tribute in the reign of Menahem, B. C. 771. Tiglathpileser, who succeeded Pul, reigned 19 years at Nineveh, invaded and conquered Syria, and exacted tribute from Judah. After him, Shalmaneser, in the reign of Hoshea, invaded Israel, took Samaria, and put an end to that monarchy, B. C. 721. He also made war upon Tyre, and besieged it five years, without success. Sennacherib succeeded Shalmaneser, and invaded Judah in the reign of Hezekiah, and took several towns. He was pacified for a time by the payment of a tribute, and went against Egypt. He, however, returned to besiege Jerusalem; but Hezekiah, having laid his letter and his blasphemy before the Lord, in prayer, the whole of his army were destroyed in one night. He himself fled to Nineveh, and was there murdered by two of his sons.

BABYLON, having hitherto been dependent on Nineveh or Assyria, became an independent state, a short time before the reign of Hezekiah. Nabonassar, from whom the rise of the Babylonian or Chaldean monarchy is dated, came to the throne, B. C. 747, which year is called the era of Nabonassar. Merodach Baladan, one of his successors, was he who sent the insidious message to Hezekiah, for the purpose of ascertaining the state of his kingdom.

MEDIA, also, had sometime before this, thrown off the yoke of Assyria, and become an independent kingdom under Arbaces, who reigned over it 28 years. The reigns of this prince and his successors, however, for upwards of a century, are by many considered as little better than fabulous; and the rise of the Median monarchy is dated from B. C. 700, during the life of Hezekiah, when Dejoces was elected king.

In GREECE, Lycurgus, while Athaliah was in possession of the throne at Jerusalem, B. C. 884, introduced his system of laws into Lacedæmon. And, in the reign of Hezekiah, the Spartans were engaged in

their first ferocious and deadly struggle to enslave the Messenians, having begun it B. C. 743.

During the reign of Joash, king of Judah, and while Jehoiada the priest was yet living, B. C. 869, CARTHAGE is said to have been founded by Elisa or Dido, sister of the king of Tyre; she having, in consequence of the murder of her husband, fled to Africa.

In

In ITALY, Rome was built by Romulus, B. C. 753, which year is the era of the building of that city, marked by the initials, A. U.C. Anno Urbis Condita. This was in the reign of Uzziah, king of Judah. Hezekiah's reign, the infant city was yet engaged in its contests with the neighbouring states. The rape of the Sabine virgins was in 750 B. C.

FROM HEZEKIAH TO EZRA.

THE KINGDOM OF JUDAH.-On the death of Hezekiah, he was succeeded by his son,

Manasseh. The beginning of the reign of Manasseh was marked by extraordinary wickedness. He entered, with his whole heart, into the practices of the heathen ; built idolatrous altars in the courts of the temple; made his children pass through the fire in honour of Moloch; used enchantments; dealt with a familiar spirit, and made the streets of Jerusalem flow with innocent blood. His subjects seem to have entered with him heartily into all the wickedness; so that the Lord finally denounced upon his kingdom that doom, which about half a century afterwards was executed.

Manasseh was visited with severe chastisement. The king of Assyria sent an army, which took him prisoner, and brought him to Babylon in fetters. There, in his affliction, he remembered the Lord God

of his fathers, repented of his sin, and besought the Lord to pardon him; and the Lord heard him, and restored him to his kingdom. He then set himself to undo, as far as possible, the mischief that he had done in the former part of his reign; but the people do not seem to have entered so heartily with him into his measures of reformation, as they did into his apostacy. Although he himself was pardoned, the sentence against the nation still remained unrepealed. He died, after a reign of 55 years, B. C. 643. He was succeeded by his son,

Amon. He followed the wicked example of the early part of his father's reign; but did not follow him in his repentance. After a reign of two years, his servants conspired against him, and murdered him. The people resented this conspiracy, put to death the conspirators, and raised to the throne his son,

Josiah, in the eighth year of his age. His character is one of the most beautiful in the whole sacred volume, and his efforts to reform the nation were the last that were made to retrieve the downward course of the kingdom. It was in the eighth year of his reign, or the 16th of his age, that he began seriously to seek the Lord God of his fathers; and in the 20th year of his age, he had begun his measures for purging his kingdom from the gross and open wickedness that had overrun it. Having banished idolatry from the land, he revived the worship of the God of Heaven in the temple at Jerusalem. In the course of purifying the temple, the book of the law was found, which seems to have been concealed from him by a sycophant priesthood; and, when he read the commands of the law, and the denunciations annexed to them, he was in deep distress, and sent immediately to enquire of the Lord respecting the book. The reply justified his apprehensions, that destruction was hanging over his kingdom; which, however, he was informed, should not come upon it in his day. The people, although to a certain extent, externally reformed, retained all their predilection for idolatry, which accordingly broke out anew on the removal of Josiah.

The occasion of his death was this. Pharaoh Necho, who reigned in Egypt, was a powerful monarch; and Babylonia, having fallen under the government of a bold ambitious prince, these two monarchs were soon involved in war with one another. Pharaoh seems to have been the assailant, for he led his army as far as the Euphrates, to besiege Carchemish. Having in his march to pass near to Judah, Josiah went out to intercept him, and would not be dissuaded from thus embroiling himself in the quarrel. The result was, that in a battle between the army of Egypt and that of Judah, Josiah was killed, after having reigned 31 years.

Immediately on his death, the people raised his younger son Shallum, or Jehoahaz, to the throne; but the king of Egypt, having, by his victory, acquired an ascendancy over the kingdom of Judah, set aside this election, carried Jehoahaz to Egypt, and placed his elder brother Eliakim, whose name he changed to Jehoiakim, on the throne. He then proceeded on his expedition against Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, but was defeated. Nebuchadnezzar, thus obtaining the ascendancy in Judah, deposed Jehoiakim, and put him in fetters, for the purpose of carrying him to Babylon; but on his promising to hold the kingdom under him, he restored him to it. It was at this time that Daniel and his three friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, were carried captives to Babylon; and it is from this first incursion of Nebuchadnezzar into Judah, that the 70 years' captivity of the Jews, to the first decree for their restoration, are computed.

Jehoiakim, having maintained his allegiance to Nebuchadnezzar for three years, at the end of that time revolted. The consequence was, that Nebuchadnezzar sent an army against him, which laid waste the country, took Jehoiakim prisoner, and put him to death in the year B.C. 599. On the death of Jehoiakim

Jehoiachin, (named also Coniah and Jeconiah,) his son, ascended the throne; but not having obtained the consent of Nebuchadnezzar, he, after reigning three

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months, was set aside, and carried to Babylon. Along with him, there were taken all the gold and silver vessels, and treasures of the temple, also all the able men, and men of influence in Jerusalem, to the number of 10,000, and 8,000 artificers from the country; the poorest of the people only being left. It was in this captivity, that Mordecai and Ezekiel were taken; and Ezekiel reckons the time, in his prophecy, from this captivity, which took place in the reign of Jehoiachin.

Zedekiah, brother of the former king, Jehoiakim, was then placed on the throne by Nebuchadnezzar. Meanwhile, the king of Egypt bore, with impatience, the increasing power of Babylon, and watched for an opportunity of curtailing it. In the 8th year of the reign of Zedekiah, he made a feeble effort to revive the power and influence of his kingdom, and persuaded Zedekiah to break faith with Nebuchadnezzar, and join in an alliance with Egypt to resist him. On the revolt of Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar came against him; and, having laid waste the country, besieged Jerusalem. The king of Egypt came up for the purpose of relieving the city. Nebuchadnezzar raised the siege, and marched against him; but he retreated within his own territory, leaving Jerusalem to its fate. Nebuchadnezzar then returned to the siege. The city was exceedingly strong, and well calculated, from its position and fortifications, to resist the implements of warfare then in use, so that Nebuchadnezzar had no resource but to reduce it by famine. He surrounded the city with his army, to prevent all ingress or egress, and, after holding this position for about two years and a half, the distress within the city was so great, that the people were devouring one another, and women were discovered cooking and eating their own infants. At length Zedekiah made an attempt to pass through the Chaldean army, but was discovered, overtaken, and brought to Nebuchadnezzar, who treated him as a rebel, made his children be put to death before his eyes, and then caused his eyes to be put out. In the mean while the Chaldean army burst into the city,