Imatges de pàgina
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EXCITEMENT.

Jacob, and the patriarchs, and yet there is room. There are many from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south, and yet there is room. There are persecuting Manasseh and Paul; there are Mary Magdalene, the demoniac, and Zacheus the publican; and yet there is room. There is the once incestuous and excommunicated, but afterwards penitent Corinthian, "washed, sanctified, justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit 'of our God;" and there may you also be, though vile as they, if, with them, you come in at the call of the gospel; for yet there is room. There is, says St John, Rev. vii. 9, 66 a great multitude, which no man can number, out of every kindred, and tongue, and nation;" multitudes from Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, and yet there is room.

By the consideration of your own extreme, perishing necessity; by the consideration of the freeness, the fulness, and sufficiency of the blessings offered; by the dread authority, by the mercy and love of the God that made you, and who is your constant benefactor; by the meekness and gentleness of Christ; by the labours and toils of his life; by the agonies of his death; by his repeated injunctions, and by his melting invitations; by the operation of the Holy Spirit upon your hearts, and by the warnings of your own consciences; by the eternal joys of heaven, and the eternal pains of hell; by these considerations, and by every thing sacred, important, and dear to you, I exhort, I entreat, I charge, I adjure you, I would compel you, to come in.-President Davies.

WHEREFORE DO THE WICKED LIVE? THIS question was one of deep interest to the afflicted patriarch. It has been not less so to many who have lived since the days of Job, and have exclaimed with the Psalmist, "These are the ungodly who prosper in the world, they increase in riches.""

The wicked are permitted to live,

1. That they may develop the depravity of their hearts. It is very common for unregenerate men to deny their depravity, and God lets them live that they may demonstrate in their lives the truth of his word in regard to human character. Thus, Hazael once exclaimed, "But what is thy servant a dog, that he should do this great thing?" and yet he lived to do it with a bloody hand. In this demonstration, the truth is confirmed and good is done.

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of Daniel did much to honour the religion of the Bible, and carry the convictions of truth to the mind of the Median king. The Jews fulfilled the Divine purpose in crucifying the Lord of glory; and afterward, by driving the disciples out of Jerusalem, sent them every where preaching the gospel of the Son of God. And so it is in all ages of the world, the wicked live to execute the purposes of the Divine mind. 5. The wicked live in answer to the prayers of God's people. The disciples prayed for the unfruitful fig-tree, and it was spared yet another year. Abraham prayed for the deliverance of Sodom, and he had the promise that it should be spared if ten righteous men could be found in it. And so it is now. Good men are praying that the lives of sinners may be spared, that they may be brought into his kingdom and made heirs of his grace. Consequently, the wicked are permitted to live.

6. The wicked live as a means of sanctifying the people of God. The mere fact that the eye of the wicked is upon God's people, makes them more watchful. Every finger of scorn, and every scoffing tongue, and every persecuting hand, drives the Christian nearer to God, and strengthens his purposes of holy life. They all tend to bring him into a more perfect conformity to the will of God, and the spirit of heaven. It was in view of this tendency, that the apostle counted it all joy when he fell into divers temptations (trials), knowing this, that the trial of our faith worketh patience.

7. The incorrigibly wicked live that they may be fitted for destruction. "Have ye not asked them that go by the way, and do ye not understand their tokens, that the wicked are reserved unto the day of destruction? They shall be brought forth to the day of wrath." We are told that God "gives up the wicked to uncleanness and vile affections;" and that "after their hardness and impenitent heart, they treasure up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath, and the revelation of the righteous judgment of God." And also that " God endures with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction." And again, "God shall send upon them strong delusions, that they should believe a lie, that they might be damned who believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness."

EXCITEMENT.

For such ends do the wicked live. Impenitent reader! does it not become you, in view of these! thoughts, to turn your feet unto the ways of right2. The wicked live that the kindness and long-eousness, and walk in the testimonies of the Lord? suffering of God may be made manifest. God is determined to show to the world that he delighteth not in the death of the wicked. Hence he bears long with him. Like a sympathizing father, he waits to see if the sinner will not put away his transgressions, so that iniquity will not be his ruin. And this principle of the Divine government he makes the sinner demonstrate by permitting him to live.

3. The wicked live that they may have space for repentance. Were they cut down in the moment of their rebellion, repentance and salvation would be equally impossible. But God determined to give the sinner the opportunity to choose life, and also to show to the world that those who are lost have rejected the offer of life, and have consequently chosen death, and become their own destroyers. And this he does by permitting them to live.

4. The wicked live that they may be instrumental in accomplishing the purposes of God. The wrath of man is made to praise God. The selling of Joseph into Egypt did much to preserve the patriarchal family, and to accomplish the fulfilment of the covenant promise which was inade to Abraham. Belshazzar's feast was the means of executing the purpose of God, in his own destruction. The accusers

"TELL the mother," says the Rev. D. E. Ford in his Damascus, " as she watches the dying agonies of her only babe, to beware of excitement: she has a husband left, and for his sake it behoves her to cling to life, and hope to be happy. Tell the widower, as he tears himself from the coffin of his best earthly treasure, to beware of excitement: his children are spared, and for their sakes he must return to the cares of life again. Tell the man whose house is burning over his head, to beware of excitement; for calmness and self-possession may facilitate his rescue. But never tell the sinner who bewails his transgressions, who apprehends the terrors of the Lord, who trembles at the thought of judgment to come, who is uncertain whether the next moment of his life will not find him in hell-never tell that man to beware of excitement (for what can you set before him to countervail his anxiety?)—but caution him against a spirit of slumber; caution him against a return to indifference; tell him that the struggle is for immortality, and that the alternative is death, certain, remediless, and eternal."

LOOK UP!

A LITTLE boy went to sea with his father, to learn to be a sailor. One day his father said to him, "Come, my boy, you will never be a sailor if you don't learn to climb; let me see if you can get up the mast." The boy, who was a nimble little fellow, soon scrambled up; but when he got to the top and saw at what a height he was, he began to be frightened, and called out, "O father! I shall fall; I am sure I shall fall; what am I to do?" "Look up, look up, my boy," said his father; "if you look down you will be giddy, but if you keep looking up to the flag at the top of the mast, you will descend safely." The boy followed his father's advice, and reached the bottom with ease. Learn from this little story to look more to Jesus and less to yourselves.

SCATTERED YET UNITED.

LET us not be so hide-bound with prejudice as to refuse to acknowledge goodness out of our own petty sects. I should feel sad indeed if I thought that all the virtue of the world was compromised in the one communion to which I belong. But

"I have wandered over many lands," and I have found some goodness, some piety, every where-some devout men and women, who believed in Christ, and were walking in his steps, In the Scottish glen and on the moor; in the Alpine gorge and on those upland pastures where the shepherd feeds his flock-the voice of singing ascends to God. Yonder, down in the deep forest, where a solitary lamp from a cottage window twinkles through the darkness, an old man is at prayer!

"There kneeling down to heaven's eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays These are all members of one church catholic-of one invisible, but universal communion," the communion of saints." They are the scattered sheep of one fold, and under one shepherd.

The Church of God includes all the good that have lived on earth, and that shall live to the end of time. It is a mighty army, issuing out of the regions of death, gathering out of every clime, and stretching into heaven. It includes a multitude whom no man can number, both among the living and the dead.-H. M. Field.

ON THE DEATH OF TWO MINISTERS IN ONE WEEK.

Two famous lights in one week are put, not under a bushel, but under a gravestone. God is now calling in his labourers, then who shall gather in his harvest? He is putting out the lights, and who shall guide us to Emmanuel's land? God's gardens take a great deal of dressing; and when dressers are taken away, what danger are vineyards in of becoming like the field of the slothful! The loss of a guide in the way to heaven is not a small loss. God pulls out stakes in Zion's hedge, but few are put in to make up the gap. But while we obey the precept, "Pray ye therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he will send

forth labourers into his harvest," Lord, fulfil thy promise, "I will give you pastors according to my heart, which shall feed you with knowledge and un derstanding."-Pauling.

men.

A SINGULAR TREASURE. WHERE is it? What is singular respecting it? It is of singular value. Gold and precious stones cannot compare with it. It is worth more than all the riches of the world. It is singular, in that it never does injury, but always does good. This cannot be said of treasures of gold and silver. They have been the undoing of millions for time and for eternity. It is singular, in that it does not make men proud, arrogant, oppressive, nor vicious. The treasures of gold very generally have these effects on the minds of But the more of this singular treasure men have, the more humble, meek, kind, affable, and virtuous are they. It is singular in that it never produces discontent nor unhappiness in the minds of those who have it, nor is made a source of misery to those who have it not. Is it so with treasures of gold? Do they not disquiet thousands every day? What corroding cares, what jealousies, family quarrels, litigation, frauds, and almost every species of crime and vice, are engendered and cherished by the riches of the world! It is singular, in that it will endure for ever. "Riches certainly make themselves wings; they fly away.' The flames consume-the floods carry away. Bankruptcies occur almost every day. At the longest, earthly riches can endure for the present life only. They can do no good to the dead. But this singular treasure can never lose its value. It is worth immeasurably more after death than in the present life. Its highest value is never realized until men have passed into the "bourne whence no traveller returns." But what is this treasure? It is a treasure of fear. A very singular treasure, truly. Even so. Now, please turn to Isaiah 33d chapter, 6th verse, and read-" The fear of the Lord is his treasure."—Pilgrim.

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THE EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY.-A person discovering the proofs of the Christian religion, is like an heir finding the deeds of his estate. Shall he officiously condemn them as counterfeit, or cast them aside without examination ?-Pascal.

A SOLEMN THOUGHT.-Reader, you may die any moment, and you are as near to heaven or hell as you are to death.-Rev. J. A. James.

THE ROOT OF THE EVIL.-The moralists of our age, whether in lessons from the academic chair, or by the insinuating address of fiction and poetry-while they try to mend and embellish human life, have never struck one effective blow at that ungodliness of the heart which is the germ of all the distempers in human society.-Dr Chalmers.

BIRTH AND DEATH.-Those born once only, die twice-they die a temporal, and they die an eternal for over them the second death hath no power.— death. But those who are born twice, die only once.

Jay.

UNBELIEF.-No man is an unbeliever, but because he will be so; and every man is not an unbeliever because the grace of God conquers some, changeth their wills, and binds them to Christ.-Charnock.

sullen detector of the poverty and misery of man. HUMAN PHILOSOPHY.-Philosophy is a proud, It may turn him from the world with a proud, sturdy contempt; but it cannot come forward, and say, "Here are rest, grace, peace, strength, consolation!"-Cecil.

of prayer that is required; nor the labour of the lip PRAYER. It is not the length but the strength but the travail of the heart that prevails with God. "Let thy words be few," as Solomon says, but full and to the purpose.-Spencer.

THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY.

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NOVEL-READING.

FEW persons suspect how many novels are written, and printed, and sold. There are about five thousand five hundred offered for sale in this country. If a man were to read one a-week for seventy-five years, he would not be through the list. There are, of course, many novel-readers. Something on a great scale will be the result. What will it be-good or evil? Let

us see.

It is natural to enquire who write novels? A few pious persons have written works which are sometimes called novels; but they are too serious for the gay, and too gay for the seriousso they are seldom read. I have seen but one such for years. They are not in demand. Others are written by moral persons, who really seem anxious to teach some truth in an easy way. But nearly or quite all such are thought dull, and so they lie, covered with dust, on the shelves of the bookseller, are sent to auction, sell for a few pence, and are heard of no more. The popular novels of our day are, to a great extent, written by men whom no wise man would take for patterns. Indeed, they are known to be lax in principle, and loose in life. England and France contain no men who are more free from the restraints of sound morality than their leading novelists. They are literal and "literary debauchees."

But do not novels contain many good things, which cannot be learned elsewhere? I answer, They do not. It is confessed that they never teach science. It is no less true, that they pervert history, or supplant it by fiction. This is throughout true of Walter Scott, who has excelled all modern novelists in the charms of style. The literature of novels is commonly poor, and that of the best cannot compare with the standard English and French classics. Even Scott's best tales are intended to ridicule the best men, and to excuse or extol the worst men of their age. Like Hume, he was an apologist of ty. rants, whose crimes ought to have taken away both their crowns and their lives. The lowest occupation of a great mind is to flatter a living tyrant. I am mistaken. To burn incense at the shrine of a dead tyrant is the last step in degradation. I beseech you not to read novels. I will give my reasons.

1. Their general tendency is to evil. They

present vice and virtue in false colours. They dress up vice in gaiety, mirth, and long success. They put virtue and piety in some odious or ridiculous posture. Suspicion, jealousy, pride, revenge, vanity, rivalries, resistance of the laws, rebellion against parents, theft, murder, suicide, and even piracy, are so represented in novels as to diminish, if not to take away, the horror which all the virtuous feel against these sins and crimes. Almost all that is shocking in vice is combined with some noble quality, so as to make the hero on the whole an attractive character. The thief, the pirate, and especially the rake, are often presented as successful, ele-| gant, and happy. Novels abound in immodesty and profane allusions or expressions. Wantonness, pride, anger, and unholy love, are the elements of most of them. They are full of exaggerations of men and things. They fill the mind with false estimates of human life. In them the romantic prevails over the real. A book of this sort is very dangerous to the young, for in them the imagination is already too powerful for the judgment.

2. Novels beget a vain turn of mind. So true is this, that not one in a hundred of novelreaders is suspected, or is willing to be suspected, of being devout. Who by reading a novel of the present day was ever inclined to prayer or praise Novel-reading is most unhappy in its effects on the female mind. It so unfits it for devotion, that even in the house of God levity or tedium commonly rules it. Thus practical atheism is engendered. The duties of life are serious and weighty. They whose trade it is to trifle and to nourish vanity cannot be expected to be well informed, or wel disposed respecting serious things. However much novel-readers may weep over fictitious misery, it is found that they generally have little or no sympathy with real suffering. Did you never know a mother to send away a sick child, or a daughter to forsake a sick mother, for the purpose of finishing a novel? If irreligion and impiety do not flourish under such influences, effects cannot be traced to causes.

3. The price of these books is often low, yet the cost of them in a lifetime is very great. Miss W. borrowed some books, yet she paid L.12 in one year for novels alone. Doing this

for fifteen years, she would spend L.180. Yet her nephews and nieces were growing up without an education. Mrs L. stinted her family in groceries that she might have a new novel every month. Mr C. pleaded want of means to aid the orphan asylum, yet he paid more than L.10 a-year for novels for his daughters. This waste is wanton; no good is received in re

turn.

4. Novel-reading is a great waste of timetime,

"That stuff that life is made of,

And which, when lost, is never lost alone, Because it carries souls upon its wings." Nothing is so valuable as that which is of great use, yet cannot be bought with any thing else. We must have time to think calmly and maturely of a thousand things, to improve our minds, to acquire the knowledge of God, and to perform many pressing duties. The business of life is to act well our part here, and prepare for that solemn exchange of worlds which awaits us. He whose time is spent without economy and wasted on trifles, will awake and find himself undone, and will "mourn at the last, when his flesh and his body are consumed, and say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof, and have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me."

5. The effects of novel-reading on morals are disastrous. Many young offenders are made so by the wretched tales which now abound. In one city, in less than three months, three youths were convicted of crimes committed in imitation of the hero of a novel. Here is a court of justice in session. Blood has been shed. Men are on trial for their lives. All the parties involved are intelligent and wealthy. The community is excited. Crowds throng the court-room from day to day. The papers are filled with the letters which led to the tragical end of one, and the misery of many. The whole scene is painful in the highest degree. Among the witnesses is one of manly form, polished manners, and hoary locks. Even the stranger does him reverence. His country has honoured him. He must testify, and so sure as he does he will tell the truth; for he has honour, and blood is concerned. He says, "The husband of my daughter was kind, honourable, and af- | fectionate ;" and "if my daughter has been in an unhappy state of mind, I attribute it to the works of Eugene Sue and Bulwer." All these cases have been judicially investigated and published to the world. They have filled many

a virtuous mind with horror, and every judicious parent with concern.

Nor is novel-reading a wholesome recreation. It is not a recreation at all—it is an ensnaring and engrossing occupation. Once begin a novel, and husband, children, prayer, filial duties, are esteemed trifles until it is finished. The end of the story is the charm. Who reads a novel a second time!

Some say, Others do it, and so may we. But others are no law to us. The prevalence of an evil renders it the more binding on us to resist the current.

Novel-reading makes none wiser, or better, or happier. In life it helps none,-in death it soothes none, but fills many with poignant regrets. At the bar of God, no man will doubt that madness was in his heart when he could thus kill time and vitiate his principles. I add,

1. Parents, know what books your childrer read. If there were not a novel on earth, you' still should select their reading. Leave not such a matter to chance, to giddiness, or vice. Give your children good books: a bad book is poison. If you love misery, furnish novels to your children.

2. Young people, be warned in time. Many," as unsuspecting as you, have been ruined. Be not rebellious to your own undoing. Listen to the voice of kindness, which says, Beware, beware of novels.

3. Pastors, see that you do all in your power to break up a practice which will ruin your young people, and render your ministry fruitless. Greatly was I shocked when I heard of one of you recommending a novel which exposed the arts of the Jesuits. The Jesuits are indeed bad, but not worse than Sue.

4. Booksellers, let me say a word. A young man, with a hurried manner, entered a druggist's shop, and asked for an ounce of laudanum. It was refused. He went to another, and got it, and next morning was a corpse. Which of these druggists acted right? You sell poison when you sell novels. They kill souls. You sell for gain. "Woe to him that coveteth an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil! Thou hast consulted shame to thy house by cutting off many people, and hast sinned against thy soul. For the stone shall cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer it." You may make money by depraving the public morals, but for all these things God will bring you into judg ment.-American Messenger.

JONAH.*

JONAH.

THE TIME AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF JONAH'S APPEARANCE AS A PROPHET.

It is always of importance for a correct understanding of the prophetical scriptures to know something of the time when they were indited, and of the persons to whom they were originally addressed. In the case of Jonah it is not difficult to ascertain this, as a passage in the Second Book of Kings marks with sufficient distinctness the period of his agency in the affairs of Israel. Speaking of the second Jeroboam, the great-grandson of Jehu, and the last of his seed that for any length of time occupied the throne of Israel, the inspired historian says, "He restored the coast of Israel, from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet which was of Gath-hepher (a town in the tribe of Zebulon); for the Lord saw the affliction of Israel, that it was very bitter; for there was not any shut up, nor any left, nor any helper for Israel; and the Lord said not, that he would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, but he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam, the son of Joash."-(2 Kings xiv. 25-27.)

This passage puts it beyond a doubt, that Jonah was in the exercise of his prophetical office, certainly not later than the commencement of the reign of Jeroboam II.; for, the prediction he is recorded to have uttered respecting the recovery of a part of the Israelitish territory from the yoke of Syria was fulfilled by the hand of Jeroboam. And as this monarch, in fulfilling it, had to wage a difficult and arduous warfare with Syria, in the course of which he got possession of Damascus, the capital of the kingdom, and raised Israel anew to much of its former splendour and importance, we may certainly conclude, that he was at the time in the vigour of his days, and that the conquests achieved by his hand were made much nearer the beginning than the close of his reign. But the prophecy which foretold the result of these conquests must have been earlier still. Nay, it was manifestly uttered at a time when the affairs of Israel were in the most shattered and depressed condition; when, as it is said, "there was none shut up or left," that is, confined or left at large; when there was neither bond nor free, the inhabitants of all conditions being utterly wasted, and there seemed to be none that could act the part of "a helper for Israel." But the kingdom of Israel was never in such a state at any period during the reign of Jeroboam, nor even when he ascended the throne. It had been so, indeed, in the days of his father Joash, who had found the kingdom reduced to the most abject subjection to the king of Syria; but he had gradually restored it, by a succession of victories, to comparative strength, and commenced the prosperous career which was only continued and carried out by Jeroboam. So that the utterance of Jonah's prediction concerning the recovery of Hamath and Damascus, seems rather to belong to the earlier part of the reign of Joash than to any period of Jeroboam's reign; and, though the fulfilment of it is ascribed only to Jeroboam, because it was he who recovered the more distant portion of the territory of which it spake, yet the prophecy itself appears to have equally included the preceding victories and nearer conquests of Joash.

We thus arrive at the result that Jonah was the earliest, in point of time, of all the prophets whose labours and predictions have been recorded in sepa

From an excellent treatise just published, entitled, Jonah his Life, Character, and Mission, &c., by the Rev. Patrick Fairbairn of Salton,

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rate books. Hosea and Amos are both reported to have prophesied in the days of Jeroboam; but, from the other marks of time given in their writings, they could not have begun to prophesy till near the close of his reign. The time of Jonah thus treads closely on that of Elisha; and we can scarcely doubt that the two were for some years contemporaneous. Elisha lived to an advanced age, and died some time in the reign of Joash, before the close of his successful conflict with the Syrians. And as Joash's entire reign did not exceed sixteen years, we may reasonably infer that Jonah, who in the course of that reign appeared on the prophetic stage, had in his early years sat at the feet of Elisha. His first appearance also was of a kind that fitly became the successor of that gentle and humane ambassador of heaven; for the word then put into the mouth of Jonah, the only direct word, indeed, he is recorded to have uttered concerning Israel, was a word of mercy and consolation to the covenant people. It told them, that the Lord still yearned over them for their good, and would once more drive back the tide of evil which had been flowing in upon them, and recover the territory they had lost. Yet, while this promise of returning prosperity was held out, it was not doubtfully intimated, that all stood in an uncertain and hazardous position. The mercy of heaven hovered over the land, as if ready to take its departure; and the Lord had only not said, he would blot out the name of Israel, but neither had he said, he would preserve it. The fate of the kingdom hung in a kind of fearful suspense, as if He on whom its destinies depended were waiting the issue of a last trial to decide whether it was to be established in peace or given up to perdition.

Such was the posture of affairs in the kingdom of Israel when Jonah entered on his prophetical career. But whence originally arose this extreme danger? How did it happen that, in a religious and moral point of view, they had come into so peculiarly critical and perilous a condition? It is necessary to know this, in order rightly to understand the future mission and history of the prophet of Gath-hepher; and it will consequently be proper here to take a rapid glance of the course which this kingdom of Israel had pursued since its commencement, and of the kind of dealing to which it had been subjected on the part of God.

The erection of the kingdom of Israel, or of the ten tribes, into a distinct and separate government, it is necessary to bear in mind, is constantly represented

Thus Amos expressly states, that he began to see his vision concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah and Jeroboam, two years before the earthquake. Now, this earthquake, we learn from Zech. xiv. 5, happened in the reign of Uzziah. king of Judah, who did not begin to reign till about fourteen years before the death of Jeroboam. But Jeroboam reigned altogether forty-one years, so that at whatever precise perioc in Uzziah's time the earthquake may have happened, the two years before it, mentioned by Amos as the commence. ment of his prophetical agency, necessarily carries us into the latter half of Jeroboam's reign. Then Hosea is said to have prophesied so late as the reign of Hezekiah, king or Judah; and between even the last year of Jeroboam's reign and the first of Hezekiah's, a period of about sixty years intervenes. He must, therefore, have been a very young man at the close of Jeroboam's reign, and could not have entered on the prophetic office much earlier So that Jonah, who seems to have uttered a prediction in the days of Joash, was considerably earlier than either of these prophets They were the next to follow him; and as it is probable that the transactions recorded in the book which bears his name took place in the latter period of his life, the book itself may possibly not be much older than some portions of the writings of Hosea and Amos. Various reasons might be assigned for the Jews not placing his book precisely at the commencement of the minor prophets; and the belief of Lightfoot (Chronica Temporum) and many others, as to his being actually later than Hosea and Amos, seems partly to have arisen from a wrong view of his mission.

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