no doubt most true. For all Abaz paid and with those of Syria, of whioh Damascus we.a bribed out of tbe sacrilegiously employed capital. Their names were Rimmou, •rttbrim- treasure of the temple, out of the deprecia- mon, H11.d0.d, e.nd some others. Perhaps ting and partieJ dismantling of '' the house no verse in Chronicles is more typiool of of the )dng," and out of the begged contri- the epeoie.l moral aspects and aims of the butions or taxee extortionately \'\Tung "of writer. the princes" (see the euooinct account of Ver. 24.-This verse (oomJ?leted, indeed, next verse, and compare the parallel in its by the verse following) heightens to its vers. 8, I 8), he bought e. master for himself, climax the description of the guilt of Ah[l.Z, servitude. tributa.riness, a.nd the humilie.- which grew to me.dness. Vere. 17, 18 of the tion of disgrace itself. The temporary relief parallel enlarge our view of what Ahnz did he obte.ined (and whioh the writer of Chro- in the way of destruction, relating his nicles in no we.y means to deny) from one mutilation of the bases e.ud !aver and sea, enemy rivetted round hie neok the yoke of after also the displacement of the brazen another and greater. And worse than this, altar in favour of that the pattern of which he secured in hie own heart the greatest he had sent from De.masons to Urijah the adversary of all-a. restless, implacable foe, priest, who must he.ve been a consenting which ever goaded him on to worse folly party to the iniquity. Our eh. xxx. 14 and deeper sin. speaks of the time the.t came when these "Ver. 21.-Add to references of last vnse wicked steps of king and priest began to be eh. xvi. 2; 2 Kings xii. 18; xnii. 15. Bnt retraced, and, with the previous verses of he helped him not. See the parallel in its same chapter, are the sad but interesting ver. 9 (2 Kings xvi.), and note on onr fore- reverse of the pres·eut pnsenge. The 1Dodern going verse. Jews commemorate, by the observance of a. Ver. 22.-This is that lung Aha.z. Ex- fast, this mournful crisis of Judah's history. punge the words in italic type. Revised Ver. 26.-The book of the kings of Judah Version, this same King Ahaz. But the most and Israel. Pe.re.llel (ver. 19), "the book lit.ersl rendering will be the most forcible: of the chronicles of the kings of Judah." He, the King .AJwz. Ver. 27.--Slept with his fathers , , , buried Ver. 23.-B:e sa.cri1ioed unto the gods of . . . in the oity, . . . Jerusalem . , . not Damasc11S, which smote him. The writer brought into the sepulchres of the kings, must be understood to speak from the point Pa.re.llel (ver. 20), "slept with his fathers of 'l'iew of Ahaz, in putting it, that it was . . . buried with his fathers in the city of "the gods of Damaecns who smote." The David." Sea our notes on eh. xxvi. 23 formula, all Israel, is a clear instance of how (parallel, 2 Kings xv. 7); xxiv. 25 (parallel, the name " Israel" is need as "Judah." The 2 Kings xii. 21); xxi. 20 (parallel, 2 Kings god.ii of DamaBcu.B were, of course, the same viii. 24).
HOMILETICS. Vers. 1-27.-" This King .Ahaz:" the "progress" of a, king lite,·ally devoid of religion. In such words, the significance of which no one can mistake, is the royal person who is the chief subject of this chapter pointed to (ver. 22), Ahaz is the bad son of a good father. He is a type of those who begin badly, who are untaught by experience, who grow worse by suffering and adversity, and who end by maddening themselves, to their own destruction! The career of his father J otham is written, u.pparently, without a. fault, and _without a reflecti?n to be cast on him; t~e career of this son is written, npparently, without one redeemmg feature to be put to his account. The contents of this chapter look like a series of pictures, marking a royal progress in wrongness, and which, in the issue, led to a very insanity of irreligion I In this pro- gress notice how the king- I. FoRSOOK THE RIGHT MoDEL. To be not " like his father David" was at once to waut the stamp of a true royalty. 'l'o be "like the kings of Israel," the schismatic line, was to be stamped with the stamp of a base and ungenuino royalty. 'l'his description (ver. 2) of "the ways" in which Judah's king "walked" was, indeed, on the other band, a fearful characterization for that same schismatic line of Israel. For Ahaz however thus to be, and be described, as at the beginniog of his reign, when he was ~!ready ar~ived at the twenty-fifth year of his age, was an evil, anyway, of that worst calamity, viz. hope for an altered future almost hopelessly shut out I The augury proved too true. Aha.z counts for nothing :Moses, as well as "hiA father David." He ~yskm.atica.lly "framed mischief by" his own" law," aod the law of heathendom. ou. xxvm. 1-27.J 'fHE &ECOND BOOK OF THE CHRONICLES. 335