Alas! alas! it is the same sad story over and over again—“The murmurs of the wilderness.” It was all well enough to escape out of Egypt when the terrific judgments of God were falling upon it in rapid succession. At such a moment, there was but little attraction in the flesh-pots, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic, when they stood connected with the heavy plagues sent forth from the hand of an offended God. But now, the plagues are forgotten, and the flesh-pots alone remembered. “Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh-pots, and when we did eat bread to the full.” What language! Man would rather sit by the flesh-pots, in a land of death and darkness, than walk with God through the wilderness and eat bread from heaven. The Lord Himself had brought His glory down into connection with the very sand of the desert, because His redeemed were there. He had come down to bear with all their provocation—to “suffer their manners in the wilderness.” All this grace and exceeding condescension might well have called forth in them a spirit of grateful and humble subjection. But no; the very earliest appearance of trial was sufficient to elicit from them the cry, “Would to God we had died in the land of Egypt!” However, they were very speedily made to taste the bitter fruits of their murmuring spirit. “The Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died.” (Ver. 6.) The serpent was the _source_ of their discontent; and their condition, when bitten of the serpents, was well calculated to reveal to them the true _character_ of their discontent. If the Lord’s people will not walk happily and contentedly with Him, they must taste the power of the serpent—alas! a terrible power, in whatever way it may be experienced. The serpents’ bite brought Israel to a sense of their sin. “Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, ‘We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord, and against thee: pray unto the Lord, that He take away the serpents from us.’” (Ver. 7.)