HISTORY OF MOSES.

LECTURE LXXXII

And Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho. And the Lord showed him all the land of Gilead, unto Dan, and all Naphtali, and the land of Ephraim, and Manasseh, and all the land of Judah unto the utmost sea, and the south, and the plain of the valley of Jericho, the city of palm-trees, unto Zoar. And the Lord said unto him, This is the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, saying, I will give it unto thy seed: I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither. So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth-Peor: but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day.-DEUTERONOMY XXXIV. 1—5.

WHEN strangers accidentally meet to per- illustrious man is singular, and instructive form together the same voyage or journey, they are apt, at first to regard each other with looks of caution and distrust; they converse sparingly, and with reserve; they conceal their views and purposes in their own breasts; they attempt to dive into the characters and designs of their fellow-travellers. By degrees this suspicious cautiousness wears off; it becomes their mutual desire and endeavour to please and oblige, they feel themselves united by a common interest, their communications become frequent and free, they discover all that is in their hearts, they take a kind concern in each other's future fortunes, they exchange tokens of affection, they devise the means of coming together again, and part at length with regret. We seem, my brethren, to have been travelling through a vast country; seem to have been conversing with men of a different age and region; we have contemplated many a fair prospect, we have marked many successive changes, and, at the end of another stage or two, we must separate, and bid each other farewell. Like men acquainted and friendly, who know each other's meaning and wish each other's happiness, we look back to our common pilgrimage with some degree of satisfaction, and forward, I trust, with some degree of desire to meet together again. The mutual token which, in the mean time, we shall carry with us to stir up our minds by way of remembrance, is one that touches the heart by more than one spring, the memory of a dear and estimable common friend, who has contributed much to our pleasure and improvement, who was lovely and pleasant in life, and in death fills the soul with admiration and regret: but whom we have the felicity of considering as having only preceded us a little in a journey, on which we too have already entered, and the end of which will bring us to the same home with him.

The pen has now dropt from the hand of Moses, and silent is his tongue; and another, not himself, must tell us what he is and how he died. Every scene in the life of this

as singular; and his latter end is not the least interesting and useful. He had now completed his one hundred and twentieth year, without having become subject to the usual infirmities of that advanced age. It is one thing to live long, and another to be old. We frequently see old age commenced by many woful symptoms, long before the man has begun to live at all: and we sometimes see the wisdom and piety of gray hairs giv ing lustre to the bloom of youth, and tempering the vivacity of the morning of life. We wish to live long, but we weakly associate what never met, except in Moses and a favoured few like him, perfect soundness of faculties and the capacity of enjoying life united to length of days and richness of experience. We wish to live long, but fail to reflect on dimness of eyes, decay of memory, wasting of strength, loss of appetite, the neglect or unkindness of friends, and the other concomitants of that forlorn period. We wish to live long, but if the days come we find them evil; when these wished-for years draw nigh, we are constrained to acknowledge "we have no pleasure in them." The few, the very few exceptions the history of mankind furnishes, from the general rule, serve only the more grievously to confirm it. Happy would it be for old men, however, happy for theinselves, and most happy for others, though they cannot retain at pleasure the clearsightedness and vigour of Moses, did they cultivate as they ought, and acquire as they might, something of his meekness, and gentleness, and condescension; they would not have such frequent reason to complain of the petulance, self-sufficiency, and presumption of young men, if they themselves would learn to be less peevish and obstinate and overbearing. For, bad as the world is, age will obtain respect, unless it take pains to provoke insult and disrespect.

The death of Moses, then, was not in the ordinary course of nature, it was not preceded by its usual harbingers, it was not occasioned by a failure of the radical moisture, by the stroke of violence, or the malignity

ness, "for the forgiveness of all our sins, according to the riches of thy grace."

But though death was to Moses a mark of the divine displeasure, and the punishment of sin; like all the chastenings of fatherly wisdom, like all the punishments of Heaven, it was in the issue, and upon the whole, a real benefit, it was unspeakably great gain: it relieved him of a burden sometimes ready to prove intolerable, it introduced him to communion with God more intimate and endearing than ever he had hitherto enjoyed; it placed him among the spirits of just men made perfect. Moses died in sight of the promised land, was permitted to measure it with his eye, and to judge of its fertility from specimens of its produce; and all that the labours and light of those who are fellow workers with Moses can do, is to repeat the promise, to point with the finger and to say, "This is the way, walk ye in it." It belongs to another power to subdue corruption, to divide Jordan, to level the walls of proud Jericho.

We know the offence, we have heard the doom, the reprieve is expired, the warrant of death is signed, the day of execution is come. But the bitterness of death is over already, the sting of death is plucked out, and even the word that condemns and kills the body, is a word of love. A worldly mind cannot discern the reason why the cross is the way, why death is in the cup, why the entrance into the kingdom of God is through the thorny road of much tribulation; but the child of God, the disciple of Jesus, has ceased from himself and from his own will and understanding: "He knows whom he has believed," and who has said, “As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten:" he sees death in the list of his privileges and possessions, and is assured that all shall work together for his good.

the tabernacle with the pillar of cloud resting upon it: his affection with his sight is concentred on the happy spot, his whole soul goes out in one general departing blessing. As he ascends, the prospect expands and brightens to his ravished eye. He can trace Jordan from its source, till it falls into the sea; he wanders with delight from hill to hill, from plain to plain. He sees on this side mount Lebanon losing its lofty head in the clouds; on that, the ocean and the sky meeting together to terminate his view. Beneath his feet, as it were, the city of palmtrees, and the happy fields which the posterity of Joseph were destined to inhabit. The land which Abraham had measured with his foot in the length and in the breadth of it; in which Isaac and Jacob had sojourned as strangers; which God had fenced, and cultivated, and planted, and enriched by the hand of the Canaanite for his beloved people; which the sun irradiated with milder beams, the dew of heaven refreshed with sweeter moisture, and the early and the latter rain fattened in more copious showers. "And the Lord said unto him, This is the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, saying, I will give it unto thy seed: I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither."

But what is the glory of this world! It passeth away.-What is the felicity of man, who must die, and of the son of man, who is a worm? It cometh quickly to a period. The eye which age had not made dim, must nevertheless be closed in death at length: the strength which a hundred and twenty years had not been able to impair, is in a moment, by one touch of the finger of God, dissolved; the heart which God and Israel had so long divided, is now wholly occupied with God. In the midst of a vision so divine, Moses gently falls asleep and he who falls asleep in the bosom of a father, needs be under no anxiety about his awakening. "So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord." Moses died with Canaan full in

and the utmost that his dispensation can do, is to ascertain the existence of the heavenly country; to describe its boundaries, nature, and situation; to conduct to its limits, and to put us under the conduct of the great Captain of salvation.

Moses has fulfilled like a hircling his day, has written, has spoken, has judged, has prayed, has blessed; the business of life is ended; he has glorified God on earth, it only remains that he glorify him, by submission to his sovereign will in dying. Behold him then solitarily and solemnly advancing to encoun-view, enjoying every thing but possession; ter the last enemy: he has passed through the plain, and again he begins to climb up into the mount to meet God. The eyes of all Israel are riveted to his footsteps. Who is not ready to cry out, "Would to God I could die for thee." Every step he advances plants a dagger in the heart. The distance begins to render vision indistinct, his person is diminished to a speck, they fondly imagine they see him still, the eyes strain for another and another glimpse, they are suffused with tears, they can behold him no more. But he still beholds their goodly tents, he sees all Israel collected into one point of view: Jehovah dwelling in the midst of his people,

When we see the prophet of the law so far from having power to introduce others into their promised rest, that he himself could not enter in because of unbelief; we are admonished to court the protection and assist ance of a more potent arm; to cleave to Him, who, by dying, has overcome death, and Him who has the power of death; "who openeth

*Deut. xxxiv. 4.

↑ Deut. xxxiv. 5.

and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man openeth."

But oh, what a blessed transition! from the fairest earthly prospect that eye ever beheld, to the enjoyment of a fairer inheritance, eternal in the heavens; from the tents of Jacob, to the encampment of angels under Michael their prince: from a glory confined and transitory, to glory unbounded, unchangeable; from the symbol of the divine presence, in a pillar of fire and cloud, to his real presence, where there is "fulness of joy," and where "there are pleasures for evermore;" to see him as he is, and to be transformed into the same image, from glory to glory. Behold Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, rushing from their thrones to welcome to the realms of light the shepherd of Israel, who had led the chosen seed from strength to strength, from triumph to triumph, while the voice of the Eternal himself proclaims, "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of thy Lord."

use to disappear, and were absent for several days together; and that upon their return to the flock, their hair was perfumed with something that smelled extremely sweet. This excited their curiosity and determined them to investigate the affair with the utmost accuracy. They accordingly traced their goats, and were led by them through rugged and rocky places to a little vale, where, upon examination, they discovered a kind of cave, out of which proceeded a very agreeable smell, resembling that which the goats conveyed on their fleeces, and had first suggested the inquiry. In the middle of the cave they found a tomb of stone, on which certain characters were engraven, which, being illiterate, they could not decypher; but they soon perceived that the sweet smell was communicated to their persons and garments. Upon this they went immediately to Mataxat, patriarch of the Maronites, who resided at the monastery of St. Mary, on mount Lebanon, and related to him the particulars of their discovery. The fragrance that still adhered to their clothes confirming their testimony, he sent two of his monks with them; one of them, a man of profound erudition, named Aben-Useph, who found, in the place pointed out to them a monument inscribed with these words in Hebrew, MOSES THE SERVANT OF THE LORD. The patriarch, transported with joy at a discovery so marvellous, besought Morat, Pacha of Damascus, to constitute him sole guardian of the sepulchre. But the Greeks and Arminians, as well as the Franciscan friars, and after them the Jews, violently opposed it, and unable to agree, tried The reason commonly assigned for con- by dint of interest at court, by presents to the cealing the place where Moses was interred, Mufti and Grand Vizier, to appropriate each was to prevent a superstitious use of his tomb to themselves the superintendence of this and relics, which a people so prone to idola- tomb, which they equally believed to be that try might readily have adopted, and with as of Moses, and which the Jews, with peculiar good a colour of reason at least as the votaries earnestness, insisted must belong to them. of any hero, prince, or saint that ever was They represented that, among all the possesdeified, could ever allege for their conduct. sions of the Grand Seignior, none could be The scripture saith expressly, that, at the more valuable and illustrious than the protime this conclusion of the book of Deutero-perty of three sepulchres so renowned as that nomy was written, whether by Joshua, his immediate successor, by Samuel, three hundred and fifty years afterwards, or by Ezra, after the dissolution of the monarchy, and the Babylonish captivity, that then the place of Moses's burial was unknown to any man, and had been so from the beginning; and yet such is the wickedness of imposture on the one hand, and the fondness of credulity on the other, that so late as the year of our Lord 1655, a pretended discovery of the spot was made, and attempted to be imposed upon the world.

But we must descend from this exceeding high mountain, and inquire after the breathless clay of the servant of the Lord. It is precious in the sight of God; not a particle of it shall be lost in the grave, and it shall be raised up at the last day. In every other instance he leaves the dead to bury their dead; but he charges himself with the body of Moses, performs himself the rites of sepulture, conveys it by the ministration of angels, from the top of Nebo to a tomb of his own providing," in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth-Peor: but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day."+

of Mahomet at Mecca, of Jesus Christ at Jerusalem, and of Moses in mount Nebo. But the Jesuits had the address, by presents happily applied, to defeat the claims of all these pretenders, and to obtain an order for shutting up the sepulchre, and obstructing the road that led to it; nay, for prohibiting all access to it, under pain of death. They were, meanwhile, forming a design of secretly conveying off the body of Moses, which they flattered themselves would prove a considerable accession of respectability, and a new source of wealth to their order. Having however, with much difficulty and danger, penetrated into the sepulchre, it was found entirely empty; no body, no relics appeared."* These pleasing chimeras vanished almost as

* Hornius, Secul. xvii. Art. xxxii. p. 536.

soon as formed; for a learned Rabbin proved that the person interred in this tomb, was not the ancient legislator of the Hebrews, but a modern Jew of the same name.

The sacred history says, that Moses died the fortieth year after the deliverance from Egypt, and the most part of the Jewish writers fix the day of his death to the seventh day of the last month of that year, or the month Adar; and our learned and pious countryman, archbishop Usher, calculates it to have happened on the first day of the same month.

veries are reserved for that great and notable day of the Lord, when God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or evil; that it becomes not us to be wise above what is written, but to rest in hope, that "what we know not now, we shall know hereafter." This much we know, that, about fifteen hundred years after, Moses appeared in glory (" whether in the body I cannot tell, or whether out of the body I cannot tell, God knoweth") to do homage to his Saviour on the mount of transfiguration, and to lay his glory at the feet of There is a passage in the New Testament him in whose light he shone; and we know which refers to this event, and which has" the hour is coming when all who are in greatly exercised the labour and ingenuity of the graves shall hear his voice, and shall critics and commentators: it is in the general come forth, they that have done good, unto epistle of Jude, where that disciple, in reprov- the resurrection of life, and they that have ing the rashness and licentiousness of certain done evil, unto the resurrection of damnaheretics, "who despise dominion, and speak tion."* evil of dignities," quotes an example of very high authority, as condemning the practice: "Yet," says he, "Michael the archangel, when, contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee."*

Now, as many questions almost as words have been started on this subject: what is an archangel; and who is Michael? How came the body of Moses to be a ground of controversy between him and the devil, what were they severally aiming at, and what was the issue of their quarrel? What authority restrained Michael from preferring a railing accusation against him, how his conduct comes to be adduced as a pattern of self-government, and a reproof of the vices of the tongue? And from what source did Jude derive his knowledge of this transaction? The very mention of so many, some of them, on the first glance, unimportant questions, will, I doubt not, check curiosity altogether, instead of exciting it. It is evident, that the death and burial of Moses interested heaven and earth and hell; that many historical facts of great moment are purposely left unrecorded; that many disco

* Jude 9.

Such was the latter end of, "take him for all in all," the greatest mere man that ever existed. But I check myself. It is impossible to do any thing like justice to such a character in a few moments' discourse; you will indulge me with another hearing on this subject: I mean, to preach a funeral sermon: the only one I ever undertook without pain, over a character and a memory to which no eloquence can rise, no detail do justice; in celebrating which, praise cannot degenerate into panegyric, nor the preacher be suspected of adulation.

Moses died in the year of the world two thousand five hundred and fifty-three-before Christ one thousand four hundred and fifty-after the flood eight hundred and ninety-seven. The most ancient and authentic of historians, the most penetrating, dignified, and illuminated of prophets, the profoundest, sagest of legislators, the prince of orators and poets, the most excellent and amiable of men, the firmest and faithfullest of believers. "Whether we live, let us live unto the Lord," that when we die we may "die in the Lord;" that "living and dying we may be the Lord's."

* John v. 28, 29.

HISTORY OF MOSES.

LECTURE LXXXIII.

And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face: in all the signs and the wonders which the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and to all his servants, and to all his land, and in all that mighty hand, and in all the great terror which Moses showed in the sight of all Israel.-DEUTERONOMY XXXiv. 10–12.