"brake down the altars of the Baalim in his presence; and the sun-images that were on high above them he hewed down; and the Asherim, and the graven images, and the molten images, he brake in pieces, and made dust of them, and strewed it upon the graves of them that had sacrificed unto them, and purged Judah, and Jerusalem." It was at this time that the decline in the fortunes of Assyria set in. Esarhaddon and his successor, Ashurbanipal, preserved a semblance of holding the empire together; but it was not for long. Built up by mercenaries, whose fighting was for pay and not for their country, the weak rulers who followed Ashurbanipal on the throne in Nineveh hurled the empire quickly to its fall. Even in the last days of the cultured and illustrious Ashurbanipal the outlying provinces of Assyria became independent. The Assyrian governors were slowly withdrawn from the tributaries along the Mediterranean Sea, and Judah, always ready to resist a foreign yoke, began to feel its independence. Josiah added to his territory most of what had been the kingdom of Israel and reigned over a country that nearly equalled in size that of David and Solomon. This good fortune of Judah, perhaps more than anything else, convinced the king that God was again favoring his nation, and that, therefore, it was time to remove from his dominions all those things that were abominations in the sight of God. Now, it is one thing to cleanse a land of its outward show of idolatrous worship and abominable practices and another to purge the hearts and minds of a people that have been sotted with these for more than two generations. To do the latter never entered into Josiah's calculations. He didn't even give it a thought. But the uselessness of outward reforms, without inward chastening, did not escape the deep-thinking Jeremiah. It was evident to him that Josiah was only scratching the surface and he wanted to come to the well-meaning king's help. Notwithstanding his call and his conviction that his life work as a prophet had been determined upon even before his birth, Jeremiah was yet too timid to take up his burden among the people until the word of God came to him a second time, saying: "Gird up thy loins and arise, Speak to them all that I command thee, Do not be terrified before them, lest I terrify thee in their presence; For behold, I myself make thee this day a fortified city, And a brazen wall against the kings of Judah, its princes, and the common people. And they shall fight against thee, but they will not overcome thee, For I am with thee to deliver thee." So Jeremiah's course was not to be smooth and easy! He would encounter opposition from the common people, the princes, the king himself! But there was no turning back for him now! Though his heart was heavy, it was determined. Jeremiah went down to Jerusalem to preach. His first pleadings were in line with Josiah's reforms: