The Scripture progressive reading books [ed. by J. Ridgway].

The command was, "Make no league with them," have "no intercourse with them ;" and the promise was, "I will drive them out before you," "little by little" they shall be subdued.

Israel took up her place, as we know from the Book of Joshua, upon the mountains of Palestine, these "citadels of the earth," as they have been called.

Instead of resisting her foes and thrusting them out from before her, she put some to tribute, entered into agreement with others, and intermarried with those about her; so that a little more than three hundred years after the death of Joshua we find Israel practising the manners of the heathen.

Although she had expelled the Canaanites from the valley of Esdraelon, she copied their form of worship, shared in the gross immoralities of their priests, and debased her own holy religion to a level with that of the nations of the earth; yea, so entirely did she imbibe their mode of thought, that, after a defeat in a battle with the Philistines, she brought the ark as other nations would their idols, and bid her priests carry it into the battle, without the direction of the God to whom it belonged.

But there were a few in those sad times who held fast their integrity to the God of Israel, and amongst these few some of the women of Israel shine with a bright lustre.

We read of an angel being sent to one to tell her she should have a son (Samson), who should begin to "deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines." Of the life and death of this wonderful child we have a full account in the Book of Judges.

With a deeper interest we turn to the story of Hannah, and follow her from her home in Ramathaim up to Shiloh, where she poured out her heart before the Lord in that silent pleading which was accepted of Him, and received the answer she desired, in granting her also to be a mother in Israel.

Samson and Samuel must have been boys together, although Samson was a few years the elder; but what a contrast we see in their mind and character.

Samson, the child of promise, was richly endowed with personal gifts. Had his mental character and spiritual energies been equal to his physical strength, what might he not have accomplished for his people? As it was, he only kept the enemies of Israel at bay, without effecting any real deliverance, for he ever allowed himself to be swayed by those carnal influences which proved his ruin.

Samuel was the child of prayer; and without possessing any extraordinary gifts (that we read of) of either body or mind, he effected more for the salvation of his people and for the church of God than almost any other individual, and from infancy to grey hairs his life is an example for all ages.

With peculiar interest, therefore, we seek out the locality of his birth, and ask which of all the Ramahs upon the mountains of Israel has the best claim to the honour of being his dwelling-place?

I must have the pleasure of believing that Er-Ram, now a Moslem village, about two hours north of Jerusalem, is the one, for it retains the name and answers to the Scripture narrative.

I am aware that some have thought this place irreconcilable with Saul's first visit to Samuel; but when it is remembered that Elkanah, the father of Samuel, was connected with Bethlehem through his ancestor Zuph (1 Sam. i. 1), and that Ramathaim-zophim very probably means Ramah of the Zophites, to distinguish it from the other Ramahs, and also that in 1 Sam. ix. there is nothing said of Ramah, but only of "the land of Zuph," who was an Ephrathite (and 'Ephrath was Bethlehem," we are told in Gen. xxxv. 19), we may conclude that Samuel was not at his own home on the day of Saul's first visit to him, but that he had gone over to Bethlehem, as is mentioned on some other occasion, to offer a sacrifice.

The answer of the maidens to Saul, in verse 12, appears to me conclusive that the prophet was only a visitor that day, and as his office was to bless the sacrifice, he would have a right to direct its distribution.

In searching for the lost asses, Saul passed "through

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE first portion of this book concludes the Prose Lessons of the Series. It supplies miscellaneous information illustrating Bible History, which would have interrupted the narrative if placed in its strict historical position, but will elucidate many expressions and customs in ancient Eastern life that differ from our own.

The remainder of the book consists of selections from Sacred Poetry, intended to furnish (with those minor pieces interspersed throughout the Series) a fairly complete representation of the best standard works of this branch of sacred literature in modern times. The arrangement follows that of the order of events in the Bible, as the titles of the pieces will show.

Many of the poems have been selected with a view to recitation; and but few of them have been hitherto published in books of this class, for which they seem to be specially adapted.

The Editor's thanks are due to those Authors and Publishers by whose kind courtesy he is able to use them for that instructive purpose for which they are so admirably suited.

OXFORD, 1878.

JAMES RIDGWAY, B.D., F.S.A.

Visit to Ramah, the Home of Samuel,-Part I.,

Jehovah-Shammah,

Visit to Ramah, the Home of Samuel,—Part II.,
Sickness in the Cradle,

The Seer,

The History of the Ark of the Covenant,