For I shall send him among those hypocritical people, among the people that have deserved my disfavour shall I send him: that he may utterly rob them, spoil them, and tread them down like the mire in the street.

Howbeit, his meaning is not so, neither thinketh his heart of this fashion. But he imagineth only, how he may overthrow and destroy much people,

for he sayeth, "Are not my princes all kings?

Wherefore the LORD sayeth: As soon as I have performed my whole work upon the hill of Zion and Jerusalem, then will I also visit the noble and stout king of Assyria, with his wisdom and pride."

For he standeth thus in his own conceit: "This do I, through the power of my own hand, and through my wisdom: For I am wise, I am he that removes the lands of the people, I rob their princes: and like one of the worthies I drive them from their high seats.

My hand hath found out the Hosts of the people, as it were a nest. And like as eggs, that were laid here and there, are gathered together: So do I gather all countries. And there is no man, that dare be so bold as to touch a feather, that dare open his mouth, or once whisper."

The trees also of his field shall be of such a number that a child may tell them.

Therefore thus sayeth the LORD God of Hosts, "Thou my people, that dwellest in Zion, be not afraid for the king of the Assyrians: He shall wag his staff at thee, yea and beat thee with the rod, as the Egyptians did sometimes:

But soon after shall my wrath and mine indignation be fulfilled against their blasphemies.

No man shall do evil to another, no man shall destroy another, in all the hill of my Sanctuary. For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, even as though the water of the sea flowed over the earth.

So that then thou shalt say, "I will praise thee O LORD, that though thou were angry with me, yet thine anger is turned, and thou hast comforted me.

Behold, God is my salvation: I will be bold therefore and not fear. For the LORD God is my strength and my praise whereof I sing: and is become my saviour.

Lift up the banner upon the high hill, call unto them; hold up your hand, that the princes may go in at the door.

For I will send for my deputies and my giants, sayeth the LORD, and in my wrath I will call for such as triumph in my glory.

that they may all - one after another - sing and speak unto thee. Art thou wounded also as we? Art thou become like unto us?

For thou thoughtest in thine heart, "I will climb up into heaven, and make my seat above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the holy mount toward the North;

The Assyrians shall be destroyed in my land, and upon my mountains will I tread them under foot. Wherethrough his yoke shall come from you, and his burden shall be taken from your shoulders.

Mourn, ye ports; weep, ye cities; and fear thou, O whole Philistia, for there shall come from the North a smoke, whose power no man may abide.

Who shall then maintain the messages of the Gentiles? But the LORD establisheth Zion, and the poor of my people shall put their trust in him.

Woe is my heart for Moab's sake. They fled unto the city of Zoar, which is like a fair young bullock of three years old; they went up to Luhith, weeping. The way toward Horonaim was full of lamentation for the hurt.

Let my persecuted people dwell among you; Moab; be thou their refuge against the destroyer: for the adversary is brought to naught, the robber is undone, the tyrant is wasted in the land.

Therefore I mourned for Jazer, and for the vineyards of Sibmah with great sorrow. I poured my tears upon Heshbon and Elealeh, for all their songs were laid down, in their harvest and gathering of their grapes.

Wherefore my belly rumbled as it had been a lute for Moab's sake, and mine inward members for the brick wall's sake.

For thus hath the LORD said unto me: "I will take my rest, and look upon the matter in my habitation, like a fair heat after the rain, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest."

And the LORD of Hosts shall bless them, saying: Blessed is my people of the Egypt, Assyria also is the work of my hands, and Israel is mine inheritance.

Then said the LORD, "Whereas my servant Isaiah goeth naked and barefoot, it is a token and signifying of the thing that after three years shall come upon Egypt and Ethiopia.

This is the heavy burden of the waste sea: A grievous vision was showed unto me, even as the stormy weather that passeth through at the noonday, to come from the wilderness, from that horrible land.

Whoso may deceive, said the voice, let him deceive: Who so may destroy, let him destroy. Up Elam, besiege it O Media, for I will still all their groanings.

With this, the reins of my back were full of pain: Pangs came upon me, as upon a woman in her travail. It made me stoop when I heard it, and it vexed me when I saw it.

My heart panted, I trembled for fear. The night of my voluptuousness hath he turned against me into fear.

For thus the Lord hath charged me: "Go thy way, and set a watchman, that he may tell what he seeth."

And the watchman cried, "LORD, I have stood waiting all the whole day, and am appointed to keep my watch every night.

This, O my fellow threshers and fanners, have I heard of the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, to show it unto you.

The heavy burden of Dumah. He calleth unto me, out of of Seir, "Watchman, what hast thou espied by night? Watchman, what hast thou espied by night?"

For thus hath the LORD spoken unto me, "There is yet a year according to the years of a hired servant, and all the glory of the Cedar shall fail.

When I perceived that, I said, "Let me alone, and I will make lamentation. Take no labour for to comfort me, as touching the destruction of my people."

After this will I call my servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah,

Even the LORD of Hosts hath devised it, that he may put down all pomp, and minish all the Glory of the world.

the wicked cities shall be broken down, all houses shall be shut that no man may come in.

We heard songs sung to the praise of the righteous, from all the ends of the world. And I said, "O mine unfruitfulness! O my poverty! Woe is me! The transgressors have offended; the transgressors have grievously offended!"

O LORD, thou art my God, I will praise thee, and magnify thy name: For thou bringest marvelous things to pass, according to thine old counsels, truly and steadfastly.

Open ye the gates, that the righteous people which keep the truth may enter in.

that they may be trodden under the feet of the simple, and with the steps of the poor.

My soul lusteth after thee all the night long, and my mind hasteth freely to thee. For as soon as thy judgment is known to the world, then the inhabiters of the earth learn righteousness.

So go now my people into thy chamber, and shut the door to thee, and suffer now the twinkling of an eye, till the wrath be overpast.

I hear no evil will in my mind. Who will compel me that I, greatly forgetting all faithfulness, should burn it up at once with thorns and bushes?

Or who will enforce me to keep or make peace?

Command that may be commanded, bid that may be bidden, forbid that may be forbidden, keep back that may be kept back, here a little, there a little.

And therefore the LORD shall answer their stubbornness, lesson upon lesson, commandment upon commandment, rule upon rule, instruction upon instruction, here a little, there a little. That they may go forth, fall backward, be bruised, snared, and taken.

For the bed shall be so narrow that a man cannot lie upon it: And the covering too small, that a man may not wind himself therein.

For the LORD shall step forth as he did upon the mount Perazim, and shall take on as he did upon the vale of Gibeon: that he may bring forth his device, his strange device: and fulfill his work, his wonderful work.

Take heed, and hear my voice, ponder and mark my words well.

And that he may do it right, his God teacheth him and showeth him.

then shall Ariel be besieged, so that she shall be heavy and sorrowful, and shall be unto me even as an altar of slaughter.

Therefore thus sayeth the LORD, "Forsomuch as this people, when they be in trouble, do honor me with their mouth, and with their lips, whereas their heart nevertheless is far from me; and the fear which they owe unto me, that turn they to men's laws and doctrines;

Doubtless, your destruction is, in reputation, as the potter's clay. And doth the work say of him that made it, "He made me not?" And doth an earthen vessel say of the potter, "He understandeth not?"

when he seeth among his children - whom my hands have made - such as hallow my name among them: that they may sanctify the holy one of Jacob, and fear the God of Israel.

Alas, for those disobedient children," sayeth the LORD, "that will take counsel without me. Alas, that they will take a secret advice, and not out of my spirit: and therefore add they sin unto sin.

They go down into Egypt, and ask me no counsel; to seek help at he power of Pharaoh, and comfort in the shadow of the Egyptians.

Now therefore, go thy way; and write them this before them in a table, and note it in a book: that it may finally remain and be kept still forever.

Yet standeth the LORD waiting, that he may have mercy upon you, and lifteth himself up, that he may receive you to grace. For the LORD God is righteous. Happy are all they that wait for him.

His breath is like a vehement flood of water, which goeth up to the throat. That he may take away the people, which have turned themselves unto vanity, and the bridle of error, that lieth in other folks' jaws.

For thus hath the LORD spoken unto me, "Like as the lion or lion's whelps roareth upon the prey that he hath gotten, and is not afraid though the multitude of shepherds cry out upon him, neither abashed for all the heap of them: So shall the LORD of Hosts come down from the mount Zion, and defend his hill.

These are the perilous weapons of the covetous, these be his shameful counsels: that he may beguile the poor with deceitful works, yea, even there as he should give sentence with the poor.

Up, ye rich and idle women, hearken unto my voice. Ye careless cities, mark my words.

My people's field shall bring thorns and thistles, for in every house is voluptuousness; and in the cities, willfulness.

And my people shall dwell in the inns of peace, in my tabernacle and pleasure where there is enough in them all.

Grant that the people may flee at the anger of thy voice, and that at thine upstanding the Gentiles may be scattered abroad;

and that their spoil may be gathered, as the grasshoppers are commonly gathered together into the pit.

Ye shall conceive stubble, and bear straw, and your spirit shall be the fire, that it may consume you.

Now hearken to, ye that are far off, how I do with them; and consider my glory, ye that be at hand.

The sinners at Zion are afraid, and a sudden fearfulness is come upon the hypocrites. "What is he among us," say they, "that will dwell by that consuming fire? Which of us may abide that everlasting heat?"

There shalt thou not see a people of a strange tongue to have so diffused a language, that it may not be understood: neither so strange a speech but it shall be perceived.

For my sword shall be bathed in heaven, and shall immediately come down upon Idumaea, and upon the people which I have cursed for my vengeance.

Thorns shall grow in their palaces, nettles and thistles in their strongholds; that the dragons may have their pleasure therein, and that they may be a court for Ostriches.

Thou thinkest, peradventure, that thou hast counsel and power enough to maintain this war: or else whereto trustest thou, that thou castest thyself off from me?

But if thou wouldest say unto me: 'We trust in the LORD our God': is not he that God whose High places and altars Hezekiah took down, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem to worship only before this altar?

Now therefore deliver hostages that thou rebel no more against my lord the king of the Assyrians, and I will give thee two thousand horses if thou be able to set men upon them.

Seeing now that thou canst not resist the power of the smallest prince that my LORD hath, how darest thou trust in the chariots and horsemen of Egypt?

Moreover, thinkest thou that I am come down hither, to destroy this land without the LORD's will? The LORD said unto me: Go down into the land, that thou mayest destroy it.'"

Then answered Rabshakeh, "Think ye, that the king sent me to speak this only unto you? Hath he not sent me to them also, that lie upon the wall? That they be not compelled to eat their own dung, and drink their own stale with you?"

But thus sayeth the king of Assyria, 'Obtain my favour, incline to me: so may every man enjoy his vineyards and fig trees, and drink the water of his cistern:

Where is the God of Hamath and Arpad? Where is the God of Sepharvaim? And who was able to defend Samaria out of my hand?

Or which, of all the Gods of the lands, hath delivered their country out of my power, so that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem from my hand?"

and Isaiah gave them this answer, "Say thus unto your lord, 'Thus sayeth the LORD: Be not afraid of the words that thou hast heard, wherewith the king of the Assyrians' servants have blasphemed me.

Were the people of the Gentiles - whom my progenitors conquered - delivered at any time through their gods? As namely, Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the children of Eden, which dwell at Telassar.

Deliver us then, O LORD our God, from the hands of Sennacherib, that all kingdoms of the earth may know, that thou only art the LORD."

Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent unto Hezekiah, saying, "Thus sayeth the LORD God of Israel, 'Whereas thou hast made thy prayer unto me, as touching Sennacherib,

Thou with thy servants hast blasphemed the LORD and thus holdest thou of thyself, I cover the high mountains, and sides of Lebanon with my horsemen. And there will I cut down the high Cedar trees and the fairest Fir trees. I will up into the height of it, and into the chiefest of his timber woods.

I know thy ways, thy going forth and thy coming home, yea and thy madness against me.

Therefore thy furiousness against me, and thy pride is come before me. I will put a ring in thy nose, and a bridle bit in the jaws of thee, and turn thee about, even the same way thou camest.

And I will keep and save the city, sayeth he: for mine own, and for my servant David's sake.'"

"I thought I should have gone to the gates of hell in my best age, and have wanted the residue of my years.

Mine age is folden up together, and taken away from me, like a shepherd's cottage: my life is hewn off, like as a weaver cutteth off his web. While I was yet taking my rest, he hewed me off, and made an end of me in one day.'

I thought I would have lived unto the morrow, but he bruised my bones like a lion, and made an end of me in one day.

Then chattered I like a swallow, and like a crane, and mourned as a dove. I lift up mine eyes to the height: 'O LORD,' say I, 'violence is done unto me, be thou surety for me.'

What shall I say? The Lord hath made a promise to me. Yea, and he himself hath performed it. I shall therefore, as long as I live, remember bitterness of my life.

O LORD, men may live beyond their years, and I will declare to all men that even in those years, it was thou that causedest me to sleep, and again thou hast given me life.

Behold, bitter as gall was my pensiveness: so sore longed I for health. And it was thy pleasure to deliver me from the filthy pit: for thou it is, O Lord, that hath cast all my sins behind thy back.

Then came Isaiah the Prophet to king Hezekiah, and said unto him, "What have the men said, and from whence came they unto thee?" Hezekiah answered, "They came out of a far country unto me, out of Babylon."