ir being "brought so seasonably" to the
Jewish camp. The quantity did not trouble his credulous mind. "Some
authors," says he, "affirm that in those eastern and southern countries,
quails are innumerable, so that in one part of Italy within the compass
of five miles, there were taken about an hundred thousand of them every
day for a month together; and that sometimes they fly so thick over the
sea, that being weary they fall into ships, sometimes in such numbers,
that they sink them with their weight." The good man's easy reliance
on 'some authors.' and his ready acceptance of such fables, show what
credulity is engendered by belief in the Bible.

The Jews gathered quails for two days and a night, and joyfully carried
them home. But "while the flesh was yet between their teeth," the Lord
smote them with a very great plague, so that multitudes of them died.
Poor devils! They were always in hot water.

How the sheep and cattle were provisioned the Bible does not inform us.
There was scarcely a nibble of grass to be had in the desert, and as
they could not very well have lived on sand and pebbles, they must
have been supported miraculously. Perhaps the authors of the Pentateuch
forgot all about this.

Not only were the Jews, like their flocks and herds, miraculously
supported; they were also miraculously found in clothes. For forty years
their garments and shoes did not wear out. How was this miracle wrought?
When matter rubs against matter, particles are lost by abrasion. Did the
Lord stop this process, or did he collect all the particles that were
worn off during the day and replace them by night, on the soles of
shoes, on the elbows of coats, and on the knees of pantaloons? If
the clothes never wore out, it is fair to suppose that they remained
absolutely unchanged. Imagine a toddling urchin, two years old at the
exodus from Egypt, wearing the same rig when he grew up to manhood!
Justin, however, says that the clothes grew with their growth. Some
Jewish rabbis hold that angels acted as tailors in the wilderness, and
so the garments were all kept straight. But Augustine, Chrysostom, and
other Fathers abide by the literal interpretation that, through the
blessing of God, the clothes and shoes never wore out, so that those
who grew to manhood were able to hand them over, as good as new, to the
rising generation. According to this theory, _everybody_ must have had
a poor fit, unless there was a transference of garments ev