Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour and they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field; all their service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigour. And the King of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, of which the nameof one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah: and he said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him; but if it be a daughter, then she shall live. But the midwives feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the men children alive. And the king of Egypt called for the midwives, and said unto them, Why have ye done this thing, and have saved the men children alive? And the midwives said unto Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are lively, and are delivered ere the midwives come in unto them. Therefore God dealt with the midwives; and the people multiplied, and waxed very mighty. And it came to pass, because the midwives feared God, that he made them houses. And Pharoah charged all his people, saying, Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river, and every daughter ye shall save

alive."

This chapter commences with a repetition of the names of the children of Jacob, and I would appeal to any impartial reader to say, whether, if the Pentateuch, or any two books. out of the five which are called the Books of Moses, where wholly written by the same person, they would so abound with repetitions; what need have we on reading on from Genesis to be told again, what were the names of the sons of Jacob? We now skip over a period of three hundred years from the death of Joseph to the time that the Egyptians were alarmed at the increasing number of the Israelites, and endeavoured to restrain their growth and strength by a severe bondage and excessive labour; if any one will believe that the Israelites within 400 years outnumbered the whole of the inhabitants of Egypt, I take the longest period of 400 years, because chronologists and commentators, the better to reconcile the difficulties and contradictions which the Bible presents to them, have made the 400 years to commence with the feigned promise to Abraham, that he should possess the land of Canaan by his posterity, and say that the Israelites were not in Egypt above 250 years, this latter time makes it still more improbable, nay impossible, that the Israelites should have left Egypt with 600,000 fighting men. Would not common prudence have rather dictated to Pharaoh the propriety of conciliating the Israelites, instead of oppressing them, when it must have been visible to the Israelites, as well as to the Egyptians,

if they really were the greater number. We are told in this chapter, that Pharaoh made the Israelites build him treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses; now in the 47th chapter of Genesis we were informed, that Ramases, which is the same as Raamses, was the capital of the land of Goshen, and allotted to the Israelites to dwell in, besides, does it appear at all probable, that Pharaoh would build a treasure city in the midst of a numerous and disaffected people, of whom he expresses a fear that they will join his enemies. We are further told, that the bondage of the Israelites was kept up with excessive rigour. If those are not improbabilities and contradictions, I know not what should bear that title. In respect to the Egyptians keeping the Israelites in a state of bondage, it can be accounted for but in one way, of which we have an existing example, that all the Egyptians must have been trained to the use of arms, whilst the Israelites were unarmed and unorganized. It would then be very similar to our modern Pharaohs, Sidmouth, Castlereagh, and Canning, and those Egyptians which compose our present standing army. The circumstance of Pharaoh speaking to the Hebrew midwives is particularly deserving of notice. It appears that there were but two midwives to 600,000 women, for it is not too much to suppose that every one of those fighting Israelites had a wife each of them; and some of the Bible commentators have allowed them two or three, by way of accounting for the rapid increase of the children of Israel: we are even favoured with the names of those two midwives. The reader can amuse himself by turning to the chapter, as it really needs no comment: he will observe, that the midwives refused to obey the order of Pharaoh to destroy the Hebrew male children, and made a pretence that the Hebrew women had very little need of their assistance; and because they deceived Pharaoh, we are told, that God built houses for the midwives. The Jewish Deity is here brought quite on a level with Pharaoh, and the reader has no alternative to suppose, but that he was some earthly chieftain, who could build houses for those who opposed his rival: it should be also noticed, that Pharaoh was no more than a name attached to those who held the office of king in Egypt, the true interpretation of which is a crocodile. The crocodile was worshipped by the Egyptians as a deity, therefore their kings assumed the title of Pharaoh, no doubt, that adoration might be paid to them. The last verse of this chapter contains an order still more extraordinary. "Pharaoh charged all his people, saying, Every son that is born ye shall cast into the

river, and every daughter ye shall save alive." This order is not confined to the destruction of the male children of the Israelites, but extends to the Egyptians also. The story we find in the New Testament about Herod's making a similar order, might be supposed to be the counterpart of this fable. It resembles also the fabulous tales we have about a race of Amazons, who sought their husbands from their captives and neighbouring countries, and destroyed all their male children. We are now approaching some of the beauties of the Bible, and how it is possible that any human being who lays claim to rationality, can believe such tales to have been facts I am at a loss to conceive. I proceed to the second chapter.

"And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. And the woman conceived, and bare a son; and when she saw that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. And when she could no longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink. And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him. And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river: and her maidens walked along by the river's side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. And when she had opened it, she saw the child; and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children. Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee? And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother. And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses; and she said, Because I drew him out of the water. And it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out unto his brethren, and looked on their burdens; and he espied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one of his brethren. And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. And when he went out the second day, behold, two men of the Hebrews strove together; and he said to him that did the wrong, Wherefore smitest thou thy fellow? And he said, who made thee a prince and a judge over us ? Intendest thou to kill me, as thou killedst the Egyptian? And Moses feared, and said, Surely this thing is known. Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses. But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian; and he sat down by a well. Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters; and they came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock,

And the shepherds came and drove them away; but Moses stood af and helped them, and watered their flock. And when they came to Reuel their father, he said, How is it that ye are come so soon to day? And they said, An Egyptian delivered us out of the hands of the shepherds, and also drew water enough for us, and watered the flock. And he said unto his daughters, Where is he? Why is it that ye have left the man? Call him that he may eat bread. And Moses was content to dwell with the man; and he gave Moses, Zip. porah his daughter. And she bare him a son, and he called his name Gershom; for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land. And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried; and their cry came unto God by reason of the bondage. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect to them."

I would have the reader mark the stupid manner in which this tale commences, which introduces Moses to us. "And there went a man of the house of Levi and took to wife a daughter of Levi." We are not told where the man went, what was his name, nor any particular, that was necessary to begin a tale which arises into such importance in Bible history. The story of Moses being found by Pharaoh's daughter, is but an alteration of the traditionary tale of Ulysses being found by Nausicaa, daughter of Alcinous, king of the Phocians, in company with her maidens, employed at the sea side in washing of clothes, as we find related in Homer's Odyssey. The word Moses signifies being taken from the water, which corroborates what I have before advanced, that the names mentioned in the early part of the Bible are not real names, but fictious and significant of the characters described under them. We have also in this chapter a strong justification of assassination, or the propriety of slaying a tyrant. It is surprising that some of our jesuitical editors of Journals should affect so much horror at the idea of assassination, in what they call a Christian land, when almost every book of the Bible shews us the example, and we are led to infer, that both the Jewish and Christian deities have at all times given it their sanction. Moses is here said to have slain an Egyptian, not from any cause or quarrel of his own, but because he saw him maltreating an Israelite. Surely there is much less excuse for Moses, than if the Israelite had slain him himself. The manner of Moses' flying into Midian and getting a wife is a repetition of the old tale about Isaac and Rebekah and Jacob and Rachel. The word, Reuel, the supposed father-in-law of Moses, has

no other meaning than a priest, and is not the proper name "of a man. According to the conclusion of this chapter, we must infer, that the Bible God had forgotten his favourite people, because we are told, "that their cry came up unto God, and he remembered his promise unto Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and looked upon the children of Israel and had respect unto them." A changing and capricious God! How different is the God of Nature!

I proceed to the third chapter.

"Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro, his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither; put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God. And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows; and I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites. Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them. Come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt. And Moses said unto God, who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt? And he said, certainly I will be with thee; and this shall be a token unto thee, that I have sent thee: when thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain. And Moses said unto God, behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, the God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, what is his name? What shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. Aud God said moreover unto Moses, thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent