fortune requires. Paganized Israel herself is introduced as speaking in the distress of harvest failure, "I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink." "But," says Jehovah, "she knew not that I gave her the grain and the must and the oil and multiplied unto her silver and gold." To Hosea the main principle is that the gifts shall come to the people with the dew of Jehovah's love upon them, deriving their value not so much from what they are intrinsically but from the fact of their being tokens of affection, to each one of which clings something of the personality of the giver. And Jehovah knows such a special art of putting Himself into these favors; He is not imprisoned in them as are the Baals, but freely lives in and loves through them, so as to make them touch the heart of Israel. When the time of her new betrothal comes, and she sees the gifts for her adornment, she exclaims, "Ishi, my husband!" and no longer "Baali, my lord!" Notice the role that nature plays in effecting this; the externals are by no means despised; they have simply ceased to be externals, and been turned into one great sacramental vehicle of spiritual favor. Jehovah sets in motion the whole circuit of nature for the service of his people: "It shall come to pass in that day, I will answer the heavens and they shall answer the earth, and the earth shall answer the grain and the new wine and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel." The things do not mutely grow, they speak, they answer, they sing, and the voice that travels
