had become all, and more than all, that she anticipated; and, in her declining years, Samuel's manhood would cheer her no less than his childhood did when she was comparatively young.

And many a Christian mother, who, like Hannah, has lent her child to the Lord, has, like Hannah, had a rich reward. Ah! it was a severe trial to one of whom we have heard, when her son bade her farewell to go far hence to the Gentiles, to proclaim the Gospel of the grace of God; but she had long before dedicated him to the Lord, and now she could not, she dared not, keep him back. What was her recompense? She lived to hear of his success in the evangelization of the Heathen, to see his name honourably mentioned in the Missionary Report, and to learn that, through his instrumentality, some Christian church had been founded which would probably prove a blessing to generations yet unborn.

VI.--ELI, AND HIS SONS.

"Them that honour Me I will honour, and they that despise Me shall be lightly esteemed,"

said the Lord to Eli. (1 Sam. ii. 30.) And now the time was at hand when the prophecies uttered against Eli's house would be literally fulfilled, and a solemn proof thus given to all Israel of God's displeasure with the conduct of the Priests.

There had long dwelt in the south-west of Canaan a people called the Philistines, (Gen. xxi. 32,) who had from the first been the enemies of the Israelites, and by whom they had already been frequently oppressed. (Judges xv., xvi.) And now they "put themselves in array against Israel," and a terrible battle took place, in which four thousand of the Israelites were slain. The elders of Israel were alarmed, and sent to Shiloh, to bring the ark of the covenant of the Lord; thinking, that if they had the ark in the camp, it would protect them from their enemies, and that, in a second battle, they would regain their honour. The ark came, and with it the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas; and, when it entered the camp, "all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth rang again." (1 Sam. iv. 5.) But the Philistines, though at first afraid, encouraged

themselves for the battle; and though the symbol of God's presence was with the Israelites, God himself had for awhile forsaken them. What was the result? Israel was smitten, the ark of God was taken, and Hophni and Phinehas, the two sons of Eli, were slain.

And where is Eli himself at this moment? He is sitting by the wayside, at a distance from the field of battle, watching the event. And see! the old man trembles; for he is afraid lest anything should befall the ark. And now a man of the tribe of Benjamin runs out of the army, and comes to Shiloh* with earth upon his head, the sign of grief, and tells the news, on hearing which the whole city is moved. "What meaneth the noise of this tumult?" asks Eli; and the man comes hastily, and repeats the news to him. "Israel is fled before the Philistines; and there hath been also a great slaughter among the people; and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead; and the ark of God is taken." (Ver. 17.)

Terrible words were these, and arranged as

The battle took place in the neighbourhood of Shiloh, probably in one of the adjoining valleys.

if on purpose to render them the most so. The last particular is the worst; worse to Eli than even the death of his sons; for the capture of the ark was an indication of the fact that God had indeed forsaken His people; and when he heard of this calamity—that the ark was taken -he fell backward from off his seat by the side of the gate, and his neck brake, and he died; for he was an old man of ninety-eight years, and heavy.

Such was "the thing which God did in Israel,” -such the doom that came upon the house of Eli, because of the wickedness of his sons. "Ichabod, the glory has departed from Israel," said the wife of Phinehas, who at this moment gave birth to a son, whom she thus named ; and "Ichabod, the glory is departed," was doubtless heard among the people, from Dan even to Beersheba.

But, in the midst of these calamities, Samuel was preserved. He lived to see the ark restored, he lived to see the glory return; and we shall meet with Samuel again, both in the history of Saul, and in that of David. "As long as he liveth," said his mother, "he shall be lent to

the Lord;" and " as long as he lived" he was "faithful" as a Prophet unto Israel.

Is it not better, we would ask, that parents should correct their children betimes than suffer them to go on in sin until they bring distress both upon themselves and upon their families? We doubt not that many young persons, when the subjects of parental discipline, think their parents harsh and unkind to them, and are disposed to resent the rod of correction. But let the case of Eli and his sons teach them that it is their parents' duty to correct them, and that a parent is not kind to his children when he allows them to do wrong and does not restrain them. Striking is the contrast between Samuel's history and the history of Hophni and of Phinehas. They grew up headstrong and rebellious, and were, if reproved for their wickedness at all, reproved too gently: he, from the first, was watched over by a mother's gentle eye, and became obedient to the voice of God. They were smitten on the field of battle, and died ingloriously in the prime of life: he was honoured by all his people, and governed Israel for many years.