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Therefore, God says, what they trust in shall be like a bowing wall, a wall that begins to sink, to lose its perpendicular, remains in a very precarious condition; very soon an extra pressure upon it will come, and the wall will give way, and you will be overwhelmed and crushed by its fall. "For thus saith the Lord, In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength; and ye would not!" How very like that remarkable sentence, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered together thy children as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not." The sentence of Isaiah, "In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and confidence shall be your strength," is excessively like the words pronounced by our Lord, “Jerusalem, if thou hadst known the things that belong to thy peace;" what is the word Jerusalem? Jerusalem, "the vision of peace;" and our Lord takes the name, and says, "If, Jerusalem, thou vision of peace, thou hadst only seen what is the true peace, and the only vision of peace, then it had been well with thee; but ye would not." In rest, in quietness, in confidence, in true peace, under the wings of the Prince of Peace, would have been your protection and your peace; but ye would not. And now what is the consequence? Your trust shall deceive you. "One thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one;" you shall be scattered and driven before your enemies. And yet, notwithstanding all this, God will not cast you off. What a gracious God have we to deal with! He has put up with this

people during times, and generations, and ages. The Gentiles have afflicted them; they have been trodden under foot; they have been scattered among all nations; and yet what does he say? "Therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you; and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you. For the people shall dwell in Zion at Jerusalem." I believe that God's ancient people shall be restored to Palestine. I believe that Jerusalem shall be the capital, the beauty, the joy, the admiration of the whole earth. I believe that corresponding to their deep depression shall be the magnificence and splendour of their rise; and that they shall yet return to Jerusalem, and in Jerusalem they shall praise and magnify him whom their fathers crucified: "Thou shalt weep," in the words of the 19th verse, "no more; he will be very gracious unto thee at the voice of thy cry; when he shall hear it, he will answer thee. And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers; and thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left." Now this is a prophecy of grace, of guidance, of restoration. But how unfair it is, now, when you look at the headings of the chapters of our authorized version of the Bible in Isaiah, how unfair is it for the Christian to seize all these beautiful passages, and say, That belongs to me; and to tell the Jew that in these bright promises he has no interest; and then, when you come to the curse pronounced on the Jew

in Isaiah, you fling that to the Jew, and tell him, That is your heritage; that is for you. Now that is not fair; you most selfishly take the promises of Isaiah to yourselves, and you say, That is for us; but the curse you most uncharitably fling in the face of the Jew, and say, That is for you. Now I believe the curse and the blessing are both for him. True, underlying each is what refers to Christians, or converted men, as such; but that does not prevent us regarding the whole subject as national; and whilst we admit that the Jew is the victim of the great curse pronounced here, we ought also to admit, what I think is irresistible and consistent, that the Jew also is to be the inheritor of the grand blessing which God also has promised to him, and pronounced by the mouth of Isaiah; and that literally in Jerusalem "the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days;" perfect light; " and there shall be upon every high mountain, and upon every high hill, rivers and streams of waters;" and God's anger will be turned away from them, and his gracious voice will be heard, and he will shine before his ancients gloriously. Now I believe all that is not only certain, but near: how near, it is impossible to say that it is not far distant, all phenomena, all signs, all dates, all calculations show.

And then the close of the chapter is judgment pronounced upon some adversary. "Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared; he hath made it deep and large: the pile thereof is fire and much wood; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it." Now these words seem iden

tical with the statement in the Book of Revelation. "The beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and that worshipped his image; these both were cast alive into a lake of fire, burning with brimstone." And therefore the words here of the prophet seem to relate to that day when all opposition shall be destroyed, when all that defileth shall be cast out; when nothing that God has made shall be destroyed, but whatever Satan has introduced at the fall shall be handed over to Satan again, and his own momentary victory on earth shall be the elements of that fire, of that brimstone, and lake of fire into which he shall be cast, and where he and the fallen. angels shall suffer for ever and for ever.

THIS chapter is plainly a prediction of the glory that is to be revealed, interspersed with allusions to the earnest of it in the present peace, prosperity, and joy of the people of God. It begins with the promise, "A king." "Thou art the King of Glory;' "Thou sayest that I am what I am, a king;" "A king shall reign," not in iniquity, but "in righteousness;" and under him "princes," rulers, magistrates, shall judge justly, and "shall rule in judgment."

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And then, speaking of our present economy, and of what Christ is in it, he adds, "A man shall be as an hiding place from the wind;" so that the fierce winds of judgment shall not beat upon you; "and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place." "Jesus stood and said, If any man thirst, let him come and drink." He is truly a river of water in a dry place; he is a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat; as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." Many have felt in a warm country, and amidst the fervour of a June or a July sun, what a rich treat a grey limestone or a granite. rock is, sheltering you from the burning sun, and what a coolness there is within the area of its shadow. That very coolness, that very peace, that very shelter, is to be enjoyed in its spiritual, and therefore its highest sense, from our having a retreat in him who is the Rock of ages, the Prince of peace, the Refuge of his people. In other words, the prophet exhausts the choicest imagery and the most expressive in setting before us not only the safety, for that is the lowest, and humblest, and most meagre estimate of Christianity, but the joys, the happiness, the peace, the conscious refreshment of that man who has found a shelter under the shadow of the Rock of ages, and a retreat in the clefts of that Rock who is the refuge of his people.

The prophet predicts, "The eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear shall hearken." He expresses it in another passage in these words: "All thy children shall be taught of the Lord." Many people have eyes, but see not,