is one so valuable in the lesson it is intended to impart, that we shall venture to insert it here. It is said that St. Martin was one day accosted by a beggar, in terms of deep and earnest supplication, for the relief of his necessities. This man, the very picture of misery, did not apply in vain; the saint immediately gave an alms. Upon this, the pretended mendicant threw off his disguise, and appearing as Satan himself, scoffingly asked the holy man, how he could have been so easily imposed upon? The saint calmly replied, "You are mistaken, if you imagine that I have been imposed upon at all. I never gave the money to you, I gave it, in your person, to the Lord Jesus Christ." This, although it ought not to render us indiscriminate in the application of our charities, is an admirable illustration of the truth, that their value depends upon their motive.

Remember, then, that as yours is a religion of motives, in proportion as these are pure, honest, and of good report; or, in other words, as they are suggested, directed, sanctified by the Spirit of God, so will every deed of charity, and every act of beneficence that flows from them, be acceptable in the sight of him whom you serve, and be recorded against that day, when God shall give to every man "according to his

works."

EXPOSITION IV.

EXODUS ii. 4-10.

4. And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him.

5. 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.

6. 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.

I

7. Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall

go

and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?

8. And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother.

9. 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.

10. 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.

How providentially is the whole of this little drama arranged. The mother of Moses places the

floating ark among the flags by the side of the river, and leaves her youthful daughter, Miriam, who must have been at that time quite a child, and therefore less likely to be suspected of having any hand in the plot, to watch the event. The daughter of Pharaoh comes down at the precise moment, and to the precise spot. The child, we have been already told, was “goodly," or beautiful, and, as St. Stephen adds, “exceeding fair, which tended no doubt greatly to conciliate the damsel's affectionate interest in its behalf; while its tears (for what can be more touching than an infant's tears?) appear to have determined the matter in its favour, since the inspired writer immediately adds, that Pharaoh's daughter "had compassion on him," and resolved at once to adopt him as her own.

Here, again, mark how the providence of God interferes: it was well that an Egyptian should be the instrument to preserve the life of the child it was well that an Egyptian capable from her rank and station of having him initiated into "all the wisdom" of her country, should be permitted to superintend his education, that he might be eminently qualified, even in worldly gifts, for the important post which he should one day fill: but it was not well that an Egyptian should direct his opening thoughts, and

his first lisping words, and his earliest infant prayers for the taint of idolatry might have so grown with his growth, and strengthened with his strength, as never afterwards to have been wholly eradicated. The providence of God, therefore, provides a better, yea, the best of all nurses for the infant Moses, even his own dear mother, whom her little daughter naturally calls, and the Egyptian princess as naturally engages. Every line, every word of the transaction, is regulated by God himself. The princess does not, as we should have anticipated, direct the mother to attend her to her palace, and there nurse the child; but says, "Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages." Thus securing for the early years of Moses, a holy and a happy home, void indeed of the luxuries of life, but, by the generosity of Pharaoh's daughter, probably, not absolutely without its comforts: a home where the true God was worshipped, and where everything around the infant would tend to enlist his earliest sympathies, and draw out his first affections, on behalf of his suffering countrymen; effects most important, and yet which could scarcely have been produced amidst the splendours of a palace, although they would come unsought, while witnessing the cruel privations, the bitter bondage, the daily sufferings, of

his father the brickmaker, or labourer in the iron furnaces of Pharaoh. It was not, therefore, until Moses was grown, that he appears to have become the inmate of the palace of the Pharaohs, where he remained until he was forty years of age time amply sufficient to acquire all the wisdom of the Egyptians, though, as it appears, insufficient to obliterate one feeling of piety towards God, or one trace of his ardent love towards his fellow-countrymen.

There is nothing more delightful than to be permitted thus, as it were, to look into the secret works of the great and wonderful machine, of which the exterior is usually the only portion visible to us, and to view all its different movements, not as mere coincidences, but as the appointed results of infinite wisdom, and infinite love. It cheers the Christian's heart, and strengthens his hands, thus to behold a Father's mercy influencing and directing the minutest events of his life, and enables him to leave everything, even the most difficult and the most doubtful, in filial confidence to him, who doeth all things well, and who having given to us his Son, and in him life eternal, shall "with him also freely give us all things."