indeed, they hear him denounce many threatenings against the ungodly : but they will not believe that he will execute them. They hear him, too, promising many things to his humble and obedient people : but they cannot persuade themselves that he will fulfil them. They imagine that he has, as it were, " for- saken the earth0 :" and quite contented are they that he should do so, since the very thought of his presence would disquiet them. Thus do they, in fact, " say like the fool, ' There is no Godd.'"
Not that this is the language of their lips : they would be ashamed to avow such sentiments as these. But it is the lan- guage of their hearts : " they say in their hearts, The Lord will not do good; neither will he do evil." If they believed in their hearts the promises and threatenings of God, they would manifest a suitable regard to them in their lives : but, as they neither delight themselves in the one, nor tremble at the other, they shew beyond all doubt what the secret feeling of their hearts is, and that the construction which God puts upon their conduct is true. They may be moral and decent in their out- ward conduct ; but radically in their hearts they are " Atheists in the world e."]
After this view of the persons described in our text, we shall not wonder at,
II. The judgments denounced against them —
Two things God declares in the words before us ;
1. That however hidden they may suppose their state to be, God will search it out —
[The Jews at the passover would search every corner of their houses with candles, in order to find the smallest portion of leaven which might lie concealed : and God will search with candles, not Jerusalem only, but every place, yea and every heart, to find the abominations which have been just described. They may not betray themselves by any overt acts, so as to excite the attention of men : they may even exist where all the outward conduct is correct; even as the most offensive masses of corruption are hid under a whited sepulchre. But God will not be deceived by any appearances, however specious ; " The darkness is no darkness with him; but the night is as clear as the day:" before him all things are naked and opened : the thoughts and intents of the heart are discerned by him : and " he will make manifest its most hidden counsels." " He searcheth the heart, and trieth the reins," and " weigheth the spirit" as in a balance; and will interpret as infallibly the
c Ezek. viii. 12. d Ps. xiv. 1.
e Eph. ii. 12. See the Greek.
c c 2