themselves: they needed the constant appearance of burning and shining lights, and whenever these were withdrawn, they fell back without reluctance into their former darkness. In this respect their prophets were all in all to them; for their kings, without exception, were not such as they could look up to for guidance or encouragement in any godly course: there is not one of them who departed from that prime temptation of Israel, the idolatrous worship of the calves of Bethel; not one who had the honesty to recall his people from their state of schism, and to point out to them Jerusalem as the place where they ought to worship, and the invisible God as the single object to whom, whether permitted to go up thither or not, their religious adoration ought to be invariably directed. When rulers forsake their main duty to the people-provision for the pure worship of God-can they, with any colour of reasonableness, complain if they in their turn should be forsaken of him? Still God is merciful and long-suffering, and though he afflicts and chastises again and again, it is long before he utterly casts off even those who are little amended by his reproofs. Jeroboam, the son of Joash, was a king no better than his father. God, however, discerned some disposition in his people Israel to trust in him still, and blessed it by a decided interposition in their behalf, when oppressed by an invasion of the Hagarites and other eastern nations, who, as it would seem, had possessed themselves of a considerable portion of their land. "The Lord saw the affliction of Israel, that it was very bitter, for there was not any shut up, nor any left, nor any helper for Israel. And the Lord said not that he would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven: but he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam, the son of Joash."* On his 2 Kings xiv. 26, 27. * Y 66 The Syrian frontiers he recovered Damascus and Hamath for Israel; while on the east of Jordan, the men of Reuben, and Gad, and Manasseh, "made war with the Hagarites, and Jetur, and Nephish, and Nodab; and they were helped against them, and the Hagarites were delivered into their hand, and all that were with them; for they cried to God in the battle, and he was entreated of them, because they put their trust in him." And there fell down many of their enemies slain, because the war was of God." "And they dwelt in their steads until the captivity." records of these Israelitish victories may be transferred in a figure, as has been done by the apostle of Jesus, to our spiritual conflicts with the enemy of our souls: the weapons of our warfare are not carnal," St. Paul assures us, "but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds: we war not after the flesh," but through the Spirit which helpeth us, we are engaged in carrying on the battle within our own hearts," casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." Such wars are indeed of God; and in them every Christian is engaged to serve at the time of his baptism, when he is "signed with the sign of the cross, in token that hereafter he shall not be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified, and manfully to fight under his banner, against sin, the world, and the devil; and to continue Christ's faithful soldier and servant unto his life's end." Jeroboam the king, whose victories over the enemies of his country have led to these reflections, reigned forty-one years over Israel, and was succeeded on the throne by his son Zachariah, who occupied it for six months only, and was then cut off in a con *2 Kings xiv. 28. +1 Chron v. 18-22. * spiracy by Shallum, the son of Jabesh. He was the fourth of Jehu's line, and with him it ended. "This was the word of the Lord which he spake to Jehu, saying, Thy sons shall sit on the throne of Israel unto the fourth generation; and so it came to pass." God will make good his promises, however unworthy and ungrateful they show themselves to whom they have been made; but he is not pledged to do more, and they who despise the riches of his liberality, and are evil because he is good, will find at last that there remaineth nothing for them but " a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour all the adversaries of God." From which sad end may we through grace preserve ourselves, by taking earnest heed to the things which we have heard, and following their instructions with our whole heart. CHAP. XXXI. THE HISTORY OF JONAH. WHEN Elijah and Elisha, the prophets of God, had been taken from the scene of their earthly labours, the former by a miraculous elevation into heaven, the latter by the ordinary process of death at a good old age, the Lord did not leave himself without a witness in the land of his adoption, but continued to raise up from time to time meet successors to those gifted men, less remarkably endowed indeed for the most part with the power of working # 2 Kings xv. 12. ↑ Heb. x. 27. wonders, but not less suited to the special duties which it was given them to perform under his authority and direction. Of these, Jonah, the son of Amittai, offers himself in the first place to our contemplation that he lived in the times of which we have been speaking, is apparent from the fact, that when Jeroboam the son of Jehoash" restored the coast of Israel from the entering in of Hamath unto the sea of the plain," he did it "according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, which was of Gath-hepher."* Gath-hepher was a city of the tribe of Zebulun, situated in that district of country called afterwards Galilee of the Gentiles; a circumstance which, while it may serve to rebuke the ignorant malignity of those Pharisees, who out of their hatred to Christ, chose to affirm that "out of Galilee ariseth no prophet," was perhaps of importance in the case of Jonah, as tending to fit him, by familiarity with the manners and language of the heathen, for that extraordinary mission which God commanded him to undertake. We have hitherto seen the prophets of God exclusively engaged in discharging their appointed duties within the limits of the two kingdoms of Judah and Israel, or at the most, like Elisha, at Damascus, paying a brief visit to some neighbouring land: but Jonah, by command of God, was sent upon a distant journey, to a city comparatively unknown; to great Nineveh upon the river Tigris, at that time the capital of the Assyrian empire; a city covering a vast extent of surface, and containing a great multitude of inhabitants, and also much cattle. Into this mass of human beings, engaged in all their various occupations, and indulging in all their luxurious vices, * 1 Kings xiv. 25. ↑ John vii. 52. in a state of undisturbed security, the prophet of Israel was commanded to go, with an announcement of God's vengeance: he was to declare to them their wickedness and its speedy punishment: "within forty days," he was to tell them, "Nineveh shall be overthrown."* It does not seem to have been fear of the consequences, likely to result to himself from the indignation of the people, to whom he carried such a message, which deterred Jonah from conveying it his motive for drawing back seems rather to have been a persuasion, that God was too gracious and merciful ever to make good his threatenings against a set of men, however sinful, to such an extent as this; and therefore that, if he declared to them their destruction, his prophecy would not come to pass, and he should be scorned, and perhaps punished, as having spoken falsely in the name of the Lord. Accordingly, instead of reverentially submitting himself to do his will, he went down to Joppa, and took his passage in a ship bound for Tarshish, intending to flee from the presence of the Lord. Observe, in this striking instance of Jonah's conduct, a truth which shows itself more or less in the history of all God's merely human agents, that in selecting them to do his work, he neither found nor made them perfect; that they might possess the gift of prophecy, and many other supernatural endowments, consistently with a lamentable want as well of charity as of wisdom. This prophet, we may perceive, had his feelings of compassion and benevolence so deadened by self-love and vanity, that his fear was, not that millions of people should be swept from the face of the earth, but that they might not be so swept away, after he had prophesied that they should. He cared not how many perished, so that * Jonah iii. 4. |