Ver.12.-Unparalleled woe. 'fhe prophecy here rises into poetry. The captured and afflicted city is personified. Like a woman bereaved and desolate and lonely, bewail- ing her misfortunes, and pouring out the anguii!h of her heart, Jerusalem sits in her solitary desolation and contempt, and calls upon bystanders to remark her sad condition, and to offer their sympathy to unequalled anguish. I. THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF SORROW, DESOLATION, AND SHAME. How extreme is the distress and humiliation here depicted is apparent from the fa.et that this language has been attributed to our Divine Saviour when hanging upon the cross of Calvary. If a city never endured sorrow like that of Jerusalem, certainly no human being ever experienced agonies so piercing as those which the Captain of our salvation willingly bore for our sake when he gave his life a ransom for many. •• All ye that pass by, To the Se.viour draw nigh; To you is•it nothing that Jesus should die_? For sins not his own He died to atone; Was pain or was sorrow like his ever known ?n II. THE ADMISSION THAT AFFLICTION 1B OF DIVINE APPOI~TMEb""T, THAT IT IS CHASTISEMENT. When Jerusalem came to herself she could not fail to recognize a Divine hand in the miseries which befell her. The scourge was the army of the Cha.1- deans, but the hand was the righteous and retributive hand of the Eternal. It is too common for those who a.re in trouble to murmur against Providence, to exclaim against the injustice of providential appointments. Yet trne wisdom points out that the path of submission and resignation is the right path. When once the mind is brought to acknowledge, "It is the Lord I " there is a prospect of spiritual improvement. III. THE ORY FOB SYMPATHY. By a striking figure of speech, Jerusalem is repre- sented as calling upon surrounding nations for interest and compassion. "Is it nothing to you? . . . Behold, and see I" Human sympathy is welcome in seasons of sorrow. Yet true help e.nd deliverance must be from God, and from God a.lone. It is better to ca.11 upon the Lord than to-call upon man; for he is both ready to sympathize and mighty to save.-T. Ver.18.-" The Lord is righteous." In nothing is the distinction more marked between rcliaions of human origin and device and the religion which is the revelation of infinite Wi~dom and Truth, than in the views they re!l1'6ctively afford of the moral character and attributes of Deity. Whilst the heathen freely attribute to their gods qualities 12 THE LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH. [ott. I, 1-22,
which l\re detest.l\ble in man, the Scriptures represent the Supreme as perfectly right, eou~. The aoknowledgment here made by Jeremiah was made by Moses, by Nehemiah, by Daniel, and indeed is virtually, if not verbally, made by the writer of every book of the Old 'l'estament. And the new covenant is based upon the revelation of a righteous Ruler and Father. l. Goo IS RIGHTEOUS IN HIS CHARA0TER. It is certainly no progress, but 8 retro- gression towards ignorance and barbarism, to represent the supreme Intelligence as destitute of moral attributes, exercised in the fulfilment of wise and benevolent pur- y,oses. Affliction and anguish sometimes obscure men's judgment of the character and the dealings of God. It was not so with Jeremiah, who, in lamenting the troubles of his nation and of himself, did not distort the representation he gave to his countrymen of the attributes of the Most High. II. Goo IS RIGHTEOUS IN ms LAW. The theocratic government of the Hebrews was based upon the just character and the holy Law of the eternal King. To some minds the reflection might have seemed inappropriate and unwelcome in the depth of disaster. But a true prophet, a true religious teacher, feels bound to set forth the fact that the rule under which men live as individuals and as communities is a righteous rule; the justice of the Law abides although that Law he broken, and although its penalties be incurred and endured. III. Gon IS RIGHTEOUS IN ms RETRIBUTION. This is probably the thought most prominent in the text. The fate of Jerusalem was a h!U'd fate, a lamentable fate, but it was not an unjust fate. The people reaped as they had sown. An onlooker might readily have acknowledged this, but it was a merit in a sufferer so to do. For the chastened to confess the justice of their chastisement is a proof that already the chas- tening is not in vain.-T.