ON HOSEA XIV.- VERSES 3, 4. 141 had not Joseph as a tender father (as he is called, Gen. xli. 43.) to provide for them, then God remem- bered that he was their Father, and Israel his first- born, Exod. iv. 22. nothing will make us seek for help above ourselves, but the apprehension of weak- ness within ourselves. Those creatures that are weakest, nature bath put an aptitude and inclination in them to depend upon those that are stronger. The vine, the ivy, the hop, the woodbine, are taught by nature to clasp and cling and wind about stronger trees. The greater sense we have of our own vile- ness, the. fitter disposition are we in to rely on God, " I will leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord," Zeph. iii. 12. Isa. xiv. 32. When a man is proud within, and hath anything of his own to lean upon, he will hardly tell how to trust in God, Prov. iii. 5. xxviii. 25. Israel never thought of returning to her first husband, till her way was hedged up with thorns, and no means left to enjoy her former lovers, Hos. ii. 6, 7. When the enemy should have shut up and in- tercepted all her passages to Dan and Bethel, to Egypt and Assyria, that she hath neither friends nor idols to fly to, then she would think of returning to her first husband, namely, to God again. Now from hence we learn : I. The condition of the church in this world, which is to be as an orphan, destitute of all succour and favour, as an outcast whom no man looketh after, Jer. xxx. 17. Paul had low thoughts of the world, and the world thought as basely of him. " The world," saith he, " is crucified unto me, and I unto the world," Gal. vi. 14. Before conversion the world is an Egypt unto us, a place of bondage ; after conversion
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