withdraw their shining." The same allusion is involved in these words of Nahum, concerning the fall of the Assyrian empire: "Thy crowned are as the locusts; and thy captains as the great grasshoppers, which camp in the hedges in the cold day, but when the sun ariseth, they flee away, and their place is not known." Bochart and other writers, who are best acquainted with the eastern countries, mention a great variety of locusts, which vindicates the language of the prophet: "Thy captains are as the great grasshoppers." The next clause is attended with some difficulty. Mr. Lowth, in his comment, supposes that these insects flee away to avoid the heat of the sun; and it has been queried, whether the phrase cold day, does not mean the night. But it is well known that the heat of the sun, instead of compelling the locusts to retire, quickens them into life and activity; and the words cold day, we believe, are never used in scripture, nor by any writer of value, to signify the night. The prophet evidently refers, not to their flight during the heat of the day, but to the time of their total departure; for he does not speak of their moving from one field to another, but of their leaving the country which they have invaded, so completely that the place of their retreat is not known.

The day of cold cannot mean the depth of winter, for they do not make their appearance in Palestine at that season; and although in Arabia, from whence Fulcherius supposes they come, thickets are found in some places, and it has been imagined that the locusts die concealed in them during the winter, which may be thought to be their camping in the hedges in the cold day; yet it is to be observed, that the word translated hedges, properly signifies, not living fences, but stone walls, and therefore cannot with propriety be applied to thickets. But if the locust appears in the months of April and May, the phrase "cold day" may seem to be improperly chosen. This difficulty, which may be thought a considerable one, arises entirely from our translation. The original term, (p) karah, denotes both cold and cooling; and the difficulty vanishes when the latter is introduced, and the words are translated, the day of cooling, or the time when the Orientals open their windows with the view of refrigerating their houses, or to retreat from the oppressive heats which commence in the months of April and May, to the cooling shades of their gardens. A derivative of this term is employed by the sacred historian, to denote the refrigeratory or summer parlour, which Eglon, the king of Moab, occupied, when Ehud presented the tribute of his nation.-PAXTON.

Ver. 6. Before their face the people shall be much pained; all faces shall gather blackness.

The margin has, for "blackness," "pot." The Tamul translation has," All faces shall wither, or shrivel." Thus of a man in great poverty it is said, "His face is shrivelled." It is very provoking to tell a person his face is like the KARE-CHATTE, i. e. the earthen vessel in which the rice is boiled. The "pot" may allude to such a utensil, in being made black with the smoke.-ROBERTS.

We have an expression, Joel ii. 6, "Before their approach [of the locusts] the people shall be much pained; all faces shall gather blackness," which is also adopted by the prophet Nahum, ii. 10: "the heart melteth, the knees smite together, much pain is in all loins, and the faces of them all gather blackness." This phrase, which sounds uncouth to an English ear, is elucidated by the following history from Ockley's History of the Saracens, (vol. ii. p. 319,) which we the rather introduce, as Mr. Harmer has referred this blackness to the effect of hunger and thirst; and Calmet, in his Dictionary, under the article OBSCURE, has referred it to a bedaubing of the face with soot, &c. a proceeding not very consistent with the hurry of flight, or the terror of distress. "Kumeil, the son of Ziyad, was a man of fine wit. One day Hejage made him come before him, and reproached him, because in such a garden, and before such and such persons, whom he named to him, he had made a great many imprecaions against him, saying, the Lord blacken his face, that is, fill him with shame and confusion; and wished that his neck was cut off, and his blood shed." The reader will observe how perfectly this explanation agrees with the sense of the passages quoted above: to gather blackness, then, is equivalent to suffering extreme confusion, and being overwhelmed with shame, or with terror and dismay.

In justice to Kumeil, we ought not to omit the ready turn of wit which saved his life. "It is true," said he, "I did say such words in such a garden; but then I was under a vine-arbour, and was looking on a bunch of grapes that was not yet ripe: and I wished it might be turned black soon, that they might be cut off, and be made wine of." We see, in this instance, as says the sagacious moralist, that "with the well-advised is wisdom:" and "the tongue of the wise is health;" that is, preservation and safety.— TAYLOR IN CALMET.

Ver. 8. Neither shall one thrust another, they

shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded.

Dr. Shaw, speaking of locusts, says, "Those which I saw were much bigger than our grasshoppers: no sooner were any of them hatched, than they collected themselves marching forward, climbed over trees and houses, and ate into a body of about two hundred yards square, which up every thing in their way. The inhabitants made large fires on the approach of them, but to no purpose; for the fires were quickly put out by infinite swarms succeeding one another; while the front seemed regardless of danger; and the rear pressed on so close, that retreat was impossi ble."-BURDER.

Ver. 23. Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and re joice in the LORD your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month. See on Prov. 16. 15.

Ver. 23. Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the LORD your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month. 24. And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil.

In southern climates, rain comes at particular seasons, which are generally termed the rainy seasons. The rain seldom continues to fall long at one time even then, but rather falls in what may be called thunder-showers, and in torrents. If the ground happens to be hard, which it generally is, such a short, though plentiful fall of rain, does little service to the land, as it runs off immediately, not having time to soften and sink into the ground; afterward the powerful heat of the sun, soon breaking forth from behind the clouds, draws up the little damp that has been left, which soon rehardens the surface of the ground, and renders it as impervious as before, so that succeeding showers are rendered almost useless; but rain falling MODERATELY, as promised in the text, gradually penetrates the ground, and prepares it to retain future showers, which process produces fertility.-CAMPBELL.

CHAPTER III.

Ver. 1. For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, 2. I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them. there for my people, and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.

Those spiritualizing Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans, who wrest this passage, like a thousand others of the scriptures, from a literal to a mystical sense, insist on its applying to the resurrection of the dead on the last great day. From this belief the modern Jews, whose fathers are thought, by some of the most learned, to have had no idea of a resurrection, or a future state, have their bones depos

ited in the valley of Jehoshaphat. From the same hope the Mohammedans have left a stone jutting out of the eastern wall of Jerusalem, for the accommodation of their prophet, who, they insist, is to sit on it here, and call the whole world from below to judgment. And a late traveller, with the staff of a Christian pilgrim, after summoning up all the images of desolation which the place presents, but without once thinking of the contemptible size of this theatre for so grand a display, says, one might say that the trumpet of judgment had already sounded, and that the dead were about to rise in the valley of Jehoshaphat. (Chateaubriand.) | -BUCKINGHAM.

Ver. 3. And they have cast lots for my people: and have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink.

Morgan, in his history of Algiers, gives us such an account of the unfortunate expedition of the emperor Charles the Fifth against that city, so far resembling a passage of the prophet Joel, as to induce me to transcribe it into these papers.

That author tells us, that besides vast multitudes that were butchered by the Moors and the Arabs, a great number were made captives, mostly by the Turks and citizens of Algiers; and some of them, in order to turn this misfortune into a most bitter, taunting, and conteinptuous jest, parted with their new-made slaves for an onion apiece. "Often have I heard," says he, " Turks and Africans upbraiding Europeans with this disaster, saying, scornfully, to such as have seemed to hold their heads somewhat loftily, 'What! have you forgot the time when a Christian at Algiers was scarce worth an onion?' The treatment of the Jewish people by the heathen nations, which the prophet Joel has described, was, in like manner, contemptuous and bitterly sarcastic: "They have cast lots for my people, and have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink." Joel iii. 3.

They that know the large sums that are wont to be paid, in the East, for young slaves of either sex, must be sensible that the prophet designs, in these words, to point out the extreme contempt in which these heathen nations held the Jewish people.

Considered as slaves are in the East, they are sometimes purchased at a very low price. Joel complains of the contemptuous cheapness in which the Israelites were held by those who made them captives. "They cast lots for my people, and have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink." On this passage Chardin remarks, that, "the Tartars, Turks, and Cossacks, sell the children sometimes as cheap, which they take. Not only has this been done in Asia, where examples of it are frequent; our Europe has seen such desolations. When the Tartars came into Poland they carried off all they were able. I went thither some years after. Many persons of the court assured me that the Tartars, perceiving that they would no more redeem those that they had carried off, sold them for a crown, and that they had purchased them for that sum. In Mingrelia they sell them for provisions, and for wine."-HARMER.

Ver. 10. Beat your ploughshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak 1 say, I am strong.

The Syrian plough, which was probably used in all the regions around, is a very simple frame, and commonly so light, that a man of moderate strength might carry it in one hand. Volney states that in Syria it is often nothing else than the branch of a tree, cut below a bifurcation, and used without wheels. It is drawn by asses and cows, seldom by oxen. And Dr. Russel informs us, the ploughing of Syria is performed often by a little cow, at most with two, and sometimes only by an ass. In Persia it is for the

most part drawn by one ox only, and not unfrequently even by an ass, although it is more ponderous than in Palestine. With such an imperfect instrument the Syrian husbandman can do little more than scratch the surface of his field, or clear away the stones or weeds that encumber it, and prevent the seed from reaching the soil. The ploughshare is a "piece of iron, broad, but not large, which tips the end of the shaft." So much does it resemble the short sword used by the ancient warriors, that it may, with very little trouble, be converted into that deadly weapon; and when the work of destruction is over, reduced again to its former shape, and applied to the purpose of agriculture. In allusion to the first operation, the prophet Joel summons the nations to leave their peaceful employments in the cultivated field, and buckle on their armour: "Beat your ploughshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears." This beautiful image the prophet Isaiah has reversed, and applied to the establishment of that profound and lasting peace which is to bless the church of Christ in the latter days: "And they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more."-PAXTON.

An hour and a half beyond the bridge we gained the road from Jaffa to Ramleh. The country had now become generally cultivated, the husbandry good, the crops and fallows clean. Upon a space of ten or twelve acres I observed fourteen ploughs at work; and so simple and light is the construction of these implements, that the husbandman, when returning from his labour in the evening, takes his plough home upon his shoulder, and carries it to the field again in the morning. The share is of wood, and armed only at the end with a tooth, or point of iron. The beam is very slender, as well as the rude handle by which it is directed.-MUNROE'S SUMMER RAMBLE IN SYRIA.

Ver. 19. Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.

Of the striking scene delineated in the engraving, the enterprising traveller, who has contributed it, must speak for himself: "Our conductor preceded us, calling our attention to some large slabs, traces of an ancient pavement, by which the labour of man had converted this abrupt and wild ravine into a magnificent avenue. After many windings in the midst of this almost subterranean street, (so near do the summits of the rocks above approach each other,) we were arrested by a prospect which it were vain to altempt to describe. Our view is taken from the entry of the ravine. Two Arabs, with their camels, are seen in the foreground, advancing towards the city of Selah or Petra, the magnificent ruins of which, seen in the distance, fully exemplify the prophetic denunciation-Edom shall be a desolation.' (Joel iii. 19.) A grand triumphal arch raised at this spot, such as the ancients were accustomed to construct at the approaches of cities, boldly connects together these two great walls of rocks. The impression produced by it is very imposing, at the moment the traveller enters this kind of covered way."

The novel disposition of this triumphal arch led M. de Laborde at first to think that it might have served both as a passage from one side of the rocks to another, and also as a channel for conveying part of the waters of an aqueduct, which was carried along the ravine. He ascended by a s'eep opening encumbered with rocks; but after reaching the summit with difficulty, he found nothing which could authorize the supposition that this arch was destined for any other use than that of adorning the approaches to the capital of Arabia Petræa.-HORNE.

[See Jer. 49. 15–17. Mal. 1. 4, and the engravings there. See also the COMPREHENSIVE COMMENTARY, and some addi tional views of this city, in that work.]