_Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion_[322]--it is a proud and overweening ease which the word expresses--_and that trust in the mount of Samaria! Men of mark of the first of the peoples_--ironically, for that is Israel's opinion of itself--_and to them do the house of Israel resort!_...[323] _Ye that put off the day of calamity_[324] _and draw near the sessions of injustice_[325]--an epigram and proverb, for it is the universal way of men to wish and fancy far away the very crisis that their sins are hastening on. Isaiah described this same generation as drawing iniquity with cords of hypocrisy, and sin as it were with a cart-rope! _That lie on ivory diwans and sprawl on their couches_--another luxurious custom, which filled this rude shepherd with contempt--_and eat lambs from the flock and calves from the midst of the stall_[326]--that is, only the most delicate of meats--_who prate_ or _purr_ or _babble to the sound of the viol, and as if they were David_ himself _invent for them instruments of song;_[327] _who drink wine by ewerfuls--waterpotfuls--and anoint with the finest of oil--yet never do they grieve at the havoc of Joseph!_ The havoc is the moral havoc, for the social structure of Israel is obviously still secure.[328] The rich are indifferent to it; they have wealth, art, patriotism, religion, but neither heart for the poverty nor conscience for the sin of their people. We know their kind! They are always with us, who live well and imagine they are proportionally clever and refined. They have their political zeal, will rally to an election when the interests of their class or their trade is in danger. They have a robust and exuberant patriotism, talk grandly of commerce, empire and the national destiny; but for the real woes and sores of the people, the poverty, the overwork, the drunkenness, the dissoluteness, which more affect a nation's life than anything else, they have no pity and no care.