven. Of that kingdom we are still the servants upon earth. As we know not the thoughts of Moses as the disembodied spirit between the day of his death and the day of his appearing at the transfiguration, so do we now know nothing of his present mode of existence. But as at the transfiguration he delighted to talk with Christ and Elijah of the true Exodus, the Exodus of Christ, from the Egypt of this world, to the Canaan of heaven; so also may we now find our highest spiritual happiness in pondering the same great mystery. And if we may presume to rise in thought within the veil, and to inquire into the nature of the contemplations of the spirits in heaven; we may believe that they rejoice to anticipate the result of that true Exodus, when the kingdom of that Christ, the common God of the Jew and the Gentile, shall be co-extensive with the earth and heaven. We may believe that the one prayer which unites earth with heaven, and the souls of Moses and Elias, and the disciples of their Saviour and our Saviour, is this,-"Thy kingdom come." So do the souls on earth and the souls in heaven form but one communion. They have one God,

one Saviour, one prayer. So may we consider the death of Moses, and his appearance at the transfiguration of our Lord, as the earnest of the two great events, which must pertain to ourselves, the death of the body; and the appearance of the soul, in a spiritual body, before the Judge of the world. We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, to partake of His glory, as Moses and Elias; or to be banished from the presence of the Lord and of His glory. The day is at hand when the reader who ponders over these lines, and thinks, and reasons, and conjec tures within himself the nature, the destiny, and the continued existence of the soul in the state that follows death, shall know and understand all these things. Who will not pray that we may all meet in peace and safety, through God's mercy, in that better, happier, higher state, where Christ, and Moses, and Elijah, and the innumerable company of angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect, and our own kindred and friends among them, and the presence of God, manifested in some different mode from that in which we now behold Him, shall form one holy society! Who will not rejoice, if the soul be indeed capable of an immortality of happiness, in such reflections, which are but the anticipa tions, and the realizations, and the earnest, of the employments and the felicities of that immortality? Who will not exclaim, with the pious Father of the early Church," If these things are true, I often wish to die 2?" Who will not weep over the infirmities, the weaknesses, and the inconsistencies, which so often make death dreadful, and render the loftier aspirations of the soul a mockery and a scorn to itself and who will not rejoice, though with trembling, that the last recorded action of the leader of Israel, with whose death the Pentateuch is now concluded, was the testify ing from the invisible world to the sinful, the repentant, the humble believer, that while be welcomes the Revelation of Moses and of the Prophets, he must be still more persuaded to obey, and hope, and trust, and persevere by Him who rose from the dead? Who will not rejoice in the words which came from the invisible state, in the hearing of Moses, of Elias, and of the disciples of Christ: "This is my beloved Son; hear Him?" Let the heart of man hear Him, who still speaks to all, by the Holy Spirit which He sends forth, to bring His people from Egypt, to guide them through the wilderness, to uphold them in the death, which divides the present world from the future, and unites us to the true Israel in the Canaan of rest. Amen.

· ἐγὼ μὲν γὰρ πολλάκις ἐθέλω τεθνάναι εἴ κεν ταῦτά ἐστιν ἀληθῆ.-Justin Martyr.

OF THE

JOURNEYS OF THE ISRAELITES
IN THE WILDERNESS.

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FIRST YEAR.

FIRST MONTH, Abib [Chald. Nisan, Esth. iii. 7].
MARCH and APRIL.

(It began with the first new moon after the vernal equinox.)

Setting out on their march on the morning of the 15th day (on the morrow after the Passover, Exod. xii. 37; Numb. xxxiii. 3) from Rameses to Succoth.

2nd Stage. From Succoth to Etham. [Cloudy pillar first mentioned.] 3rd Stage. From Etham to Pi-hahiroth. [Now Pharaoh's army approaches.]

4th Stage-From Pi-hahiroth, through the Red Sea, to Marah. [In this stage they went three days' journey through the wilderness of Etham, or of Shur.]

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9th Stage. From Sin to Dophkah.

10th Stage. From Dophkah to Alush.

11th Stage. From Alush to Rephidim, where they murmured for water, were miraculously supplied by streams that issued from the rock at Horeb, and defeated Amalek (Exod. xvii.; Numb. xxxiii. 14).

12th Stage-From Rephidim to SINAI, where they arrive on the 3rd day of the month (about the 15th or 18th of May), and in FIVE days after (about the 20th or 22nd of May) the Law is first given. [Here they remain for nearly a year.]

[The transactions at Mount Sinai are related in Exod. xix. to the end of the book; in Leviticus; and in Numb. i.—ix. ; x. 1—10.]

Sinai. The Law given.

NINTH MONTH [Chald. Chisleu]. Sinai. The Law given. The golden calf.

November-December.

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