That the hill of the Lord’s temple shall be established on the top of the mountains, And it shall be exalted above the hills, And nations shall flow unto it; And many people shall come and say, Come and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah, And to the house of the God of Jacob, That he may teach us of his ways And we may walk in his paths. For the law shall go forth from Zion And the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge among many people, And be arbiter of strong nations afar off. They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, And their spears into pruninghooks; Nation shall not lift up the sword against nation Neither shall they learn war any more. But they shall sit every man under his own vine and under his figtree And none shall make them afraid: For the mouth of the Lord of Hosts has spoken it. Micah iii. iv. “Such prophets as these spoke in the days of Hezekiah, a weak but pious man. When indeed could the word of prophecy be more seasonable or more needed? The doctrine of retribution was now fully developed. Israel had ceased to be; Judah still existed, through the piety of her kings. Had the prophet to speak of judgment—he had only to point to the hills of Ephraim, and to her sons on the banks of Chebar; was the faithfulness of Jehovah—and his recompense of obedience, the theme;—the seed of David still sat upon the throne of Judah, while so many dynasties had successively occupied that of Israel. But there was another occasion for a prophet: for danger threatened on all sides, and Sennacherib with his immense host besieged Jerusalem. To-day the army of the conqueror stood around the terrified city and its trembling king. He goes dejected to the house of the Lord, spreads out before him the letters and demands of the haughty invader, and prays to Jehovah. Isaiah, the prophet, declares to him, ‘He shall not come into this city; for I will defend it to save it, for mine own sake and for David my servant’s sake.’[53] And in the morning Sennacherib flees before the angel of the Lord, who had smitten his host during the night. But Jehovah, who was so benign towards those that called upon him in humility, showed himself equally severe towards the proud. When Hezekiah, thoughtless and vain, had shown his treasures to the Babylonians, a nation then of little account in comparison with the Assyrians, Isaiah appears before him, and says, ‘Behold the time cometh, when all that is in thine house and all that thy fathers have collected unto this day shall be carried away to Babylon, nothing shall remain saith Jehovah.’[54] Footnote 53: 2 Kings xix. 33, 34. Footnote 54: Isaiah xxxix.