The Old Testament abounds in illustrations of the bearing of religion upon national and corporate life. In this passage of prophecy Ezekiel rebukes his countrymen for their disc, intent under the Assyrian rule, and for their treacherous intrigues with Egypt. Speaking in the name of the King of kings, he upbraids them for deliberate infraction of a covenant which they were bound to observe. He shows them that political action may be sinful, and that, when such is the case, the Divine Ruler will not suffer it to go unpunished.

I. THE JUSTICE OF GOD IS DISCERNIBLE IN NATIONAL CALAMITIES. This was most evident in the case of Judah and Israel, who by their defection and apostasy incurred the righteous displeasure of the Almighty Ruler, and brought upon themselves the judgment beneath which, in the time of Ezekiel, they were smarting. The King of Babylon had come to Jerusalem, had taken the king thereof and the princes thereof, and had led them with him to Babylon; he had taken of the king's seed, and had established him in authority over the remnant in the land, that the kingdom, though base, might stand. In all this the righteous hand of God was visible to every observant and reflecting mind.

II. THE MERCY OF GOD IS DISCERNIBLE IN THE COVENANT BETWEEN THE CONQUERORS AND THE CONQUERED. Judah would have met with the fate she deserved had she been treated as an ordinary subject province. But God's providence ordered matters otherwise. The King of Babylon was disposed to deal favourably with the conquered sons of Judah. He made a covenant with Zedekiah, and took an oath of him. Thus some semblance of self-government was left with the vanquished. Although their chiefs were carried captive, those who were permitted to remain did so under the sovereignty of a member of the royal house. We are taught to see in this arrangement an evidence of the favour and forbearance of the Most High.

III. THE SANCTION OF GOD RESTS UPON NATIONAL ENGAGEMENTS SOLEMNLY UNDERTAKEN AND RATIFIED. An oath is an appeal to God, and he will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain. A nation may appeal to Heaven, as may an individual. Peoples come voluntarily into certain relations with each other in the great community of mankind. As surely as there is an Almighty Ruler who sways a righteous sceptre over the nations, so surely does sacredness attach to those obligations which nations take upon themselves with regard to one another. They are not indifferent and trivial matters, but matters with which the moral life of nations is bound up.

IV. THE DISPLEASURE OF GOD IS UPON THOSE WHO VIOLATE SOLEMN TREATIES. In language of truly prophetic indignation, the prophet upbraids the king and those who acted with him in secretly rebelling against the court of Babylon, to whose favour they owed whatever national existence was left to them, and with whom they had entered into sacred and binding treaty. "Shall he prosper? shall he escape that doeth such things? shall he break the covenant, and yet escape?" The Eternal regarded this conduct as a wrong, not so ranch to Babylon, as to himself. "Mine oath he hath despised; my covenant he hath broken." "He hath trespassed against me." It is to be feared that this is a consideration which never enters into the minds of some rulers and statesmen; they think of the effect of their conduct upon the great and mighty of this world, but they do not ask themselves how their falsehood and treachery are regarded by him who rules not in heaven only, but on the earth.

V. THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD WILL OVERTAKE THOSE WHO REGARD INTEREST AND EXPEDIENCY RATHER THAN PRINCIPLE AND PROMISES. It was foretold that Judah should gain nothing by her deceptive and base conduct. Pharaoh should not deliver the people with his mighty army. Judah's conduct should be recompensed by Divine interposition; the king who had rebelled should die in the midst of Babylon, and should not escape; the fugitives should fall by the sword, and they that remained should be scattered toward all winds. The lesson is one of universal import. Be they high or low, men who violate the compacts and disregard the engagements into which they have voluntarily and deliberately entered, shall not be unpunished, shall not escape the righteous judgments of the Judge of all the earth. - T.

The word "riddle" may in this connection mean parable, picture, symbol; whatever will excite and interest the imagination. If the zephyr has not voice enough to arrest us, God will employ the thunder; if the little silvery streamlet, hurrying through its green banks, has nothing to say to us, the great floods shall lift up their voices and compel us to attend. Who will say there is only one way of preaching, teaching, educating young men? There are a thousand ways: what we want is that a young man shall say when his way is not being adopted. This will suit a good many: God bless the teacher in this effort; he is not now speaking to me, but to persons who can understand that way alone; let heaven's grace make hearts tender as he unravels his parable, as he takes up his harp and discourses upon its sweet, mysterious music. When a preacher is setting forth riddle and parable, the man who falsely thinks himself a logician — for there can only be a logician once in a generation — should pray that the parable may be blessed. When the preacher or teacher is seeking by hard, strong argument to force home a truth, those who live on wings should carry themselves as high as possible that they may bring down a larger, riper blessing upon the teacher and his method. This is God's administration: this is the many-coloured robe of providence with which He would clothe our naked shoulders. What has come to us — a riddle, a parable, a dream, a process of logic, a historical induction? Take God's gift, and through it find the Giver.

(J. Parker, D. D.)