190 APPENDIX. 



life, and preferving thefe immenfe herds of cattle by con* 

 dueling them into the fands beyond the limits of the black 

 earth, and bringing them back again when the danger from 

 this infect was over. 



We cannot read the hiftory of the plagues which God 

 brought upon Pharaoh by the hands of Mofes, without 

 Hopping a moment toconfider a Angularity, a very principal 

 one, which attended this plague of the fly. It was not till 

 this time, and by means of this infect, that God faid, he 

 would fcparate his people from the Egyptians. And it 

 would feem, that then a law was given to them, that fixed 

 the limits of their habitation. It is well known, as I have 

 repeatedly faid, that the land of Gofhen, or Gefhen, the pof- 

 femon olthe Israelites, was a land of paflure, which was 

 not tilled or fown, becaufe it was not overflowed by the 

 Nile. But the land overflowed by the Nile was the 

 black earth of the valley of Egypt, and it was here 

 that God confined the flies ; for he fays, it fhall be a fign 

 of this Separation of the people, which he had then made, 

 that not one fly mould be feen in the fand or paflure 

 ground, the land of Gofhen, and this kind of foil has ever 

 lince been the refuge of all cattle emigrating from the 

 black earth to the lower part of Atbara. Ifaiah, indeed, fays, 

 that the fly fhairbe in all the defert places, and consequently 

 the fands ; yet this was a particular difpenfation of provi- 

 dence, to anfwer a Special end, the defolation of Egypt, and 

 was not a repeal of the general law, but a confirmation of 

 it ; it was an exception, for a particular purpofe,and a limU 

 ted. time, 



I N HAVE 



