Town and country life.
In describing the happy future of Israel after the restoration Jeremiah draws a pair of idyllic pictures of town and country life. Both the city of Jerusalem and the outlying regions were so depopulated and wasted by the Chaldean invasion that it was difficult to believe the sun of prosperity would ever shine on them again. But under the providence of God there is a wonderful recuperative power in the human world as well as in the natural. It is remarkable how soon the battlefield with its hideous relics becomes a flowery meadow. The rapid revival of the French nation after the war of 1870 was an astonishment to Europe. This may be accounted for partly on natural principles, since war rarely touches the permanent resources of a country; if it drains the stream, it does not stanch the fountainhead. The capital of a country is always being consumed and remade in peaceful times, so that the destruction of it in war is not so great a calamity as might appear at first sight. But a true revival of prosperity depends on higher causes. A nation is only really prosperous when its people are advancing in moral tone, when there is a Divine root to their recovery. This is implied in the description of restored Israel. Let us consider the two pictures of the restoration.
I. TOWN LIFE. In the happy city described by Jeremiah there is a repopulation of the deserted streets. What a melancholy sight is a city in ruins, silent and solitary! The very suggestion of life and bustle increases the gloom of the unnatural stillness that haunts the place. The first step towards restoration is to bring back the inhabitants. The strength of a nation resides ultimately in its population. No empire has yet been ruined through over population; many, from Rome downwards, by the decay of population. There was a great economic truth in the Hebrew estimate of the value of a thickly inhabited country. In the city we see this concentrated. That is a human world in itself. If man is a social being, if cooperation and sympathy are good things, there we may look for true advancing prosperity. But the congregation of human beings in a city aggravates the evils of life when these are not restrained. In the city disease, misery, vice, and crime find their victims. The saddest sight in modern civilization (?) is the wretched condition of the back slums of the greatest cities of Europe, and the moral state of too much of the remainder. Men do not find prosperity and happiness by merely crowding together. In Jeremiah's picture of the new Jerusalem there is no room for those ugly scenes that Victor Hugo and Dickens make familiar in their representations of Paris and London. There is joy. There is worship. There is sacrifice and devotion to God. When the temple is the true centre of the city, when religion presides over her commerce and her pleasure, then, and then only, can true happiness be enjoyed by the citizens.
II. COUNTRY LIFE. Jeremiah paints a companion picture of country life with skilful adaptation of parallels and contrasts. The scene is pastoral. Prosperity is witnessed in quiet industry and growing wealth of flocks and herds. Such a life is no more idle than that of the city—often less so, and it is more calm. The stimulus of competition and the aid of cooperation are lost, but the reflections of solitude are gained; communion with nature takes the place of communion with man. This may be an ideal state of happiness to him who knows how to enjoy it. Both forms of life will be blessed when rightly followed; neither when abused. Dr. Johnson showed his wisdom in appreciating the merits of town life, but Cowper had good reasons for preferring the country. Country life has its vices, its ignorance, narrowness, and brutality, its poverty and lonely distresses. This also needs a higher life to keep it pure and happy. The Christian may find good in whichever condition his lot is cast, since God can bless both to him,