the sender had nothing to do with her answer; but when she comes to
speak of pardon and God's favour, there must be no vagueness in the
destination of the message, and the penitent heart must be tenderly
bound up by a word from God straight to itself. The threatenings are
general, but each single soul that is sorry for sin may take as its
very own the promise of forgiveness. God's great 'Whosoever' is for me
as certainly as if my name stood on the page.

The terrible message of the inevitableness of the destruction hanging
over Jerusalem is precisely parallel with the burden of all Jeremiah's
teaching. It was too late to avert the fall. The external judgments
must come now, for the emphasis of the prophecy is in its last words,
it 'shall not be quenched.' But that did not mean that repentance was
too late to alter the whole character of the punishment, which would
be fatherly chastisement if meekly accepted. So, too, Jeremiah taught,
when he exhorted submission to the 'Chaldees.' It is never too late to
seek mercy, though it may be too late to hope for averting the outward
consequences of sin.

As for Josiah, his penitence was accepted, and he was assured that he
would be gathered to his fathers. That expression, as is clear from
the places where it occurs, is not a synonym for either death or
burial, from both of which it is distinguished, but is a dim promise
of being united, beyond the grave, with the fathers, who, in some one
condition, which we may call a place, are gathered into a restful
company, and wander no more as pilgrims and sojourners in this lonely
and changeful life.

Josiah died in battle. Was that going to his grave in peace? Surely
yes! if, dying, he felt God's presence, and in the darkness saw a