A

SERMON,

&c.

EXODUS, 11. 5 and 6.

And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to

wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by the river side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. And when she had opened it, she saw the child; and behold the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, this is one of the Hebrews' children.

My dear children, another year has passed, and I am now to talk to you again about religion. I preach to the old; but I talk to the young and the subject I have chosen is the life of Moses. You can all understand this. A child of four years old has heard of Moses, and his being hid in the ark of bulrushes. If the least child in church will look at me, I will try to speak so plain that he may understand

me.

And I pray God to open all your hearts,

that you may hereafter become like this great and good man.

I will make some remarks:

1. ON THE BIRTH OF MOSES.

II. HIS CHOOSING THE WAYS OF GOD WHen he

WAS COME TO YEARS.

III. HIS MEEKNESS.

IV. HIS EARNEST PRAYERS TO GOD.

V. HIS FAITH IN THE PROMISED MESSIAH OR SAVIOUR.

I. I make some remarks on the BIRTH of Moses.

He was born in Egypt, at the time when King Pharaoh had ordered all the little Hebrew children, that were males, to be cast into the river. His parents, however, seeing he was a goodly child, by faith hid him three months. When they could conceal him no longer, they took an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein, and laid it in the flags by the river's brink. Soon after the daughter of Pharaoh came down to the river, and seeing the ark among the flags, sent her maid to fetch it. She opened it and found the babe within, which was weeping; as well it might in such a case. The heart of Pharaoh's daughter was touched with pity, and the child's mother was called at her command, and

nursed it for her; and the child grew, and was brought up as the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

See, my children, how wonderful was the providence of God in taking care of little Moses. If the child had not been placed among the flags just at the time and just in the place where he was, Pharaoh's daughter would not have seen him. If the babe had not wept, perhaps, she would not have had compassion on him. If the child's mother had not been ready at hand to nurse him, he might not have had the necessary care bestowed on him. But now, all these things meeting together, the babe is preserved, and becomes at last a good and great man; yea, the deliverer of his nation.

How remarkable was the care of God's providence over this child; and has not the same Providence been careful over you, my children? Though you have not been placed in the same circumstances as Moses, and God's providence has not been shown towards you in the extraordinary way it was to him, yet it was the same goodness of God that took care of your birth-it was God's goodness that caused you to be born, not under a cruel heathen king like Pharaoh, but in a Christian country-it was God's goodness that gave you kind and tender parents—it was God's goodness that preserved you during your infancy. Perhaps some of you have been saved from great dangers—

dangers as great as those of little Moses, though of a different kind; some of you, perhaps, have met with dreadful accidents, or have fallen into bad sicknesses, and it was God who kept you from dying. Observe also, children, that God notices in the text that Moses wept-Behold, the babe wept; an infant's tears are marked by God your heavenly Father. He knows all your little troubles, and dangers, and wants. He feeds the young ravens when they cry. You remember the hymn in which you thank God for being born a happy English child'.

"I was not born a little slave,

To labour in the sun,
And wish I were but in the

And all my labour done.

grave,

"I was not born without a home,

Or in some broken shed,
A gipsy baby, taught to roam,

And steal my daily bread."

Then follows the verse which I wish you

particularly to feel.

"My God, I thank thee, who has plann'd

A better lot for me,

And plac'd me in this happy land,

Where I may hear of thee."

Here I close my first remark. Observe the

The Negro Child.