captivity, and we see them no more.

Those that had

sinned were gone, but the sin must not pass uncondemned. More than fifty years after the Captivity of Israel we find ourselves brought once more to Bethel, the scene of the schismatic worship; and the prophecy, uttered some 360 years before concerning the pollution of that altar, is brought to pass. As a prophet of Judah had been commissioned to foretell it, so from Judah came its execution. Josiah, king of Judah, came there, "and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, had made, both that altar and the high place he brake down, and burned the high place, and stamped it small to powder, and burned the grove" (2 Kings xxiii. 15). Moreover, he "took the bones out of the sepulchres, and burned them upon the altar, and polluted it, according to the word of the Lord, which the man of God proclaimed."

With a brief comment we leave the Old Testament. Are we wrong in saying that we gather from this history that "the good and acceptable and perfect will of God" had been that all the tribes of His chosen people should come up to Jerusalem to worship? Jerusalem was to be the joy of the whole earth.

"Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together; whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord. . . . Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee" (Ps. cxxii. 3, 4, 6).

But man introduced division, and with division a

strange worship, "and this thing became a sin" (1 Kings xii. 30).

It would seem that to this beginning may be traced the constant idolatries of the ten tribes as compared with the kingdom of Judah, and their ultimate dispersion (1 Kings xiv. 15, 16; 2 Kings xxi. 7, 8). All across their history has God placed this record, "The sin of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin," as though it furnished the key to all that befell them.

It is a record that is repeated more than twenty times, is applied to some fifteen reigns, and ranges over 250 years.

It is a record that is applied to the kingdom of Israel alone, since that alone was guilty of schism.1

It is a record that proves at least this, that lapse of time does not modify God's view of a long-established sin.2

In the solitary case of Jehoram king of Judah it is said that "he walked in the way of the kings of Israel" (2 Kings viii. 18); but we miss the well-known reference to the sin of Jeroboam.

2 In these days, when it is urged on behalf of Dissent that the existing generation, having been born in its ranks, is not chargeable with the sin of schism, it is of importance to notice that each king of Israel as he came is condemned for the sin of Jeroboam, because "he departed not therefrom" (2 Kings iii. 3; x. 29; xiii. 2, 6; xiv. 24; xv. 18, 24, 28). In one instance, that of Zimri, who reigned but one week, during part of which he was besieged, there could scarcely have been time for anything more than a general countenance of the sin. Nevertheless it is placed on record that "he died for his sins which he sinned in doing evil in the sight of the Lord, in walking in the way of Jeroboam, and in his sin which he did, to make Israel to sin” (1 Kings xvi. 18, 19).

One other conclusion may be drawn from this history. It is

"Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples [or types]: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are

come.

"Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall" (I Cor. x. II, 12).1

ii.—The Schismatic Worship of the Samaritans.

In passing from the Old Testament to the New we do not at once pass from the consideration of the Jewish to that of the Christian Church. There is a period of transition, during which we can observe our Lord's attitude not only to the Jewish Church, but also to those who dissented from it. Had Scripture been silent it would have been urged, with some show of reason, that our Lord coming upon the corrupt age of that Church withdrew from it, and formed a purer Church on a new basis. Had this been the case, it would have justified secession under similar circumstances in all ages.

But our Divine Master was no dissenter from the Jewish Church. He who "entered into the synagogue on the Sabbath-day as was His custom," or taught daily in the temple" at Jerusalem; He who

plain that any argument based on mere numbers which may be urged either now or hereafter in justification of Dissent is untenable. Christ's Church does not shift with the religious majority of the nation. It was no justification of Jeroboam's sin that it carried with it ten out of the twelve tribes, together with the coveted title of "the children of Israel."

1 For other lessons to be drawn from the sin of Jeroboam, the reader is referred to the Appendix.

came, as every devout Jew came, to the festivals of that Church, lends no colour to such a supposition. He even was careful to enjoin respect to the authorized teachers. As a child He was found sitting at their feet, hearing them and asking them questions. To the lepers He says, "Go show yourselves unto the priests" (Luke xvii. 14); to His own disciples, "The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses' seat: all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not" (Matt. xxiii. 2, 3). His example can never be quoted in justification of Dissent. He warns all against such a thought. "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil" (Matt. v. 17).

There can be no need to dwell longer on this point. It is beyond controversy that, though that Church was utterly corrupt, our Master never, by precept or example, gave any kind of justification for withdrawing from it, and setting up a separate communion. His words all point to obedience to the ordained ministers and observance of the authorized worship.

We turn, then, to that other inquiry, whether Dissent did not exist at that time, and if so, in what light did our Lord regard it?

In the centre of the Holy Land, separating Galilee from Judæa, was Samaria. Who were these Samaritans? Not Jews-nor, to speak precisely, Gentiles.1 They were not Jews, for it is said, "The Jews have

1 We may notice our Lord's way of particularizing them (Matt. x. 5, 6; Acts i. 8). It would seem from these instances

no dealings with the Samaritans." They were not Gentiles, for they worshipped the true God; they looked for the Messias which is called Christ; they read the Scriptures, and observed the law of Moses. They spoke of Jacob as their father (John iv. 12). It is evident, then, that they claimed to be Israelites.

If we inquire into their history, we find that they were a mixed population of Israelites, Jews, and Gentiles who had intermarried. After the captivity of the Ten Tribes, the land was peopled by colonies from Assyria. These colonists were settled, it would seem, in the cities (2 Kings xvii. 24), while the country districts were, in some measure, still inhabited by "the remnant of Israel" (2 Chron. xxxiv. 9, 21).

that He classed them neither under the head of Jew nor Gentile, but assigned them a distinct position. Bishop Wordsworth has pointed out that had the Samaritans been Gentiles, then S. Peter and the other Apostles would have felt the same scruple as to their reception into the Church that they felt with regard to the subsequent admission of Cornelius. In the absence of any such scruple, it is plain that he, not they, was the first fruits of the Gentile world (Acts xi. 18). See Commentary, 2 Kings xvii. 41.

"In the later conquest of Judah it is especially mentioned that the 'poorest sort of the people of the land' were left behind, and only the nobles, warriors, and artizans carried away (2 Kings xxiv. 14). It seems most probable that such had been the case with Israel also, for Josiah, in 630, puts down idolatry in 'Manasseh and Ephraim, and Simeon, even unto Naphtali,' and a little later repairs the temple with money collected for the purpose from Manasseh and Ephraim and all the remnant of Israel,' as well as from Judah and Benjamin (2 Chron. xxxiv. 6, 9). Again, after the ruin of Judah, in 588, worshippers from Shechem and Samaria are represented as coming with offerings