mercy. Even while living in sight of the cloud on the Mountain, where
Moses was known to be talking with God, the Israelites lost faith, and
set up a golden calf in memory of the Egyptian symbol of divinity,
making it their leader instead of Moses. Such a transgression of their
newly-made promise so utterly forfeited their whole right to the
covenant, that Moses destroyed the precious tables, the token of the
mutual engagement, and God threatened to sweep them off in a moment and
to fulfil His oaths to their forefather in the children of Moses alone.
Then Moses, having purified the camp by slaying the worst offenders,
stood between the rest and the wrath of God, mediating for them until he
obtained mercy for them, and a renewal of the Covenant. Twice he spent
forty days in that awful Presence, where glorious visions were revealed
to him; the Courts of Heaven itself, to be copied by him, by Divine
guidance, in the Ark and Tabernacle, where his brother Aaron, and his
seed after him, were to minister as Priests, setting forth to the eye
how there was a Holy Place, whence men were separated by sin, and how it
could only be entered by a High Priest, after a sacrifice of atonement.
Every ordinance of this service was a shadow of good things to come, and
was therefore strictly enjoined on Israel, as part of the conditions of
the Covenant, guiding their faith onwards by this acted prophecy; and
therewith God, as King of His people, put forth other commands, some
relating to their daily habits, others to their government as a nation,
all tending to keep them separate from other nations. For transgressions
of such laws as these, or for infirmities of human nature, regarded as
stains, cleansing sacrifices were permitted. For offences against
the Ten Commandments, there was no means of purchasing remission; no
animal's, nay, no man's life could equal such a cost; there was nothing
for it but to try to dwell on the hope, held out to Adam and Abraham,
and betokened by the sacrifices and the priesthood, of some fuller
expiation yet to come; some means of not only obtaining pardon, but of