and fullest that words could convey, through | number seven is, through the whole of dithe difficulties and dangers of a journey the vine revelation, connected with many im most eventful upon record, Balaam is now portant ideas, institutions, and events, in arrived at Balak's metropolis, Kirjath-huzoth, cases depending on the sovereign authority the city of streets.-Greetings, such as may of the great God. This leads us to conclude be supposed to pass between wicked and that it has a meaning and design, the know selfish men, being over, the sacrifice is of ledge of which is either lost to the world fered up, and the banquet is prepared, accord- or never has yet been revealed to man. It ing to the state of a king, and the sacredness cannot be for nothing that it presents itself and importance of his guest. The evening so often, and in so many forms, upon the being passed in festivity, they retire to rest; sacred page. That God rested the seventh and early on the morrow, Balaam permits day from all his work, and sanctified it— himself to be conducted by the Moabitish that on the solemn day of the atonement, prince into the "high places of Baal, that under the law, the blood of the sin-offering thence he might see the utmost parts of the was sprinkled before and upon the mercypeople." Here the cloven foot appears at seat seven times-that the altar of burntence. Balaam was too intelligent to believe offering was consecrated by being anointed that Baal was any thing; that his sacrifices seven times with the holy oil-that the conor high places were any thing: but Balak's secration of Aaron to the priesthood congold being, indeed, the god whom he himself sisted of a service of seven days-that the worshipped, it is to him a matter of the last leper was to be sprinkled, in order to puriindifference before what idol the superstitious fication, seven times; and after a separation monarch bowed down. Reason and religion of seven days, be admitted to his rank as a say, "What concord can there be between citizen-that every seventh year was ordainGod and Belial; between him that believeth, ed a year of rest, to the land of promise; and and an infidel? Ye cannot serve God and that a revolution of seven times seven years mammon." But avarice will attempt any brought on the jubilee, or universal release thing, submit to any thing, commit any thing;-that seven priests, bearing so many trum will adore the God of Israel, or bend at the altar of Baal, just as it serves the occasion. Balaam even volunteers in the service of the idol; feeds the superstition of Balak, which it was his duty to have corrected; and, as if there had been something potent and mysterious in the number, directs seven altars to be erected, and a bullock and a ram to be prepared for a sacrifice upon each of the seven. pets, were commanded to begin the conquest of Canaan, by seven days encompassing Jericho; and that, upon the seventh circuit, and at the seventh blowing of the trumpet, the walls of that city should fall to the ground-that the like number of priests should be employed to precede and announce the removal of the ark, when David brought it home; and not to multiply instances without end-that the Lamb, which John saw in vision in the midst of the throne, should be represented as having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God, sent out into all the earth-that the book in the right hand of Him who sat upon the throne, should be sealed with seven seals-that in these, and so many more cases, which the careful reader of the scriptures need not have pointed out to him, the Spirit of God should see meet to press upon our minds, with such peculiar emphasis, this number of perfection, as it hath been called both by Jews and Heathens, though we cannot account for it, leads to this pleasing conclusion-That there are in the word of God, many precious mines of knowledge, yet undiscovered; endless mysteries of wisdom, goodness, and love, yet to be unveiled; depths of mercy, which the capacity of angels has not yet fathomed; heights of grace, to which the seraphim's wing hath not soared. Is it imagination, merely, to suppose that the felicity of saints in bliss may consist in diving deeper and deeper into the plan of redemption; in tracing its progress, its history, to its consummation, We have observed formerly without pre-in reading this wonderfu' book, with the veil tending to assign a reason for it, that the removed from our eyes; to find in it all the Behold how soon the reproof of a speaking, reasoning brute, the terrors of the opposing angel, and the admonitions of the heavenly vision, are disregarded and forgotten! Balak is deliberately suffered to remain the dupe of his own credulity: he is fed with the vain hope of triumph, in a way by which it could not be achieved; and an attempt is impiously made to aid him in an enterprise which Heaven had repeatedly condemned; and, dreadful to think, this is done under all the awful forms of a religious service; and a purpose too vile to be avowed, even to men, is presumptuously obtruded upon the great Jehovah, as if his determinations were to fluctuate with the vile interests and caprices of mortals. "The sacrifice of the wicked," saith the wise man, is an abomination, how much more when he bringeth it with a wicked mind." The religion of God is, I will have mercy and not sacrifice." But the leading article of Balaam's creed is, Gain is godliness:" hence he attempts to sanction cursing and cruelty, under the solemn ordinances of the blessed God. stores of natural, moral, and divine truth; in | not, the tardiness of man delays him not, the for ever learning, ever beginning to learn flattery of man sways him not. "the love of Christ which passeth knowledge?" I will indulge the dear, the delightful hope, that the period will come, when, taught of that Spirit, who is promised to "take of the things of Christ and show them unto us," I shall discover, in this blest volume, ten thousand excellencies to which I am now blind; ten thousand truths, of which I have at present no perception; ten thousand beauties I am now incapable of relishing. But to return. It is no great wonder to find a man of so mixed a character as Balaam, employing altars and victims, according to a number and quality long before sanctified by the appointment of the true God. For all the rites of idolatry may easily be traced up to divine institutions. But what signifies the form, when the spirit and meaning is lost? Chemosh was the peculiar idol of the Moabites, as we learn from chap. xxi. 29; for Baal, that is, lord, was a general term, descriptive of the whole tribe of deities, and applied by every particular nation to its respective patron; yet we find Balak easily persuaded by Balaam to offer sacrifice to Jehovah. For they that have false notions of Deity, cannot be very difficult in their choice of a god; and Balak probably was so weak as to imagine, that by this piece of flattery and respect, the God of the Israelites might be decoyed from them, withdraw his protection, and give them up to the sword of their enemies. Balaam, now the sacrifice was set on fire, directs the king to stand by it, in solemn expectation of its success; he himself withdraws to an "high place," or, he went solitary; probably to some adjoining clift of the rock, favourable either to meditation, or the practice of his enchantments: for observation of any preternatural signs that might be given, or for a clearer prospect of the camp to be devoted. Nothing astonishes me more than the boldness of this retreat. An ill conscience seeks concealment from the eye of God in noise and a crowd. To what a pitch of insensibility has this man attained, who has the dreadful courage to go forth to meet an offended God in solitude!" And God met Balaam." In what manner we are not told, neither is it of any importance to know; but it is of importance to observe that "God's ways are not our ways, nor his thoughts our thoughts." Insulted in the same manner, what man but would have felt resentment, and have returned insult for insult! In nothing, Father of Mercies! is thy glorious superiority more conspicuous than in thy gentleness and patience. God is not a man that he should be ruffled and discomposed, nor the son of man, that he should oppose vehemence to vehemence. The wrath of man provokes him not, the haste of man urges him Balaam has the confidence to advance a plea of merit for the service which he had performed, in erecting so many altars, and offering so many victims; but he has not the assurance to avow the motive, nor directly to prefer the request to which it plainly led. Without paying the least regard to the one or to the other, God, the great God, puts the word he would have spoken into Balaam's mouth, and sends him back to pronounce it aloud in the ear of Balak, and his attendants. I see, with an honest satisfaction, the disappointed, mortified enchanter, returning with downcast eyes, sullen and slow from the solemn meeting: his schemes of malignity checked and prohibited, all his prospects of ambition and avarice for ever blasted; cursing in his heart that inflexibility of purpose which he durst neither attempt to alter or oppose. I see the expecting monarch in the midst of his seven altars, all eye to watch the moment of the prophet's return; eagerly anticipating his message from his looks, and all ear to hear it delivered in articulate sounds. The emotions which filled the hearts of both, are to be conceived, not described, when the reluctant tongue of Balaam thus pronounced the immutable decree of the Holy Oracle, while the assembled princes of Moab listened with sorrow and disappointment. "Balak, the king of Moab, hath brought me from Aram, out of the mountains of the east, saying, Come, curse me, Jacob, and come, defy, Israel. How shall I curse whom God hath not cursed? Or how shall I defy whom the Lord hath not defied? For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations. Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel?"* The first reflection that naturally presents itself, on hearing these words, is one that has frequently occurred in the course of these exercises, and which it is impossible to repeat too often:-How wonderful, how tremendous, how irresistible the power of God, which has thus all matter, all spirit, at its disposal! which can make the dumb ass speak what naturally he cannot, and the mad prophet to utter what wickedly and perversely he would not: "and out of the mouths of babes and sucklings perfecteth praise." Mark how God brings to nought the counsel of the heathen; writes vanity upon the counsels of princes, and "maketh diviners mad." Thus said Balak; thus did the king of Moab; how poor and contemptible, compared to "Thus saith the Lord." "The enemy said, I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil; my lust shall be satisfied upon them. Numb. xxiii. 7-10. I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy | to the same great poet; who, beholding their them. Thou didst blow with thy wind, the pure and innocent affection, "turned aside sea covered them: they sank as lead in the for envy," and exclaimed: mighty waters. Who is like unto thee, O Lord, amongst the gods! who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders!"* Mark how the slow and reluctant prophecy of Balaam accords with the predictions of former times, and the history of periods yet to come. "Look up now," says God to Abraham, “ toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be."+ And lo, the promise is more than fulfilled: it is infinitely exceeded by the accomplishment. "Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel?" Look forward to the days of Solomon, when the glory of Israel was in its zenith, when the descendants of the men in the plains of Moab were multiplied as the sand on the sea shore; and thence rise higher still, to a greater promise, to a better covenant, to the spiritual seed of faithful Abraham increased "to a great multitude, which no man can number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands;" encamped not in a fertile terrestrial plain, but expatiating through the vast regions of eternal day, and possessing, not a land flowing with milk and honey, but the pure and sublime delights of the paradise of God. How I envy Balaam the prospect from the top of the rock! A rich champaign country, skirted by the silver Jordan, meeting the distant horizon; the tents of Israel spread out like the trees in the forest, and covering an innumerable multitude; a whole nation of men beloved of God, and destined to conquest; the spacious tabernacle, the habitation of the Most High, expanded in the midst, and the cloud of glory, the unequivocal proof of the presence of the great King, resting upon it. How many objects to delight the eye, to swell the imagination, to elevate the soul! No wonder the tongue of envy was charmed from its purpose. But alas! the heart of malice and covetousness remains unchanged; a chest full of gold had been to Balaam a sight more enchanting. Place him in heaven, like Mammon his father; according to the description of our great poet, his attention had been fixed but on one object. "Sight hateful, sight tormenting! Thus these two. The happier Eden, shall enjoy their fill It was a spirit and a situation not unlike "to this, which suggested to the wicked prophet the words of the text; "Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his !"* Unhappy Balaam! he descried from the top of the rock goodly tents, in which he had no part nor lot; he discerned the happy estate of the righteous, but chose to be a partaker with the ungodly; he admired and envied the happy end of the people of God, but felt his own end approaching without hope; he saw and approved the beauty and loveliness of virtue; he persisted to the last, pursuing and cleaving to the wages of unrighteousness. "Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell Were always downward bent, admiring more The beautiful view beneath, therefore, was to Balaam what the conjugal bliss of our first parents in paradise was to Satan, according Exod. xv. 9. 11. † Gen. xv. 5. Rev. vii. 9. But what, I beseech you, could dictate this wish to Balaam? What but a strong and irresistible persuasion of the immortality of the soul, and an approaching unalterable state of rewards and punishments? What but a consciousness of having acted wrong, and the dreadful knowledge of his being accountable to a holy and righteous God? And is it really possible for reasonable creatures to fall into such gross absurdity and contradiction? And can there exist such characters in the world? Let us bring the case home to ourselves. It is too evident to need a proof, that many indulge themselves in very unwarrantable practices, whose religious principles, notwithstanding, are exceedingly sound and just. Try them on the side of soundness in sentiment and opinion, and they talk and reason like angels from heaven: consider how they live, they are mere men of this world. They find a salvo for conscience, by making a sort of composition with their Maker, as some men find a salvo for their integrity, by putting off their good-natured creditors with a certain proportion of their debt, when they are either unwilling or unable to pay the whole. And, with equal insolence and presumption, the one vainly imagines that his Creator and Lord, the other that his credulous friend, may think themselves sufficiently satisfied with such partial payments as they think fit to render. Such of God's commands they will cheerfully obey; but as to others, why, they will make all the atonement in their power-the proud, the ambitious, the covetous, the dissolute, each in a way that shall not clash with his favourite pursuit. One will give his time, another his diligence, a third his money to God, just according as it is the article upon which he himself puts least value, and the conscious deficiency he attempts feebly to cke out, by * Num. xxiii. 10. 66 faint hopes and half resolves, that some time live what way men will, they have but one or another he will exhibit a more uniform thought, one conviction, one prayer, when they and thorough obedience to the will of God. come to die. After the pleasure or the advanWhen the command is clear and express, tage of a wicked action is over, who would not to question and reason on the subject is re- gladly get clear of the guilt of it? But this bellion. By this the allegiance of man in a is the misery; the profit and pleasure quickly state of innocence was assailed; and, listen-pass away, the guilt and pain are immortal. ing to this, he staggered and feli, Yea, Could a lazy wish or two supply the place hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of virtue, all would be well: the conscience of the garden?" When temptation of this would go to rest, the "strong man armed sort is once listened to, men will gradually would keep the house." But the very wishes come to doubt of every thing and learn to ex- of indolence and impiety betray their own plain away every thing. Deliberation and flimsiness; and Balaam feels his own prayer doubt in the face of " Thus saith the Lord," falling back with an oppressive weight on his are dishonesty and impiety: and to attempt guilty head. Let us be instructed to mend it to get rid of one uneasy text of scripture, is a little, and say with Paul, "None of us liva direct attack on the validity of the whole. eth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. When we see a man so intelligent as Ba- For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; laam, duped by his passions into a train of and whether we die, we die unto the Lord : folly and wickedness so gross and palpable, whether we live, therefore, or die, we are let us look well to ourselves. The absurdi- the Lord's."* "To me to live is Christ, and ties into which we fall, escape our own notice: to die is gain." Lord help us so to live, as but a discerning by-stander sees them, smiles to be raised above the fear of death. Let me at them, perhaps makes his advantage of them. fall asleep in the bosom of my heavenly FaIf we are conscious of the influence of any ther, and I shall awake in perfect peace. very powerful propensity or aversion, it is a just ground of suspicion, that we may be tempted to act unworthily; and it is a powerful admonition to watch our hearts narrowly on the side of that infirmity "which doth more easily beset us." We see in the dying struggles of Balaam's conscience, a deep, a rooted concern about futurity: a concern which no one, let him say what he will, has been able to overcome. His ardent wish, "Let me die the death of the righteous," is the involuntary homage which vice pays to piety. Think what way, Happy, unspeakably happy, they, who in reviewing life, and in the prospect of death, can with holy joy and confidence adopt these words of the apostle, and say, "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day and not to me only but unto all them also that love his appearing."+ HISTORY OF BALAAM. LECTURE LXXI. But I have a few things against thee, because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols, and to commit fornication.-REVELATION ii. 14. THE mystery of iniquity, which the human the same person could possibly be so much heart is daily bringing to light, is as strange changed, and by what steps the man was and incomprehensible as any thing in the gradually transformed into the devil. Scripframe of nature, or in the conduct of Provi- ture represents to us a man shrinking with dence. In the first stages of a sinful career, horror from a prophetic display of his own a spectator could not conceive, the man him- character, and an anticipated view of his own self cannot believe the desperate wickedness conduct-"What, is thy servant a dog, that to which he may in time be brought. The he should do this great thing?" He viewlatter end is so very unlike the beginning, ed it then, through the calm medium of rea that it becomes matter of astonishment how * 2 Kings viii. 13. son, humanity, and conscience; and justly re-up of seven bullocks, and seven rams, upon probated, what passion and opportunity afterwards prompted him to act, without pity or remorse. The progress of sin is like that of certain diseases, whose first symptoms give no alarm; to which a vigorous constitution bids a bold defiance, and treats with neglect; but which, through that neglect, silently fix upon some of the nobler parts, prey unseen, unobserved upon the vitals, and the man finds himself dying, before he apprehended any danger. It was but a slight cold, a tickling cough, a small difficulty of breathing; but it imperceptibly becomes an intolerable oppression, an universal weakness, an extenuating hectic, under which nature fails; the nails bend inwards, the hairs fall off, the legs swell, the eyes sink, and the cold hand of death stops the languid current at the fountain. Thus the giddy sallies of youth, the mistakes of inconsideration, the errors of inexperience, through neglect, presumption, and indulgence, become, before men are aware, habits of vice, constitutional maladies, by which manhood is dishonoured, old age becomes pitiable, and death is rendered dreadful beyond expression. These considerations clearly justify and enforce the advice of the apostle: "Exhort one another daily while it is called to-day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin."* as many different altars; and the hardened wretch has the impious boldness of retiring a second time to meet God on this ungracious errand. An answer is now put into his mouth, which levels a mortal blow at the hopes of his wicked employer, and the wrath of man serves but the more illustriously to praise God. Who but must shudder to hear such words as these falling from such a tongue? "Rise up, Balak, and hear; hearken unto me, thou son of Zippor: God is not a man, that he should lie: neither the son of man, that he should repent: Hath he said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? Behold, I have received commandment to bless: and he hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it. He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel: the Lord his God is with him, and the shout of a king i mong them. God brought them out of Egypt, he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn. Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel: according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought! Behold, the people shall rise up as a great lion; and lift up himself as a young lion: he shall not lie down until he eat of the prey, and drink the blood of the slain."* Happy is that people that is in such a case: yea, happy is that people whose God is the Lord."† 66 If there be a history and a character, which, more powerfully than another press this ex- The time would fail to go into a particular hortation upon the conscience, it is the his- detail of the events which justify this noble tory and character of Balaam, the son of prediction. But we should do it infinite inBosor, "who taught Balak to cast a stumbling-justice to restrict its meaning to one particublock before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols, and to commit fornication." We have traced his progress from Aram to Moab, and found him pertinaciously adhering to an impious purpose, with an understanding clearly informed as to his duty, and a conscience perfectly awake to his situation. It is unpleasant, but God grant it may not be unprofitable to attend him through the remainder of his wicked and abominable course. lar nation, to transitory purposes, or to temporal events. It is gloriously descriptive of the unchangeable faithfulness, the undeviating truth, the almighty protection, the immoveable love of God to his people. It speaks the blessedness of the man "whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. The blessedness of the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile." It exposes the impotence of Satan, and of all the enemies of their salvation. It exhibits the signal triumph of the church of God, through the great Captain of their salvation, who unites in his person, among other wonderful extremes, the cha Balak, chagrined and disappointed to hear the eulogy of Israel from those lips, which he had hired to curse them, weakly hopes to change the counsels of Heaven, by changing the place of his own view: and Balaam wick-racter of "the Lamb slain, to take away the edly humours his fondness and credulity. The Moabitish prince ascribes the rapturous expressions of the prophet to the full and distinct prospect which he had of the camp of Israel, and therefore proposes to view it from ☐ new station, whence its extremity only was visible, in the hope that a partial survey of that glory might encourage him to blast it with a curse. He conducts him accordingly Into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and another preparatory sacrifice is offered Heb. iii. 13. sins of the world," and of the "Lion of the This decisive answer seems for a moment Psalm xxxii. 1, 2. |