Ill 
therefore, that there may have been about 600,000 men of 
war, all descendants of the 70 who came down into Egypt 
210 years before. It is possible, I say ; but is it probable ? 
13. (1.) Could so large a number have dwelt in all Lower 
Egypt, not to mention the land of Goshen, to which they appear 
to have been restricted ? The number of 600,000 men implies 
a population of 2,000,000 at least ; the Targum of Palestine 
says that each man had five children with him, which, allowing 
each man one wife only, makes a total of 4,200,000. It adds 
that the “ mixed multitude ” amounted to 240 myriads; so 
that the total number of fugitives reached 6,600,000, Evi- 
dently Eabbi Jonathan ben Uzziel did not want to help us out 
of a difficulty, as he added this trifle of 6,000,000 to the already 
large number of 600,000. But adhering to the lower figure, 
2.000. 000, can we suppose so many to have been able to find 
habitations ? The present population of Lower Egypt is about 
2.000. 000. But at the time of the Exodus there must have 
been Egyptians as well as Hebrews living in the country. 
We cannot put them at less than 1,000,000. Now, as the 
present population of Lower Egypt gives 340 to a square mile, 
a population half as large again would give 510 to a square 
mile, which is considerably in excess of 438, the number per 
square mile inhabiting Belgium, the most thickly-populated 
country known in the world. I say known, because it is likely 
that some parts of China, as yet unvisited, are more densely 
peopled. 
14. (2.) These 600,000 men, or rather more, nearly 620,000, 
as numbered in the wilderness, all died in the course of their 
forty years* wandering. Of these we are told 14,700 died in 
one fearful visitation, 24,000 in another, and some smaller 
number on two other occasions. But allowing 50,000 for 
those who died on these occasions, and supposing them all to 
be men, we still have 570,000 men dying in forty years, or 
very nearly forty per day. And as the women were not 
exempt from the common lot of humanity, the daily death- 
rate, excluding those who perished by pestilence, must have 
been at least fifty. Is this probable ? I am not objecting to 
the number of deaths per thousand per annum ; a death-rate 
of one-fortieth, or twenty-five in a thousand, is not a high one. 
The present rate in London and Paris is about twenty-seven, 
and in some of our unhealthier towns far higher. What appears 
to me enormous is not the proportion, but the actual number 
of dead bodies collected within a limited space. 
15. (3.) These 620,000, strangely enough, leave behind 
them a progeny somewhat less numerous than themselves. 
Instead of 603,550, we have at the numbering in the plain of 
