The Chosen People | Page 8

sacrifices
were permitted. For offences against the Ten Commandments, there
was no means of purchasing remission; no animal's, nay, no man's life
could equal such a cost; there was nothing for it but to try to dwell on
the hope, held out to Adam and Abraham, and betokened by the
sacrifices and the priesthood, of some fuller expiation yet to come;
some means of not only obtaining pardon, but of being worthy of
mercy.
The Israelites could not even be roused to look for the present temporal
promise, and hankered after the fine soil and rich fruits of Egypt, rather
than the beautiful land of hill and valley that lay before them; and when
their spies reported it to be full of hill forts, held by Canaanites of giant
stature, a cowardly cry of despair broke out, that they would return to
Egypt. Only two of the whole host, besides Moses, were ready to trust
to Him who had delivered them from Pharaoh, and had led them
through the sea. Therefore those two alone of the grown-up men were
allowed to set foot in the Promised Land. Till all the rest should have
fallen in the wilderness, and a better race have been trained up, God
would not help them to take possession. In their wilfulness they tried to

advance, and were defeated, and thus were obliged to endure their forty
years' desert wandering.
Even Moses had his patience worn out by their fretful faithlessness, and
committed an act of disobedience, for which he was sentenced not to
enter the land, but to die on the borders after one sight of the promise of
his fathers. Under him, however, began the work of conquest; the rich
pasture lands of Gilead and Basan were subdued, and the tribes of
Reuben and Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh, were permitted to take
these as their inheritance, though beyond the proper boundary, the
Jordan. The Moabites took alarm, though these, as descended from
Abraham's nephew Lot, were to be left unharmed; and their king, Balak,
sent, as it appears, even to Mesopotamia for Balaam, a true prophet,
though a guilty man, in hopes that he would bring down the curse of
God on them. Balaam, greedy of reward, forced, as it were, consent
from God to go to Balak, though warned that his words would not be in
his own power. As he stood on the hill top with Balak, vainly
endeavouring to curse, a glorious stream of blessing flowed from his
lips, revealing, not only the fate of all the tribes around, even for a
thousand years, but proclaiming the Sceptre and Star that should rise
out of Jacob to execute vengeance on his foes. But finding himself
unable to curse Israel, the miserable prophet devised a surer means of
harming them: he sent tempters among them to cause them to corrupt
themselves, and so effectual was this invention, that the greater part of
the tribe of Simeon were ensnared, and a great plague was sent in
chastisement. It was checked by the zeal of the young priest, Phineas,
under whose avenging hand so many of the guilty tribe fell, that their
numbers never recovered the blow. Then after a prayer of atonement, a
great battle was fought, and the wretched Balaam was among the slain.
The forty years were over, Moses's time was come, and he gave his last
summing up of the Covenant, and sung his prophetic song. His
authority was to pass to his servant, the faithful spy, bearing the
prophetic name of Joshua; and he was led by God to the top of Mount
Nebo, whence he might see in its length and breadth, the pleasant land,
the free hills, the green valleys watered by streams, the wooded banks
of Jordan, the pale blue expanse of the Mediterranean joining with the

sky to the west; and to the north, the snowy hills of Hermon, which sent
their rain and dew on all the goodly mountain land. It had been the
hope of that old man's hundred and twenty years, and he looked forth
on it with his eye not dim, nor his natural force abated; but God had
better things for him in Heaven, and there upon the mountain top he
died alone, and God buried him in the sepulchre whereof no man
knoweth. None was like to him in the Old Covenant, who stood
between God and the Israelites, but he left a promise that a Prophet
should be raised up like unto himself.

LESSON V.
ISRAEL IN CANAAN.
"But He was so merciful, that He forgave their misdeeds and destroyed
them not."--Psalm Lxxviii. 38.
In the year 1431, Joshua led the tribes through the divided waters of the
Jordan, and received strength and skill to scatter