78 dignified, and learned, yet sorrowful, for they had been forcibly brought away from the services of the temple, which they had delighted to perform. The common people heard" with eagerness; but some of them, who had believed the words of the false prophets, were dissatisfied. Shemaiah too, wrote a letter to the priests and people at Jerusalem, complaining of Jeremiah, and requesting them to rebuke him for writing such a letter to the Jews at Babylon. When Jeremiah heard of this, God comman:led him to pronounce a curse upon Shemaiah, which he accordingly did. Another assembly of the Jews at Babylon met that same year on the banks of the Euphrates. Jeremiah had received frohn God the announcements that are contained in the fiftieth and fiftyfirst chapters of his prophecies. He had written them in a book, and sent them to Babylon. Books at that time were written upon a long piece of gloth, or parchment, or on paper made of the reed papyrus, and rolled up like,a picture or a map. The mes senger of Jeremiah read this book to the people
