I. BEoAUBE OF BUMAN CBANGEFULNEBS. Men do not continue ahvaye of one mind. They make promises, and regret that they have made them, and find some way of e,caping their force, or else boldly break them with a cynical disregard to what others may think or say. 'l'heir interests change, or the views that they take of them ; and tlie wise policy of t-0-<lay seems foolishness, or even madness, to-morrow. Some men nre actuated by mere caprice, and have no sooner effected a desired purpose than it loses favour in their eyes, and seems to them of little worth. 'fhey will make heavy 1;11crifices to obtain an alliance, and none to maintain it. They sigh always for some- thing that they have not, and despise what they have. Human protection is nlwaye uncert.a.i.n, owing to the fickleness of man, who is naturally "double~minded," and "unstable in all his ways " ( J as. i. 8). II. BECAUSE OF POSSIBLE INSUFFICIENCY. The human protector may, with the best intentions in the world, prove insufficient. Syria and Ammon summoned Assyria to their aid when they contended with David (2 Sam. x. 6, 16; Ps. lxxxiii. 8); but the result was the entire defeat of the confederate army. Hannibal called on Macedonia to assist him against the Romans; but Macedonia proved too weak, and her efforts resulted in her own subjection. There must, in almost every case, be the risk that the pro- tector, though doing all he can, may fail, and our having called him in exasperate, or even infuriate, our adversary. III. BECAUSE OF HUMAN GREED AND SELFISHNESS. The protector may become, is only too apt to become, the oppressor and the conqueror. Rome's vast empire was built up largely by taking states under her protection, and then absorbing them. Had Egypt succeeded in defeating Assyria, and rolling back the tide of invasion that had so long been ril:.i.ng higher and higher, and threatening her own independence and that- of her neighbours, the result would simply have been that Judrea and Samaria would have been absorbed into Egypt, or at any rate have become Egyptian dependencies. The sma.1.1 state that calls in one powerful kingdom to help her in her struggle against another rarely gains anything more than an exchange of masters. IV. BECAUSE THE GREATEST RUMAN STRENGTH IS POWERLESS AGAIS'ST Gon. The Egyptians were "men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit" (ver. •3). Had all the chariots of Egypt come forth, and all their footmen and all their horsemen,. they would not have saved Judah, since God had declared that here there was" no work for Egypt" (eh. xix. 15), and that Judah, if she trusted in Egypt, "should be ashamed of Ethiopia their expectation, and of Egypt their glory" ( eh. xx. 5). God can strike an army with blindness, as he did that of Benha.dad (2 Kings vi. 18) on one occasion; or with panic fear, as he did that of the same monarch on another (2 Kings vii. 6); or he can ea.use quarrel to break out among the constituent parts of an army, and make the soldiers slay one another (2 Chron. xx. 23); or he can send out a destroying angel, and kill a hundred and eighty thousand men in a night (2 Kings xix. 35). Again, the God of battles determines the issue of battles. "It is nothing to him to help, whether with, many or with them that have no power" (2 Chron. xiv. 11). He can cast down and bring to nought the mightiest human protector; he can save, if he wills to save, by his own angelic e.rmy, without the intervention of any human aid at all. Ver. 9.-The rock of .Assyria and the Rock of Israel. In each case the "rock" was tI) the refuge, stronghold, and main reliance of the people; (2) a person, not an inac- cessible heiuht or a fortress; (3) the recognized monarch and master of the nation. But in all ~ther respects the contrast between the two was extreme, the difference immeasurable. L AssYB.U's Bocx-SENNACIIEBIB. A man, a weak, fallible, ephemeral man-the creature of an hour-mortal, soon wearied, needing rest and sleep, liable to sickness, daily losing strength, approaching nearer and nearer to the grave. And not only a man, but a wicked man-proud, cruel, contemptuous of his foes, blasphemous towards God, merciless, pitiless! WLat a poor object on which to place reliance, trust, dependence I No doubt to the Assyrians he seemed a grand fignre, seated on hie throne of carved cedar and ivory, receiving tribute from kings and princes, and sur- rounded by his army of perhaps two hundred thousand men. But of what avail was bis grandeur? He could not save a single soldier out of the two hundred thousand frolll an ache or a poi,), if God sept_ them-no, i:ior from death \teelf, if their live• were cm. Xlll, 1-9.J THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. 513
required by the Most High. To-night Sennacherib liee down to rest, confident of victory, his camp gu1Hded on every side by nigh a quarter of a million of strong warriors. To-morrow he is woke up by a sound of universal wailing. More than a hundred and eighty thousand of his soldiers are dead in their tents. His chances of victory are clean gone; nnd in half an hour he is an alarmed and trembling fugitive. II. IsnAEL'B RooK-JEIIOVAH. God, and not man-the Strong One, everlasting he that "inbabiteth eternity" (cb. lvii. 15), that is never wearied, that needs not to slumber ot sleep, that knowe no sickness, that never loses etrengbb, that has "neither beginning of daye nor end of life" (Heb. vii. 3). And One who to all this might adds tenderness, and the deepest love of his own, and the genUest care of them. A Rock, but not bard or rugged-a Refuge from all foes, a Shadow from the heat, a Refreshment to the weary, a Help to those in need. God is able to save all men, not only from death, but from all suffering or unhappiness. There is no foe that can daunt him, none from whom he will have to flee. And he is willing to save all. Only let them "return to him" (ver. 6), "cry to him" (eh. xxx. 19), trust in him, wait on him. He is indeed a "great Rock" (eh. xxxii. 2), a "strong Rock " (Ps. xxxi 2), even "the Rock of our salvation" (Ps. lxxxix. 26),