"Thus said the Lord of Hosts: 'Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again.'"
That was all! He had portrayed more vividly than he could ever have done in a long speech what would be the consequences if the king persisted in bringing back the horrible worship of Moloch.
Returning to the city, Jeremiah stopped at the Temple. He had not been in Jerusalem since he narrowly escaped stoning at the hands of the mob. As soon as he was recognized—and the word of his coming had been spread by the onlookers, who had returned from Tophet ahead of him—the crowd gathered about him, anxious to hear what he would have to say.
He told them a story first. He had been down at a potter's house that morning, watching the potter at work. The vessel the potter made didn't suit him, so he destroyed it while the clay was yet soft and pliable. Then he made another vessel out of that same clay, "as seemed good to the potter to make it." This story he followed up with a passionate plea to the people:
"'O house of Israel cannot I do with you as this potter?' saith the Lord. 'Behold, as the clay in the potter's hand, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel.'
"'At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to break down and to destroy it; if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it; if they do that which is evil in my sight, that they obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, wherewith I said I would benefit them.'
"'Now, therefore,' thus saith the Lord: 'Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you. Return ye now every one from his evil way, and amend your ways and your deeds.'"
Several of the Jerusalem prophets, upon Jeremiah's coming to the Temple, gathered quickly in Pashhur's chambers to talk the matter over. They had thought that the charge of blasphemy had frightened Jeremiah so that he would not return; but here he was again, as persistent in his course as ever. Not one was willing to admit that there was some truth in Jeremiah's pleadings and threats, but all of them came to this conclusion:
"Come and let us devise devices against Jeremiah; for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words."
Pashhur listened to all their talk with amusemsnt. Jeremiah had been a nuisance around the Temple, of which he was chief officer, long enough. Here was his chance to fix him, he thought.