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that, as often as I have read it, it never appeared to me in any other, than that of an honeft and over-flowing gratitude for favours received: nor do I believe I ever fhould have had fagacity enough to fee it in any other, if the penetrating Mr. Bayle had not taught me to look upon it in the light of bribery. He doth not, indeed, brand it by fo harsh a name; he hath the goodness to abate of his usual severity to David on this occafion, and to call it only a gaining of the chief men (of his tribe) by prefents; at the fame time distinguishing the phrase by capitals, left it should not fufficiently be noticed.

I thank GOD, that he hath formed me with a plain, and unrefining fight, that fees things only as they are fhewn to me, and as they shine out in their natural light.

I READ in the text, that David fent presents to his friends; and I always imagined, that friends were perfons already gained to our intereft; and I imagined, that David had merit enough with the whole realm of Ifrael, to make fome of them his friends, without bribery. I read, that the rovers the Amalekites had fpoiled the South

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of

of Judah; and I did not know but David had a mind to make his friends fome reparation for the damages they had fuftained: I read also, that he had fent presents to the Ferahmeelites and Kenites, and all the places where he and his men were wont to haunt ; and I imagine, to this day, that if he had nothing but felf-intereft in view, he had better have confined his favours to those of his own country.

EVERY one hath heard enough of bribing for fome years paft; and yet, as little fcrupulous as fome men are of their cenfures upon that head, (how juftly I neither mean to say, nor infinuate) I don't remember to have heard any man charged with bribing for an election before the borough was vacant, or the member fick, or the parliament diffolved. And if any man, in fuch an interval, fhould, upon fome remarkable turn of fortune in his favour, fend fome presents to fome near relations, or particular friends of that borough, to whom he was known to be greatly obliged, I can never be brought to believe, that fuch a conduct could justify the paffing of a vote of corruption and bribery

upon

him.

CHAP.

CHAP. XXV.

The Battle of Mount Gilboa.

HE reader will, I believe, now think

TH

it high time that we resume the thread of our history, as far as it relates to Saul.

SAUL, as I humbly apprehend, was not long returned to his camp before the Philiftines attacked it, and, after some time, gained it. There is no doubt but that he and his fons made all the refiftance that might be expected from fuch great captains, and fuch valiant men; but to no purpose: when the Philistines had once forced their intrenchments, they bore down all before them..

AFTER a confiderable flaughter the Ifraelites fled; and Saul and his fons fled with the reft: but in vain ; for the enemy prefs'd so close upon them, that Jonathan and his brethren were flain. Saul was yet alive, but faint, weary, and wounded; and, defpairing to outgo his purfuers, he called to his armour-bearer to difpatch him, left he

*

Abinadab, and Malchifhua.

fhould

should fall alive into the enemy's hands: Draw thy fword, (faid he) and thrust me through therewith, left these uncircumcifed thrust me through, and abuse me: which his armour-bearer dreading to do, he himself took the sword, and fell upon it, and died ; and his armour-bearer quickly followed his example, and died by his fide.

No fooner did the Ifraelites of the adjacent vale fee the battle go against Saul, but they deferted their cities in the utmost consternation; which the Philistines quickly seized.

WHEN the Philistines came the next day to strip the flain, the text tells us, they found Saul and his fons fallen upon mount Gilboa ; and they cut off his head, and stripped off his armour, and sent into the land of the Philiftines round about, to publish it in the house of their idols, and among their people, that publick thanksgivings might be made to their gods throughout the whole country.

His head they faftened in the temple of Dagon*, after they had ftript off the hair and flesh; and they put his armour in the houfe of Afhteroth, (these were their great idols, different in shape, but agreeing in the I Chron. X. 10.

lewd

lewd ceremonials of their worship) and his body they fastened to the wall of Beth-shan ; as they did those of his fons alfo. How they disposed of their heads and arms, is not faid : but it is to be prefumed, that they also were difpofed of in like manner with those of their father.

I AM now at leisure, and I hope the reader is fo too, to make fome reflections upon this battle; and to confider fome objections in relation to the preceding history.

IN the first place, then, I think it evident, from many concurring circumstances, that Saul was now attacked in his camp.

In the next place; I think it is as evident, from the tenor of the hiftory, that he could not be long returned to his camp before the Philistines attacked it.

AND, thirdly; I think it highly probable, that they were encouraged to this attempt, by fome fecret information of Saul's having ftollen out of the camp the evening before, with his general, (for Abner is fupposed to have been one of his attendants) and another person: 1, Because an intelligence of that kind was not hard to be had; and,

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