THE BRAZEN SERPENT.

IN the book of Numbers (ch. xxi., v. 4.) we read-" And they journeyed from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to compass the land of Edom: and the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way." The Israelites in their wanderings had got to a place called Kadish. (Ch. xx. 1.) At this stage Moses sent messengers to the King of Edom, requesting permission to pass through his country in their route; assuring him that they would not pass through his fields, nor through his vineyards; nor would they drink of the water of his wells; but they would keep the king's highway until they had passed his borders. This the King of Edom refused, at the same time threatening that, if they persisted, he would come out against them with the sword. (Num. xx.) The Israelites were strong enough to have forced a passage; but God had forbidden this in the following words :--"Thou shalt not fight with Edom; he is thy brother." The Edomites descended from Esau the Israelites from Jacob; these two men were brothers, and their descendants are considered as brethren. In the face of this interdict no option was left to Israel but to avoid a collision; and so he turned from him. (v. 21.) The travellers had to take a circuitous route to reach their destination. "By way of the Red Sea to compass-go round-the land of Edom." We do not greatly wonder that the soul of the people was discouraged because of the way. They had been at Kadish about eight and thirty years before, and are now here again. It seemed as though their journeys and wanderings would never end. Added to which they were obliged to go round about to the place of their destination, which they had hoped to reach by a shorter and pleasanter

Besides, they were passing a very cheerless part of country. It is described as sterile in the extreme; as

being worse for travellers than the common desert; because, being beyond the latitude of Mount Hor, they would have to travel over an expanse of shifting sand brought hither from the shores of the Red Sea by the southerly wind. Travellers who have passed through these regions have indulged in the same complaints as the Israelites in relation to the scarcity of water.

Under the privations of the journey they grew petulant, and said what was not true-they exceeded the bounds of truth. (Ch. xxi. 5.) This so grieved the Lord that he sent serpents among the people, and those serpents bit them, and many died in consequence.

Some have thought these serpents were created at this time for this special purpose; but we think such a work needless, as this country abounded with those deadly creatures. The fishermen of those parts were much afraid of them, and extinguished their fires lest the glare should attract them. Herodotus says that Arabia would not be habitable if the serpents multiplied so fast as their nature admits; but that their numbers were checked by a strange propensity among those reptiles to destroy one another. God may have influenced these creatures to collect in great numbers at this time on this spot to carry out the purposes of His will. In Deut. viii. 15, this region is described as "The great and terrible wilderness wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water."

They are said to be fiery serpents. So called either from their appearance, or from the effect of their bite; probably on account of the latter. The bite of these reptiles caused violent heat, thirst, and inflammation, giving to the body, especially to the countenance, a fiery appearance. The effect of the bite of the dipsas is thus described by the poet Lucan:

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Aulus, a noble youth of Tyrrhene blood,
Who bore the standard, on a dipsas trod;

Backward the wrathful serpent bent her head,
And, full with rage, the unheeded wrong repaid.

Scarce did some little mark of hurt remain,
And scarce he found some little sense of pain,
Nor could he yet the danger doubt, nor fear
That death with all its terrors threatened there.
When, lo! unseen, the secret venom spreads,
And every noble part at once invades ;

Swift flames consume the marrow and the brain,
And the scorched entrails rage with burning pain;
Upon his breast the thirsty poison preys,
And drains the sacred juice of life away.

No kindly floods of moisture bathe his tongue,
But cleaving to the parched roof it hung;

No trickling drops distil, no dewy sweat,

To ease his weary limbs and cool the raging heat."

The camp was in danger of being decimated; but the people, reduced to penitence, request Moses to pray for them. To this request their illustrious leader accedes. and God instructs him to make a serpent of brass and to put it upon a pole, telling him that if any man be bitten, when he shall look upon the serpent of brass he shall live. This event is thus alluded to by the author of Ecclesiasticus: "For when the horrible fierceness of beasts came upon them, and they perished with the stings of crooked serpents, thy wrath endured not for ever; but they were troubled for a small season that they might be admonished, having a sign of salvation to put them in remembrance of tby law. For he that turned towards it was not saved by the thing that they saw; but by thee that art the Saviour of all. In the third chapter of John, v. 14, 15, we have a beautiful allusion to this piece of Old Testament history in the following words:-" And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life." As the Israelites were bitten by the serpents, so the world is bitten by sin. As they received a cure by looking at the serpent, so we by looking to Christ

Stung by the scorpion sin,

My poor expiring soul
The balmy sound drinks in,

And is at once made whole.

See there my Lord upon the tree;
I hear, I feel he died for me."

The brazen serpent was preserved till the time of Hezekiah. It had then become an object of idolatrous worship to the Israelites, and was, in consequence, destroyed. (See 2 Kings xviii. 4.)

Serpent worship was one of the most common forms of idolatry in the ancient heathen world. In Egypt and India serpents were held in high veneration. In these countries, as in Greece and Rome, the serpent symbolized the good and beneficent. It was easy for the Israelites to associate the idea of beneficence with this creature, for in the wilderness they had been taught to look upon it with the assurance that by doing so they should live: they did so, and they lived. To them the serpent appeared as good, and in their minds it was "the good God." As it had thus become a temptation and a snare, Hezekiah resolved to destroy it. P. P.

THE MISER AND HIS BAG.

"GONE!"

A FEW weeks ago a medical journal recorded the following incident as an illustration of the strength of "the ruling passion" even in death.

"An old man in his last illness was admitted into one of the metropolitan hospitals. He was without relations, friends, or apparent means of subsistence; but when undressed and put into bed, a bag of money was found suspended by a string round his neck. To this he clung

with tenacity, refusing to part with it to any one, and wearing it about him by day and night. As his end approached, the treasure became a matter of anxiety to those attending him; for the sum was evidently large, and it was feared that it might offer temptation to some patient, in case the moment of his death should be unobserved. At length the hour arrived, and when death had apparently claimed him, a nurse gently unfastened the string, and removed the bag. At the same moment the old man opened his eyes and felt instinctively for his treasure, which was no longer in its place. He uttered the word 'Gone!' and died. The money, which was found to amount to £174, was handed over to the hospital authorities."-(Lancet.)

"He uttered the word 'Gone!' and died!" So instructive a word, and under such instructive circumstances, has been seldom uttered.

As this solitary word "Gone!" issues from the still ward of the hospital, it comes forth as a solemn preacher amongst living, busy men. That last feeble breath of a dying man sounds with the strength of a trumpet blast an alarm concerning things of the other life; it awakens thoughts of which he who uttered it little dreamed. It speaks to us of the secret of life. This old man had a secret; its material form was that bag that hung around his neck, but its essence and spirit lay deep within his heart. None knew what the spring of that man's life really was until it became revealed at death. And what, reader, is your spring of life; and what will death reveal about you? Death is the great revealer of this secret; it may not be, in your case, to your fellow-man, but with reference to eternity and judgment. What moves you now? For what do you work and live? Whither tend all your hopes and fears? What is the secret spring within from which flows forth your outward life? Reader, say to yourself-and bethink you well of the meaning of what you say "The day is quickly coming on me, when the whole spring of my exist