The subsequent history of this favoured spot is very mournful. Partaking in the wickedness and idolatry of Samaria, and then deserted by the apostate people for more favoured shrines, it soon sank down into ruin and desolation, so that in the time of the later kings it became a conspicuous instance of the fate which awaits all who forsake God. God “forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which He placed among men.” “But go ye now unto my place which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel.” “I will make this house (the Temple) like Shiloh, and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth.”[187] The same lesson is thus taught us here as in the cities in which our Lord’s mighty works were performed, that privileges abused or neglected can only increase our guilt and deepen our ruin. [Illustration: Head-Piece—Road-side Wells] SHECHEM, EBAL, AND GERIZIM. SHORTLY after leaving Seilûn we descend into the broad and fertile plain of El Mukhna. Two parallel ridges of mountains bound the view on the north-west. Rising to a height of two thousand seven hundred feet above the level of the sea, they are conspicuous objects in the landscape, and are visible from a great distance. Elsewhere in Palestine we are struck by the contrast between the grandeur of the history, and the unimpressive character of the scenery; but these noble and massive forms are a fitting theatre for the grandest events. They are EBAL and GERIZIM. In the narrow valley between them was Shechem, where Abram pitched his tent, and built his first altar, on his entrance into the Promised Land.[188] In the plain at the foot was the parcel of ground which Jacob bought, where he digged a well, and erected an altar, and called it El-elohe-Israel, (_God, the God of Israel_).[189] Close by is the sepulchre in which the embalmed body of Joseph was buried when his descendants came up from Egypt.[190] On those opposing heights the blessings and the curses of the Law were recited, whilst the people stood in the valley between.[191] It was on Gerizim that Jotham spoke his parable of the trees choosing a king.[192] In this ancient and venerable sanctuary, the kings of Israel received their inauguration,[193] and after the secession of the northern tribes, Jeroboam fixed here his capital.[194] And it was in this birth-place of the Jewish nation, that our Lord proclaimed the abrogation of all that was local and temporary in the covenant with Abraham and his seed, “Neither in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem shall ye worship the Father.... God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”[195] The associations of this spot thus cover the whole range of Hebrew history, from its commencement to its close. [Illustration: ARAB AT TENT DOOR.] [Illustration: THE VALLEY OF SHECHEM, WITH EBAL AND GERIZIM.]