The Pulpit Commentary — Numbers — Section 183

. before Moses." Thie intimates the excitement and turbulence of their feeling. Th1J ,chnnces nre thnt a good dee.I of disparagement of Canaan had come to their ears, losing nothing as it passed from one tongue to another. Notice the temporary -effacement, e.e it were, of Moses. It is Caleb who here takes the lead. Moses is nothing save as the mouth-piece of God, and the time is not quite ripe for God to speak. But Caleb, who, here as afterwards, shows himself a courageous man, prompt and ready, has formed his opinion, and at once expresses it; to be immediately followed by opinions just as decided in the opposite direction. We need not hem 110 much to consider who was right and who wrong; God himself brings all out presently into the clearest of light. The great matter to be noticed is that the . people were now exposed to conflicting counsels. I. THESE CONFLICTING COUNSELS WERE TH& CONSEQUENCE OF BACKSLIDING FRO)( Goo. The people had turned away from their true Guide, and the consequence of being in a wrong path very soon appears. God is one, and in his infinite wisdom and power -can make all things work together for good to them that love him, and are called according to his purpose. But men are many and diverse, and if those who are -called according to his purpose fall from the obedience which shows their love, how shall they make things work together for good? To God the scheme of human affairs is as a machine, complicated and intricate indeed, but well under control, and :producing large results. To men it is, more or less, a ma.ze of motions. They understand it a little in parts, but are hopelessly divided as to the meaning and ·service of the whole. II. THE PREPONDERANCE IN THESE CONFLICTING COUNSELS WAS AGAINST THE COURSE WHICH Goo BAD ALREADY LAID OUT, God had promised the land, kept it before the people, and brought them to the very verge; yet ten out of twelve men-responsible men in the tribes, men who had journeyed through the land for forty days-declared that it was beyond the strength of Israel to obtain. What a satire on vox populi -vox Dei I What a humbling revelation of the motives that work most powerfully in unregenerate human nature I How easy it is to exaggerate difficulties when one's heart is not in a work; to see, not everything that is to be seen, but only what tlrn eye wants to see, and to see in a particular way I It is a part of spiritual prudencs to reckon that, whatever strength there may be in mere numbers, in brute force and material applinncee, they cannot be counted on in advancing the kingdom of God. With all these resources heaped up around them, craven spirits will still cry out that there is a lion in the way. Ill. IT IB EVERYTHING TO RECOLLECT THAT THERE WEBE CONFLlCTING COUNSELS. Cowardice, carnality, and backsliding did not altogether get their own way. Things were had enough, but after all Caleb and Joshua counted for a great deal on the -Other side. We must not only count men, but weigh them. There are times wheu it is no credit to men, when it says but little for their piety or their humanity, that they are found among majorities. H is the glory of God's cause on earth that it never loses its hold on at least a few. There is always a Caleb to fling to the wind considerations of base expediency.-Y. Ch. -xiv.-They co1tld not enter in because of unbdiej. Less than two years have passed since the congregation marched out of Egypt, yet already they stand at; the threshold of the land of promise. Turning their gaze northward and westward from K~deeh, th~y see the ~il)s wh_ich form the outworks of the famous and goodly -mountain which 1e to be their inheritance. A crowd of joyous thoughts fill the hearts of Moses and the faithful at the sight. "Those hills belong to the Jund for which Abraham left his native country, and was content to be a sojourner ull hie days. They enclose the sepulchre in which the bones of the patriarchs were le.id, in the sure_ hope that_t~e land should yet be the inheritance of their seed. The promisi, he.e tamed long; 1t 1s now at the door. Ere the clusters of Eshcol shell have age.in ripened under the southern sun, the Ce.naanites will have been dispossessed, and wi, shall have been settled in their place." So Moses and the godly in Israel fondly thought. But they were doomed to disappointment. For thirty-eight years muri, the Ce.naanites were to dwell undisturbed. Moses and all the grown-up people weri, to die in the wilderness. How this came about the present chapter relates, Tiu, lll ~ ,  164 TIIE BOOK OF NUM.8ERS. [CHS, XIII., xtl'.