is to our own country, and in Ezekiel xxxviii. and xxxix. there seems to be evidence that it is so.

"And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down; the idols he shall utterly abolish." Then nothing can be more contemptible than the reception that these idols shall meet with; " they shall be cast to the moles and to the bats." I am told that in India it is a common expression for a Hindoo to say of a thing, "Fling it to the bats." It is a very common expression also in speaking of the ruin of a man's house to say, "It has been thrown to the bats;" the bat being unseemly, unprepossessing, the creature of the night, the inhabitant of old ruins and deserted homes. To fling a thing to the bats means to throw it away with disgust and contempt to utter ruin.

And man, it is said, shall go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, to hide himself, for fear of the Lord. And then the chapter closes with that most solemn and impressive admonition, "Cease ye from man ;" cease to hope from him, cease to trust in him; seek to do him good, to enlighten, to sanctify, to make him happy; but do not trust in him as if in the hour of trouble, in the time of death, before the great white throne, he could do you any good. "Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted of?"

JUDGMENTS AGAINST THE JEWS.

ISAIAH III.

In this chapter is described the utter overthrow of Jerusalem; an overthrow so complete, that the simple opinion that one was possessed of food and clothing, would create an eminence sufficient to cause a desire in the desolate remnant to appoint him king. This had a first accomplishment in the captivity by Nebuchadnezzar. Thus we read, 2 Kings xxiv. 14, 16, “And he carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valour, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and smiths: none remained, save the poorest sort of the people of the land. And all the men of might, even seven thousand, and craftsmen and smiths a thousand, all that were strong and apt for war, even them the king of Babylon brought captive to Babylon." The persons thus described as led captive are precisely those noticed by Isaiah; the mighty, the princes, the cunning workmen, the men of war. But it had a second fulfilment, and a more complete one, at the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. "The whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water was taken away." Hear what Josephus says,-" Many there were indeed who sold what they had for one measure; it was of wheat, if they were of the richer sort; but of barley, if they were poorer. When these had so done, they shut themselves up in the innermost rooms of their houses, and ate the corn

they had gotten." (Book v. c. x. § 2.) Again, after mentioning the completion of the circumvallation made by the army of Titus, he says,-" Then did the famine widen its progress, and devoured the people by whole families and houses; the upper rooms were full of women and children dying by famine; and the lanes of the city were full of the dead bodies of the aged; the children also and the young men wandered about the market-places like shadows, all swelled with the famine, and fell down dead, wheresoever their misery seized them." (Book v. c. xii. § 4.) In another place he adds,-"Now of those that perished by the famine in the city, the number was prodigious, and the miseries they underwent unspeakable; for if so much as the shadow of any kind of food did anywhere appear, a war was commenced presently; and the dearest friends fell a fighting with one another about it, snatching from each other the most miserable supports of life."

In the previous chapter we discovered that the children of Israel were placing their trust in man, and departing from the living God; that God called upon them also in the last verse of the chapter to cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted of? And then in this chapter he shows them the reasons why they should cease from man; first, that all their splendid political economy, in which they gloried, should be shattered into fragments, and turned upside down; secondly, that all their wealth should take wings and flee away; thirdly, that all their great men and their chief men should be overwhelmed in the approaching catastrophes; and lastly, that all their women,

the most beautiful, who loved the ornaments and the decorations of their persons more than they loved the ornaments of meek and quiet spirits, should also be cast out; and the whole land, Jerusalem herself, should sit like a widow on the ground, mourning and lamenting the calamities that had overtaken her. This being the summary of the chapter, we have in the first part of it the prediction of a judgment; that God would take away the stay and the staff; the loss of whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water; that is, that he would inflict famine. It is then predicted that he will take away the warrior, and therefore they shall be without a champion; the judge, and therefore in their disputes, and their quarrels, and their lawsuits, they will have no one to appeal to; the cunning artificer, and therefore that all the ornaments, and pomp, and splendour should disappear from want of those who fabricated them; and the eloquent orator, so that they should have no one to plead for them; and lastly, that he would give children to be their princes; not literally so, but men who had not the simplicity of children, but who had all their ignorance and inexperience; and the people should be oppressed by one another; and office shall sink into such unutterable contempt that when one is asked to take the highest office in the land he shall beg to be excused regarding it, as a thing not in itself honourable, or worthy of the occupation and the possession of the humblest.

Then in the 9th verse I may mention that there is a distinct reading given in the Septuagint Greek, which was the translation from the Old Testament Hebrew 300 years before the birth of our Lord; and

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that this other reading is quoted by Justin Martyr, the first eminent Christian writer of the second or rather of the first century; and next by Eusebius and others; and there is reason to believe, though it may be perhaps a dangerous, some would say a rash admission, that the Jews corrupted designedly the 9th verse, though it would be very difficult to prove it, because it testified so emphatically against themselves. At all events it is difficult to understand why it should be quoted in almost all these writers in different words from those in which it is quoted in the passage as we have read it here. It is here, "Woe unto their soul; for they have rewarded evil unto themselves;" words that are very difficult of construction or interpretation. But as quoted by Justin Martyr, as quoted by Eusebius, and if I mistake not also by Josephus, the Jewish historian, the words are, "Woe unto their souls, for they have killed the Just One." If so, it would explain some allusions in the Gospels. "Ye killed that Just One;" words that refer to our blessed Lord; and so singular that they seem allusive to some passage in the Old Testament, worded in some such way as that which I have quoted from the New Testament. If this reading be correct, it would be a prophecy that they would put to death the Holy and the Just One-that is, the Messiah; and that because of this they should receive the reward of their own works-their dispersion over all the earth, and their depression till they should say, "Hosanna, blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord."

Then we find at the close of the chapter fearful denunciations upon the daughters of Zion. What