Of two facts we may be very sure. (1) They had no help from God. Their wonders were not wrought by God’s power. We may put this denial on two independent grounds:――――(a.) The moral purpose of their work utterly forbids the least participation on God’s part. God never fights against himself.――――(b.) Their power was infinitely less than divine. Compared with God’s, it was shown to be simple weakness. “Aaron’s rod swallowed up their rods.” Before the plague of lice they were compelled to succumb, and (utterly against their will and against their interest) they declare to Pharaoh――“This is the finger of God”! It utterly distances all our skill. We can not approach it. Before the boils, they writhed in agony. They could not even screen themselves from the terrible infliction. Moreover it is made plain throughout the whole transaction that they were powerless to remove even the slightest of these plagues. If they had possessed this power Pharaoh would have put them to this service. It is plain they shrank from even the attempt. The whole scene was a competition between God’s power as manifested through his servants, Moses and Aaron, and the power of Egypt’s magicians――resulting in most overwhelming proof that the latter had not the first element of God’s power in it.――――It follows therefore that if the magicians had extra-human help――if they had any power beyond human skill, _they obtained it from Satan_. We may readily suppose they were in league with him, working according to his will. He may have sharpened their wits by his influence, helped their arts by his suggestions, and possibly may have given them superhuman aid in the line of physical power. It is not given to us to know the exact limits of his power to aid his servants. It is not essential that we should know precisely where these limits are. We know enough to impress the injunction――“Be sober, be vigilant, because of your adversary the devil” (1 Pet. 5: 8). It may always be our consolation that whenever he matches his power or his skill against the Almighty, he will come off, as, in the case before us, utterly worsted in the fight, overwhelmed with defeat and shame. * * * * * 4. Some attention should be given to the divine purpose and policy in shaping the demand made upon Pharaoh to let the people go.――――The point of special importance here is one which has been thought to involve the question of strict moral honesty――it being claimed that the divine demand at first ran on this wise: “Let us go three days’ journey into the wilderness that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God” (Ex. 3: 18)――leaving Pharaoh to assume that, this being granted, they would return to his service. The facts on this point are: (1.) It was never promised or even intimated that they would return. If Pharaoh construed the words of God and of Moses to imply this, he did so on his own responsibility.