d taken care
that drink should come to them without any labor or pains-taking. When
Moses had received this command from God, he came to the people, who
waited for him, and looked upon him, for they saw already that he was
coming apace from his eminence. As soon as he was come, he told them
that God would deliver them from their present distress, and had granted
them an unexpected favor; and informed them, that a river should run
for their sakes out of the rock. But they were amazed at that hearing,
supposing they were of necessity to cut the rock in pieces, now they
were distressed by their thirst and by their journey; while Moses only
smiting the rock with his rod, opened a passage, and out of it burst
water, and that in great abundance, and very clear. But they were
astonished at this wonderful effect; and, as it were, quenched their
thirst by the very sight of it. So they drank this pleasant, this sweet
water; and such it seemed to be, as might well be expected where God was
the donor. They were also in admiration how Moses was honored by God;
and they made grateful returns of sacrifices to God for his providence
towards them. Now that Scripture, which is laid up in the temple, [6]
informs us, how God foretold to Moses, that water timid in this manner
be derived out of the rock.'

CHAPTER 2. How The Amalekites And The Neighbouring Nations, Made War
With The Hebrews And Were Beaten And Lost A Great Part Of Their Army.

1. The name of the Hebrews began already to be every where renowned,
and rumors about them ran abroad. This made the inhabitants of those
countries to be in no small fear. Accordingly they sent ambassadors
to one another, and exhorted one another to defend themselves, and to
endeavor to destroy these men. Those that induced the rest to do so,
were such as inhabited Gobolitis and Petra. They were called Amalekites,
and were the most warlike of the nations that lived thereabout; and
whose kings exhorted one another, and their neighbors, to go to this war
against the Hebrews; telling them that an army of strangers, and such
a one as had run away from slavery under the Egyptians, lay in wait to
ruin them; which army they were not, in common prudence and regard to
their own safety, to overlook, but to crush them before they gather
strength, and come to be in prosperity: and perhaps attack them first in
a hostile manner, as presuming upon our indolence in not attacking them
before; and that we ought