completely from the rest of men, and a promise of perpetual temporal
prosperity is granted to them by God as the reward of their obedience,
and as a figure of the eternal blessedness of the just. From that time
with, as before, occasional exceptions, the supernatural events which
befall them wear a new aspect. Their peculiarly typical import is
exchanged for one more precisely in conformity with the leading
principle of the new dispensation. The rites and ceremonies of the new
Law prefigure the Sacrifice and Redemption of the Messias; but the
miracles of the next fifteen hundred years are for the most part
directed to uphold that rule of present reward and punishment, which was
the characteristic feature of the Jewish theocracy. The earth opens to
punish the disobedience of Core and his companions. Fiery serpents
smite the murmuring crowd with instant death; while the promised Saviour
is prefigured, not by a miracle, but by the erection of a brazen serpent
by the hands of Moses. The walls of Jericho fall prostrate before the
trumpets of the victorious Israelites; one man, Achan, unlawfully
conceals some of the spoil, and an immediate supernatural panic, struck
into his countrymen, betrays the committal of the sin. Miraculous water
fills the fleece of Gideon, to encourage him to fight for his country's
deliverance. An angel foretells the birth of Samson to set his people
free, when they are again in bondage. Samson himself is endowed with
supernatural strength; exhausted with the slaughter of his foes, he
prays for water to quench his thirst, and a stream bursts forth from the
ass's jawbone with which he had just slain the Philistines. Bound in
chains, blinded, and made a jest by the idolaters, his prayer for a
return of his strength is heard by God, and he destroys a multitude in
his last moments.

And thus, through all the history of the Kings and the Prophets, the
power of God is repeatedly put forth to alter the laws of nature for the