BOOK II.

ISRAEL IN EGYPT.

Family of Jacob-Joseph-State of Egypt-Famine-Migration of Jacob and his whole family—Administration of JosephPeriod between Joseph and Moses-Birth and Education of Moses-Flight and Return to Egypt-Plagues of EgyptExodus or Departure of the Israelites-Passage of the Red Sea -Ancient Traditions.

THE seed of Abraham had now become a family; from the twelve sons of Israel it was to branch out into a nation. Of these sons the four elder had been born from the prolific Leah, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah. The barren Rachel had substituted her handmaid Bilhah, who` gave birth to Dan and Naphtali. Leah, after her sister's example, substituted Zilpah; from her sprang Gad and Asher. Rachel, for the sake of some mandrakes, supposed among eastern women to act as a love philtre and remove barrenness, yielding up her right to her sister, Leah again bore Issachar and Zebulon, and a daughter, Dinah. At length the comely Rachel was blessed with Joseph; and in Canaan, Benoni or Benjamin completed the twelve.

The children of the handmaidens had no title to the primogeniture. Reuben had forfeited the esteem of his father by incest with his concubine, Simeon and Levi by their cruelty towards the Sichemites. Judah, the next brother, was inadvertently betrayed into a serious crime. There was a singular usage afterwards admitted into the Mosaic law, that in case a married man died without issue his next brother was bound to take his wife, in order that his line might not become extinct. The perpetuation of their name and race through their offspring being then, as it is still in some countries of the East, the one great object to

which all moral laws, even those generally recognised, were to give way. The eldest son of Judah, Er, died; the second, Onan, was guilty of a criminal dereliction of that indispensable duty, and was cut off for his offence. Judah, neglecting his promise to bestow the widow, Tamar, on his third son, Shelah, was betrayed into an unlawful connexion with her, and became the incestuous father of two children.

But Joseph, the elder born of the beloved Rachel, had always held the first place in the affections of his father. He was a beautiful youth, and it was the pride of the fond father to behold him in a dress distinguished from the rest of his sons-a coat of many colours. The envy of his brethren was still farther excited by two dreams seen by Joseph, which, in the frankness of his disposition, he took no pains to conceal. In one, the brothers were binding sheaves of corn, (a proof that they were advancing in the cultivation of the soil,) the sheaves of the brothers bent, and did homage to that of Joseph. In the other, the sun and the moon and eleven stars seemed to make obeisance to Joseph. Each of these successive visions intimated his future superiority over all the family of Israel. One day, when Joseph had set forth to the place where his brothers were accustomed to feed their flocks, they returned to their father's tent without him, bearing that very dress, on which Jacob had so often gazed with pleasure, steeped in blood. The agony of the old man cannot be described with such pathetic simplicity as in the language of the Sacred Volume,He refused to be comforted, and he said I will