would not have written naturally, and therefore
truthfully. Through this interweaving of biography with revelation, God
has given in the case of Jeremiah, as in that of the great apostle to
the Gentiles, a rich storehouse of truth for the instruction and comfort
of his persecuted and suffering servants in all ages. With the
simplicity of truth, the prophet informs us how the men of Anathoth, his
native place, conspired to take away his life (11:18-23; 12:6); how
Pashur, the son of Immer, smote him and put him in the stocks (20:1-6);
how in the beginning of Jehoiakim's reign he was accused before the
princes by the priests and false prophets as a man worthy of death, but
acquitted by them (chap. 26); how afterwards he and Baruch were hidden
by Jehovah (chap 36); how under Zedekiah he was repeatedly imprisoned
(chaps. 32:2; 33:1), and thrust into dungeons (chaps. 37, 38); how upon
the conquest of the city by the Chaldeans he was released from his
fetters and honorably treated (chs. 39:11-14; 40:1-4); and how
afterwards he was forced to go into Egypt with the fugitive Jews (chaps.
42, 43).

In connection with this external history, we have a vivid portraiture of
his inward conflicts. Most deeply does he sympathize with his countrymen
in the calamities which their sins have brought upon them; yet he is
rewarded only with curses, because he faithfully forewarns them of the
judgments of heaven which are fast approaching, and which can be averted
only by hearty repentance and reformation. "Woe is me, my mother," he
cries out in his anguish, "that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a
man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor
men have lent to me on usury; yet every one of them doth curse me"
(15:10); and like Job he loses all composure under the pressure of his
sorrows, and bitterly curses the day of his birth (20:14-18). Again we
see him in the hands of his persecutors serenely committing himself to
God, and calmly warning them against the guilt of shedding his blood
(26:12-15). In such alternations of impatience and faith we have a true
portraiture of the struggle of grace against the weakness of nature; and
it is this which gives it especial value as a part of revelation, which
never exhibits good men in a fictitious light, but always in the sober
livery of truth.

11. Jeremiah was of priestly descent (1:1); but that Hilkiah, his
father, was identical with the high priest who found in the te