iii. 12. _As for my people, children are their oppressors,
and women rule over them._
"Children," "women," are not to be taken literally. In interpreting
the second of these figures, we must remember the status of women in
ancient times in the East. +I. A weak government is a curse.+ 1. By
such a government the affairs of a nation are mismanaged, its
resources squandered, and its great possibilities unrealised. 2. A
weak government always becomes in the end an oppressive government.
By it the national burdens are caused to press most heavily on those
least able to bear them. 3. Under such a government, privileged
classes and monopolies multiply and grow strong, to the hurt of the
nation at large. 4. Worst of all, and as the source of countless
evils, government itself comes to be despised, and the national
respect for law destroyed. In short, under a weak government a nation
makes rapid progress towards anarchy. +II. The curse of a weak
government is not long in overtaking a nation that gives itself up to
luxury and loses its regard for moral considerations.+ 1. It is only
by such a nation that such a government would be tolerated. 2. By
such a nation such a government is likely to be for a time most
popular (Jer. v. 31).
The cures for political evils are not political but moral. Political
remedies will but modify the symptoms. Political evils are really due
to moral causes, and can only be removed by moral reformations.
Hence, while good men will never neglect their political duties (no
good man will neglect any duty), they will be especially in earnest
to uplift the nation morally, and therefore will do their utmost to
strengthen those agencies which have this for their aim--the church,
the school, and those societies which exist for the diffusion of the
Scriptures and of religious liberty. Wherever the Bible becomes the
book of the people, oppression by "children" becomes impossible, and
the government of "women" is set aside.