them molten images, even two calves; and they made a grove, and worshipped all the hoft of heaven, and ferved Baal; and they caufed their fons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divinations and enchantments, and fold themfelves to do evil in the fight of Jehovah, to provoke him to anger. Therefore was Jehovah angry with Ifrael, and removed them out of his fight.

We fee, however, the evidence of this great miracle of Elijah in the effects which it produced; as it seems to have put a stop to the more public worship of Baal, to which the prince and the people had been long addicted, and to have eftablished the belief of the fuperiority of Jehovah, the God of Ifrael. And, indeed, nothing could have been better calculated to answer the purpose.

This miracle was performed in public, due notice was given beforehand, and it was in the presence of enemies; the prophet of Jehovah being but one, and the priests of Baal four hundred and fifty men, the prince and confequently all the great men in the nation favouring them. Unprotected

N 4

protected as Elijah was, it might have been in their power to impofe upon him, as by privately introducing fire to confume the facrifice, but it could not have been in his power to impofe upon them. To cut off all fufpicion of the kind, he made it as difficult as poffible for the fire to have any effect on the facrifice. The priests of Baal had all the time that they could wish for, having been employed from morning till the time of evening facrifice. But on the prayer of Elijah, in the very unfavourable circumstances that have been described, the fire took place in an inftant, and not only were the wood, and the facrifice, confumed, but even the water in the trench that had been made round it diffipated, and the stones themfelves confumed, probably calcined, which is the greatest effect of fire upon ftone. Confequently, it could not be denied that Jehovah appeared to be the God of nature, the fole author and controller of its laws.

There is another event in the fubfequent part of the reign of Ahab, well calculated to confirm him and the people of Ifrael in

the

the worship of Jehovah as the God of univerfal nature. The Syrians, having been deteated by the Ifraelites in a battle fought in the hill country, imagined, as we read 2 Kings xx. 25, that the Gods of Ifrael were Gods of the bills. Therefore, faid they, they are ftronger than we; but let us fight against them in the plain, and furely we shall be ftronger than they. On this, as we read ver. 28, there came a man of God, and fpake to the king of Ifrael and faid, Thus faith fehovah; Because the Syrians have faid that Jehovah is God of the hills, but he is not God of the vallies, therefore will I deliver all this great multitude into thy hand, and ye shall know that I am Jehovah. Accordingly we read that, though the army of the Ifraelites were like two little flocks of kids, while that of the Syrians filled the country; when the battle was fought in the plain, the Ifraelites flew of the Syrians an hundred thoufand footmen in one day.

Having given this general view of the most important of the miraculous events that occur in the hiftory of the kingdom of Ifrael, I fhall confider those that occur

in

in the history of Judah, which are no less remarkable, and equally calculated to confirm the people in their attachment to their religion, notwithstanding their proneness to idolatry.

The kingdom of Judah had many excellent and pious princes, ftrict observers of the laws of Mofes, but feveral of them apoftatized to the idolatrous cuftoms of the neighbouring nations. It is remarkable that even Solomon, who built the temple, and to whom God had appeared twice, from complaifance to his wives of foreign nations, not only permitted them to introduce the worship of the Gods of their refpective countries, but himself, at least, occafionally joined them in it. His fon Rehoboam did the fame, and no doubt encouraged the common people to do it. Indeed, fuch examples were fufficient without any pofitive precept. In this reign, as we read, 1 Kings xiv. 22, the people did evil in the fight of the Lord, and they provoked him to jealousy with their fins, which they had committed above all that their fathers had done. For they also built them high places, and

images,

images, and groves on every high hill, and under every green tree, and there were Sodomites alfo in the land. For even this unnatural vice was a rite in fome of the heathen religions, especially in Egypt, where it was imagined that the regular rife of the Nile (on which the fertility of Egypt depends) was connected with that abominable practice in the priests, and it was not abolished till the time of Conftantine. they did according to all the abominations of the nations which the Lord caft out before the children of Ifrael.

And

After the two pious princes Afa and Jehoshaphat, came Jehoram, who, having married a daughter of Ahab, adopted his religion, which was the worship of Baal, after the manner of the Tyrians; and his fon Ahaziah trod in his fteps. In the reign of Joash the worship of the true God was reftored by the pious high-prieft Jehoiada, and the fucceeding princes are not much blamed till we come to Ahaz, who is faid, 2 Chron. xxviii. 2. to have walked in the ways of the kings of Ifrael,

made molten images for Baalim.

and to have

Moreover he

burned