88 BATTLES OF THE BIBLE.

Micah was when we love anything else better than God,
or trust to any other rather than to Him. This is a sin
to which our own hearts are continually tempting us ; to
avoid it we must “ watch and pray.”

I shall now go on with our story. To Micah’s house
there came a visitor,—a stranger to Micah’s family.
He was a young man, and was travelling about the
country seeking for a situation. He was a Levite, but
his mother having belonged to the tribe of Judah, up
to this time he had lived in Bethlehem-Judah with
his mother’s relations. Micah asked him about his cir-
cumstances, and learning from him that he had no settled
place of abode, asked him to stay with him and act as
priest in his family. He would treat him, he said, with
respect, and, by way of payment for his services, would
give him ten shekels of silver in the year, besides his
food and a suit of clothes. The Levite thought that a
small income was better than no income at all, and, as
his desire was merely to get a living, and not to do good,
he was satisfied to stay with that family of idolaters, and
worship images with them. Micah was much pleased
when the young man agreed to stay with him; he
thought surely God would shew him favour now when
he had got a Levite for his priest.

Johnnie. Why did he think so, grandfather ?

Grandfather. The Levites were set apart to the priestly
office, therefore a peculiar sacredness attached to them.
Yet Micah might more reasonably have expected a judg-
ment than a blessing when he had enticed the Levite