to determine what God would have left undetermined. It being an object of much greater importance to a wise and good prince, to see his subjects thriving, numerous, and happy, than to know the exact number over which he reigns; just as it is much more delightful and beneficial to a man, to contemplate the beautiful seeming irregularity of the starry heavens, to lose ourselves, as it were, in their glory and immensity, and to enjoy their benign influences, than to fix with the utmost exactness and precision, their number, motions, and distances. Accordingly, we find, that in the days of Solomon the son of David, when Jewish splendour and populousness were at their zenith, no attempt was made to discover the number of the people; but in conformity to the obvious intention of God, in the passage now under review, that matter was for ever left in a state of glorious uncertainty.

one Mordecai sits in the king's gate, when a pious Abram feels uneasy in the enjoyment of all this world could bestow, because one thing was withheld? Alas, what condition of humanity is exempted, for any length of time together, from sorrow and vexation of spirit? How much of the affliction of the remainder of Abram's life, arose from the possession of that blessing, which he now coveted so earnestly! But surely we should do but slender justice to the holy man, in supposing that the sentiments which he expressed upon this occasion were merely the effect of a natural desire of having children of his own body, to whom his large possessions might descend. The man who rejoiced in the prospect of the Saviour's day; the man who was ready at God's command to offer up Isaac in sacrifice; the man who had given up every thing nature holds dear, when duty called him to it; and who took the simple promise of God as a full indemnification; such a man must, in charity, be presumed to entertain" the most liberal and disinterested views, in thus ardently desiring a son. We hear of no disapprobation expressed against his ardour and impatience; on the contrary, it procures from God a more distinct and decisive promise of the speedy accomplishment of his wishes-"And behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir."* The time, though not the manner of the vision is fully conveyed to us; it was early in the morning while it was yet dark, for "he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So shall thy seed be."+ Scripture allusions to natural objects, are adapted to the ordinary conceptions of mankind. The sun is represented as rising, and setting, and moving round the earth; and the stars are represented as innumerable, because this is apparently the case, and justified by the ideas and language of all nations, though the fact he philosophically otherwise. Surely the truth of God, in his promise to Abram, is little affected by the astronomical arrangement of the heavenly bodies, which latter ages have devised, and whereby the number of those glorious luminaries is determined to a greater degree of accuracy. What the promise means to give the good man full assurance of, is, that his posterity should be both numerous and illustrious beyond all conception. And, if I may be permitted to hazard a conjecture, and to anticipate an observation on this subject, the error of David, inany ages afterwards, in insisting on having the people numbered in his reign, which was one of the most prosperous periods of the Israelitish history, consisted in his attempting † Gen. xv. 5.

Gen. xv. 4.

Abram's doubts are now entirely removed; he believed in the Lord; and counted it to him for righteousness."* As God rewards the faithful, not by halves, not sparingly, nor grudgingly; so all true believers, like faithful Abrain, honour God by an entire and unlimited confidence; and believe not only in hope but against hope. The patriarch thus indulged and encouraged, presumes still farther on the divine goodness, to entreat some present token of the truth and certainty of the promises made to him. "And he said, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" Both from what goes before and follows, we must conclude, that this was not a request of diffidence, but of desire and love. We neither desire nor exact from our friends formal obligations to show us kindness: this would imply a doubt of their attachment; but we dearly love to hear about us the tokens of their affection. In like manner Abram asked for a sign, not that he suspected any thing, but because he loved much. It was taken, as it was meant; and friendship was strengthened by the request and the grant of it. The covenant which ensued, and the ceremonies by which it was ratified, have already been considered. But some farther circumstances here recorded well deserve our notice. The order for the sacrifice was given early in the morning. The former part of the day was employed in preparing it; and we may suppose all things ready by noon. Abram has done what was incumbent upon him; but the great God is not limited to seasons or forms; Abram must therefore wait and watch-wait till God condescends to appear-watch, that his sacrifice be not plundered or polluted. At length, about the going down of the sun, the approach of deity is felt. "And when the sun was going down a deep sleep fell upon Abram: and lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him."‡ How in* Gen. xv. 6. † Gen. xv. 8.

Gen. xv. 12.

supportable must be the visitations of God's an- | day, when "they that be wise shall shine as ger! (I tremble while I speak) if the visions the brightness of the firmament, and they of his mercy and love are so awful and tre- that turn many to righteousness, as the stars mendous! While he was in this ecstacy, the for ever and ever." principal events that should affect his family for the space of four hundred years, are revealed to him; and the issue is to be, at the end of that period, the quiet and certain possession of the very land which he then inhabited; even from the Nile to the Euphrates. But we trespass on your patience too long.

HISTORY OF ABRAM.

LECTURE XIV.

He that believeth shall not make haste.-ISAIAH XXviii. 16.

now read, as the foundation of another Lec- | with Sarai's beauty, had made his court to ture on the history of Abram, is just and her, on the presumption of her being a single striking. "He that believeth shall not make woman, by the usual modes of attention, and haste." Faith neither lags behind, nor strives presents numerous and costly, suitable to his to outrun the word of God. "Thus saith the rank and the manners of the times: " sheep. Lord," is its rule and measure; it endures, oxen, he-asses, men-servants, maid-servants, waits, proceeds, acts, refrains, as " seeing him she-asses, and camels." Of the female serwho is invisible." But in the most composed, vants probably bestowed upon that occasion, firmest, and faithfullest of believers, we find one is now brought particularly into view, the frailties and infirmities of the man fre- and occupies a conspicuous place henceforquently predominant; and a slighter tempta- ward in this history. The deception attempttion sometimes prevailing, after more severe ed by Abram, in making his wife pass for a and difficult trials have been withstood and sister, is very little to his credit; and his overcome. Nothing can exceed the solem- accepting presents from Pharaoh, circumnity with which God ratified his covenant stanced as he was, and knowing what he did, with Abram, as recorded in the fifteenth chap- was far from being an honourable proceeding; ter of Genesis. Under the sanction of the indeed, no good could be expected to come most awful forms and ceremonies, a son is of it; and though God did not, at the time, promised, the future father of a numerous reproach him for his conduct by a verbal reoffspring; and an inheritance is allotted to proof, he is now preparing, by his righteous that chosen seed, by him who has all things providence, to make him feel that he had in heaven and in earth at his disposal. Abram acted wrong. Thus, the monuments of our takes the word of God as a full security; faults become the instruments of our punishDelieves and rejoices. He had now dwelt tenment. Sarai proposes to her husband to asyears in Canaan: and notwithstanding his advanced period of life, we find him discovering nothing like eagerness or impatience; he "believed" and therefore did "not make haste." But though he was not the first to devise an undue and intemperate method of arriving at the accomplishment of the promise, we find him ready enough to adopt one of this nature when it was suggested to

him.

sume this Egyptian handmaid, Hagar, as a secondary, or inferior wife: in hope of building up a family by her, and thus of making the promise to take effect. Unnatural as this may appear, it is far from being without a parallel. The truth is, it is very natural, and very common, to try to get rid of a present pressure, though with the hazard of subjecting ourselves to a heavier burthen. Every thing was wrong here. A shameful distrust of God; an attempt to introduce a foreign and perhaps an idolatrous mother into the family of Abram: a most unwise and incon

It was now put beyond a doubt that Abram should become a father, but it has not yet been declared explicitly that Sarai shall be a mother. With the anxiety natural to wo-siderate tampering with her husband's affecinen in her circumstances, however, we may suppose her to hope till she could hope no longer. At length, her feelings as a wife gave way to her concern about her husband's glory and happiness; and she consents to Abram's having children by another, rather than that he should not have children at all. Projects formed and executed in haste, are generally repented of at leisure; and when we fly in the face either of nature or of religion, we shall speedily and infallibly find both the one and the other much too powerful for us. Sarai's was a lot to be envied by most women; beautiful and beloved even to old age; mistress of an ample fortune, and a numerous train of domestics: the wife of a prince, and, what is much more, of an amiable and excellent man. But the glory and joy of all these flattering circumstances were marred and diminished by one perverse accident, "she bare Abram no children." Not blindly and caprieiously, but in wisdom and in righteousness, the great God apportions to the sons of men good and evil in this life; that none may be exalted above measure, and that none may sink into dejection and despair. During Abram's sojourn in Egypt, Pharaoh, smitten

tion; a foundation laid of probable, if not of certain domestic jealousies and quarrels ; evil done in vain expectation that good may come of it. Abram complies with the suggestion of his wife, and Hagar conceives. It requires not the gift of prophecy to foresee the consequence. Hagar becomes vain and insolent, and Sarai is thoroughly mortified. The handmaid now considers herself as her mistress's equal, if not her superior; she views Abram's vast possessions, and vaster prospects, as entailed on her posterity. Little and wicked minds are soon elevated, and as easily depressed. The whole of Sarai's behaviour, is that of a peevish, unreasonable, disappointed woman. The wise scheme was of her own contriving; and now that she feels the effect of her impetuosity and rashness, she turns the edge of her resentment against her innocent husband; "And Sarai said unto Abram, My wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid into thy bosom, and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: the Lord judge between me and thee."* How weak, wicked, and absurd is all this! Had the good man

Gen. xvi. 5.

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formed a deliberate design of injuring and insulting her, she could not have employed harsher language; and yet whatever evil has been committed, was her own devising. But the language of passion is ever contradictory and inconsistent. "My wrong be upon thee." Why should it? My folly recoils upon myself," would have been the language of truth and justice. She dares not, even in her rage, accuse Abram of incontinency, but reluctantly discerns and acknowledges her own rashness: "I have given my maid into thy bosom, and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes." The tide of anger says not, it is enough, knows not where to stop: "The Lord judge between me and thee." Who would not conclude, from an appeal so solemn, that she has the better cause? And yet, she is appealing to God in a case where she was clearly, consciously in the wrong. I like not hasty references to Heaven. A truly serious spirit will reflect twice before it interposes the name of God on any occasion, and shudder at the thought of employing it upon a false or frivolous one; an angry spirit sticks at nothing. For this reason, I will sooner believe a plain, unprofessing man, on his simple word, than ten thousand common swearers, under the sanction of as many oaths.

for "when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face." In what deep and accumulated wo, I say, may one inconsiderate step involve the children of men! And if good and well-intentioned people suffer thus severely from one act of rashness and imprudence, who but must tremble to think of the fearful consequence of deliberate wickedness? A thousand volumes written against polygamy, could not lead to a clearer, fuller conclusion against that practice, than the story under review.

Mark now, how seasonably and suitably God interposes to rectify all this disorder.When we have wearied ourselves with our own devices, and snared ourselves in the works of our own hands, Providence takes up the case, subdues it to its own wise and gracious purposes, and turns evil into good. Hagar flies from the face of her unkind mistress, but happily for her, she cannot flee from God. The interest which Abram now has in her, gives her an interest in the peculiar care and protection of the Almighty.

This is the first time we read in scripture of the appearance of an angel; and it was to reprove, exhort, and succour an helpless afflicted woman: and thus is mercy ever more ready to come at the call of misery, than justice to pursue the footsteps of guilt. From the whole tenor of the history, we are led to See into what disorder one ill-advised mea- conclude, that this heavenly vision was the sure has thrown a happy, well-regulated fa- uncreated angel, God in the form, and permily. Abram's ill-judged compliance with forming the office of a "ministering spirit;" the precipitate advice of his wife, has em- for this angel assumes the names and attri broiled him in contention with herself; it butes of God, speaks of Hagar's present conconstrains him to connive at her cruel treat- dition, and future prospects, with the knowment of an unhappy woman, who is at least ledge peculiar to Deity; and describes the to be pitied as much as blamed; and renders extraordinary future greatness of the male the prospect of the promised seed a heavy child, with which she was pregnant, as his affliction instead of a blessing. Sarai is be- own work. The event demonstrates whose trayed by the eagerness of her spirit, first the prediction was: and Hagar evidently into an absurdity: then into unkindness and considered the person who spake with her undutifulness towards her lord; then into in this light; for she ascribes to him the inprofanity and impiety towards God; then by communicable name Jehovah, and adores an easy transition, into barbarity towards a him as the omniscient, omnipresent God.wretched slave, who was entirely at her" And the angel of the Lord said unto her, mercy, who had been brought, without any I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it high degree of criminality, into a condition which claims compassion and attention from all; brought into it by herself too: and this to the endangering, for ought she knew, of all the hopes of her husband's family, and the greater interests of the human race. Hagar, hapless wretch! an object of commiseration throughout; led, perhaps reluctantly, to her master's bed, elevated to a transient gleam of hope, exulting in the prosperity of a nioment, hurried instantly back, by all the severities which jealousy can inflict, into the horrors of slavery, and driven from visionary prospects of bliss, into scenes of real distress; ready to perish with the innocent unborn fruit of her womb, in the wilderness, by famine, or the jaws of some ravenous beast!

shall not be numbered for multitude. And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Behold thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the Lord hath heard thy affliction. And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him, and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren. And she called the name of the Lord that spake unto her, Thou God seest me: for she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me.'

A great number of striking circumstances press upon us in the careful perusal of these words. Does God condescend to exercise all this care and tenderness about a person so

* Gen. xvi. 10-13.

marks of external complaisance, at least with secret and silent satisfaction. And Abram, always wise, and gentle, and good, would now necessarily rejoice in the restored peace of his family; in this fresh demonstration of the divine tenderness towards himself and all who belonged to him; in the farther enlargement and extent of the blessing promised; and in the prospect of the final and full accomplishment of all that the Lord had spoken. According to the word of the angel, Ha

obscure, helpless, and unbefriended as Ha- | must surely have humbled the spirit and molgar; then who is beneath his notice, or un-lified the heart of Sarai, and disposed her to important in his sight? Are the secondary receive the returning fugitive, if not with and subordinate designs of his providence of such extensive and permanent consequence to the world? Then, of what infinite and eternal weight, is his first, great leading object? If an Ishmael be introduced into the world with so much pomp and solemnity, what must the birth of an Isaac be? And what must it be, when God bringeth his own first-begotten upon the scene, whom all the angels are commanded to worship? How astonishingly awful is that foreknowledge, which discovered, before he was born, Ish-gar in due time bears a son to Abram, in the mael's character; and that power which pre- eighty-sixth year of his age, and the eleventh determined and affected the character and after his departure from Ur of the Chaldees. state of his posterity to the latest ages, while To preserve forever the memory of the divine as yet their progenitor was in his mother's interposition, the name given to the child by womb? How are all the designs of the Most the angel in the wilderness, is put upon him High, in the course of his adorable provi- by his pious father, to whom, no doubt, Hadence, and the execution of them, rendered gar had carefully related the whole transsubservient to one glorious purpose, which action, Ishmael, "God shall hear," because rises superior to, and absorbs all the rest- God heard, pitied, and relieved her affliction. the plan of salvation by a Redeemer! How And such was the origin of the father and wisely are the children both of the bond wo-founder of the Arabian nation; a people, man and of the free, reminded of the lowness and helplessness of their original! "A Syrian ready to perish was my father," says the one; an Egyptian bondmaid ready to perish was my mother," says the other.

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who, in their character and manners, through every period of their history, evince from what root they sprung, and verify the prediction concerning their progenitor, "he will be a wild man, his hand will be against What a happy circumstance it was for every man, and every man's hand against Hagar to have lived so long in Abram's house! him." And history illustrates the expression Liberty in Egypt had not proved a blessing of the angel, "and he shall dwell in the preso great, as slavery in Canaan. To be ex- sence of all his brethren." For whereas the alted to the dignity of a mother to princes! slavery and subjection of all other nations To be introduced to the knowledge of the make a considerable part of their history, living and true God! How different are the that of the Arabs is entirely composed of a appearances of Providence, considered at the relation of their conquests, or their independmoment, and viewed through the medium of ence. They are at present, and have conreflection and experience! Under the im- tinued through the remotest ages, during the pulse of sorrow or of joy, we cry out, "all various and successive victorious expeditions these things are against me," or "it is good of Grecks, Romans, and Tartars, a separate, for me to be here;" but when the account a free, an independent, and an invincible nacomes to be arranged, after the transport is tion; a mighty band of illustrious robbers, over, we find ourselves necessitated to trans-united among themselves, and formidable to fer many articles to the opposite pages, and to state that as favourable, which once we called adverse; and that a misfortune which once we accounted a blessing.

The history informs us of Hagar's flight, but leaves us to draw our own conclusions respecting her return. Indeed, we may now suppose all parties to have been brought a little to themselves. The solitude and dangers of the wilderness, and the apparition of the angel, awful, though in mercy, have of course, greatly diminished in Hagar's mind the rigour of her mistress's treatment, and she is glad to return to her former habitation. The sudden disappearing of her maid; the just apprehension of the evil which might have befallen a desperate woman in her delicate situation; time, serious reflection, and remorse for her cruel and unjust behaviour,

all the world; inhabiting a vast country of one thousand three hundred miles in length, and one thousand two hundred in breadthone region of which, from the purity and salubrity of its air, and the fertility of its soil, is deservedly denominated the happy; it produces the finest fruits, spices, and perfumes in the world, and is remarkable for breeding the most beautiful and useful animals of their kind, horses, camels, and dromedaries.

We hasten to conclude this Lecture, by adding to the reflections already made, this farther one, that we are not to judge of the greatness and importance of the designs of Providence, by any worldly marks of distinction and pre-eminence. The posterity of Ishmael was much earlier, and has been much longer established, and existed in a much higher degree of national dignity and