you with blasting and mildew: the palmer-worm hath devoured the increase of your gardens and your vineyards, and your figtrees and your olive-trees; yet have ye not returned unto me, saith YAHVEH. I have sent among you the pestilence; your young men have I slain with the sword, and I have taken away your horses; and I have made the stench of your camps to come. up to your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith YAHVEH. I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet ye have not returned unto me, saith YAHVEH. Therefore, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel." (Amos ii.-iv.)

"And YAHVEH said to Hosea, Go, take to thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from YAHVEH. So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim; who conceived, and bare him a son. And YAHVEH said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel [2 Kings x.] upon the house of Jehu, and will cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel. And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.

"And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And he said unto him, Call her name Lo-ruhamah [Not having obtained merey]: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away. (But I will have mercy upon the honse of Judah, and will save them by YAHVEH their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen.") [Isa. xxxvi., xxxvii.]

"Now when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived, and bare a son. And he said, Call his name Lo-Ammi [Not my people]: for ye are not my people, and I will not be [' 7, I, not I WILL BE] your God." (Hosea i.)

The fulfilment of these prophecies commenced in the reign of Pekah the son of Remaliah, who sat on the throne in Samaria twenty years, beginning B.C. 757. About B.c.740, "came Tiglathpileser, king of Assyria, and took Ijon (1 Kings xv. 20), and Abel-beth-maachah (1 Kings xv. 20), and Janoah, and Kedosh (Judg. iv. 6), and Hazor (Josh. xix. 36), and Gilead (Deut. iii. 12, 13), and Galilee (1 Kings ix. 11; Isa. ix. 1), all the land of Naph

tali, and carried them captive to Assyria." (2 Kings xv. 29.) "The God of Israel stirred up the spirit of Tilgath-pilneser, king of Assyria, and he carried them away (even the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh), and brought them unto Halah, and Habor, and Hara, and to the river Gozan." (1 Chron. v. 26.) Thus, the tribes east of the Jordan, and Naphtali, the first northern tribe adjacent to the captured half-Manasseh, being all on the border, and more readily taken than the others, were the first to be swept by the Assyrian beyond the Euphrates.

After this captivity, a brief respite was given to the remaining tribes; but in the reign of Hoshea, who came to the throne about B.C. 728, "Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, came up against him: and Hoshea became his servant and gave him tribute. And the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea: for he had sent messengers to So, king of Egypt, and brought no present to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year: therefore the king of Assyria shut him up, and bound him in prison. Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea (B.C. 719) the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes." (2 Kings xvii. 3-6, xviii. 9-11.) "YAHVEH was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah only. (Also Judah kept not the commandments of YAHVEH their God, but walked in the statutes of Israel which they made.) And YAHVEH rejected all the seed of Israel, and afflicted them, and delivered them into the hand of spoilers, until he had cast them out of his sight. So was Israel carried away out of their own land to Assyria." (2 Kings xvii. 18–23.)

About B.C. 598, Judah came to her day of judgment. "At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up against Jerusalem, and the city was besieged. And Jehoiachin, the king of Judah, went out to the king of Babylon, he, and his mother, and his servants, and his princes, and his officers. And the king of Babylon carried out thence all the treasures of the house of YAHVEH, and the treasures of the king's house. And he carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the

mighty men of valor, ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and smiths: none remained, save the poorest, sort of the people of the land. And he carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, and the king's mother, and the king's wives, and his officers, and the mighty of the land. And the king of Babylon made Mattaniah his father's brother king in his stead, and changed his name to Zedekiah." (2 Kings xxiv.)

"Zedekiah reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. And he did evil in the sight of YAHVEH." (2 Kings xxiv. 18, 19.) Against him went forth the word of YAHVEH by Ezekiel the captive prophet: "And thou, profane wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come, when iniquity shall have an end, Thus saith the Lord YAHVEH, Remove the diadem, and take off the crown; perverted, perverted, perverted will I make it; and it shall be no more, until HE come whose right it is; and I WILL GIVE IT him." (Ezek. xxi. 25-27.)

"Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon. And it came to pass, in the ninth year of his reign, that Nebuchadnezzar came against Jerusalem. And the city was besieged unto the eleventh year of king Zedekiah. And the famine prevailed in the city. And the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled by night. And the army of the Chaldees pursued after the king, and overtook him in the plains of Jericho: and all his army were scattered from him. And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon. And Nebuzaradan, servant of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem, and burnt the house of YAHVEH, and the king's house, and all the houses of Jerusalem, even every great house, burnt he with fire. And all the army of the Chaldees brake down the walls of Jerusalem round about. And the rest of the people that were left in the city, and the fugitives that fell away to the king of Babylon, with the remnant of the multitude, did Nebuzaradan carry away. But he left of the poor of the land,-vinedressers and husbandmen. And over the people that remained, Nebuchadnezzar made Gedaliah the son of Ahikam ruler. But it came to pass, that Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, of the seed royal, came, and ten men with him, and smote Gedaliah, that he died, and the Jews and the Chaldees that were with him at Mizpah. And all

the people, both small and great, arose, and came to Egypt: for they were afraid of the Chaldees." (2 Kings xxv.)

Thus was the scattering of Israel effected. "Israel," said Jeremiah the prophet, "is a scattered sheep, the lions have driven him away; first the king of Assyria hath devoured him, and last this Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon hath broken his bones." (Jer. 1. 17.)

And Israel was permanently scattered; for although there was a restoration of the Jews from Babylon in the days and under the protection of Cyrus the Persian and his successors, yet Israel, the great body of Jacob's seed, did not return. And until the seed of Joseph returns, "the power of the holy people" must remain scattered (Dan. xii. 7); for "the birthright was given to Joseph." (1 Chron. v. 1, 2.)

Ephraim, the holder of the birthright, and Manasseh his brother, pushed the ten tribes to the ends of the earth, according to the prediction of Moses. (Deut. xxxiii. 17.) They departed, to be "wanderers among the nations," never to come back until the words of YAHVEH by Jeremiah should be fulfilled. "Behold, I will bring them from the north country, and gather them from the coasts of the earth, and with them the blind and the lame, the woman with child and her that travaileth with child together: a great company shall return thither. They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble; for I am a Father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first born. Hear the word of YAHVEн, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock. Thus saith YAHVEH, A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children, refused to be comforted for her children, because they were not. Thus saith YAHVEH; Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears; for thy work shall be rewarded, saith YAHVEH; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy. And there is hope in thine end, saith YAHVEH, that thy children shall come again to their own border." (Jer. xxxi.)

THE GOOD SHEPHERD.

"ISRAEL is a scattered sheep;" who will gather him? "I!" saith YAHVEH. "Thus saith the Lord YAHVEн, Behold, I! even I! will care for my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country. I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel. And I will set up one Shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David; he shall feed them, and he shall be their Shepherd. And I, YAHVEH, WILL BE their God, and my servant David shall be Prince among them: I, YAHVEH, have spoken. Thus shall they know that I, YAHVEH, their God, am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people, saith the Lord YAHVEH. And ye my flock, the flock of my pasture, are men, and I am your God, saith the Lord YAHVEH.” (Ezek. xxxiv.)

By whom will YAHVEH gather Israel? "Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye peoples from far: YAHVEH hath called me. from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath he hid me, and hath made me a polished shaft. In his quiver hath he hid me; and hath said unto me, Thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. YAHVEH hath formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him." (Isa. xlix. 1–3, 5.)

Who speaks? Who, but the "one altogether lovely"? Who, but "the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Shoot of David"? Was he not "called from the womb"? Was his name not mentioned from the bowels of his mother? "As his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was discovered to be with child." And "the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto