Jeremiah was never weary of opposing to the uttermost any view of this kind. To him the Chaldæans were the instrument of Jehovah for the punishment of the nations: to endure their rule was, in his view, the will of Jehovah; any one who resisted the Chaldæans only brought on himself a heavier yoke, and called down destruction more completely on his head. If Isaiah had at least cherished the belief in the continuance of Jerusalem and the temple, Jeremiah, as we have seen, did not share in this hope. And therefore he preached without ceasing submission to the yoke, and patient obedience; he was unwearied in taking from the people every prospect of rescue; he sent letters to the Jews transplanted to Babylonia, and urged them not to enter into conspiracies; he went so far as to commend the lot of these captives, and requested them to build houses in Babylon, and pray to Jehovah for the welfare of that country.[621] But though the national feelings and impulses of his nation were unknown to a prophet whose eyes were directed upwards, though for him the feeling of nationality was lost in religious conceptions,--the efforts of the people to win back its independent existence, the stubborn tenacity with which the Jews were ready to fight for their fatherland, and break the yoke of the foreigner, even when they rested on deceptive calculations, were not less justified than the intelligent calculation of the impossibility of such an attempt; and even from the lofty religious position of Jeremiah, who regarded nothing but the inward salvation, the purity, and elevation of the heart, could claim appreciation, since even the common children of earth must have their rights. Who could blame those who, even in the most hopeless, desperate condition, estimated more highly the duty of dying for their country, than the advice to submit quietly to the conqueror? That persons who held these views should consider this step on the part of Jeremiah as a corrupt movement, should demand that the prophet take the side of his own nation against the foreigner, and brand his predictions as treason to the state, is easily intelligible.