This suggestion was agreeable to all. With Hilkiah as leader of the delegation, they came to Huldah, bringing the request from the King. Her face lighted up benignly when she had read the book, but when she thought of the reply she had to send back, her brows knitted and wrinkles of care and pain showed in her face. Returning the scroll to Shaphan, Huldah said: "Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel; Tell ye the man that sent you unto me: Thus saith the Lord, 'Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the curses that are written in the book which they have read before the king of Judah. Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their bands; therefore is my wrath poured out upon this place and it shall not be quenched.' "But unto the King of Judah, who sent you to inquire of the Lord, thus shall ye say to him: 'Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel: As touching the words which thou hast heard, because thy heart was tender, and thou didst humble thyself before God, when thou heardest his words against this place and against the inhabitants thereof, and hast humbled thyself before me and hast rent thy clothes and wept before me; I also have heard thee, saith the Lord. Behold, I will gather thee to thy fathers and thou shalt be gathered to thy grave in peace, neither shall thine eyes see all the evil that I will bring upon this place and upon the inhabitants thereof.'" The good prophetess knew that what happens to individuals must happen to whole nations. Here was a people that had been adding evil to evil and transgression to transgression for many generations. Just as a person who keeps on sinning and sinning, without reforming in his heart and in his deeds, arrives at a time when, no matter how anxious he is to turn from his evil ways, it is too late and he must finally pay the penalty for his misspent life, so this nation of Judah, into the very heart of which the cancer of wrongdoing had long been eating, could not, at this late date, escape its final destruction. But it is different, as the Prophetess Huldah expressed it, with individuals who turn from their evil paths while they are young, or who, like Josiah, attempt to do the right thing in the very midst of evil. Therefore, she could send back the message to the king, that he, because of the tenderness of his heart, because of his humility before God, because of his unquestioned effort to act in accordance with God's commandments, would return unto the God who sent him here before the evil days were to come upon the land, before the doom that awaited his people would encompass them. The king had been anxiously awaiting the return of his messengers, when they arrived at the palace from the house of the Prophetess. They were quickly ushered into the throne room.