vices; when they have anchored their entire confidence upon certain men and certain teachings which are in perfect harmony with their own aims in life and their own selfish predilections, they are not only disturbed and distressed but often enraged by a demonstration that they are lulled in a false security. And anger of this kind is apt to be so irrational, that they may think to escape from the threatened evil by silencing its prophet. _Come and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not hearken to any of his words!_ They will first get rid of him, and then forget his words of warning. Their policy is no better than that of the bird which buries its head in the sand, when its pursuers have run it down; an infatuated Out of sight, out of mind. And Jeremiah's recompense for his disinterested zeal is another conspiracy against his life. Once more he lays his cause before the one impartial Judge; the one Being who is exalted above all passion, and therefore sees the truth as it is. "Hearken Thou, O Iahvah, unto me, And hear Thou the voice of mine adversaries. Should evil be recompensed for good? For they have digged a pit for my life. Remember my standing before Thee to speak good about them, To turn back Thy wrath from them." Hearken Thou, since _they_ refuse to hearken; hear both sides, and pronounce for the right. Behold the glaring contrast between my innocence of all hurtful intent, and their clamorous injustice, between my truth and their falsehood, my prayers for their salvation and their outcry for my blood. As we read this prayer of Jeremiah's, we are reminded of the very similar language of the thirty-fifth and hundred and ninth psalms, of which he was himself perhaps the author (see especially Ps. xxxv. 1, 4, 5, 7, 11, 12; cix. 2, 5). We have already partially considered the moral aspect of such petitions. It is necessary to bear in mind that the prophet is speaking of persons who have persistently rejected warning, and ridiculed reproof; and now, in return for his intercessions on their behalf, are attempting his life, not in a sudden outbreak of uncontrollable fury, but with craft and deliberate malice, after seeking, apparently, like their spiritual successors in a later age, to entrap him into admissions that might be construed as treason or blasphemy (Ps. xxxv. 19-21). "Therefore give their sons to the famine, And pour them into the hands of the sword; And let their wives be bereaved and widows, And let their husbands be slain of Death; Let their young men be stricken down of the sword in the battle! "Let a cry be heard from their houses, When Thou bringest a troop upon them suddenly! For they digged a pit to catch me, And snares they hid for my feet.