uld get nothing more from
him, or could get more elsewhere, she left him. She was like the woman
in Kipling's poem, "The Vampire," "she did not care." It hurt Hosea.
For a time the light of the whole world seemed darkened for him.

=Reading a meaning in sorrow.=--Then like a flash the thought came to
him; Jehovah is just like me in this regard. He wants love, not gifts,
from his people, a love which on their part does not fawn for other
gifts from him in return, like the cupboard love of kittens purring
for cream. He loves his people Israel just as I love Gomer. That is
why he asks us not to worship these other gods, the Baals; not because
he is jealous but because he is good. He wants us to learn a different
kind of worship altogether--a worship which is not prompted by greed
but by love.

With his whole soul aflame, Hosea poured these new ideas into the ears
of his countrymen.

="I desire mercy, and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God
more than burnt-offerings."=

These great words were quoted by Jesus himself in one of his
controversies with the Pharisees; they are one of the supreme
utterances of human literature.

STORM CLOUDS ON THE HORIZON

This new insight of Hosea helped him to interpret hopefully the
troubles which at that time were coming thick and fast upon his
people. The forebodings of Amos were coming true. The kings of Assyria
were ambitious. They had set their hearts upon a great Assyrian empire
extending from Babylonia to Egypt. For more than two centuries each
new king at Nineveh sent his conquering armies farther west and south.
Already in Hosea's day they had more than once invaded northern Israel
and had taken away tribute. And the leaders of the nation did not have
the brains or the character to avoid a conflict with this merciless
and resistless foe.

=Jehovah loving even in punishment.=--Amos had declared that Jehovah
would surely punish his people because of injustices and wrongs which
they were inflicting on one another. Hosea agreed, but was able to go
further, and say that in these very punishments which were now coming
Jehovah was still showing not his anger but his love. He was punishing
in the hope that his children might learn their lesson and return to
him in love.

=Fall of the northern kingdom.=--The nation, as a nation, seemed to
pay no attention to Hosea's pleadings. They went right on living their
selfish and greedy and lustful lives. And in B.C. 721, as a