I. THE GUILT OF ARROGANCE. (Ver. 6.) Moab was proud, haughty, insolent, boastful; she lifted up herself in contemptuous defiance of Judah, of the city of God; and the prophet of Jehovah speaks of her arrogance as a very great offence in 'the eyes of the supreme Disposer. There is nothing which is more emphatically, or more repeatedly condemned in Scripture than haughtiness of heart or spiritual pride; it is a very rank offence in the estimation of the Holy One. And well may it be so; for what can be more pitifully wrong, more utterly unbecoming, than that such puny, ignorant, dependent creatures as we are should assert ourselves against the God from whom we came and in whom we live? It should be remembered that there is not only the arrogance of an idolatrous defiance, like that of Moab, but also, as too often found amongst ourselves,

(1) the arrogance of unbelief - the product of intellectual pride;

(2) the arrogance of impiety - the daring determination of the soul to live without God, to delay all attention to his sovereign claims until a late hour of life;

(3) the arrogance of vice - the reckless resolution to snatch forbidden and unholy pleasure, whatever Divine laws may be broken, whatever human hearts may be embittered and human lives despoiled, whatever penal consequences may be entailed.

II. THE DEPTH OF ITS DISCOMFITURE.

1. This is seen in the sadness of the circumstances of Moab. Its inhabitants were "stricken (ver. 7) with a crushing blow (see Isaiah 5.; also ver. 8). Perhaps the culminating feature is seen in the shouting of the harvest home being exchanged for the shouting of the enemy's soldiery taking possession of the spoil (ver. 9).

2. It is also seen in, the signs of prevailing misery. Moab shall howl for Moab; every one shall howl (ver. 7). Each one for himself and all for one another; "the people to the city, the city to the provinces." The land should be full of weeping. "Pride cometh before a fall; '"He that exalteth himself shall be abased." These are specimen-passages, representing a large number and a great variety of Divine declarations that arrogance will have a disastrous end. Of course, the special form which the sin takes will usually determine the particular punishment which will ensue. But there will surely come defeat, humiliation, distress; and of this distress the most intolerable element will probably be a lacerating remorse, in which the soul will smite itself because it yielded not, as it might have done, in the day of opportunity.

III. THE COMPASSION OF THE RIGHTEOUS. (Vers. 9-11.) The prophet is so impressed with the deplorableness of Moab's condition that his heart is powerfully touched on its behalf. He "bewails" for it; his heart "sounds like an harp" for it. Human indignation against sin does well to pass into pity for the sorrow and the ruin which sin entails. This is truly God-like, Christian. "God so loved," with the love of an infinite compassion, this sin-ruined world, "that he gave his only begotten Son." Jesus Christ, when lie beheld the doomed city of David, moved with a tender compassion for its coming woes, "wept over it." Let the holy grace of indignation have its due share in the Christian character; the soul that has it not is seriously wanting: but let it by no means exclude from the chambers of the heart that heavenly guest - Christ-like compassion. Let us have a large and generous pity for the fallen, for the guilty, for those who are suffering the bitter pangs of self-reproach; and let sympathetic sorrow pass speedily into a wise and kind helpfulness, which will lead back from the "far country" of sin and shame to the Father's home of righteousness and joy. - C.

is never concealed in the Divine writings. God is always seeking to bring about the time when in mercy His throne shall be established, and when there shall sit upon it in truth one who will represent the ideal judgment and blessing of God. The fifth verse might be rendered, "In mercy shall a throne be established, and One shall sit upon it in truth." The prophet has constantly kept before his mind the image of an ideal king. The ideal was partially fulfilled in Hezekiah, yet only partially; the prophet was sure One was coming who would fulfil it in its utmost meaning, and he steadfastly kept his eye on the bright day when God's throne should be established among the nations, and His sceptre should be extended over all. God does not exist merely to destroy, nor does He rule only in order that He may humble and crush; His purpose is one of equity, righteousness, blessing, cultivation.

(J. Parker, D. D.)