moreover, the more anxious to direct the reader's notice to a fact not generally considered, and much less generally understood, that the richest resources of the poetic art are existent in these eloquent and sublime predictions.

Upon the words curse and defy as our translators have rendered the latter expression, Bishop Patrick remarks, that they are "two different expressions for the same thing, only the latter word, which we translate defy, imports something of fury, because he would have had him curse them in such a prophetic rage, as would have the most direful effects upon them."* The Targum of Jerusalem paraphrases this couplet as follows:-"How shall I curse the house of Jacob, when the word of the Lord hath blessed them? Or how shall I diminish the family of Israel, when the word of the Lord hath multiplied them." Here is a good sense, though much below the condensed vigour of the original passage.

See Bishop Patrick's note.

CHAPTER XXXI.

Bulaam's first prophecy, continued.

This

HAVING closed the exordium of his first pro phecy, the inspired bard proceeds to deliver the divine oracle, with reference to the future condition of those enemies of Moab, whom their sovereign had commanded him to execrate. was anxiously expected by Balak, who was standing by the altars of sacrifice, impatiently waiting to hear the curse of immediate extermination pronounced upon God's people.

For from the tops of the rocks I see him,

And from the hills I behold him.

It is impossible not to perceive the parallels here, though the gradation of sense may not be so immediately obvious to a cursory scrutiny.

From the tops of the rocks I see him.

This was, no doubt, some rocky eminence on the mountain whither Balaam had repaired, in order to obtain a more extensive view of the plain upon which the Israelites were encamped. He was now standing upon the "high places of Baal," probably one of the mountains of Abarim, Peor, Nebo, and Pisgah, belonging to the same range. 'The mountains of Abarim spread far

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into the tribe of Reuben, and the country of Moab on both sides the Arnon. They were composed of many little hills, under different names. It is impossible to define exactly their extent: Eusebius and Jerome speak of them in several places. Eusebius fixes them at six miles west of Heshbon, and seven east of Livias."* On the words 'the high places of Baal,' Stackhouse observes after Patrick, "The word Baal signifies Lord, and was the name of several gods, both male and female, as Seldon shows (de Diis Syris, cap. i.) The god of the Moabites was Chemosh, but here very probably is called by the common name of Baal: and as all nations worshipped their gods upon high places, so this god of Moab, having more places of worship than one, Balak carried Balaam to them all, that from thence he might take the most advantageous prospect of the Israelites. These high places were full of trees and shady groves, which made them commodious, both for the solemn thoughts and prayers of such as were devout, and for the filthy inclinations and abominable practices of such as affected to be wicked." It is clear then that the prophet, when he pronounced the prophecy, was upon a lofty elevation above the plain in which the posterity of Jacob were encamped, he being thus enabled to overlook their whole encampment, for this is implied by the first couplet of the prediction, in both verses of which he declares that he sees the enemy, not in part but entirely. I have said

See Calmet's Dictionary of the Bible, Art. Abarim.

that in this couplet the gradational parallelism is present. In the first hemistich it will be observed that only a part or peculiar locality of the hill is signified :

From the tops of the rocks I see him.

In the second, the term "hills" is used generally to express, no doubt, the great elevation of his position:

And from the hills I behold him.

He was not only looking from a rocky eminence, but from the hills, the most elevated region in that mountainous district, where the sanctuaries of the heathen deities were erected on account of those high places being seldom trodden by profane feet, and only when the rites of that unholy worship which defiled these degraded shrines were to be consummated. The duplication of the parallel phrases, I apprehend to have been employed merely to express the same thing more emphatically, to give a more graceful turn to the clauses and, above all, to preserve that peculiar but expressive form of construction so often brought to the reader's notice, under the characteristic designation of parallelism, which, as I have already attempted on several occasions to show, forms so decided and specific a feature of Hebrew poetry. Bishop Newton, and justly as I think, considers this passage and that which immediately follows, to refer not only to the present view which Balaam had of the Israelites, but likewise and indeed more emphatically to their final settlement in

Canaan. Both Bishop Lowth's and the common version evidently countenance this interpretation; and indeed, from the context, it appears manifest that while Balaam pointed to the camp occupied by that highly favoured race, concern ing whom he pronounces the prophecy contained in the two subsequent lines, to which we shall presently refer, he at the same time represents to the astonished sovereign of Moab, who would willingly have heard a less favourable character of those whom he so deeply detested, that extraordinary union among themselves which distinguished the literal seed of Abraham, not merely during their occupation of the promised land, but continues, even at this remote period, to be the prominent feature of their national character-a character which has exhibited no perceptible change during a lapse of more than three thousand years. They are still "dwelling alone;"-they are not even now "numbered among the nations.”

Reverting to the parallel terms in the first distich of the prophecy, it may appear that two of them are merely synonymous, and consequently that a common pleonasm or unnecessary redundancy is produced, but this is by no means the case the terms are clearly gradational, as a slight consideration will show. Betwixt the words "see" and "behold," though they may seem upon a superficial view, to express precisely the same sense, there is a nice, indeed, but nevertheless manifest advance of meaning. To see, is to perceive generally; to behold, to perceive distinctly-it will therefore appear that the one