destruction which has always attended it! It overturns kingdoms, ruins families, and makes God our enemy. In 2d Kings xxiii. 27 we read the following affecting passage; "And the Lord said, I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I removed Israel." Accordingly we find in chapter xxv. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came, and all his host, and pitched against Jerusalem; while the siege lasted, the famine dreadfully prevailed; at length the enemy got possession of the city. Zedekiah, king of Judah, fled, but was overtaken; his sons were slain before his face; his eyes were then put out, he was bound in fetters of brass, and carried to Babylon; the temple, which had stood more than four hundred years, was burnt, the city was laid in ashes, the wall were demolished, and the people were carried to Babylon.

Thus we see desolution brought by sin upon the Lord's favourite people. About eight hundred and fifty years they had been in possession of this land; God had watched graciously over them, no nation was ever so favoured, and no people ever revolted more; till at length divine patience gave way to divine wrath, and they were made to feel that rod which they had long deserved. But the Lord did not altogether forsake Judah, they were only confined seventy years in Babylon, where they were cured of their idolatry; they then were allowed to return to their land again. Cyrus, king of Persia, having obtained possession of Babylon, was inclined to let the Jews go out of captivity, of which they availed themselves; and having returned, they rebuilt the temple of the Lord at Jerusalem, as we read in the book of Ezra.

ESTHER IS MADE QUEEN.

BEFORE CHRIST 514 YEARS.

To grace the feast Ahasuerus sends,
And asks the presence of his queen;
But she no due obedience lends,

And will not with his guests be seen,

THERE is in the book of Esther a great deal that is entertaining and instructive. When the Jews availed themselves of the clemency of Cyrus, king of Persia, to return to their own land after seventy years of captivity in Babylon, many of them remained behind in the land of the heathens, and it is to such that the book of Esther chiefly refers.

This short narrative, comprised in the book under this title, is supposed to have

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