But the Lord of hosts has revealed himself in mine ears: Surely this iniquity shall not be expiated for you till ye die.

Behold, joy and gladness.' Huge sacrifices to procure God's deliverance passing over into mere merrymaking and debauchery (Duhm), or great sacrifices of thanksgiving for deliverance already obtained (Skinner)? Either is awkward. For if the former, the 'joy and gladness' are unnatural and forced, and yet this is scarcely indicated in the text; if the latter, the words 'for to-morrow we shall die' need the somewhat strained interpretation: the revellers may well have been conscious that their escape had only procured for them a precarious respite.'

sure. come.

'Eat and drink (in the Authorized Version, "let us eat and drink"), for to-morrow we shall die.' Perhaps this famous proverb of despair was already current in Isaiah's day, and is a quotation even to him. One thing is sure. The proverb, 'Eat and drink, for to-morrow we die,' is the advice of those who have cared for little more than eating or drinking their whole lives long. He who cares for higher things and labours in their service will not cease to labour, rather will he be braced to greater effort, because he knows that his time on earth is short. In one sense we all die 'to-morrow,' for if when we die is uncertain, that we die is A few years less, a few years more: to one end we all must There is no good reason why our hands and hearts and minds should become slacker because in the fullness of youth and of strength we were told that we had but one year more to live. Rather should we seek to make the most, in the best sense of the words, of the few short months that were still allotted to us. If we were worth our salt before the solemn summons came, we should not lose courage after it. The summons would be a test of our true character. And another thing is also certain, that no one who trusts in God and realizes him in his daily life would, or could say, Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. If reason and righteousness be the true principles by which the universe is governed (albeit that the facts of life often seem to belie our faith), the advice of the proverb is the advice of fools and knaves. Mr. Ruskin says truly: The shortness of life is not, to any rational person, a conclusive reason for wasting the space of it which may be granted him; nor does the anticipation of death, to-morrow, suggest, to any one but a drunkard, the expediency of drunkenness to-day.' Even a day spent in the service of goodness is worth having, if God be in the background. Years are but made up of days, and none realize better than the most devoted servants of duty and of God how small is the interval between

A RIGHTEOUS KING

355

themselves and death. Life is not more worth living well because there are a few more years to live it in; it is not less worth living well because there are a few less. For, apart from all hope of personal immortality, it is a belief in the permanent reality of goodness and of truth, as conditioned and confirmed by the permanence and reality of God, which gives us the assurance that it is both abundantly worth while, as well as our privilege and duty, to labour in the service of goodness and of truth, whether our engagement is to be measured by months or by years.

§14. The ideal ruler.—We now return to the prophecies contained in chapters xxviii to xxxiii. If the whole, or the first part, of the thirteenth section be genuine, it is best to assign it to Isaiah's old age, and we need not suppose that it was added by himself to his own collection of prophecies in this particular group. It will then form one of those Messianic' vaticinations of the Golden Age which, as we have seen, Professor Duhm retains for Isaiah and Professor Cheyne rejects. So here the latter regards the whole section as post-exilic; the former 'brackets' only the second half, which he regards as a sort of commentary upon the ethical terms of the first. The beneficent purpose of the true ruler is finely conceived. Surely Ruskin must somewhere have quoted the words? They are wholly in his spirit, and in Plato's.

Behold, a king shall reign according to righteousness,
And princes according to justice.

And each of them shall be as a hiding-place from the wind,
As a covert from the tempest;

As rivers of water in a dry place,

As the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. And the eyes of them that see shall not be closed, And the ears of them that hear shall hearken.

And the heart of the hasty shall understand knowledge, And the tongue of the stammerers shall hasten to speak clearly.

The fool shall no more be called noble,

Nor the intriguer said to be gentle.

[For the fool speaketh folly,

And his heart deviseth iniquity,

To practise impiety,

And to speak error against the Lord,

To make empty the soul of the hungry,

And to cause the drink of the thirsty to fail.

And the intriguer, his tricks are wicked;
He planneth evil devices,

To destroy the poor with lying words,

Even when the needy speaketh what is right. But the noble planneth noble things,

And in noble things doth he persist.]

§ 15. A fertile soil and a righteous people.-The fourteenth section is wholly disconnected with what precedes it, and it is itself composed of two separate parts only artificially connected with each other. The first of these is a 'threatening oration addressed to the women of Jerusalem.' If it is Isaiah's, it had best be assigned (with Professor Duhm) to his early period, when he anticipated, as he anticipates here, the complete destruction of the capital. Later on he realized that this utter overthrow was for his time at any rate mercifully cancelled, and so we get the later predictions of Zion's inviolability and of the Assyrian defeat. The second division is a fresh and brief delineation of the Messianic times of happiness, when through the grace and spirit of God righteousness and peace shall reign supreme. Fertility of the soil is co-ordinated (as a blessing from God) with the higher gifts of righteousness and justice. In form as well as in substance this division differs from the denunciation of the 'careless women,' and it would seem that some words are wanting at its commencement. An editorial link of a single word (until') connects it, tant bien que mal, as the French would say, with its present environment. If Isaiah's, as Professor Duhm holds, it may have been written at about the same period as the passage concerning the 'righteous king' to which we have just listened. Professor Cheyne brackets' the whole section, regarding it as post-exilic.

Rise up, ye women that are at ease, hear my voice;
Ye careless daughters, give ear unto my speech.

For a year and a day shudder, ye careless women :

For the vintage hath failed, the fruit harvest cometh not. Tremble, ye women that are at ease; shudder, ye careless

ones:

Strip you, and make you bare;

Gird sackcloth upon your loins, and smite upon your breasts, For the pleasant fields, the fruitful vine,

For the land of my people, which is filled with thorns and briers,

Yea, for all the houses of rejoicing in the exulting city.

RIGHTEOUSNESS AND PEACE

357

For the palace is forsaken, the tumult of the city is a solitude; The Hill and the Watch Tower are become bare spaces for ever,

A joy of wild asses, a pasture of flocks.

[Until] there shall be poured out

A spirit upon us from on high,

And the wild pasture shall become garden land,
And the garden land shall be counted for forest.
And justice shall dwell in the pasture,

And righteousness shall inhabit the garden land.
And the work of righteousness shall be peace,

And the effect of righteousness quietness and confidence for ever.

And my people shall dwell in an habitation of peace,
And in dwellings of security.

Happy are ye who may sow beside all waters,

Who may send forth freely the foot of the ox and the ass.

§ 16. Present trouble and future glory. The last section of our group is formed by what is now the thirty-third chapter of the book. It is a sort of prayer and prophecy in one, in all probability of post-exilic date, appended to the group to make it close with glad anticipations of peace and prosperity.

[Woe to thee, O Spoiler, that wast not spoiled,

And thou Robber, who wast not robbed;

When thou shalt cease to spoil, thou shalt be spoiled,
When thou shalt have made an end of robbing, thou shalt

be robbed.

O Lord, be gracious unto us; we hope in thee;

Be thou our arm every morning,

Our salvation in the time of trouble.

At the sound of the tumult the peoples flee;

At the lifting up of thyself the nations are scattered; And spoil is carried off like the carrying off of locusts, As the running of locusts, they run upon it.

The Lord is exalted; for he dwelleth on high;

He hath filled Zion with judgement and righteousness. And the stability of thy times shall be a store of salvation, Wisdom and knowledge and the fear of the Lord (?).

Behold, the valiant ones (?) cry without,
The ambassadors of peace weep bitterly.

He hath broken the covenant, despised the witnesses,
He hath regarded no man.

The earth mourneth and languisheth;

Lebanon is ashamed and withereth away.

Sharon is become as the prairie;

Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.

'Now will I arise,' saith the Lord;

'Now will I be exalted; now will I lift myself up. Ye conceive chaff, and bring forth stubble;

Your breath is a fire which devoureth you. And peoples shall be burnt to lime;

Thorns cut up that kindle in the fire. They that are far hear what I do;

They that are near acknowledge my might.'

The sinners in Zion are afraid;

Trembling seizeth the impious:

'Who among us can dwell with devouring fire?

Who amongst us can dwell with everlasting burnings? He that walketh in righteousness and speaketh uprightly; He that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his hands from holding of bribes,

That stoppeth his ears from hearing of bloodguiltiness, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil

He shall dwell on high, rock fortresses shall be his refuge; His bread is appointed, his water assured.

Thine eyes shall see the king in his beauty; they shall behold a far stretching land. Thine heart shall muse on the terror: where is he that reckoned? where is he that weighed? where is he that counted the towers?

The insolent people thou shalt no longer see, the people whose speech is too deep to be understood, of a stammering tongue without meaning.

Thine eyes shall see Jerusalem a quiet habitation, a tent that shall not be moved, whose stakes shall never be pulled out, and whose cords shall not be broken. And there is unto us the stream of the Lord (?), instead of broad-armed rivers; no oared galley shall go thereon, no proud ship shall traverse it.

For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; he will save us. Then is prey of spoil divided in abundance; the lame shall plunder. And the