&elf-sacrifico for the good of his country which marked the career of Ehud and Gideon. What, however, is here especially to be remarked and treasured up in our minds is, that the cup of prosperity and joy which God's goodness had mixed for Jephtbah was turned into a cup of bitterness by his own perverse folly and rashness and ignorance of God's grace. See what great things Gori had done for him. He hod delivered him from his life of lawlessness; he had placed him in a high and honourable e.~tate; he had brought him from banishment to the land and house of his fathers; he had filled him with his Spirit, and mightily strengthened him for his great task; he had gone fo1th with his army, and driven his enemies before his face, and crowned him with victory. Jephthah returned to his home as the deliverer of his country, the restorer of peace to the homesteads of Gilead, all glittering with success and glory. Nor was he wanting in sources of a softer and tenderer happiness. A bright and loving spirit, full of affection and joyous sympathy, overflowing with dutiful pride and beaming sympathy, was awaiting his return. His daughter, the light of his home, the solace of his cares, was there to welcome him and to double his happiness by sharing it. And as he looked forward to the future, he might hope to see her the mother of children who would perpetuate his name and his race. Such was his lot as God had prepared it for him_ His own rash and perverse act, springing from a culpable ignorance of the character of God, and directed by heathen super- stition and cruelty instead of by trust in the love and mercy of Jehovah, poured an ingredient of extreme bitterness into this cup of joy and poisoned his whole life. The hour of triumph was turned into desolation, the bright home was made a house of mourning, what should have been years of peace and hononr were turned into years of trouble and despair, and Jephthah had no one but himself to blame for this lamentable reverse. Alas, how often we can match this scene by similar instances of human perverseness embittering the sweet cup of life! A nation's career is checked by crime, or cruelty, or treachery; an individual's life is marred by some act of ungodliness which entails a life-long harvest of bitter fruits; domestic enjoyment is destroyed by the sins of selfishness and self-willed folly. Bountiful gifts of a gracious Providence, wealth and abundance, splendid opportunities for good, intel- lectual endowments, rare talents, or, in humbler life, openings for advancement and usefulness which might have led to distinction, are through the perverse folly of their possessors worse than wasted, and dark shadows are thrown across what should have been the brightness of a happy life. And then men speak of their bad luck, and murmur against the providence of God; as if one could sow the wind and not reap the whirlwind, or cut off the shadow of sin, remorse and shame and death.
HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vera. 29-33.-The spirit of sacred warfare. There is much at which the modern reader stumbles in the stories of Old Testament warfare. The pitilessness, the assumption that all the right of the question between the belligerents is on one ijide, the carnage even to extermination, are all repugnant to modern feeling. It is well to look at the Divine background and relation of these wars: therein, and therein alone, will be found their apology, if apology be forthcoming. In the Ammonite war of Jephthah- I. JUSTIFICATION IS FOUND IN THAT, ON THE LOWEST GROUNP, IT WAS A WAR OF SELF- PRESEllVATION j AND, ON THE HIGHEST, JSRAEL WAS DEFINITELY AND AUTHORITATIVELY IDENTJFrnD 'WITH THE CAUSE OF Goo's TRUTH AND RIGHTEOUSNESS, AND APPOINTED TUE INSTRUMENT OF HIS JUDGMENTS. In a sense there was II no quarter" in these wars. The claims of the foes of God's people were of the most extreme and exacting character. The barbarians had no pity. It would have been of small moment to them to have II utterly cut off" every man, woman, and child. The greatest crimes were perpetrated by them on the smallest provocntion ; and they could not be trusted. There was one argument, and one alone, that could be understood-the sword- But there were also weighty interests represented by Israel, for the sake of which it was pre-eminently important that it should continue to exist, and that under conditions of freedom and religion. It was its mission to reveal the will of God to 128 THE DOOK OF JUDGES. [CH. XI, 29-40,