reigned next (called also Uzziah); and God made him a leper, for invading the priest's office, by offering; and his son Jotham ruled, and, when he was dead, reigned next; and Ahaz, a bad man, succeeded him; and Hezekiah, a good king, came next him. Manasseh, a most wicked man, was next. Amon, a bad man, was next him; and he being murdered, his son Josiah, a good king, was next. Jehoahaz was next him; he was wicked, and the king of Egypt took him, and set his brother Eliakim, called Jehoiakim, in his stead: he was bad, and made subject to Nebuchadnezzar and his son Jehoiakim was next. He was wicked; and Nebuchadnezzar carried him, and all the chief of the people, captives to Babylon; and over the rest, he made his uncle, Mattaniah, king, called Zedekiah. He was wicked, and rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, who took him, and put out his eyes, and killed his sons, and destroyed Jerusalem; and carried him, and all the chief of the people left, to Babylon; and set one Gedaliah over the poor in the country, who was presently murdered And thus ended the kingdom of Judah, by captivity.

C. And who succeeded Jeroboam, and what became of the kingdom of the ten tribes of Israel?

M. All that came after Jeroboam followed him, in his sin of idolatry, to keep the people from going to Jerusalem. Nadab came next Jeroboam. Baasha murdered him, and came next. Elah was next. Zimri murdered him, when he found him drunken, and reigned next; he killed also the king's kindred, and reigned but a week, before Omri was chosen king by the people; who besieged Zimri, and made him set fire to his house, and burn himself. Omri, a wicked man, was next. And Ahab, more wicked, next him. Ahaziah was next. His brother, Jehoram, was next. Jehu killed him, and was next. Jehoahaz was next. Joash was next. Another Jeroboam was next. Next him, was Zachariah. Shallum murdered him, and was next. Menahem killed him, and was next. Then Pekahiah. Pekah killed him, and was next. Hoshea killed him, and was next; and in his days Shalmanesar, king of Assyria, carried him, and all the chief people, away, and sent men of other countries into the land; who together feared God, and worshipped their own idols. And so ended the kingdom of Israel, before that of Judah.

C. But what great things fell out in all this time?

M. The greatest thing for our notice was, the many prophets that God sent to warn them, and what they did, and how they were used by these kings.

C. Who were these prophets?

M. 1. Ahijah was sent to prophesy Jeroboam's reign against Solomon, when he sinned. 2. Shemaiah was sent to forbid Judah to fight against Jeroboam, for Rehoboam. 3. A man of God was sent from Judah to foretel Jeroboam that Josiah should destroy his altar, and burn his priests on it. 4. When Jeroboam's son, Abijah was sick, Ahijah, the prophet, foretold his death, and the destruction of Jeroboam's wicked house. 5. Azariah is sent to Asa, to rid Judah of idols. 6. Hanani was sent to reprove Asa, for trusting to Syria for help; and, though otherwise he had done well, he was in a rage against the prophet, and imprisoned him, and oppressed some of the people; and in his sickness sought not to God, but to the physicians. 7. Jehoshaphat sent his princes and Levites, to teach the law of the Lord in the cities of Judah; and when he joined with Ahab in war, the prophet Jehu was sent to reprove him. 8. The same Jehu is sent to prophesy against king Baasha. 9. Elijah, in Ahab's days, prophesieth, that Israel should have no rain, but famine, three years. And when he fled to a brookside, God sent ravens, to carry to him bread and flesh twice a-day. Then the brook was dried up; and God sent him to Zarephath, near Sidon, to a widow woman, to be fed. And the woman had nothing left but a little meal and oil, to make one cake for herself and son, before they died. And Elijah bid her make one for him first, and told her from God, that the meal and the oil should not waste and fail till rain came. And the woman believed him, and they all lived on that meal and oil a full year, and it wasted not, for God secretly renewed it. Then the woman's son died: and Elijah prayed to God, and laid himself upon the child, and God restored the soul and life of the child.

And the third year, God bid Elijah go show himself to Ahab; and wicked Ahab had a more wicked wife, Jezebel, who killed the prophets of the Lord. But yet he had a governor of his house, called Obadiah, who greatly feared God, and hid two hundred prophets, by fifties, in a cave, and fed them. To this Obadiah Elijah appeared, and bid him go tell Ahab of him; and promised to appear to him. And the king met Elijah, and said, "Art thou he that troubleth Israel?" And Elijah said,

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"I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy father's house, in that you have forsaken the Lord, and followed Baalim." And to convince him, he bid him gather Israel and Baal's prophets to Mount Carmel. So he gathered eight hundred and fifty false prophets, that Jezebel maintained. And Elijah said to all the people, "How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him; but if Baal be God, follow him." And he said, "I only remain a prophet of the Lord, and Baal's prophets are four hundred and fifty; other four hundred belonged to the groves. So he bid them take a bullock, and cut him in pieces for a sacrifice, and lay it on wood without fire, and he would do the same by another bullock; and let each call on his God, and let him that answereth by fire be their God. And they did so; and Baal's prophets cried, "O Baal, hear us!" and Elijah mocked them, and said, their god was talking, or pursuing, or in a journey, or asleep, and must be awaked. And they cried, and cut themselves till they bled, as their manner was, but no fire came. Then Elijah repaired God's altar, and laid on the wood and sacrifice, and made a trench about the altar, and he made them pour water on the sacrifice and wood three times, till the trench was full; and he prayed to God, and a fire came and consumed the flesh and the wood, and the stones, and the water. And when the people saw it, they fell on their faces and cried, "The Lord he is God! the Lord he is God!" And Elijah bade the people kill all the prophets of Baal; and they obeyed him, and killed them. Then Elijah bade king Ahab haste up, for rain was coming, and it rained plentifully.

C. But how did the king take the death of his prophets?

M. He told his wife Jezebel, and she swore that she would take away the life of Elijah the next day: and Elijah fled into Judah, and went into the wilderness, and prayed God to end his life; and he fell asleep, and an angel awoke him, and bid him arise and eat. And he saw by him a cake baked on coals, and a cruse of water, and he did eat and drink, and slept again: and the angel came again, and bid him eat and drink, for he had far to go. And he went to Horeb, the mount of God, forty days, in the strength of that meat as he was there in a cave, God spake to him and said, "What dost thou here, Elijah?" and he said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain the prophets, and I only am left, and they seek

my life also." And after a wind, that tore the rocks, and an earthquake, and a fire, had passed by him, God spake in a still voice, and bid him go and anoint Hazael, king over Syria, and Jehu king over Israel, and Elisha to be a prophet in his stead; and God told him, he had yet seven thousand in Israel that had not bowed to Baal. So Elijah went, and did but cast his mantle on Elisha, and he left, and followed, and served him.

C. But what became of king Ahab, and Jezebel?

M. Shortly after, Benhadad, king of Syria, raised an army against him, and commanded him to surrender to him all that he had Ahab was ready to yield, but the elders of Israel were against it; and though Ahab was wicked, God, in mercy, sent a prophet to him, to bid him not fear that great multitude, for God would deliver them into his hand; and he told him how to order the battle and so the Syrians were overthrown. And the prophet told Ahab, that at the return of the year they would come again, and bid him prepare. And so it came to pass, for the Syrians told their king, that the gods of Israel were gods of the hills, but, if he would fight in the plains, he should be too hard for them. But God would not put up that reproach, but sent a prophet to bid Ahab fight with them again, and he should conquer; which he did, and then the Syrians fled into a city, and a wall fell upon twenty and seven thousand of them that were left. And Benhadad and his servants came in sackcloth, with ropes on their heads, to beg for life of Ahab; and he let him go: whereupon God sent another prophet to tell Ahab, that because he had dismissed one whom God had appointed to destruction, his life should go for his life.

After this Naboth, a subject of Ahab, had a vineyard, which lay near to Ahab's house, and Ahab desired it, to make him a garden, and offered him money, or a better, for it. But Naboth refused, because it had been the inheritance of his fathers. This so offended Ahab that he took to his bed, (and would not eat) in discontent. But his wife Jezebel told him that this was unmeet for a king, and bid him be merry, and she would give him Naboth's vineyard. So she wrote letters to the nobles and elders of the city where Naboth dwelt, in Ahab's name, and sealed them with his seal, requiring them to proclaim a fast, and set up Naboth, and get two wicked men to swear that he blasphemed God and the king, and so to stone him to death as guilty. And they did all that was required of them.

C. Could not the king have taken it without this?

M. No; God had given the people their inheritances, and they knew that the king might not take them from any that did not forfeit them and they that were so wicked as to obey the king in perjury and murder, yet would not give him an arbitrary power over their inheritances and lives. But God sent Elijah to Ahab, when he went to take possession of the vineyard: and he said, "Hast thou killed, and taken possession?" and Ahab said, "Hast thou found me, O my enemy?" And Elijah said, "I have found thee, because thou hast sold thyself to work evil :" and, he told him, that in the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, they should lick his blood, and all his house should be destroyed; and that the dogs should eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel, and dogs and birds should eat his household. And when Ahab heard this, he humbled himself in sackcloth, with fasting and God so far suspended his judgments as to tell Elijah that, because he humbled himself, this destruction of his house should not come till he was dead.

C. And how did God execute this judgment?

M. After three years, Ahab had a mind to recover Ramoth, a bordering city, from the Syrians; and Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, coming to visit him, he persuaded him to join with him in the war, which he did: and Jehoshaphat desired him first to inquire of the Lord, what they should do; and king Ahab gathered four hundred of his own prophets, and inquired of them, and they bid him go, for God would deliver the city into his hand. But Jehoshaphat asked whether there were never a prophet of the Lord to inquire of and Ahab said, "There is one Micaiah, but I hate him, for he doth not prophesy good of me, but evil." Jehoshaphat said, "Let not the king say so:"so the two kings sat in their robes, and all the prophets prophesied good to them; and said, "Go and prosper :" and one of them, Zedekiah, made iron horns, and said, "With these shalt thou push the Syrians till thou hast consumed them." And they that went to call Micaiah, told him what all the prophets said, and persuaded him to be conformable, and say as the rest did: but he protested that he would speak the word of God, whatever it should be. And when the king demanded it of him, he said, "I saw all Israel scattered on the hills, as sheep without a shepherd ;” and the Lord said, "These have no master, let them return in peace.' And Ahab said to Jehoshapat, " Did not I tell thee that he would prophesy no good of me, but evil?" And Micaiah told him, that he saw the Lord on his throne, and the host of heaven about