and dark prophecies, with words that are only surpassed in their tenderness and the outpouring of the heart of God, by the fuller revelation in Jesus Christ:  ’O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God.  Take with you words, and return unto the Lord, and say unto Him:  Assyria shall not save us, for in Thee the fatherless findeth mercy.’  The divine answer which he was commissioned to bring to the penitent Israel—­’I will heal their backslidings, I will love them freely; if Mine anger is turned away from Me’—­is, in all its wealth of forgiving love but an imperfect prophecy of the great Physician, from the hem of whose garment flowed out power to one who ’had spent all her living on physicians and could not be healed of any,’ and who confirmed to her the power which she had thought to steal from Him unawares by the gracious words which bound her to Him for ever—­’Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace.’

‘FRUIT WHICH IS DEATH’

’Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself:  according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images. 2.  Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty:  He shall break down their altars, He shall spoil their images. 3.  For now they shall say, We have no king, because we feared not the Lord; what then should a king do to us? 4.  They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant:  thus judgment springeth up as hemlock in the furrows of the field. 5.  The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven:  for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it. 6.  It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb:  Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel. 7.  As for Samaria, her king is cut off as the foam upon the water. 8.  The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed:  the thorn and the thistle shall come up on their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us. 9.  O Israel, thou hast sinned from the days of Gibeah:  there they stood:  the battle in Gibeah against the children of iniquity did not overtake them. 10.  It is in my desire that I should chastise them; and the people shall be gathered against them, when they shall bind themselves in their two furrows. 11.  And Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn; but I passed over upon her fair neck:  I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods. 12.  Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground:  for it is time to seek the Lord, till He come and rain righteousness upon you. 13.  Ye have plowed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity; ye have eaten the fruit of lies:  because thou didst trust in thy way, in the multitude of thy mighty men.