The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant / Being a collection of select pieces from our best modern writers, calculated to eradicate vulgar prejudices and rusticity of manners, improve the understanding, rectify the will, purify the passions, direct the minds of youth to the pursuit of proper objects, and to facilitate their reading, writing, and speaking the English language with elegance and propriety

by John Hamilton Moore

8. If the feelings of your heart, whilst you read, correspond with those of mine whilst I write, I shall not be without the advantage of your partial affection, to give weight to my advice; for, believe me, my heart and eyes overflow with tenderness, when I tell you how warm and earnest my prayers are for your happiness here and hereafter.

Of Genesis.

9. I now proceed to give you some short sketches of the matter contained in the different books of the Bible, and of the course in which they ought to be read.

10. The first book, Genesis, contains the most grand, and, to us, the most interesting events, that ever happened in the universe: The creation of the world, and of man; the deplorable fall of man, from his first state of excellence and bliss, to the distressed condition in which we see all his descendants continue: The sentence of death pronounced on Adam and on all his race; with the reviving promise of that deliverance, which has since been wrought for us by our blessed Saviour: The account of the early state of the world; of the universal deluge: The division of mankind into different nations and languages: The story of Abraham, the founder of the Jewish people, whose unshaken faith and obedience, under the severest trial human nature could sustain, obtained such favour in the sight of God, that he vouchsafed to stile him his friend, and promised to make of his posterity a great nation; and that in his seed—that is, in one of his descendants—all the kingdoms of the earth should be blessed. This, you will easily see, refers to the Messiah, who was to be the blessing and deliverance of all nations.

11. It is amazing that the Jews, possessing this prophecy among many others, should have been so blinded by prejudice, as to have expected from, this great personage, only a temporal deliverance of their own nation from the subjection to which they were reduced under the Romans: It is equally amazing, that some Christians should, even now, confine the blessed effects of his appearance upon earth, to this or that particular sect or profession, when he is so clearly and emphatically described as the Saviour of the whole world.

12. The story of Abraham's proceeding to sacrifice his only son, at the command of God, is affecting in the highest degree, and sets forth a pattern of unlimited resignation, that every one ought to imitate in those trials of obedience under temptation, or of acquiescence under afflicting dispensations, which fall to their lot: of this we may be assured, that our trials will be always proportioned to the powers afforded us. If we have not Abraham's strength of mind, neither shall we be called upon to lift the bloody knife against the bosom of an only child; but, if the almighty arm should be lifted up against him, we must be ready to resign him, and all we hold dear, to the divine will.

13. This action of Abraham has been censured by some who do not attend to the distinction between obedience to a specified command, and the detestably cruel sacrifices of the heathens, who sometimes voluntarily, and without any divine injunctions, offered up their own children, under the notion of appeasing the anger of their gods. An absolute command from God himself—as in the case of Abraham—entirely alters the moral nature of the action; since he, and he only, has a perfect sight over the lives of his creatures, and may appoint whom he will, either angel or man, to be his instrument of destruction.

14. That it was really the voice of God which pronounced the command, and not a delusion, might be made certain to Abraham's mind, by means we do not comprehend, but which we know to be within the power of him who made our souls as well as bodies, and who can control and direct every faculty of the human mind: and we may be assured, that if he was pleased to reveal himself so miraculously, he would not leave a possibility of doubting whether it was a real or an imaginary revelation: thus the sacrifice of Abraham appears to be clear of all superstition, and, remains the noblest instance of religious faith and submission, that was ever given by a mere man: we cannot wonder that the blessings bestowed on him for it, should have been extended to his posterity.

15. This book proceeds with the history of Isaac, which becomes very interesting to us, from the touching scene I have mentioned—and, still more so, if we consider him as the type of our Saviour: it recounts his marriage with Rebecca—the birth and history of his two sons, Jacob,—the father of the twelve tribes, and Esau, the father of the Edomites or Idumeans—the exquisitively affecting story of Joseph and his brethren—and of his transplanting the Israelites into Egypt, who there multiplied to a great nation.