HISTORY OF ISAAC. more recently removed, with a suitable provision, into a distant part of the country.* So that upon his father's demise, Isaac found himself in the quiet possession of by far the greatest part of his immense wealth, but excluded from the society of those whom his own sweetness of temper and sense of duty, and the proximity of blood, would have led him to cultivate and cherish. And thus riches, the object of universal desire and pursuit, create more and greater wants than those which they are able to remove. By exciting envy, jealousy, and suspicion, they separate those whom nature has joined; friendship is sacrificed to convenience; and, to enjoy in security what Providence has given him, the unhappy possessor is constrained to become an alien to his own brother. We cannot refrain from bestowing, in this place, a posthumous praise upon Abraham, who, uninfected by the tenacity of old age and selfishness, cheerfully surrendered, while he yet lived, a considerable part of his property, in order to insure the future peace of his family, and wisely left his principal heir a poorer man, that he might leave him happier and more secure. those sordid wretches, who will scatter noHow unlike thing till death breaks into the hoard; and who care not what strife and wretchedness overtake those who come after them, in the very distribution of their property, provided they can keep it all to themselves, were it but for one day longer! [LECT. XXL mainder of Isaac's life, were chiefly interna. The distresses which embittered the reand domestic; and, alas! had their source in his own infirmity, namely, a fond partiality in favour of his elder son; the mischief of which was increased and kept alive, by partiality, equally decided, which Rebekah had conceived in favour of Jacob. loved Esau because he did eat of his venison "Isaac but Rebekah loved Jacob."* evils of a man's lot may be easily traced up Most of the to some weakness in which he has indulged himself, some error into which he has fallen, some opportunity he has let slip, or some crime which he has committed. Of all the infirmities to which our nature is subject, none is more common, none is more unreasonable, unwise, and unjust, none more easily guarded against, none more fatal in its consequences to ourselves and others, than that of making a difference between one child and another. It destroys the favourite, and discourages those who are postponed and slighted; it sows the seeds of jealousy and malice, which frequently produce strife, and end in violence and blood. It sets the father against ther; the sister against the brother, and the the mother, and the mother against the fabrother against the sister. It disturbed the repose of Isaac's family, and had well nigh brought down Jacob's hoary head with sorrow to the grave. Parents ought to examine, and to watch over themselves carefully on Isaac had hitherto trusted every thing to the feeling, the expression of it, at least, is this head. If they are unable to suppress the wisdom and affection of his kind father, in their power; and policy, if not justice, and to the care of an indulgent Providence, demands of them an equitable distribution even so far as to the choice of his partner of their affection, their countenance, and for life. But his father being now removed their goods. For, if there be a folly which, by death, and his own children growing up more certainly than another, punishes itself, fast upon him, he is under the necessity of it is this ill-judged and wicked distinction arising and exerting himself. For the bless- between equals. One is ashamed to think ing of Providence is to be asked and ex- of the reason which is assigned for Isaac's pected, only when men are found in the way preference of his elder to his younger son, of their duty, and wisely employing lawful" Isaac loved Esau because he did eat of his and appointed means of prospering. We venison." accordingly find him, with the prudent sa- it still more forcibly, "because his venison The original language expresses gacity of a good husband, father, and master, was in his mouth." By what grovelling and directing the removal of his family from place unworthy motives are wise and good men to place, as occasion frequently required; often actuated! And what a mortifying forming alliances with his powerful neigh- view of human nature is it, to see the laws bours, for their mutual security; and presid- of prudence, and justice, and piety, vilely ing in the offices of religion, his favourite controlled and counteracted by the lowest employment. And though Providence has and grossest of our appetites! It was not deprived him of the counsel and protection long before the effect of parental partialities of an earthly parent, he finds, in his happy appeared. A competition for precedency, experience, that the man whom God con- and the rights of primogeniture, engaged the tinues to protect and bless, has lost nothing. attention of the two brothers, and whetted "Father and mother have forsaken him, but their spirits against each other, from their the Lord has graciously taken him up," earliest years. "hedged him round on every side," and put the fear and dread of him into all the neighbouring nations, who, though they envied, durst not hurt him. #Gen. xxv. 6. were supported respectively by the parents Who it was that prevailed in this conten- | of God over the hearts of men. The dread tion, and by what means, will be seen in the sequel. While the family of the patriarch was thus torn with internal dissension, Providence was pleased to visit him with a grievous external calamity. "There was a famine in the land, besides the first famine that was in the days of Abraham."* This, for a while, represses animosity. Distress, common to all, teaches them to love one another; and, instead of a struggle for precedency, the weightier concern, "Where shall we find bread?" now occupies their thoughts. This dispensation was probably intended as a reproof and correction to all parties. The parents were admonished of the folly of aiding and increasing the unavoidable ills of life, by wilfully sowing discord among brethren. Esau, ready again to perish with want, is stung with remorse to think, that in one hasty impatient moment of hunger, he had sold, for the transient gratification of a low appetite, what no penitence could undo, no money repurchase. And Jacob, feeling himself the cravings of hunger, was chastised for taking an unkind advantage of his brother's necessity; and, ready in his turn to perish, might be constrained to adopt the words of starving Esau, "behold, I am at the point to die, and what profit shall this birthright do to me." For, although God serves himself of the weaknesses and vices of men, he approves them not, nor will suffer them to pass unpunished. Ísaac, warned of God, removes not into Egypt, the land which had afforded his father shelter and subsistence in a similar storm, and which has often proved an asylum to the church; but retires to Gerar, one of the cities of Palestine, situated between Kadesh and Shur. Abimelech was the prince who at that time reigned over the Philistines. The same person, according to Josephus, with whom Abraham had formed a connexion so friendly, and with whom, for that reason, Heaven now directed Isaac to sojourn, till the famine should be relieved. This conjecture of the Jewish historian, though not insupportable, from a physical impediment seems highly improbable; if we consider that seventy-five years have elapsed since Abraham resided at Gerar: and history furnishes few, if any examples, of reigns of so long continuance. It is more probable that Abimelech was then the general appellative name of the princes of that part of Palestine, as Pharaoh was that of the kings of Egypt. When we behold the patriarchs thus removing from place to place, a feeble, unwarlike, encumbered band, through nations fierce, envious, and violent, their safety is to be accounted for only from the restraining power Gen. xxvi. 1. * Gen. xx. 1. † Gen. xxv. 32. Gen. xx. 14, 15. ful judgment of Sodom, where Lot dwelt; the blindness which punished the attempt to violate his guests, and the more tremendous destruction which avenged just heaven of their ungodly deeds, might operate power fully, so far as these events were known and their memory was preserved, to overawe the neighbouring nations, and to procure for Lot's family and kindred, the attention and respect which fear, if not love, inspires. And, as a proof of his supremacy, that God, "in whose hand the heart of the king is, and who can turn it which way soever he will," has frequently constrained the enemies of his church and people to be their friends and protectors. This repeated visitation of Canaan by famine, was a repeated trial of the patriarch's faith. The promise of a land, so frequently unable to sustain its inhabitants, could have little value in the eye of a worldly mind. But faith in God discerns the principal worth and importance of temporal blessings, in their being connected with, and representing spiritual objects; and examines events, not by their agreement with preconceived opinions, and extravagant expectations, but by their moral effects and consequences. A region uniformly and unfailingly plenteous, might betray its possessor into the belief that its fertility flowed solely from natural causes, and God might be forgotten and neglected. A year of scarcity is calculated to teach man his dependence, and to force him to implore "the blessing which maketh rich, and causeth the earth to yield its increase." While he sojourned among the Philistines, Isaac falls into the same infirmity which dishonoured his father in Egypt. Misled, by suspicion unworthy of an honest man, and fear unworthy of the friend of God, he violates sacred truth, and sins against his own conscience: for when interrogated concerning Rebekah, "he said, She is my sister: for he feared to say, She is my wife, lest, said he, the men of this place should kill me for Rebekah: because she was fair to look upon."* The criminality of this mistrust is greatly aggravated by the clearness and fulness of the heavenly vision, whereby he had been admonished to bend his course to the court of Abimelech. "And the Lord appeared unto him and said, Go not down into Egypt. Dwel! in the land which I shall tell thee of. Sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee, and will bless thee: for unto thee, and unto thy seed, I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father. And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries: and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. Because that Abraham obeyed ny * Gen. xxvi. 7. HISTORY OF ISAAC. [LECT. XII. voice, and kept my charge, my command- the flocks and the herds. For without water Virtue is not hereditary in families, it descends but in rarer instances; whereas frail-melech himself, more liberal-minded than ty, alas! descends from every father to every son. Virtue is the water in the particular pool; vice the torrent in the river, which sweeps every thing before it. The moderation, honour, and good sense of Abimelech, are the severest imaginable reproof of the disingenuousness of the prophet,+ and happily prevented the mischief, which Isaac, seeking by improper means to shun, had well nigh occasioned. meaner men, grows at length weary of his guest, feels hurt at his growing prosperity, envies his greatness, and dismisses him with cold civility. Isaac, Go from us: for thou art much mightier "And Abimelech said unto than we."* ship; and friendship disdains to dwell with Grandeur admits not of friendprofligacy. Of all the men in a nation, the king is most certainly excluded from this to be once compared with it, or which can blessing; and surely, his lot contains nothing supply its want. draws the hated object from before the eyes Isaac prudently gives way. He withtent in the valley of Gerar. Apprehending, of envy, and leaving the city, pitches his he had a hereditary right to the wells of water which were his father's, and which the Philistines had maliciously obstructed, he digs again for them in the valley. And from respect to the memory of Abraham, as well as to keep alive the remembrance of the gracious interpositions of the Divine Providence in his behalf, he revives the ancient names by which the wells were dissheba, or, the well of the oath, is preserved, tinguished. Particularly the name Beerthe memorial of the covenant ratified upwards of seventy years before, between the king of the Philistines and Abraham; and which was known by that name for many ages afterwards, as one of the extreme boundaries of the holy land. But the unrelenting jealousy of the Philistines pursues him from the city into the field. No sooner has he by industry procured for his family that import Under the protection and friendship of this prince, he has now obtained a settlement in the land; and by the blessing of Heaven upon his honest industry, he prospers and increases in the midst of difficulties. sowed in the land, and received in the same "Isaac year an hundred fold: and the Lord blessed him. And the man waxed great, and went forward, and grew, until he became very great. For he had possession of flocks, and possession of herds, and great store of servants." But we are by no means to imagine, that worldly success is ever proportioned to promising means and favourable opportunities. "The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong." sails seem to gather every breath of the Some men's wind: they get forward in spite of every obstacle. Others feel the tempest continually blowing in their faces. All things are against them, and though they set out with the fairest, most flattering prospects, unaccountably thwarted and disappointed, they "wax poor, and fall into decay." Let not prosperity, then, be deemed an infallible proof of wisdom, or worth, or of divine favour. Neither let want of success be always de-ant necessary of life, water, than the herdrived from folly, or vice, or the curse of Heaven; for in this mixed, imperfect, probationary state, "time and chance happen to all men," neither can a man tell "what is good for him all the days of his vain life, which he spendeth as a shadow." men of Gerar, endeavoured by violence to possess themselves of it. Isaac, fond of peace, chooses rather to recede from his just right, than to support it by force; and still retires, seeking relief in patience and indusEvery temporal advantage has a corres- pride and selfishness of his neighbours; but try. He finds himself still pursued by the ponding infelicity. Isaac grew rich and great, at length conquers by yielding. A victory but "the Philistines envied him." And, "who the most certain, the most honourable, and can stand before envy?" That dark, malig- the most satisfactory. And the tranquillity nant passion, prompted his surly, jealous foes and ease of Rehoboth, amply compensate to cut off one source of his wealth, "for all the troubles and vexation of Esek and Sitthe wells which his father's servants had dig-nah. Finally, to prevent as far as in him ged in the days of Abraham his father, the lay, every ground of quarrel, he fixes his Philistines had stopped them, and filled them residence at a still greater distance from with earth." This was, in effect, to destroy Abimelech. "He went up from thence to * Gen. xxvi. 2—5. †Tb. 9-11. Ib. 12-14. § Ib. 15. * Gen. xxvi. 16. † Room. Contention. § Hatred Beer-sheba ;" where feeling himself at home, | son; who, in the fortieth year of his own life, after so many removals, he at once pitches that is, the hundreth of his father's, introhis tent for repose, and builds an altar for duced two idolatrous wives at once, into the religion; and the hatred and violence of man holy family. This was two great evils in is lost and forgotten in communion with one. It was being unequally yoked with inGod. fidelity; and carrying on a practice which The expression," he called upon the name has ever been and ever will be fatal to doof the Lord," seems to import, that when his mestic peace. The daughter of a Hittite altar was built, it was consecrated to the would naturally be disposed to interrupt the service of God, with certain extraordinary religious harmony which prevailed in Isaac's solemnities; such as sacrifice, and public habitation, and two wives at once would, as thanksgiving, at which the whole family as- certainly, be disposed to annoy each other, sisted, and in which the holy man himself, and to embroil the whole family in their the priest as well as the prince of his family, quarrels. Isaac was well acquainted with joyfully presided. His piety was speedily the solicitude of his pious father on his own acknowledged and crowned with the appro- account, in the important article, marriage; bation and smiles of his Heavenly Father. and was conscious of a similar anxiety resFor, "the Lord appeared unto him the pecting the settlement of his sons. We may same night, and said, I am the God of Abra- easily conceive, then, how he felt at this acham thy father, fear not, for I am with thee, cumulated irregularity and imprudence of and will bless thee, and will multiply thy Esau. He was wounded there, where as a seed, for my servant Abraham's sake." His man, a father, and a servant of the true God, meek and placid deportment, together with he was most vulnerable. To be neglected, his increasing power and wealth, and the unacknowledged in a matter of the highest favour of Heaven so unequivocally declared, moment to his comfort, by that son whom he have rendered the patriarch so dignified and had cherished with the fondest affection, and respectable in the eyes of the world, that on whom he rested his fondest hopes; how the prince, who from an unworthy motive mortifying to a father! But besides the had been induced to treat him with unkind- holy descent was in danger of being marred ness, and to dismiss him from his capital, by an impure heathenish mixture; and the now feels himself impelled to court his minds of his grandchildren likely to be perriendship, and to secure it by a solemn com-verted from the knowledge and worship of act. Abimelech considers it as no diminuion of his dignity, to leave home, attended with the most honourable of his council, and the supreme in command over his armies, in order to visit the shepherd in his tent. The expostulation of Isaac is simple and natural, and his conduct exhibits a mind free from gall, free from resentment. The reply of Abimelech discloses the true motive of this visit. And we are not surprised to find, that fear has at least as large a share in it as love. The worst of men find it to be their interest to live on good terms with the wise and pious: and good men cleave to each other from af fection. The covenant being amicably renewed, and the oath of God interposed, and, "an oath for confirmation is an end of all strife," the king of Gerar and his retinue return in peace, and leave Isaac to the retirement which he loved, and to that intercourse with Heaven, which he prized infinitely above the friendship of earthly potentates. And now, a delightful calm of eighteen years ensued, of which no traces remain to inform or instruct men, but which from the well known character of this patriarch, we may well suppose were spent in such a manner, as to be had in everlasting remembrance before God. At this period, his domestic tranquillity was again cruelly disturbed, and, by his favourite the God of their fathers. Such is the ungracious return which parents often meet with, for all that profusion of tenderness and affection which they lavish upon their offspring; such their reward, for all their wearisome days, and sleepless nights. The ingrates dispose of their affections, their persons, their prospects, their all, in a hasty fit of passion; as if the father who brought them up with so much toil and trouble, as if the mother who bore them had no concern in the matter. The ungrateful, disorderly conduct of their elder son, and no wonder, was grief of mind to Isaac and to Rebekah." 66 a Whether it was from the vexation occasioned by this event, from disease, from accident, or some natural weakness in the organs of sight, we are not informed, but we find Isaac, in the one hundred and thirty-fifth year of his life,-in a state of total blindness; and he was probably visited with the loss of that precious sense at a much earlier period. But forty-five years, at least, of his earthly pilgrimage were passed in this dark and comfortless state. All men wish to live to old age; but when they have attained their wish, they are apt to repine at the infirmities and the discomforts which are necessarily incident to it. They would be old; but they would not be blind, and palsied, and feeble. They would be old; but they would not be neglected, wearied of, and forsaken. They would be old; but they would not be practised upon and deceived. But, old age certainly brings on all these, and many more inconveniences; and vain it is to dream of the benefit, without the care. We read but of one, that is Moses himself, whose "eye at the age of one hundred and twenty, was not dim, nor his natural force abated." blame, have been known to establish distinctions in families, which destroyed their peace and accelerated their ruin. Children unborn have often felt the dire effects of a silly nickname, imposed on a progenitor whom they knew not, and whose relation to them was thereby rendered a curse. Men are often deemed unfortunate, both by themselves and others, where they deserve to be reckoned unwise. They themselves do the mischief, and then wonder how it came about. They spoil their children, and then complain that they are so perverse. I know how difficult it is to bring up youth; how difficult to bear an even hand between child and child, to counteract the bias of favour and affection, to conceal and disguise the strong emotions of the heart. But it is only the more necessary to be prudent, to be vigilant, "to walk circumspectly," and, to ask "wisdom of This dark period of Isaac's life, containing many interesting and instructive particulars, will furnish matter for a separate discourse. In reviewing the past, we are under the necessity of again admonishing parents on that momentous article.-Impartiality in the distribution of their attention, their tenderness, and their property, among their children.The trifling circumstances of name, of personal likeness, of beauty and deformity, and the like, over which parents had little power, and the children none at all; and which in themselves have neither merit nor demerit, and are the objects of neither just praise nor God." HISTORY OF ISAAC LECTURE XXII. And it came to pass, that when Isaac was old, and his eyes were dim, so that he could not see, he called Esau his eldest son, and said unto him, My son. And he said unto him, Behold, here am I. And he said, Behold, now I am old, I know not the day of my death. Now, therefore, take, I pray thee, thy weapons, thy quiver and thy bow, and go out to the field, and take me some venison; and make me savoury meat, such as I love, and bring it to me, that I may eat; that my soul may bless thee before I die. And Rebekah heard when Isaac spake to Esau his son: and Esau went to the field to hunt for venison, and to bring it.-GENESIS xxvii. 1—5. THERE is a generous principle in human | good report,"* and the persons who love and nature, which commonly disposes us to take practise them. part with the weakest. We feel an honest It is not the least profitable part of the stuindignation at seeing weakness oppressed by dy of both providence and scripture, to trace might, honesty over-reached by cunning, and the conduct of a righteous God in punishing unsuspecting goodness played upon by self- the offender, though he has subdued the of ishness and knavery. God himself feels the fence into a servant of his own will; chasteninsults offered to the destitute and the help- ing his children by a rod of their own preless; declares himself "the judge of the wi- paring; tumbling the wicked into the pit dow, the protector of the fatherless, the shield which themselves have digged, and bringing of the stranger." He aims his thunder at the backsliders again to himself, by making them head of him who putteth a "stumbling-block to eat the bitter fruit of their own doings. in the way of the blind, and planteth a snare Happy it is for the children of men, if their for the innocent." And though, in the sove-deviations from the path of rectitude meet reignty of his power, and the depths of his their correction in a temporal punishment. wisdom, he is sometimes pleased to employ But wo to that man, whom justice permits the vices of men to execute his purposes of to thrive in his iniquity, and to grow hardengoodness and mercy, he loves and approves ed through impunity; whose retribution is only "whatsoever things are true, whatso-deferred, till repentance can produce no ever things are honest, whatsoever things are change. Chastise me, O Father, as severely ust, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever as thou wilt. Let me not fall asleep under things are lovely, whatsoever things are of Phil. iv. & |