s were one nation. While the people of Israel were oppressed,
they were not enslaved. They were tributary, but not reduced to
personal bondage. They dwelt together in that portion of Egypt assigned
to them. They spoke their own language. They seem to have regulated
their internal affairs by their own elders. They maintained their own
worship. Their family relations were unbroken. They must have amassed
riches, for they brought great wealth out of Egypt, as the offerings at
the tabernacle show--and although in part this may have been received
from the restitution which the conscience-smitten Egyptians offered upon
their departure, all could not have been thus derived. The whole
narrative of the Israelites shows that they were rich in silver and
gold, and possessed much cattle. Yet all their property was
personal--they owned no land. And much of the tribute was, doubtless,
exacted as rent, paid by many in personal labour; and while they thus
erected, perhaps, the proudest monuments of Egyptian art by this
enforced labour, they were acquiring the various knowledge needful to a
nation; while their very task-masters, by compelling them to acquire the
habits of industry, to which a pastoral people are always averse, were
school-masters, needful though harsh, teaching them to develop their
energies and forcing them to exercise patience and to acquire skill.

Learning and wisdom have departed from Egypt. She has long been the
basest of kingdoms. The race of the Pharaohs has passed away. She has
been for ages governed by slaves. Temple and palace are in ruins. Her
tombs, sacred and precious, have been pillaged; And the bones of her
great and noble ones, her priests and kings, feed the fire by which the
wandering Arab prepares his food. Yet many monuments of her ancient arts
remain, interesting as attesting her power, grandeur, and high
advancement in civilization, and still more valuable as corroborating
the sacred history and throwing light on many passages of the inspired
word,--at once showing the former residence of the Israelites in Egypt,
the close connection of these ancient people, and affording proofs of
that wisdom which selected Egypt for the cradle and school of the chosen
race.

The Egyptians, gradually after the flood, lost the knowledge of Jehovah
and departed from his worship.

At the time Joseph married the daughter of the priest of On, the
Egyptians could not have sunk into that gross idolatry which contraste