acy. There all the sacrifices were to
be offered, there was the seat of royal authority, and consequently of
public justice, and thither all the males among the people were required
to repair three times a year at the great national festivals. Deut.
16:16. A Jew could conceive of the conversion of all nations only in the
form of their subjecting themselves to the theocracy, and coming up to
Jerusalem for worship and the administration of justice. Accordingly the
Spirit of prophecy here represents the mountain of the Lord's house as
"established in the top of the mountains," a conspicuous object to all
nations, who resort thither for worship, submit themselves to the
authority of the great king who reigns there, and thus have universal
peace and happiness. To insist on the literal interpretation of these
words is contrary to the general analogy of prophecy. It is an attempt
to bring back the outward sensuous form of the kingdom of heaven which
the gospel dispensation has abolished.

There is another celebrated passage in Zechariah (14:16-21) which is
intensely Jewish in its costume. After describing the judgments of God
upon the nations that have fought against Jerusalem, the prophet goes on
to say: "And it shall come to pass that every one that is left of all
the nations which came against Jerusalem, shall even go up from year to
year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of
tabernacles. And it shall be, that whoso will not come up, of all the
families of the earth, unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of
hosts, even upon them shall be no rain. And if the family of Egypt go
not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague,
wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the
feast of tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the
punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of
tabernacles. In that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses,
HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD; and the pots in the Lord's house shall be like
the bowls before the altar. Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah
shall be holiness unto the Lord of hosts; and all they that sacrifice
shall come and take of them and seethe therein: and in that day there
shall be no more the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts." The
prophet's care to include "all the families of the earth" in this
ordinance is very noticeable. Whatever nation refuses to observe it
sha