trifling and bombast. They had no pleasure in the exercises of true piety; and it might be were even afraid directly to invoke Jehovah. It was the neglect of the latter by themselves and their idolatrous followers which had entailed the present evils npon Judah. The prophet points out, therefore, the true method of discovering the will of God, and of restoring, not only the vessels to the temple, but the exiles to their land. II. THEm PRETENSIONS WOULD BE TESTED BY THE EFFICACY OF THEIR INTERCES- SION, 'l'his is the most disinterested form of prayer. By betaking themselves to it, instead of prophesying lies, they would do real service to the nation. Because he who can effectually intercede: 1. Is a source of blessing to all who are about him. He has true sympathy and insight, and can bring down forgiveness even upon the undeserving. The grandest promises of Holy Scripture are encouragements to this practice. 2. Is thereby acknowledged and accepted by God. As Elijah provoked with a similar challenge the prophets of Baal, so Jeremiah taunts his enemies with their spiritual impotency, The restoration of the vessels under the circumstances would be nothing short of a miracle, and supernatural aid would be required. He alone is truly graat .who can prevail with God, And the greatest of the prophets is he who makes inter- cession for mankind according to the Divine will.-M. Vers. 1-11.-Jehovah's consideration towards some neighboors of Israel, I. GoD FORESEES THE NATURAL PROBABILITY OF A STRUGGLE. Nebuchadnezzar and his hosts are not to drop from the clouds on the land of Jehovah's people whom Jehovah has now doomed. These hosts come from a distant land, and have many intervening lands to pass through; and how can they pass through in any but a destroying, impoverishing fashion? If the King of Babylon is to reach Jerusalem, the lands here mentioned must assuredly suffer from him scarcely less than Judah itself. And naturally they will prepare to meet him. Alliances will be formed ; resources will be accumulated ; the greatest strain will be put on every one in order to make the defence successful. These attacked people cannot assume that, because Babylon is such a mighty power, it is folly to think of resisting it. Thus they seem to have sent to Zedekiah, hoping to make a confederation strong enough to drive the invader back. II. NATURAL AB THE STRUGGLE MIGHT BE, IT WAS DOOMED TO CERTAIN FAILURE, Doomed, not because it was the strength of many against the weakness of few, but because God's great purposes required that any scheme of defence should be a failure. If the defenders had become as the invaders in point of strength, and the invaders as the defenders, this apparently decisive exchange of resources would have left the result unaffected. III. The struggle, therefore, being vain beyond all doubt, THE TRUE WISDOM WAB NOT EVEN TO ATTEMPT IT. These nations, persevering in a vnin struggle, wore only com- mitting self-slaughter. If the issue had been in any way uncertain, self-respect would have said " fight." But the issue was clear; and to make it clear and impres- sive by some visible symbol, God commands his prophet to send these yokes to the kings of the nations by their messengers. When the yoke is seen on the neck of the ox labouring at the plough or drawing the waggon, that yoke signifies, not only sub- mission, but a submission that is inevitable. The ox is made for the service of man, and although when young it may rebel and defy for a while, it must submit at last. The superior intelligence and the ordained master cannot but conquer. And what the ox is in the hands of man, that every nation, even the strongest and bravest, is in the hands of God. Babylon, conqueror and spoiler as it was, was no more free from God's yoke than any of the nations it defeated. It is quite compatible with the carrying out of God's great purpose that there should be the most strikiug disparities in the temporal conditions of both individuals and nations. '!'hat Babylon should be tho victor and these other nations the vanquished, was in his eyes a ro11.tter of very secondary moment. He cannot recognize, as a state of things to obt11.in even a modified permanence, that any nation should have the right to any particular territory. Men count it a great matter that they can show a title, 11.s they call it, to a piece of land. Thi,; simply means that for the purposes of present society it is better for one particular person to have the piece of land than any one else. But wars and revolutions make short work of these so-called rights of property, The Lord has given the earth in trust to the human race, and one division he puts here and another there, one man 580 THE BOOK OF 'l'HE PROPHET JEREMIAH. [OH. XXVIII. 1-17.
here and another there. From the throne where Jehovah sits in his righteousneee, human patriotism and mere territorial pride are esteemed as nothing more _than the feelings of ignorant children. We also,_ as taught of God, must beco~e lees m~reeted in the traditions and rivalries of the kmgdoms of earth, and more mterested m that f-'J"eat procedure of God by which the whole earth will become a part of the kingdom of heaven.-Y.