he had intended to present himself in that place of so many sacred memories before the God Whose express

command he had just daringly set aside. By the way he had tarried at Carmel,147 where he "had set him up a

claiming to have executed Jehovah's behest.

But the very bleating of the sheep and lowing of the oxen betrayed his failure, and the excuse which he

offered was so glaringly untrue,149 that Samuel interrupted him150 to put the matter plainly and

straightforwardly in its real bearing: "Was it not when thou wast small in thine own eyes thou becamest

head of the tribes of Israel?" - implying this as its counterpart: Now that thou art great in thine own eyes,

thou art rejected, for it was God Who appointed thee, and against Him thou hast rebelled.

Once more Saul sought to cloak his conduct by pretense of greater religiousness, when Samuel, in language

which shows how deeply the spiritual meaning of ritual worship was understood even in early Old

Testament times,151 laid open the mingled folly and presumption of the king, and announced the judgment

which the Lord had that night pronounced in his hearing.

And now the painful interest of the scene still deepens. If there had been folly, hypocrisy, and meanness in

Saul's excuses, there was almost incredible weakness also about his attempt to cast the blame upon the

people. Evidently Saul's main anxiety was not about his sin, but about its consequences, or rather about the

effect which might be produced upon the people if Samuel were openly to disown him. He entreated him to

go with him, and when Samuel refused, and turned to leave, he laid such hold on the corner of his mantle

that he rent it. Not terrified by the violence of the king, Samuel only bade him consider this as a sign of how

Jehovah had that day rent the kingdom from him. At last the painful scene ended. Saul gave up the pretense

of wishing Samuel's presence from religious motives, and pleaded for it on the ground of honoring him

before the elders of his people. And to this Samuel yielded. Throughout it had not been a personal question,

nor had Samuel received directions about Saul's successor, nor would he, under any circumstances, have

fomented discord or rebellion among the people. Besides, he had other and even more terrible work to do ere

that day of trial closed. And now the brief servic e was past, and Samuel prepared for what personally must

have been the hardest duty ever laid upon him. By his direction Agag was brought to him. The unhappy

man, believing that the bitterness of death, its danger and pang were past, and that probably he was now to

be introduced to the prophet as before he had been brought to the king, came "with gladness."  152 So far as

Agag himself was concerned, these words of Samuel must have recalled his guilt and spoken its doom: "As

thy sword has made women childless, so be thy mother childless above (ordinary) women."  153

But for Israel and its king, who had transgressed the "ban" by sparing Agag, there was yet another lesson,

whatever it might cost Samuel. Rebellious, disobedient king and people on the one side, and on the other

Samuel the prophet and Nazarite alone for God - such, we take it, was the meaning of Samuel having to hew

Agag in pieces before Jehovah in Gilgal.

From that day forward Samuel came no more to see Saul. God's ambassador was no longer accredit ed to him;

for he was no longer king of Israel in the true sense of the term. The Spirit of Jehovah departed from him.

Henceforth there was nothing about him royal even in the eyes of men - except his death. But still Samuel

mourned for him and over him; mourned as for one cut off in the midst of life, dead while living, a king

rejected of God. And still "Jehovah repented that He had made Saul king over Israel."