Exodus 19:12

By this symbolical injunction God designed,

1. To restrain men's curious and bold inquiries into the things of God.

2. To possess the Israelites then present, and all succeeding generations, with the dread and reverence of the Divine Majesty, and of his holy law.

3. To prepare and inure the people to the obedience of God's commands, even when they discern not the reasons of them.

4. To make them sensible of their own impurity and infirmity, and of their absolute need of a mediator, through whom they might have access to God. See Galatians 3:19.