brought order out of chaos at first. "He spake, and it was done," etc. Dy the same word, turning order into chaos again, shall all things be dissolved (2 Pet. iii. 101 11). It is little for the word that makes and unmakes, that created and will dissolve the frame of nature, to move in earthquake upheaval the solid crust of earth till it mimicks the roll of the sea., or "Nile's proud flood" in its rise and fall. 8. He dis- tributes the waten of the sea. The sea is the most stupendous natural object, There is majesty in all its moods, and awe in its very presence. Hence in the mythology a god was allocated to it., brother to Zeus, the god of heaven and earth, and second only to him in power. And God's •• way is in the sea." He rules its waves. He regulates its myriad currents and restless tides. Its great throbbing pulse beats but at his will. He holds its waters in the hollow of his hand, and concentrates or dis- perses them as it pleases him. He is a God, then, "whose wrath is terrible.n Every force of nature he not alone controls, but wields an instrument of his will. In eh. v. 8 the same fact is pled as an inducement to seek his favour, which here appears as a reason to dread his wrath. As the same locomotive will drive the train before it or draw it after it at the engineer's will, so the .fact of the omnipresent energy of God is fitted alike to alarm and to attract., but in eitb.er case to bring the sinner to his feet. III. PHYSICAL CONVULSIONS THE OOUNTEBPABTS OF MOBAL CONVULSIONS, Events in the two worlds happen according to similar if not identical laws. To a discriminating eye, the one set rises up in the likeness of the other, created so by God. "He daily buildeth his stories in the heavens when he raiseth up his saints from things below to heavenly places, presiding over them, ascending in them" (Pusey). "He toucheth the earth, and it melteth," when he stretches out his hand in wrath on its inhabitants, and men's hearts fail them for fea.r. "He calleth to the waters of the sea, and poureth them out over the earth," when he makes the wicked the rod of his anger to overrun and 'l"eJ: society (Ps. xciii. 3, 4). Verily the God who makes the heavens his throne, the earth his footstool, the elements his playthings, and men and angels his ministers, is a Being in whose favour is life a.nd whose power is terrible.
Vers. 7-10.-The exalted brought low. "Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father." And yet the blind and infatuate Israel were always saying it. They said it in view of every imminent catastrophe. They said it in abbreviation of all argument. They said it in lieu of fit and seasonable action. They made it an amulet to hang around their neck when they rushed purblind into rebellious action. They ran into it as into an intellectual joss-house, where any absurdity was raised to the dignity of a god. This last support of their false security the prophet in this passage knocks away. They had acted altogether out of character, and now- L .APOSTATE ISRAEL CAN ONLY TAKE RANK WITH THE HEATHEN IN Goo's ESTIMA.· TION. National election was, no doubt, a pledge of national preservation, but only in connection with national faithfulness; for: 1. .d spiritual relation with the unspirituaZ is impossibl,e, "What fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? " It is a moral impossibility. They a.re moral opposites and incompatible in the _nature of thinae. Becoming assimilated to the heathen, Israel contracted themselves out of the cove~ant, and became "afar off," even as they. 2 . .d relation, when it is repudiated on either side, virtually terminates. Israel had said, "We will not have this Man to rule over us;" and the relation of favour on the one side and fealty on the other could not survive the step. God must cease to be their God when they ceased to be his people. " God chose them that they might choose him. By casting him off as their Lord and God, they cast themselves off and out of hie protection. By estranging them- selves from God, they became as strangers in his eight" (Pusey). 3. .dcts done becaus, of a spiritual rewtion existing lose their meaning when it is broken off. "Have I not brought Israel," etc.? They might think that, after bringing them out of Egypt, God could never disown them, however unfilial and unfaithful. But had not the circum- stances of their idolatry and corruption altered the case? Theirs was not the only exud us. He had brought "the Philistines out of Caphtor, O.!ld the Syrians out of ~ir;" yet tl,ese nations were aliens, and to be destroyed (eh. i. 5). If Ierael conformed itself tu these in character and way, then Israel's ex0dus would lose its significance, and be llu more than «:Vents of a like kind in iLeir distant past. What the father did for thQ IIOn is no Li11diug precedeut for the case of the prodigaL 011. tx. 1-15.] 'l'llE BOOK OF AMOS. 183