Exodus 10

Chap. X. Ver. 1-29. The plagues of locusts and of darkness.—Nothing seems more extraordinary in this narrative, than to hear that, time after time, Moses is sent to Pharaoh with the same message, urging and entreating their deliverance, when the launching of a single thunderbolt would at once have laid the royal rebel in the dust, and have delivered Israel: but, as in a multitude of instances, sinners are spared to be the monuments of special mercy; so in others are they raised up as the monuments of God’s righteous vengeance. ((Romans 9:22).) Lot’s wife was a pillar of salt, to warn professors against apostacy: Pharaoh is (as it were) a pillar of adamant, to teach future ages that no sinner can “harden himself against God and prosper.” ((Job 9:4).) “Wo unto him that striveth with his Maker! Is he stronger than he?” ((1 Corinthians 10:22).) “Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?” ((Job 9:4).) “Wo unto him that striveth with his Maker! Is he stronger than he?” ((1 Corinthians 10:22).) Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth.” ((Isaiah 45:9).) Pharaoh, however, still “striveth with his Maker.” From his language in the preceding chapter, we might have been led to hope his heart was softened:—“Entreat the Lord for me, that there be no more mighty thunderings;” but no sooner do the thunders cease to roll, than Pharaoh’s obduracy returns. It is remarkable, that the greatest tyrants, and the greatest infidels, have trembled at a thunder-storm. Nero and Voltaire are well known instances in point. Moses is now sent to announce the plague of locusts; but while he is delivering his message, the monarch shows such signs of inattention or disgust, that the prophet turns round upon his heel, (as the monarch had done before from the magicians, ch. vii. 22.) and leaves him. But the servants of Pharaoh, at least some of them, seem to be differently impressed. With no more regard to the God of Israel than Pharaoh, they are alarmed, and seem ready to mutiny. They knew that all the judgments which Moses had hitherto denounced had really happened, and they trembled at the thought of locusts, as leading to a famine. “How long shall this man be a snare to us? Knowest thou not yet that Egypt is destroyed?” The king is startled at this, and sending for Moses and Aaron to return back, offers fresh terms. “Go and serve JEHOVAH your God; but who (as the margin renders it, Who and who) shall go?” Moses replies, “We must ALL go, and hold a feast unto Jehovah.”

Upon this, Pharaoh assumes a threatening attitude, and forbids them on their peril. The men he agrees to let go; but insists upon retaining the women and children, and all their property, as a pledge for their return: “If ye go, look to it; for evil is before you.” But there is no trifling with the Lord. Moses, at his command, stretches forth his rod, and behold, the east wind brings up an army of locusts, great and terrible, such as never had been seen before; so numerous, that the air is darkened by their flight; so destructive, that “they did eat every herb of the land, and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left.” Now Pharaoh again calls for Moses and Aaron in haste, and Alas!

how many are there who implore the prayers of others, who never pray for themselves? There is as little sincerity, however, in Pharaoh now as before; for no sooner had a west wind driven the locusts back into the Red Sea, than we are again told, “he would not let the children of Israel go.” Without any warning, therefore, the whole land is involved in three days’ thick darkness—darkness that might be felt;” except only the land of Goshen, where the children of Israel had light in all their dwellings;” but the Egyptians sat in darkness, and were afraid to move. Once more, therefore, Pharaoh submits, and calls for Moses, and consents that the Israelites shall go, with their wives and children, but not their cattle.

Moses, on the contrary, enlarges in his demands, as no doubt instructed: not only must they “not leave a hoof behind,” but Pharaoh, as the penalty of his repeated prevarications, must now give them sacrifices and burnt-offerings to offer to Jehovah. Pharaoh becomes enraged, and, instead of desiring Moses to intercede for him, forbids him to see his face again; to which the latter replies, “Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no