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'For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but My kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of My peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee. ISAIAH liv, 10. There is something of music in the very sound of these words. The stately march of the grand English translation lends itself with wonderful beauty to the melody of Isaiah's words.
There is still another passage in holy writ that the perpetual worrier should read and ponder. It is the prophet Isaiah's assurance that God says to His children: "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." Who has not seen a fretful, sick child taken up by a loving mother, yield to her soothing influence in a few minutes and drop off into restful, healthful, restoring sleep.
For until you have well, nothing, absolutely nothing, is worth while. When you see Him there comes such a sense of His purity that, instantly, you are down on your face in utter despair, because of your own self your impurity; your lack of purity; the sharp contrast between Him and you. You feel that young Isaiah's outcry in the temple that morning is wholly inadequate. "Unclean lips," is it?
The Chaldaeans are thus in Isaiah, as elsewhere generally in Scripture, the people of Babylonia, the term "Babylonians" not being used by him; Babylon is their chief city, not one which they have conquered and occupied, but their "daughter" "the beauty of their excellency;" and so all the antiquity and glory which is assigned to Babylon belong necessarily in Isaiah's mind to the Chaldaeans.
So supper was postponed, in spite of Isaiah's grumblings, and the Captain and Mary-'Gusta started forthwith for the home of their nearest neighbor. Mr. Chase, his curiosity aroused, would have asked a dozen questions, but Mary-'Gusta would neither answer nor permit Shadrach to do so. The Bacheldor family were at supper when the callers arrived.
Isaiah's grim reticence was less of a trouble to him than it would have been under ordinary circumstances, for he had his own thoughts to think, and did not care to be drawn away from them. At the lich-gate Aunt Rachel paused to shake hands with everybody but Ruth and Reuben. "You had better take Manzini home to-night, Reuben," said Ruth.
Isaiah's remonstrance was in substance: You need not take so much trouble with your preparations; Syria and Israel will have more than enough to do presently to defend their own borders from Sargon. Besides, men like Rezin and Pekah are not men to be afraid of in any case; they have neither strength nor skill.
"Um-hm. I'd like to have a tintype of Isaiah's face. Well, sis er, Mary-'Gusta, I mean there's South Harniss dead ahead. How do you like the looks of it?" They had emerged from a long stretch of woods and were at the summit of a little hill.
First, the song sets in sharp contrast the two cities, describing, in verses 1-4, the city of God, its strength defences, conditions of citizenship, and the peace which reigns within its walls; and in verses 5 and 6 the fall and utter ruin of the robber city, its antagonist Jerusalem, on its rocky peninsula, supplies the form of Isaiah's thought; but it is only a symbol of the true city of God, the stable, invisible, but most real, polity and order of things to which men, even while wandering lonely and pilgrims, do come, if they will.
The reader will now recall that we have already heard Matthew's corroboration of the testimony of John the Baptist concerning Isaiah's claim to this prophecy. In the gospel of the Apostle John he puts on record his personal testimony concerning the author of the book bearing Isaiah's name.
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