Deut. xxxii. 21. They have moved me to jealousy ivith that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities : and I tvill move them to jealousy with those which are not a people ; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
" KNOWN unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world." Moses informs us, that, in the very first distribution of men over the face of the earth, God had an especial respect to those, who, at a remote period, should spring from the loins of Abraham ; and that he assigned to the descendants of cursed Ham that portion of the globe which, in due time, should be delivered into the hands of Israel, cultivated in every respect, and fit for the accom- modation and support of the Jewish nation : " When the Most High divided to the nations their inheri- tance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to (or, in re- ference to) the number of the children of Israel a. Yet at the very time when God carried this decree into execution, at the time when the nation of Israel were, by the discipline of forty years in the wilderness, brought to a state of faith and piety that was never equalled at any subsequent period of their history, even then, I say, did God foresee their declension from his ways, and inspire Moses to predict the wickedness which they would commit, and the chas- tisements which should be inflicted upon them on account of it : he even instructed Moses to record the whole beforehand in a song, which was, in all succeeding ages, to be committed to memory by the children of Israel, and to be a witness for God against them. It was probable that, when he should change his conduct towards them, they would reflect on him either as mutable in his purposes, or as unable to execute his promises towards them: but this song would completely vindicate him from all such asper- sions, and be a standing proof to them, that their miseries were the result of their own incorrigible perverseness. " Now," says God, " write ye this song for you, and teach it the children of Israel: put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel. For when I shall have brought them into the land which I sware unto their fathers, that floweth with milk and honey;
a ver. 8. VOL. II. I I