olved in
punishments the design of which was their relief; and in fact their
exemption is implied in the statement that the Egyptians (only) had to
dig wells. It is to be understood that large stores of water would
everywhere be laid up, because the Nile water, however delicious,
carries much sediment which must be allowed to settle down. They would
not be forced, therefore, to fall back upon the polluted common sources
for a supply.

And now let us contrast this miracle with the first of the New
Testament. One spoiled the happiness of the guilty; the other rescued
the overclouded joy of the friends of Jesus, not turning water into
blood but into wine; declaring at one stroke all the difference between
the law which worketh wrath, and the gospel of the grace of God. The
first was impressive and public, as the revelation upon Sinai; the other
appealed far more to the heart than to the imagination, and befitted
well the kingdom that was not with observation, the King who grew up
like a tender plant, and did not strive nor cry, the redeeming influence
which was at first unobtrusive as the least of all seeds, but became a
tree, and the shelter of the fowls of heaven.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] It is true that the word means any large reptile, as when "God
created great _whales_"; but doubtless our English version is correct.
It was certainly a serpent which he had recently fled from, and then
taken by the tail (iv. 4). And unless we suppose the magicians to have
wrought a genuine miracle, no other creature can be suggested, equally
convenient for their sleight of hand.

[11] To this day, amid squalid surroundings for which nominal Christians
are responsible, the immunity of the Jewish race from such suffering is
conspicuous, and at least a remarkable coincidence.

[12] But indeed this notion is not yet dead. "A high wind left the
shallow sea so low that it became possible to ford it. Moses eagerly
accepted the suggestion, and made the venture with success,"
etc.--_Wellhausen_, "Israel," in _Encyc. Brit._

[13] x. 22. The accurate Kalisch is therefore wrong in speaking of "The
duration of the first plague, a statement not made with regard to any of
the subsequent inflictions."--Commentary _in loco_.

[14] _Speaker's Commentary_, i., p. 242; Kalisch on viii. 18; Kiel, i.
484.

CHAPTER VIII.

_THE SECOND PLAGUE._

viii. 1-15.

Although Pharaoh had warning of the first plague, no appeal was made to
him to avert