With this narrative we are bound to take the section of the Book entitled _Of the Prophets_, XXIII. 9-32. The text is in parts uncertain, and includes obvious expansions. These removed, we can fairly distinguish a continuous metrical form up to 29, with the exception perhaps of 25-27. The metre is sometimes irregular enough to raise the suggestion(530) that the whole is rhetorical prose, between which and metre proper it is often hard, as we have seen, to draw the line. But we have also learned how often and how naturally irregular, when the subject requires it, Jeremiah’s metres tend to become. So I have ventured, with the help of the Greek, to render the whole as metre, in which form are parts beyond doubt. Verses 18 and 30-32 are in prose, and both, but more probably the former, may be later additions, as are 19, 20, and clauses in 9, 10. There is no reason against taking the remainder as Oracles by Jeremiah himself. No dates are given them; they probably come from various stages of his ministry, for he early found out the false prophets, and his experience of them and their errors lasted to the end. But probably this collection of the Oracles was made under Ṣedekiah; that Baruch gathered it still later is not so likely. Of the prophets:— XXIII. 9 Broken my heart within me, All pithless my bones. I’m become like a drunken man Like a wight overcome with wine.(531) Of adulterers the land is full 10 Their course it is evil,(532) Their might not right. For prophet and priest alike 11 Are utterly godless.(533) E’en in My House their evil I find— Rede of the Lord. Therefore their way shall they have 12 In slippery places, Thrust shall they be into darkness(534) And fall therein, When I bring calamity on them, The year of their visitation. In Samaria’s prophets I saw the unseemly, 13 By Baal they prophesied.(535) In Jerusalem’s prophets I see the horrible— 14 Adultery, walking in lies. They strengthen the hands of ill-doers, That none from his wickedness turns. To Me they are all like Sodom, Like Gomorra her(536) dwellers! Therefore thus saith the Lord:(537) 15 Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, And drug them with poison.(538) For forth from Jerusalem’s prophets Godlessness starts o’er the land. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts 16 Hearken not to the words of the prophets They make them bubbles,(539) A vision from their hearts they speak, Not from the mouth of the Lord. Saying to the scorners of His(540) Word 17 “Peace shall be yours;” To all who follow their stubborn hearts “No evil shall reach you!” 18. [For who hath stood in the council of the Lord and hath seen His Word? Who hath attended and heard?](541)