But he found them still unfruitful, as he thus declares by his prophet Isaiah, * " what could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?” At length the sentence went forth, that Jerusalem so long, and so highly favoured, should be ent, down, as a cumberer of the ground And John the Baptis

erunne of our Lord, proclaimed the axe was then laid

t of
tree 1 that + "ever
rood fruit,

ewn
to the fir
le the des

1 16 50

still continued unfruitful, and then after
that, it was cut down, it perished by a
miserable destruction, and its wretched
inhabitants, are to this very hour, in the
most deplorable state of banishment, from
their native land ; the kingdom of God
has been taken away from them, and given
to the Gentiles.
But the awful destruction of Jerusalem,
d the miserable dispersion of its guilty
bitants, which has now continued for
y eighteen centuries, forcibly urges
every Christian church, and upon

Christian congregation, that solemn ing of the Apostle Paul : "* Be high minded, bu for if God d not the natur

s, take heed he also sparen herefore, tha

ontinue + in bodness, an

off for unbe and disob

us endeavour ake a bet

ir Saviour's instions, t

ppy Israelites, to

dressed.
Vur
Le

to us the long-sufin his visiting the equently, before he ut down. « Behold I come seeking fruit,