concerning them, is gradually unfolding the very description which the prophets gave of their poverty and desolation, at the time of their great prosperity and luxuriance. The countries of the Ammonites, of the Moabites, of the Edomites, or inhabitants of Idumea, and of the Philistines, all bordered with Judea, and each is the theme of prophecy. The relative positions of them all are distinctly defined in Scripture, and have been clearly ascertained. And the territories of the ancient enemies of the Jews, long overrun by the enemies of Christianity, present many a proof of the inspiration of the Jewish Scriptures, and of the truth of the Christian religion. CHAPTER VI. AMMON. THE country anciently peopled by the Ammonites, is situated to the east of the Jordan. It is naturally one of the most fertile provinces of Syria, and it was for many ages one of the most populous. The Ammonites often invaded the land of Israel: and at one period, united with the Moabites, they retained possession of a great part of it, and grievously oppressed the Israelites for the space of eighteen years. Jephthah repulsed them, and took twenty of their cities; but they continued afterwards to harass the borders of Israel, and their capital was besieged by the forces of David, and their country rendered tributary. They regained and long maintained their independence, till Jotham, the king of Judah, subdued them, and exacted from them an annual tribute of a hundred talents, and thirty thousand quarters of wheat and barley; yet they soon contested again with their ancient enemies, and exulted in the miseries that befell them, when Nebuchadnezzar took Jerusalem, and carried its inhabitants into captivity. In after-times, though successively oppressed by the Chaldeans, (when some of the earliest prophecies respecting it were fulfilled,) and by the Egyptians and Syrians, Ammon was a highly productive and populous country, when the Romans became masters of all the provinces of Syria; and its capital was included among the ten allied cities, which gave name to the celebrated Decapolis. When first invaded by the |