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CALLING OF ABRAM.

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had learned from Noah, their progenitor; for, without it, he could not have taken possession of the isles of the Mediterranean sea, included in his lot. Petty monarchies, called Patriarchal, in which the head of each family was both its chief and its king, then prevailed. Nimrod is the first person mentioned, who founded a kingdom. He began his reign by building the stupendous city of Babylon, on the Euphrates.

Fanny. What was the primitive language?

Mother. The Hebrew, it is generally supposed. The Chaldee, the Syriac, and the Arabic, have contended for priority; but the Hebrew has the better claim. The Old Testament is written in the Chaldee character, but what we call the Samaritan is thought by many to be the most ancient Hebrew letter.

No event of importance, after the miracle at Babel, is recorded, till the calling of Abram, a descendant of Shem. The birth of Terah, his father, concludes the second age of the world.

During this lapse of ages, the knowledge of the Deity had become greatly obscured and debased by ignorance and idolatry; for no written law was yet given, but, orally, a few moral and ceremonial precepts. To transmit, therefore, to posterity, the knowledge of one God and his essential attributes, and to preserve in symbols and prophecies the promise of a Saviour, the particular family, of which, at the appointed time, he was to come, was now to be separated from the gentile world. The principal subject then of the Old Testament, from this epoch, is the history of this distinct and highly favoured people. They were called Hebrews, either from Eber, their ancestor, who was the great-grandson of Shem, or, more probably, from the fact that they came from beyond (in the Hebrew language, eber signifies beyond) the Euphrates. In latter times, they have been known by the name of Jews.

As the founder of this nation, Abram, the son of Terah, and the tenth from Noah, was selected and commanded by God to leave Chaldea, his native country, and go into the land of Canaan, the inheritance of his posterity," in whom all the families of the earth should be blessed." (B. C. 1921.)

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Charles, Was this a repetition of the promise made to our first parents?

Mother. A blessing so extensive could mean no less. But it is not to be supposed that it was clearly understood by Abram, who, at that time, had no child; and both he and his wife were old. Yet he did not hesitate to believe him who he knew would find means to make good his promise.

Some years before his death, Terah had come with his family from Chaldea to Haran, in Mesopotamia, and died there. After his death, Abram, and Lot, the grandson of Terah, proceeded to the land of Canaan; and they pitched their tents first at a place called Sichem, (in our day, Naplous, or Napolose,) and afterwards further south, at Bethel. At each place, we observe, they left an altar, the monument of their piety.

A famine which greatly afflicted Canaan, in the following year, (B. C. 1920) obliged Abram to go with his family into Egypt for subsistence. When they arrived at the border of that country, forgetting for a moment his accustomed confidence in divine Providence, Abram requested Sarai, his wife, to call herself his sister, lest her beauty might be fatal to him; and she consented to this deception. When they came into Egypt, and resided near the court, the princes saw her, and spoke of her in admiration before the king. This was enough to determine her fate. She was

immediately conducted to the palace, according to the still prevailing custom of oriental despots, whom no law restrains. Her supposed brother was respectfully treated for her sake. But great afflictions fell upon the royal family; and Pharaoh, who seems not to have been ignorant of a superintending providence, understood that they were the punishment of his injustice to the strangers. He ordered Abram therefore into his presence, and very properly reproved him,-Why hast thou brought these evils on me? Why saidst thou she is my sister, so I might have taken her to be my wife: she is thine; take her and go thy way. And he charged his servants to dismiss them honourably, with all their possessions.

The same year, after the famine had ceased, Abram, with his wife and his nephew, returned to their former

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residence near Bethel. But their flocks were become so numerous, that they could no longer remain together. The ground they occupied was insufficient for their support, and disputes frequently arose between their herdsmen. That they might not themselves be involved in contention, these primeval shepherds agreed to separate. Lot accordingly journeyed on towards the river Jordan, and pitched his tents on a fertile plain, watered by that celebrated

stream.

Lot was still in the territory of the Canaanites, the descendants of Ham, who, as I hinted just now, were by this time abandoned to vices of every description. Exemplary judgments had been denounced against them, and these the Sovereign Avenger began now to execute. But the virtue of Lot was regarded with singular favour. Two angels, in the character of travellers, were commissioned to tell him that Sodom, the city of his residence, would be consumed by fire from heaven, and to direct him to repair with his family to the mountains. He obeyed; and thus, with his two daughters, was preserved; whilst his wife, heedless of an express command, "not to look back," lingered. Bewailing, perhaps, her unworthy city and friends, she forgot the injunction, and "was turned into a pillar of salt."

Charles. Is that metamorphosis supposed to be literally true?

Mother. The words of Moses are often metaphorically understood by infidels to serve their own impious ends; but as his history was written for the instruction of the common people, and all classes were commanded to teach it to their children, we can seldom admit of figures beyond their comprehension. In this case, however, commentators have found several interpretations to explain the difficulty. It is enough for us to know, that she was punished for disobedience, and let us remember the example of Lot's wife, whenever we are tempted to transgress a known command!

Five populous cities with all their inhabitants were utterly destroyed by this judgment, and a remarkable lake now covers the soil where once they flourished- the lasting

monument of that tremendous event!

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CANAAN PROMISED.

Catherine. You mean, I suppose, the lake Asphaltites; or, in more modern language, the Dead Sea. But why do you call it a remarkable lake!

Mother. Because its appearance and properties are really so, independently of the fables to which it has given rise. It has been called the Dead sea, for example, because its waters were supposed to have a fatal influence on animal and vegetable life. Modern travellers have detected the fallacy of this opinion.

Catherine. How is it ascertained that it flows where Sodom once stood?

Mother. The site is described with sufficient precision by Moses; the Arabs who dwell on its borders acknowledge it, and, according to some writers, call it." the sea of Lot." Mr. Maundrel, who has written an account of A Journey to Aleppo, was even told by two aged persons of probity, that they had actually seen pillars, and other fragments of buildings in the water near the shore, but he could not discover them.

Let us now return to Abram, who, soon after the departure of his nephew, had removed his tents from Bethel, and had taken up a temporary residence on the plains of Mamre. Here the promise which had been intimated to him, was repeated, and in more explicit terms. His name was changed to Abraham, and that of his wife to Sarah.* "I will bless her," said the divine oracle, "and give thee a son of her (B. C. 1897,) and thou shalt call his name Isaac, and she shall be a mother of nations, and kings of people shall be of her. Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river Euphrates; they shall be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years. And also that nation whom they shall serve will I judge, and afterwards shall they come out with great substance."

Charles. Had the natives been acquainted with these

* Hebrew names, unlike ours, which are entirely arbitrary, were significant. Abraham and Sarah, our philologists translate, "the heads or progenitors of a multitude," according with the spirit of the annexed prophecy.

ABRAHAM AT GERAR.

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prophecies, they would not have suffered this distinguished stranger to remain among them.

Mother. Perhaps not. But his character and immense riches procured him respect. He must have been an eminent person at this time, for we read of his taking three hundred and eighteen trained servants, born in his house, to rescue his kinsman Lot, who had been seized with all his goods, at the sacking of Sodom, in a quarrel amongst the petty princes of the vale of Siddim.

Journeying still farther south, Abraham came into Phi. listia on the border of the Mediterranean, and halted near Gerar, the residence of the king. Again he was tempted to represent the fair Sarah as his sister, and a second time she was taken to the palace; but Abimelech, yet unconscious of the wrong he had done, was warned in a dream-"Thou art but a dead man for the woman whom thou hast taken for she is a man's wife," was the appal ling sentence. With unfeigned horror the terrified prince received it, and appealed to Omniscience—“ In the innocency of my heart have I done this. Said he not unto me, she is my sister? and she even she herself said, he is my brother. Lord, wilt thou also slay a righteous nation?" "Restore the man his wife," said his just Judge, "for he is a prophet and shall pray for thee and thou shalt live. But if thou restore her not, thou shalt die, thou and all thy house." In the morning early, therefore, Abimelech collected his servants and related his dream, and sent for the strangers and reprehended them both; inquiring wherein he had offended, that they should lead him into such imminent danger; or what evil disposition they had seen in him to justify their suspicion of his integrity? "Because I thought," replied the timid husband, "surely, the fear of God is not in this place, and they will slay me for my wife's sake, and yet indeed she is my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother."

Catherine. I hope Abraham was not really married to his sister?

Mother. Not his sister as we understand that appellation, but as it is commonly used in scripture, where relatives of the same stock are called brethren, or sisters,

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