So I read in the sixth chapter of Joshua, the fate of the city of Jericho: "And they utterly destroyed "all that was in the city, both man and woman, "young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the "edge of the sword. And they burnt the city with "fire, and all that was therein." But we are told that one family was saved by Joshua, out of the general destruction: "And Joshua saved Rahab, the harlot, "alive, and her father's household, and all that she "had." Was this fearful destruction an act of mercy? It seems that they saved the money of their victims: "the silver and gold and the vessels of brass "and of iron they put into the treasury of the house "of the Lord." After all this pillage and carnage, it appears that there was a suspicion in Joshua's mind that somebody was keeping back a part of the treasure. Search was made, and a man by the name of Achan admitted that he had sinned against the Lord, that he had seen a Babylonish garment among the spoils, and two hundred shekels of silver and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels' weight, and that he took them and hid 2l8 them in his tent. For this atrocious crime it seems that the Lord denied any victories to the Jews until they found out the wicked criminal. When they dis- covered poor Achan, "they took him and his sons "and his daughters, and his oxen and his asses and "his sheep, and all that he had, and brought them unto "the valley of Achor; and all Israel stoned him with "stones and burned them with fire after they had "stoned them with stones." After Achan and his sons and his daughters and his herds had been stoned and burned to death, we are told that "the Lord turned from the fierceness of "his anger." And yet it is insisted that this God "is merciful, "and that his loving-kindness is over all his works." In the eighth chapter of this same book, the infi- nite God, "creator of heaven and earth and all that is "therein," told his general, Joshua, to lay an ambush for a city--to "lie in wait against the city, even be- "hind the city; go not very far from the city, but be "ye all ready." He told him to make an attack and then to run, as though he had been beaten, in order that the inhabitants of the city might follow, and thereupon his reserves that he had ambushed might rush into the city and set it on fire. God Almighty 219