meanwhile the advice of Jeremiah, by taking every precaution that the seed of Israel should not be diminished.* The imagination of pious writers of a later date delighted to represent the exiled Jews as giving way to apathy and vain regrets:  “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.  Upon the willows in the midst thereof we hanged up our harps.  For there they that led us captive required of us songs, and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.  How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?"**

     * Jer. xxix. 1-7.

     ** Ps. cxxxvii. 1-4.

This was true of the priests and scribes only.  A blank had been made in their existence from the moment when the conqueror had dragged them from the routine of daily rites which their duties in the temple service entailed upon them.  The hours which had been formerly devoted to their offices were now expended in bewailing the misfortunes of their nation, in accusing themselves and others, and in demanding what crime had merited this punishment, and why Jahveh, who had so often shown clemency to their forefathers, had not extended His forgiveness to them.  It was, however, by the long-suffering of God that His prophets, and particularly Ezekiel, were allowed to make known to them the true cause of their downfall.  The more Ezekiel in his retreat meditated upon their lot, the more did the past appear to him as a lamentable conflict between divine justice and Jewish iniquity.  At the time of their sojourn in Egypt, Jahveh had taken the house of Jacob under His protection, and in consideration of His help had merely demanded of them that they should be faithful to Him.  “Cast ye away every man the abominations of his eyes, and defile not yourselves with the idols of Egypt:  I am the Lord your God.”  The children of Israel, however, had never observed this easy condition, and this was the root of their ills; even before they were liberated from the yoke of Pharaoh, they had betrayed their Protector, and He had thought to punish them:  “But I wrought for My name’s sake, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations, among whom they were, in whose sight I made myself known unto them....  So I caused them to go forth out of the land of Egypt, and brought them into the wilderness.  And I gave them My statutes, and showed them My judgments, which if a man do, he shall live in them.  Moreover also I gave them My sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them... but the house of Israel rebelled against Me.”  As they had acted in Egypt, so they acted at the foot of Sinai, and again Jahveh could not bring Himself to destroy them; He confined Himself to decreeing that none of those who had offended Him should enter the Promised Land, and He extended His goodness to their children.  But these again showed themselves no wiser than their fathers; scarcely had they taken possession of the inheritance which had fallen to them, “a land