At the time he was as near Jordan, and about as far from the Red Sea as he well could be. The expression “On this side Jordan” means in this verse _east_ of the river, but after the Israelites had come into the lot of their inheritance, “this side Jordan” meant _west_ of the river, and east of it was called “beyond Jordan” [Joshua, ix., 1, 10]. Judges, vii., 3. This is another geographical error. It is stated that Gideon ordered it to be proclaimed throughout his host that all who had no stomach for the pending fight with the Midianites were at liberty to depart early from Mount Gilead. Now, the encampment of Gideon was in the valley of Jezreel, west of the Jordan; whereas Mount Gilead is beyond Jordan, far away from the site of the battle. 2 Chron. xx., 35–37. This is a third example of geographical confusion, similar to those marvellous blunders of old Homer. The chronicler says that Jehoshaphat built ships in “Ezion-gaber to go to Tarshish.” Ezion-gaber was a harbour in the Red Sea, and Tarshish is generally supposed to be Tartessus, the famous Phœnician emporium near the mouth of the Guadalquiver, and not far from the modern Cadiz. It was far more than the navigators of Jewry could have accomplished to sail from the Red Sea to Spain, and certainly Jehoshaphat would not have chosen that harbour for building ships for the Mediterranean. Prov. vi., 6–8; xxx., 25. Solomon says: “Go to the ant, thou sluggard—which provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.” No doubt it was a vulgar error of very wide diffusion that ants feed upon corn, and lay up a store of grain in harvest time for winter use. Pliny, Ælian, Ovid, Virgil, Horace, {44} and several in our own country, have endorsed the instruction of Solomon, but what is the real fact? In the first place, ants are dormant in winter; and in the next place, they do not feed upon corn, but chiefly on animal food. What Solomon and others supposed to be grains of corn are in reality the cocoons which they bring out of their nests in fine weather to air, and after they have exposed them to the sun they carry them back again. Efforts have been made to prove that there is a species of ant which lives on grain; but even if such could be found, it is not the exception, but the rule which must characterise the animal. No one would say to a person, you are “white as a rose,” or “black as a cherry;” though there are white roses and black cherries. In all proverbial expressions and general allusions, the ordinary character is referred to, and not the exceptions. Matt, xiii., 31, 32; Mark, iv., 31, 32. Jesus said: “A grain of mustard-seed . . . is the least of all seeds, but when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.”