The fall of Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonians was delayed one hundred years.  But such were the moral and social evils of the times succeeding the Ninevite invasion that Isaiah saw that retribution would come sooner or later, unless the nation repented and a radical reform should take place.  He saw the people stricken with judicial blindness; so he clothed himself in sackcloth and cried aloud, with fervid eloquence, upon the people to repent.  He is now the popular preacher, and his theme is repentance.  In his earnest exhortations he foreshadows John the Baptist:  “Unless ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”  It would seem that Savonarola makes him the model of his own eloquence.  “Thy crimes, O Florence! thy crimes, O Rome! thy crimes, O Italy! are the causes of these chastisements.  O Rome! thou shalt be put to the sword, since thou wilt not be converted!  O harlot Church!  I will stretch forth mine hand upon thee, saith the Lord.”  The burden of the soul of the Florentine monk is sin, especially sin in high places.  He sees only degeneracy in life, and alarms the people by threats of divine vengeance.  So Isaiah cries aloud upon the people to seek the Lord while he may be found.  He does not invoke divine wrath, as David did upon his enemies; but he shows that this wrath will surely overtake the sinner.  In no respect does he glory in this retribution:  he is sad; he is oppressed; he is filled with grief, especially in view of the prevailing infatuation.  “My people,” said he, “do not consider.”  He denounces all classes alike, and spares not even women.  In sarcastic language he rebukes their love of dress, their abandonment to vanities, their finery, their very gait and mincing attitude.  Still more contemptuously does the preacher speak of the men, over whom the women rule and children oppress.  He is severe on corrupt judges, on usurers; on all who are conceited in their own eyes; on those who are mighty to drink wine; on those who join house to house and field to field; on those whose glorious beauty is a fading flower; on those who call good evil and evil good, that put darkness for light, that take away the righteousness of the righteous from him.  His terrible denunciation and enumeration of evil indicate a very lax morality in every quarter, added to hypocrisy and pharisaism.  He shows what a poor thing is sacrifice unaccompanied with virtue.  “To what purpose,” said he, “is the multitude of sacrifices?  Bring no more vain oblations.  Incense is an abomination to me, saith the Lord.  Therefore wash you, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings; cease to do evil, learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.”  Isaiah does not preach dogmas, still less metaphysical distinctions; he preaches against sin and demands repentance, and predicts calamity.