or a man appointed as probation officer. This is most often a young man who has sympathy with boys, and tact and forbearance.

A young Harvard student had such a delinquent put in his charge, to influence for good, and to hold him to steady habits until he paid back the money he had stolen. In New York certain business men become " Big Brothers to some who have fallen into evil ways.

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The London S. S. Chronicle of Mar. 10, 1914, has an article on how the State deals with youthful offenders. In this the writer makes a distinction between reformatories" and "industrial schools for those who must be sent away to some institution for reform. The former often hamper the boy because he has been " convicted" and has been " a pupil of the State." The industrial school child is free from this. Yet very many of the reformatory pupils have made good. In a later number of the same paper there is a statement of the great work done by Children's Play Centres in the East of London, in the way of so educating the children as to materially lessen the amount of crime.

Is crime increasing? Judge Gemmill of Chicago emphatically denies this. He says: "More than half of all the people arrested in Chicago in 1912 were charged with crimes which did not exist as crimes a few years ago." As examples he names violations of the pure food law; the laws concerning the employment of women and children; of safety or sanitary appliances by railroads and factories, etc. He says: "The communities where law and order reign, and where justice and righteousness most prevail, will have the most criminals, not because the people are most depraved but because they have higher ideals and insist upon higher standards of living." And because of this there is the more need of securing absolute justice, and the best methods of treating those who have been thus convicted.

There is great need that Christian churches, and Christian people, should interest themselves in this matter, and see to it that prisons are no longer schools of crime, but places where the prisoners are made into men.

For fuller and broader study of this subject consult the catalogue of any good public library; or obtain literature from the Prison Associations in the different states, or the American Prison Association, all of whom have as their aim the bettering of the moral condition of the prisons and the prisoners, the just care of the discharged convict, and the spread of literature to enlighten public opinion on the matter.

Some of the many books on the subject are those by Thomas Mott Osborne, as Within Prison Walls, and Society and Prisons; Life in Sing Sing, by No. 1500; The Subterranean Brotherhood, by Julian Hawthorne; My Life in Prison, by Donald Lowrie; The Present Day Problem of Crime, by Albert H. Currier; and How Criminals are Made and Prevented, by John W. Horseley (a prison chaplain).

LESSON XII (25). March 23.

ISRAEL WARNED AGAINST COMPROMISE.
Joshua 23: 1-24: 28.

(May be used with Temperance Applications.)

PRINT Joshua 23:1-13.

GOLDEN TEXT. - Evil companionships corrupt good morals.

Devotional Reading: Psalm 3.

I COR. 15:33.

Additional Material for Teachers: Num. 33: 50-56; Josh. 93-27; Judg. 2:1-3; 3: 1-6; Col. 2: 8.

Primary Topic: LOVING AND OBEYING GOD.

Lesson Material: Josh. 24: 1-28.

Print 24

16-28.

Memory Verse: Take good heed therefore unto yourselves, that ye love

Jehovah your God. Josh. 23 : 11.

Junior Topic: STANDING UP FOR THE RIGHT.

Memory Verse: Matt. 12: 30.

Intermediate Topic: DANGEROUS COMPANY.

Senior and Adult Topic: COMPROMISING WITH EVIL-DOERS.

Additional Material: Same as for Teachers.

I. THE SUMMONS OF THE NATION TO A GREAT COUNCIL, Josh. 23 I, 2; 24: I. The conquest of the country took several years, not of uninterrupted warfare, but of wars intermingled with cultivation of the fields, and the making of homes and becoming citizens. Although the Canaanites were not wholly exterminated (Josh. 23: 12; Judg. 2 : 2, 3), yet the war was practically ended.

Joshua, their Leader, was Drawing Near to the End of His Life. He died when he was 110 years old. He had been watching the tendencies of the times, and knew well the character of his people and the peculiar dangers to which they would be

AND it came to pass a long time after that the LORD had given rest unto Israel from all their enemies round about, that Joshua waxed old and stricken in age.

2. And Joshua called for all Israel, and for their elders, and for their heads, and for their judges, and for their officers, and said unto them, I am old and stricken in age:

3. And ye have seen all that the LORD your God hath done unto all these nations because of you; for the LORD your God is he that hath fought for you.

4. Behold, I have divided unto you by lot these nations that remain, to be an inheritance for your tribes, from Jordan, with all the nations that I have cut off, even unto the great sea westward.

5. And the LORD your God, he shall expel them from before you, and drive them from out of your sight; and ye shall possess their land, as the LORD your God hath promised unto you.

6. Be ye therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses, that ye turn not aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left;

7. That ye come not among these nations, these that remain among you; neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them, neither serve them, nor bow yourselves unto them:

8. But cleave unto the LORD your God, as ye have done unto this day. 9. For the LORD hath driven out from before you great nations and strong: but as for you, no man hath been able to stand before you unto this day.

10. One man of you shall chase a thousand: for the LORD your God, he it is that fighteth for you, as he hath promised you.

exposed. Therefore he determined to make before he died one more appeal to them, under the most solemn circumstances possible.

It is uncertain whether the last two chapters of Joshua are two different addresses, or two reports of the same address. The only importance of the question is its bearing on the structure of the book.

The Polychrome Bible, the Expositor's Bible, and others, regard them as two trustworthy reports of the Shechem address, given separately as the editor received them, and not interwoven according to the plan usually adopted.

Others regard them as two similar addresses on the same great occasion to different audiences, one to a mass meeting of the people, and the other to the officers and judges of the tribes, assembled at Shechem.

The address to the people, at least, was made at Shechem, probably on the sloping sides of Mts. Ebal and Gerizim, where they had gathered 25 years before, on their first entrance into the Promised Land, and made the most solemn promises to God. (See Deut. 27, 28.)

Shechem was a small city on an upland valley, bounded by Mt. Ebal on the north, and Mt. Gerizim on the south. Eighty springs of water are said to exist in or around the city, so that the surroundings are exceptionally fertile. It was a most excellent place for the assembly of the tribes.

II. A REVIEW OF WHAT GOD HAD DONE FOR THEM, 23: 3-10, 14;

24: 2-13.

1. For Jehovah your God is he that hath fought for you (v. 3).

2. God through Joshua had divided unto the twelve tribes by lot the entire land of Canaan, to be an inheritance for them. Not only the tribes which had been conquered, but those that remained, for Jehovah your God, he shall expel them before you. and ye shall possess their land (v. 4, 5).

3. No man has been able to stand before you (v. 9).

4. Jehovah your God, he it is that fighteth for you (v. 10).

II. Take good heed therefore unto yourselves, that ye love the LORD your God.

12. Else if ye do in any wise go back, and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these that remain among you, and shall make marriages with them, and go in unto them, and they to you:

13. Know for a certainty that the LORD your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you; but they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which the LORD your God hath given you.

5. Not one thing hath failed of all the good things which Jehovah your God spake concerning you (v. 14).

6. In the 24th chapter Joshua rehearses the great and wonderful things God had done for the Israelites from Abraham down through the early ages, till they had become settled in the Promised Land (vs. 2-13).

III. JOSHUA'S APPEAL TO THE NATION, 23: 6-16; 24: 14, 15.

In view

of all these great favors which God had conferred upon his people, the least they could do was to love and obey him. These favors must have touched their hearts. Joshua appealed to them to do all that is written in the book of the law; to cleave unto Jehovah; to serve him in sincerity and in truth.

Joshua felt, however, that the people were still undecided. They had for many years now been in contact with the heathen who still remained in the land. He therefore makes a still stronger appeal to them.

15. If it seem evil unto you to serve Jehovah. If, after having weighed all the arguments you still think it wise to serve other gods, then choose you this day, now, on the spot. You have had time enough to consider. Every motive for choice at all is a motive for a choice at once. Be decided. Cease to "halt between two opinions," to be " everything by turn and nothing long." They had been harboring idols (v. 23), and worshipping them in secret, while openly professing to serve God. It was high time for this to cease, for it was practically deciding for idols. The whole hope and prosperity of the nation depended upon a whole-hearted service of Jehovah. So still the gospel demands that we decide at once (2 Cor. 6 : 2). The gods which your fathers served, in Chaldea. What had these done for them? Their ancestors had rejected them as unworthy. The gods of the Amorites, who had been unable to protect their worshippers from being destroyed by the Israelites. It would be absurd to turn from Jehovah to them.

BUT AS FOR ME AND MY HOUSE, WE WILL SERVE JEHOVAH. The decision was worthy of the grand old man. Even if they stood alone, he and those for whom he was responsible should stand faithful to their God, Jehovah. IV. THE TEMPTATIONS TO EVIL, 23: 15, 16; 24: 14, 15, 20. The presence of the heathen nations in their midst would be a constant temptation to the Israelites. It would be almost impossible to keep themselves and their children entirely separate from the heathen, and the constant sight of the heathen festivals and the wantonness and abandon of the heathen worship must have its influence. The pomp of the idol-services would have their effect; for the tabernacle service may have been simple in comparison, and was only seen when the people went to Shiloh, not constantly in their home cities.

There were great fascinations in idolatry, which the Israelites felt during their whole existence, until the Exile in Babylon, which finally cured them of its taint. Idols presented a visible, tangible, representation of the god, while their God Jehovah was unseen. They were too much like children, too little developed, to resist the seen for the unseen. There must often have been a desire to be like their neighbors, who seemed more fashionable, and free from restraint. This temptation is not lacking even to-day; how can we blame a people living more than three thousand years ago for yielding to it, as they did? See Judges 2.

The nations would tempt the Israelites to join them in "the works of the flesh," "which are these: Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: they which do such things shall

not inherit the kingdom of God" (Gal. 5: 19–21).

Therefore might Joshua have exhorted them, as Paul did the Ephesians, to " put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places" (Eph. 6 11, 12).

"Go

No one

The Power of Evil Companionship. Perhaps more lives are ruined through the corruption which comes from evil companionship than from any other external cause. "Go with the wolves," says a Spanish proverb," and you will learn to howl." with mean people," says an English by-word, "and you will find life mean.' is strong enough and wise enough to be safe in constant intercourse with persons of wrong principle and false religion, any more than one is healthy enough to be safe physically in malarial or fever-laden atmosphere. Indeed, one who goes by choice into bad company and loves to remain there is already more than half fallen. The only time when one is safe in bad company is when he is laboring to do them good. A Parrot that Doesn't Talk. The following extract from a sermon for children by Rev. Frank T. Bayley, in the Congregationalist, contains a lesson for all, old and young. 'He was not always dumb. He once had a fine voice- for a parrot, and could talk quite well. But now he only mumbles and squawks. He doesn't even try to say anything. How did it happen? Some time ago he was put into a cage with other parrots that had no pretty ways; they were content just to mutter. the poor bird forgot what he had been taught, and began to do as the others did. And when I saw him, the other day, he seemed content to be no better than they. Even a bird, you see, is influenced by the company it keeps.

So

Children are more sensitive to the manners of their companions than parrots are. If you were only a bird, it would be a great pity to learn bad ways by being with naughty birds. But when a mother finds her dear child corrupted by bad companions, what can she do? That is the way that many a mother's heart is broken.

"Yet the parrots that did so much harm to this finer bird were quite beautiful and full of interesting ways. That made them all the more dangerous! If they had been ugly, they might have frightened the newcomer away without harming him. So it is with boys and girls. The dangerous ones are not always homely or unkind. They are the more dangerous because they make you like them.

V. THE COVENANT WITH GOD, 24: 15-31. When Joshua set before the people the choice which they must make, and made the right choice for himself and his house, the people decided, and sincerely, to serve God, vs. 16, 17.

"The

The People: God forbid. Hebrew, a profane thing be it to us. forsaking of Jehovah strikes them as something horrible and profane and shocking." Professor Beecher. For Jehovah our God. They rehearse the reasons given by Joshua, thus adopting them as their own and writing them on their memory. Joshua. Ye cannot serve Jehovah, etc., i. e., ye cannot in your strength; it is more difficult than you imagine." They could not serve God unless they were sincere and true-hearted. "It cannot be supposed for a moment that Joshua intended to deter the people from the service of God by representing it as impracticable or dangerous. On the contrary his design is to enlist them more sincerely and steadfastly in it.". Bush. For he is an holy God, and therefore cannot endure anything impure or selfish or wicked in his children. He is a jealous God, unwilling to have a rival, as a true husband or wife is and ought to be unwilling to have a rival in the other's affections. Such a rival is diametrically opposed to the very nature of the relation. He will not forgive your transgressions. Rather, will not pass by,' as if taking no notice. Joshua is supposing their wilful rebellion and forsaking of God." Gray.

The People: Nay; but we will serve Jehovah.

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Joshua: Ye are witnesses against yourselves. Your public promise to obey will be a witness that you know your duty and accept the conditions of blessings for obedience and punishment for disobedience. Now therefore, if you have spoken truly, show it by your actions, and put away... the strange gods that are among you. This shows that there was need of Joshua's warning. The disease was only beginning, but if let alone it would destroy the whole body. And incline your hearts unto Jehovah God.

The People: JEHOVAH OUR GOD WILL WE SERVE, AND UNTO HIS VOICE WİLL WE HEARKEN.

Thus the people made a threefold promise under the most solemn circumstances.