While they garnished the table, the watchman looked: and while he was eating and drinking it was said, "Up, ye Captains, take you to your shield."

And behold, here cometh a chariot of men with two horsemen." And he answered and said, "Babylon is fallen, is fallen! She is turned upside down, and all the images of her gods are smitten to the ground!"

Meet the thirsty with water, O ye citizens of Tema; meet those with bread that are fled.

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.

O thou city of miracles, seditious and willful? Thy slain men are neither killed with sword, nor dead in battle.

For all thy Captains gat them to their horses from the ordinance, yea they are all together ridden away, and fled far off.

'What hast thou here to do? And whom hast thou here? That thou shouldest here hew thee out a sepulchre, as it were one that causeth a costly tomb of stone to be made for himself, or that graveth a habitation out of a rock?

and array him with thy coat, and gird him with thy girdle, and I will give thy power into his hand. He shall be a father of the citizens of Jerusalem, and of the kindred of Judah.

For by sea were there fruits brought unto thee, and all manner of corn by water. Thou wast the common market of all people.

Be ashamed, thou Sidon, for the sea - even the strength of the sea - hath spoken, saying: "I have not traveled, nor brought forth children, nor nourished up young men, or brought up virgins."

Who hath devised such things upon Tyre the crown of all cities, whose merchants and Captains were the highest and principal of the world?

And he said, "From hence forth shalt thou make no more mirth, O thou daughter of Sidon: for thou shalt be put down. Stand up therefore, and get thee over unto Chittim, where nevertheless thou shalt have no rest.

Behold, for thine example: The Chaldeans were such a people, that no man was like them, Assyria builded them: he set up his castles and palaces, and broke them down again.

Mourn, ye ships of Tarshish, for your power shall be thrown down.

Therefore hath the curse consumed the earth; and they that dwell therein are fallen into trespass. Wherefore the inhabiters of the earth are perished with drought, and those that remain shall be very few.

For it shall happen unto all lands and to all people, like as when a man smiteth down the olives, that are left upon the tree: or seeketh after grapes, when the wine gathering is out.

Fearfulness, the pit, and the snare are upon thee, O thou that dwellest upon the earth.

Upon the hill shall he take away the side veil that hangeth before the face of all people, and the covering wherewith all Gentiles are covered.

In that day shall it be said, "Lo, this is our God: we have waited for him, and he shall save us. This is the LORD in whom we have hoped: Let us rejoice, and delight in his salvation.

But the ungodly, though he have received grace, yet learneth he not righteousness: but in that place where he is punished, he offendeth, and feareth not the glory of the LORD.

But unto us, O LORD, provide for peace: for thou workest in us all our works.

O LORD our God, other lords beside thee hath subdued us, but we will be mindful only of thee and of thy name.

The malicious tyrants when they die, are neither in life nor in the resurrection, for thou visitest them and rootest them out, and destroyest all the memorial of them.

Like as a woman with child, when her travail cometh upon her, is sorry and crieth in her pains: Even so are we, O LORD, in thy sight.

But as for thy dead men and ours, that be departed, they are in life and resurrection. They lie in the earth, they wake, and have joy: for thy dew is a dew of life and light. But the place of the malicious Tyrants is fallen away.

For behold, the LORD will go out of his habitation, and visit the wickedness of them that dwell upon earth. The earth also shall disclose her own blood, and shall no more hide those that are slain in her.

Or who will enforce me to keep or make peace?

Their harvest shall be burnt; their wives, which were their beauty when they came forth, shall be defiled. For it is a people without understanding, and therefore he that created them, shall not favour them; and he that made them, shall not be merciful to them.

Woe be to the crown of pride, even to the drunken people of Ephraim, whose great pomp is as a flower that fadeth away upon the head of the valley of such as be in wealth, and are overladen with wine.

But they go wrong by the reason of wine, they fall and stagger because of strong drink. Yea even the priests and prophets themselves go amiss, they are drunken with wine, and weak brained through strong drink. They fail in prophesying, and stumble in judgment.

For all tables are so full of vomit and filthiness, that no place is clean.

Whom then shall such one teach knowledge? And whom shall he make to understand the thing that he heareth? For they are as ignorant as young children, which are weeded from suck or taken from the breasts.

For ye comfort yourselves thus: "Tush, we have made a covenant with death, and with hell we are at an agreement. Though there break out any sore plague, it shall not come upon us. For with deceit will we escape, and with nimbleness will we defend ourselves."

Righteousness will I set up again in the balance, and judgment in the weights. The tempest of hail shall take away your refuge, that ye have to deceive withal: and the overflowing waters shall break down your strongholds of dissimulation."

And therefore make no mocks at it, that your captivity increase not. For I have heard the LORD God of Hosts say that there shall come a sudden destruction and plague upon the whole earth.

And when he hath made it plain, he soweth it with fitches or cumin. He soweth the wheat and Barley in their place, Milium and Rye also in their place.

And the multitude of all nations that fight against Ariel shall be as a dream seen by night; even so shall all they be that make war against it, and strongholds to overcome it.

In conclusion: it shall be even as when a hungry man dreameth that he is eating, and when he awaketh his soul is empty; or as when a thirsty man dreameth that he is drinking, and when he awaketh he yet is faint, and his soul hath appetite. So is the multitude of all people that muster themselves against the hill of Zion.

Ponder these things once in your mind, and wonder: Blinded are they themselves, and the blind guides of others; they are drunken, but not with wine; they are unstable, but not through strong drink.

For the LORD shall give you a hard-sleeping spirit, and close your eyes. Your Prophets also, and heads which should see; them shall he cover.

Woe be unto them that seek so deep, to hide their imagination before the LORD, which rehearse their counsels in the darkness, and say, "Who seeth us, or who knoweth us?"

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?"

But Pharaoh's help shall be your confusion, and the comfort in the Egyptian's shadow shall be your own shame.

Your rulers have been at Zoan, and your messengers came unto Hanes.

They were all ashamed of the people that could do them no good, and that might not help them, nor show them any profit - but were their confusion and rebuke."

Your beasts have born burdens upon their backs toward the South, through the way that is full of peril and trouble, because of the lion and lioness; of the Cockatrice and shooting dragon. Yea the Mules bare your substance, and the Camels brought your treasure, upon their crooked backs, unto a people that cannot help you.

For the Egyptian's help shall be but vain and lost. Therefore I told you also that your pride should have an end.

Therefore, thus sayeth the holy one of Israel, "Insomuch as ye have cast off your beauty, and comforted yourselves with power and nimbleness, and put your confidence therein:

therefore shall ye have this mischief again for your destruction and fall, like as a high wall, that falleth because of some rift or blast, whose breaking cometh suddenly.

And your destruction shall be like as an earthen pot, which breaketh no man touching it, yea and breaketh so sore, that a man shall not find a shiver of it to fetch fire in, or to take water withal out of the pit."

For the LORD God, even the holy one of Israel, hath promised this: "In repentance and in rest shall ye be safe; in quietness and hope shall your strength lie."

For ye have said, "No, but we will escape through horses!" Therefore shall ye flee. And, "We will get us up upon swift beasts!" Therefore shall your persecutors be swifter.

A thousand of you shall flee for one, or at the most for five, which do but only give you evil words: until ye be desolate, as a ship mast upon a high mountain, and as a beacon upon a hill.

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.

Ye shall destroy also the covering of your silver images, and the decking of your golden idols. Even as filthiness shall ye put them away, and say, "Get you hence."

But ye shall sing, as the use is in the night of the holy solemnity. Ye shall rejoice from your heart, as they that come with the pipe, when they go up to the mount of the LORD, unto the rock of Israel.

And it shall come to pass that whithersoever he goeth the rod shall cleave unto him which the LORD shall lay upon him, with tabrets and harps: and with a great war shall he fight against his host.

Now the Egyptians are men, and not God, and their horses flesh, and not spirit. And as soon as the LORD stretcheth out his hand: then shall the helper fall, and he that should have been helped, and they shall all together be destroyed.

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.

For in that day every man shall cast out his Idols of silver and gold, which ye have made with your sinful hands.

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.

O ye rich idle cities, ye that fear no peril: ye shall be abashed and removed, when ye see the bareness, the nakedness, and preparing to war.

For as the infants weep when their mothers' teats are dried, so shall you weep for your fair fields and fruitful vineyards.

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

O how happy shall ye be, when ye shall safely sow your seed beside all waters, and drive thither the feet of your oxen and asses.

LORD be merciful unto us, we wait for thee. Thine arm is at a point to visit us, but be thou our health in the time of trouble.

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

Let truth and faithfulness be in her time: power, health, wisdom, knowledge and the fear of God are her treasure.

The streets are waste, there walketh no man therein; the covenant is broken, the cities are despised; they are not regarded,

the desolate earth is in heaviness. Lebanon taketh it but for a sport, that it is hewn down: Sharon is like a wilderness: Bashan and Carmel are turned upside down.

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

And the people shall be burnt like lime, and as thorns burn that are hewn off, and cast in the fire."

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?"

and his heart shall delight in the fear of God. What shall then become of the scribe? Of the receiver of our money? What of him that taxed our fair houses?

There shall Zion be seen, the head city of our solemn feasts. There shall thine eyes see Jerusalem, that glorious habitation; the tabernacle that never shall remove, whose nails shall never be taken out; world without end, whose cords everyone shall never corrupt.

For the glorious Majesty of the LORD shall there be present among us. In that place, where fair broad rivers and streams are, shall neither Galley row, nor great ship sail.

For the LORD shall be our captain, the LORD shall be our law giver. The LORD shall be our king, and he himself shall be our Saviour

There are the cords so laid abroad, that they cannot be better; The mast set up of such a fashion, that no banner nor sail hangeth thereon; but there is dealt great spoil: yea, lame men run after the prey;

Unto thee also, O Zion, shall come the day of the vengeance of God, and the year when thine own judgments shall be recompensed.

When kings are called upon, there shall be none, and all princes shall be away.

Seek through the scripture of the LORD and read it: There shall none of these things be left out, there shall not one, nor such like, fail. For what his mouth commandeth, that same doth his spirit gather together or fulfill.

Upon whomsoever the lot falleth, or to whom he dealeth it with the line: those shall possess the inheritance from generation to generation, and dwell therein.

She shall flourish pleasantly, and be joyful, and ever be giving thanks more and more. For the glory of Lebanon, the beauty of Carmel and Sharon shall be given her. These shall know the honour of the LORD, and the majesty of our God.

Say unto them that are of a fearful heart, "Be of good cheer, and fear not. Behold, your God cometh, to take vengeance, and to reward, God cometh his own self, and will deliver you."

There shall be foot paths and common streets: this shall be called the holy way. No unclean person shall go through it, for the LORD himself shall go with them that way, and the ignorant shall not err.

In the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah, Sennacherib king of the Assyrians came down, to lay siege unto all the strong cities of Judah.

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?

Unto the time that I come myself, and bring you into a land that is like your own: wherein is wheat and wine, which is both sown with seed, and planted with vineyards.'

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?"

The LORD thy God, no doubt, hath well considered the words of Rabshakeh, whom his lord the king of the Assyrians hath sent, to defy and blaspheme the living God: with such words as the LORD thy God hath heard right well. And therefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that yet are left.'"

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.

For there came a rumor, that Tirhakah king of Ethiopia was come forth to war against him. And when the king of Assyria heard that, he sent other messengers to king Hezekiah with this commandment:

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.

Where is the king of Hamath, and the king of Arpad, and the king of the city Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?'"

Incline thine ear LORD, and consider, open thine eyes, O LORD, and see; and ponder all the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent his embassage to blaspheme the living God.

and cast their gods in the fire. Notwithstanding, those were no gods; but the works of men's hands, of wood or stone, therefore have they destroyed them.

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."