hieroglyphics, with four marble Egyptian lions at each corner of the
platform upon which it stands, pouring from their mouths copious
streams of water into large basins, with a refreshing sound. Perhaps
the eyes of Abraham rested upon this obelisk when he went down into
Egypt, the first recorded traveller who visited the valley of the
Nile; and the familiarity of the sight to the Israelites during their
bondage in the neighbourhood may have suggested the wonderful vision
of the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night which regulated
their wanderings in the wilderness. God does not paint His revelations
on the empty air, but weaves them into the web of history, or pours
them into the mould of common earthly objects and ordinary human
experiences. Many of the rites and institutions of the Mosaic economy
were borrowed from those of the Egyptian priesthood; the tabernacle
and its furniture were composed of the gold and jewels of which the
Israelites had spoiled the Egyptians; and its form, a tent moved from
place to place, accommodated itself to the wandering camp-life of the
Israelites. It is not unreasonable, therefore, to suppose that He who
appeared to Moses at Horeb, not in some unknown supernatural blaze of
glory altogether detached from earth, but in the common fire of a
shepherd in the common dry vegetation of the desert, and who made use
of the common shepherd's rod which Moses carried in his hand to
perform the wonderful miracles before Pharaoh, would also make use of
the obelisk of Heliopolis, one of the most familiar objects which met
their eye during their captivity, as the pattern of the Shechinah
cloud which guided His people in their journey to the land of Canaan.
The symbol of the sun that shone upon their weary toil as slaves in
the clay-pits beside the Nile, now protected and illumined them in
their march as freemen through the desert. What they had probably
joined their oppressors in worshipping as an idol, they now beheld
with awe and reverence as the token of the overshadowing and