M O S 
is, from twenty years of age and upwards, (ch. xxvi.) and 
found them to amount to fix hundred and one thoufand 
feven hundred and thirty, befides the Levites; in which 
lift none of thofe were to be found who were above twenty 
years of age at the time of the rebellion occafioned by 
the faife report of the ten cowardly meflengers, excepting 
Joftiua and Caleb, all the reft having periftied in the wil- 
dernefs, according to the fentence pronounced againlt 
them by God himfelf. 
As the time was now approaching when the Ifraelites 
were to enter the promifed land, Mofes was alfo directed to 
prepare for his own death on MountNebo, (ch.xxvii. 12.) 
whence he was to take a view' of that country which his 
conduft in the defert of Zin had debarred him from en¬ 
tering. This notice of his death he could not but receive 
with joy, as a paftport to a haven of repofe after a life of 
incefl’ant trouble and fatigue ; and, finding his end lo 
near, he diligently employed his few remaining days in 
fettling the affairs of the public in the belt order in his 
power. His firft care was, to have Jofhua confirmed his 
fuccefl'or, in the ntoft public and folemn manner; to 
which end he brought him forward in the fight of the 
whole congregation, laid his hands upon him, and, having 
prelented hint to Eleazar the high-prieft, and given him 
all necefl'ary diredtions, caufed him to be proclaimed head 
and general of all Ifrael. He alfo appointed the limits of 
the land w'hich they were to conquer, and the diftribution 
of it by lot according toGod’s command ; and added various 
other diredtions and regulations, relative to civil and ec- 
clefiaftical matters : (ch. xxviii-xxxv.) Afterwards he af- 
fembled the people around him, and recapitulated to them, 
in a long and pathetic fpeech, all that had taken place fince 
their departure from Egypt to that time. (Deut. i-xxviii.) 
In a fubfequent affembly, he caufed the whole nation lo- 
lemnly to ratify the covenant which their fathers had 
made with God in Horeb; (ch. xxix.) and concluded with 
calling heaven and earth to witnefs the truth of what they 
had heard from him, the reafonablenefs of thofe law's 
which God had given them, and the certainty of thofe 
bleftings or curfes which would follow the oblervance or 
the breach of them ; (ch. xxx. xxxi.) To imprefs what 
he had delivered the more ftrongly on their minds, he 
compofed a pfalm or canticle, (ch. xxxii.) in which the 
fubftance of his addrefles is expreffed in fuch elegant and 
lively language, as juftly entitle it, in the eftimation of 
every reader of true tafte, to be pronounced an inimitable 
piece of ancient poetry. Having caufed it to be read be¬ 
fore all the people, he delivered it to Joftiua, to be after¬ 
wards learned-by them and their pofterity. The laft tranf- 
aCtion of Mofes with the Ifraelites was to fummon them 
once more, to receive his farewell, and prophetic blefting 
upon the people in general and upon each tribe in parti¬ 
cular, (ch. xxxiii.) which in many refpefts agrees with 
that of Jacob, and is diftinguifhed by a beauty and fub- 
limity of expreftion that appear to have acquired additional 
force from the profpeft of his departure and their ap¬ 
proaching profperity. No fooner had he delivered his 
laft blefting, than he went up alone 'to Mount Nebo, 
in the fight of all Ifrael, (ch. xxxiv.) and from Pifgah its 
liigheft eminence had a profpeCt of all thofe regions which 
God-had promifed to the pofterity of Abraham. Imme¬ 
diately afterwards Mofes died, at the age of 120, in the 
year 1451 B.C. when his mental faculties were in perfeft 
order, and neither his eyefight nor his natural vigour 
were in the leaft impaired ; and he was buried, moft pro¬ 
bably by Jofhua and Eleazar, but with fo much privacy, 
that the place of his interment, like that of Aaron’s, has 
never fince been difcovered. 
We have been led infenfibly to detail the events of the 
life of this diftinguifhed lawgiver at much greater length 
than we ufually beftow upon articles of biography. But 
we thinjc. our readers will readily excufe us, when the im¬ 
portance of thofe events is confidered ; and we firmly be¬ 
lieve that no ferious and confiderate perfon, who will care¬ 
fully read the whole, in conjunftion with thofe parts of 
VOL. XVI,. No. 1093. 
; E S. 69 
Scripture to which we have continually referred, will have 
caufe to think the time ill-beftowed or mis-fpent. 
That Mofes was an eminently-great man will be readily 
admitted by thofe even who difpute his claims to fuper- 
natural co'mmunications with the Deity. We cannot, 
however, give up our belief in his miracles without mate¬ 
rially affefting the credibility of the whole hiftory, and of 
the other facts dependent upon it; and we fee fuflicient evi¬ 
dence to induce us to take the account as it ftands in the 
Scriptures, which, though not without difficulties, is not 
wholly irreconcileable with the dictates of reafon and found 
fenfe. In proof of Mofes’s genuine and ardent patriotifm, 
an appeal may be made to the whole hiftory of his life, and 
particularly to his dilinterefted behaviour on the approach 
of death, when he overlooked his own family, and nomi¬ 
nated Joftiua his fuccelfor, whole experience and valour 
peculiarly qualified him for fuch a polt at a period when 
the great ftruggle was about to commence with the war¬ 
like nations of Canaan. He is commended as the mcehcji 
of men; and he certainly mull: have poflefled no common 
fliare of meeknefs, and of magnanimity, to bear as he did 
for forty years the trying provocations which he received, 
while governing and inftruCting a moft obftinate and re¬ 
bellious people. His zeal for the honour of the one living 
and true God,.forms a confpicuous feature in his cha¬ 
racter ; it is indeed the principle which at once lies at the 
foundation, and conftitutes the central point, of all his 
inftitutions. The writings which bear his name, whether 
confidered in the light of hiftorical documents, or as fur- 
nilliingus with a fyftem of legifiation, are highly intereft- 
ing and important. In the former point of view', they 
fupply us with the earlieft records of the world and of the 
human race, from the creation to the birth of Abraham, 
comprifing a period of above two thoufand years ; and a 
particular hiftory of the Hebrew nation, his delcendants, 
carried on in a regular feries, till the death of Modes. 
Thefe documents are recommended by their concifenefs 
and fimplicity; and not only by ftrong internal marks 
of veracity, but alfo by the teftimony of tradition, and the 
difcoveries of philofophy. Whether fome parts of them 
are to be underftood in a literal or allegorical fenfe, has 
long been the fubjeCt of difpute, and is a point w'hich it 
does not belong to our immediate province to difcufs. 
With refpeCt to the fyftem of legifiation which thefe writ¬ 
ings contain, as far as it is of amoral nature it is unquef- 
tionably pure and excellent; its political and judicial re¬ 
gulations are wife and equitable; and the ritual part of it, 
drawn up with a particular reference to the time and peo¬ 
ple, was admirably adapted to eftablifti and fecure the 
worftiip of the one true God, by preferving the Ifraelites 
from all intermixture with other nations, and from adopt¬ 
ing any part of their idolatrous worftiip into their own. 
Speaking of the great excellence of thefe writings in point 
of compofition, leaving all idea of divine infpiration out 
of the queftion, Dr. Geddes fays, “ I know not if it would 
be too much to affirm, that, whether they be confidered as 
a compend of hiftory, or as a digeft of laws, or as a fyftem 
of theology, or as models of good writing, they are in 
fome refpeCts unequalled, in none overmatched, by the 
beft productions of ancient times.” 
That the firft five books of the Old Teftament, ,com- 
monly known by the name of the Books of Mofes, or the 
Pentateuch, were a&ually written by him, excepting the 
laft chapter of Deuteronomy, (which is thought to have 
been added by Ezra,) was the general opinion both of 
Jews and Chriftians, till between fix and feven hundred 
years ago, when Aben Ezra, a Jewilh doCto’, raifed fome 
doubts on the fubjeCt, in his notes upon Deuteronomy. 
Thefe doubts he was led to entertain bycertain paflages, 
in which mention is made of events fi.bfequent to the 
time of Mofes. But may not thefe p-«flages well be fup- 
pofed to have been added afterwards like notes in the 
margin, whence in time they would be incorporated with 
the original text ? The introduction of paflages of a lik? 
nature into other apcient writings has been accounted 
T far 
