_July 23._--The Pasha has just sent me a fish, with his compliments, and a request that I will dress it for him: this is the way he collects the daily provisions for his household; one person sends him a dish of rice, another a dish of kebaub, another bread; at other times all this takes place because of custom, but now from necessity, for he has no servants scarcely to attend to him. This is the first time I have been so honoured, and when the fish was cooked and sent, he desired the servant to come back, and bring him a few kustawee dates to eat with it; that, however, you may not think these any very extravagant luxury, I may add, their value is somewhat less than a penny a pound. I note this as a little trait of manners that one would hardly credit, had not the fact come under his own observation.
_July 24._ _Lord's Day._--Nothing among the perverted use of scriptural terms has ever struck me as more remarkable than the use the Church now makes of the expression, tempting God. In God's word it is uniformly placed among the sins of unbelief; but the Church now, by universal consent, places it among the sins of presumption, to which it is the very antipodes. For instance, it is one of the great crimes of Israel, their tempting God in the desert, and limiting the Holy One of Israel. How? By presumptuous confidence? No--but by saying he hath given bread, but _can he give meat_ also? This is the only sense I know in scripture given to tempting God, and that famous passage from which the erroneous impression has mainly sprung, in the interview of Satan with our Lord, is quite kindred. The object of Satan was to get our Lord's mind into a condition of doubting God, by leading him to argue, God has certainly said so, but will he do it? for our blessed Lord was manifestly as much tempting God by attempting to walk upon the water, as to cast himself into the air. What proves this to be the meaning is our Lord's quotation, "It is written, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." Now, where is this written? Why, in the Old Testament, where it uniformly implies doubt and distrust; in Exod. xvii. 2. "Therefore the people did chide with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me? Wherefore do ye tempt the Lord? And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel; and because they tempted the Lord, saying, _Is the Lord among us, or not?_" (verse 7.) And it is in reference to this very passage, that in Deut. vi. 16. it is said "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God, as ye tempted him in Massah." And that we may not have a doubt of the meaning, see the application of the word tempting, as applied to our dear and blessed Lord. Is it ever in the sense of presumptuous confidence? Never; but always of scepticism and doubt. I do not mean to say there is not such a sin as presumptuous confidence; I am sure there is; but that is never called tempting God. The Israelites were guilty of this sin, when they went up contrary to the command of God to fight their enemies, after he had pronounced upon them the forty years wandering in the wilderness.