be made like the engravings of a signet was given before the law was written. The law was not given to Moses until just as he was about to leave the mount, at the close of the forty days. But it. was written more than a month before; and not until after it was written, did Moses receive the instruction to prepare the ephod and the breastplate of Aaron. Signets are mentioned before the writing of the law, but there is no evidence that they were not purely hieroglyphic. God now required Moses to engrave on the mitre of Aaron letters, as distinctly as had heretofore been the hieroglyphic representations of a signet.

Now, whence is this perfect silence on the subject of alphabetical writing, until after the supernatural writing of the law, and whence the frequent notices of the art afterwards? Is not the only answer to this question found in the fact, that the origin of the art is to be attributed to God himself, and that he was the original instructor of Moses during the forty days in which he was upon the Mount?

It would be natural to suppose, if a written language were thus discovered to men, that there would be some intimations of this fact in the Mosaic history. Are there not intimations of it? Let us advert a few moments to the narrative of this transaction as it is recorded in the book of Exodus. "And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me in the Mount and be there; and I will

give thee tables of stone, and a law and commandments, which I have written." The tables here spoken of, it is obvious were already prepared and finished at some previous time. God affirms that he had written them. Subsequently to this, we are told that "God gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him on Mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God." Just after this, the fact is repeated, "and the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables." It is a question which deserves to be impartially considered, whether God does not here affirm that he himself is the author of this invention. When a work is declared in the Scriptures to be the work of God, to have been wrought by the finger of God, the idea conveyed is that it is the peculiar work of God, and altogether above the power of man. When it is said that Israel is the sheep of God's hand, the meaning is that they belong to God and to no other. When the Saviour says that he cast out devils by the finger of God, we understand him as declaring that he performs a work to which no other power is adequate but the power of God. When the magicians of Egypt exclaimed of the miracles of Moses, this is the finger of God, they acknowledged his divine mission. And so the Psalmist, when he says, "when I consider the heavens, the work of thy fingers," expresses the idea that, no other could create the

heavens but God. On the same principle idols are the invention of men, and are called the work of men's hands, and which their own fingers have made. Is it not then a fair exegetical inference, that, when the law is declared to have been written by the finger of God, the legitimate import of the phrase is, that it was so peculiarly his work that the original invention is due to him.

I remarked that with two exceptions writing is not even apparently mentioned in the Scriptures before the giving of the Law. One of these occurs just before the giving of the Law, and refers to a future rehearsal in the ears of Joshua of what Moses should subsequently commit to writing for the instruction and encouragement of his successor; and by no means proves that the art of writing was known to Moses before the time when the Law was written. Especially is this remark deserving of consideration, when it is recollected that it is no uncommon thing for the Scriptures to notice future events by this sort of anticipation. The other apparent exception will be found no exception at all. It is recorded in the twenty-fourth chapter of Exodus. "And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord:-and he took the book of the covenant and read in the audience of the people." It is said, that as God did not call Moses up into the Mount and give him the written tables until after this period, Moses must have had the art of writing before the tables were written. But the question is, when were the tables written?

Moses had been up to the Mount with God before the period here referred to. His first ascent is noticed as far back as the nineteenth chapter. He had ascended a second time, as related in the same chapter. And as is related in the latter part of the same chapter, he had ascended a third time. Not until he came down after the fourth ascent, is he represented as writing the civil and judicial statutes and reading them to the people. Now had not God prepared the two tables of the moral Law before Moses wrote and read to the people their judicial code? He had not committed them to Moses till after this, but when he did commit them, it was a commitment of tables, as we have already seen previously prepared; how long before no man can tell. But it cannot be shown that it was after Moses wrote and read the judicial statutes,

It is also objected to this position, that Job must have lived previous to the time of Moses, and that as he distinctly refers to ancient writing by books and sculpture, there must have been a written language before the giving of the Law. When it shall be made to appear that the book of Job was written at an earlier period than the time of Moses, it will be time enough to give weight to this objection. The age in which Job lived, and in which the book of Job was written is unknown. If the most distinguished critics may be relied upon, this book was posterior to the time of Moses, or Moses himself was its author. Dr. Warburton

judges it to have been written about the close of the Babylonish captivity. Dr. John Mason Good, Dr. Winder and Dr. Grey, with great strength of argument, attribute it to Moses. Gregory Nazianzen, Spanheim, and Adam Clarke attribute it to Solomon. Several distinguished writers have supposed that the silence of the author of this book respecting the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Exodus from Egypt, the passage of the Red Sea, and the promulgation of the Law, prove that it was written prior to these events, and during the age of the early patriarchs. But is it to be supposed that every book in the sacred canon which does not refer to these events, was written prior to these events themselves? Two things are indispensable to the conclusiveness of this argument, neither of which is known. The first is, that upon the supposition, that the author of the book of Job, or Job himself had lived subsequently to these events, he was acquainted with them; the second is, that upon the supposition that he was acquainted with them, they must necessarily, or even probably have been noticed in this Book. Nor does the longevity of Job necessarily place him in an age previous to the giving of the Law. That he did not live in so early an age as that of the longeval patriarchs is evident from two considerations; in the first place, the reference of Bildad to the longevity of that age, as a peculiarity that distinguished it from his own, as appears from the 8th and 9th verses of the 8th Chapter;