d Aaron could approach the holy Mount, and from it God gave to Moses
the laws that the people were to live by, and Moses wrote them all down
that he might read them to the people. A company of the Elders of
Israel went up and saw the glory of God afar off, but God called Moses
up into the Mount, and the cloud closed him round, while the Lord gave
him the laws for a great nation, and the pattern of the tabernacle
which He wished him to make for a church in the wilderness.

Forty days and forty nights Moses was on the Mount with God, and then
God gave him the ten great commandments written with his own hands on
tablets of stone, that he might give them to the people. They were to
be kept as the rules of life for all people in all times.

Forty days and nights seemed a long time to the people camped around
the Mount. Perhaps they thought Moses would never come back to lead
them, for they began to think of the gods of Egypt, and asked Aaron to
make one for them. So to please them he told them to bring him their
gold ornaments, and he melted them and made a golden calf such as the
Egyptians worshiped, and before it they made an altar, and they
worshiped the calf.

The Lord who sees all things told Moses to go down to the people for
they were worshiping an idol. So Moses went down a little way and met
Joshua, and they both went down and saw the people feasting, and
singing, and dancing, and Moses cast the tablets of stone upon the
ground and they were broken. The heart of Moses, too, was almost
broken, but he destroyed the golden calf, and punished the people for
their great sin, and then went up to the Mount to plead for the life of
his people.

"O this people have sinned a great sin," he cried, "and have made them
gods of gold, yet now if thou wilt forgive their sin, and if not, blot
me, I pray thee, out of the book which thou has written," so great was
the love of Moses for his people.

There was a time of repentance among the people after this, and Moses
and his servant Joshua reared a tent outside the camp and called it the
Tabernacle of the congregation. It was for worship until the true
Tabernacle should be built according to the pattern given in the Mount.
All who sought the Lord went to worship there, and the pillar of cloud
came and stood at the Tabernacle door while Moses talked with God, and
all the people saw it and worshiped.

Moses prayed again for the people, and the Lord said:

"My presences sh