out of the country forty years, and in the mean time they could not have loft, but, probably, would have gained, fkill in their arts, fo that they might easily have detected any trick of his. Befides, he was but one man, or at most was only affifted by his brother Aaron; whereas they were many, which gives a great advantage in things of this nature. In the next miracle all the duft in the land, it is faid, became lice, both upon man and upon beast, that is, the quantity was fo great, that it seemed as if all the duft of the country had been converted into lice. After this a fwarm of flies filled the whole country, and yet, on the prayer of Moses, they were all removed, and not one remained. In the next place, on the word of Mofes, a grievous murrain fell upon all the cattle of Egypt, but not upon thofe of the Ifraelites, the day after it was threatened; and then, on the fimple fprinkling of afhes into the air, the plague of boils came upon man and upon beast, and even upon the magicians themselves, while they ftood in the prefence of Mofes and Pharaoh, which fhews fhews that they had no power to counteract that which accompanied Mofes. After this a grievous hail-ftorm, accompanied with thunder and lightning, a thing never known in that country, and fo fevere that not only the more tender herbs, but even the trees of the field, were broken by it; and yet upon that part of the country which the Ifraelites inhabited there was no hail. This calamity, contrary to its ufual nature, must have continued fome time; but at the entreaty of Pharaoh, and of Mofes, it immediately ceafed. After the hail followed the locufts, which devoured every green thing in the whole land; and this alfo, at the relenting of Pharaoh, and the prayer of Mofes, was entirely removed. the prayer The next miracle was an extraordinary darkness where the Egyptians lived, while it continued light with the Ifraelites. And the last miracle was of a still more extraordinary nature, viz. the death of the firstborn, and of the first-born only, of man and of beast too, in one particular night, through the whole land of Egypt, while not one of the Ifraelites died, and this peremptorily foretold before the event. Things of this magnitude could never have been effected by art, and it is evident that the magicians of Egypt were fenfible that they were produced by fupernatural power. For upon the miracle of the lice they could not help confeffing it. This, faid they, is the finger of God. Exod. viii. 19. On this they defifted from making any more attempts to imitate the miracles of Mofes, afraid, probably, to proceed any farther. In order to commemorate the most extraordinary event, the fparing the firstborn of Ifrael, while thofe of the Egyptians were destroyed, a peculiar rite was instituted, and announced before the event. It confifted of killing and eating a lamb with particular ceremonies at that time of every future year, to be continued as long as they should be a nation, the first time of celebration taking place on the very night on which the event to be commemorated happened. No record of any event could be more unexceptionable than this; fo that the continuance of the cuftom, which all Jews Jews keep up to this day, is an unqueftionable proof of the reality of the fact, much more than any other known custom is a proof of any other fact connected with it, as that of our making bonfires in commemoration of the gunpowder-plot in England; the event commemorated, and the fign of it, taking place at the fame instant of time, and the event being recorded while it was fresh in the memory of all the witneffes of it, who were not a few individuals, but a whole nation, and that the leaft difpofed to credulity, as their whole history, and their prefent character, abundantly prove. The paffage of the Ifraelites through the red fea was a miracle on a still larger scale, and had greater confequences, viz. the total destruction of Pharaoh's great host of armed chariots and horses, and of himself along with them. That this great event should be accounted for in a natural way is abfolutely impoffible. Had the waters been driven back by a ftrong wind, as nothing but the continued force of the wind could have kept them in that fituation, it would not have been poffible for man or beaft, and fstill more for chariots, to have paffed during the blowing of it, and yet it is evident that they did it, and at their leisure. Besides, the waters were held back on both fides, which could not have been effected by a wind, blowing in any one direction whatever. The former of thefe obfervations will apply to the paffage of the Ifraelites through the river Jordan, which divided to make way for them during the feafon of its overflowing its banks, and which continued a whole day, as that through the red fea continued the whole night. The effect of thefe miracles, and efpecially of this laft, impreffed the people greatly. They were not things which they had heard of others, but what they had seen themselves. For, as we read in my text, Exod. xiv. 21, Ifrael faw that great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians, and the people feared the Lord, and they believed the Lord, and his fervant Mofes. They were convinced that, notwithstanding the boafted wisdom of the Egyptians, and their great fuperiority to all other nations (for not |