reverently, and in the fear of God." The law of moral heritage makes
parental responsibility a solemn trust, while, in so far as it affects
those who inherit bad or good tendencies, we are sure that the Judge of
all the earth will do right. But it must never be forgotten that even
a bad disposition need never become a dominant habit. It is something
to be resisted and conquered, and, it may be, by the grace of Him who
is faithful, and will not suffer any of us to be tempted above what we
are able to bear. Our tendencies are Divine calls to us to recognise
and guard certain weak places in the citadel of character, for it is
against these that our enemy directs his most persistent and vigorous
attacks.

Unhappily, Adonijah's natural bias was made the more dangerous by the
atmosphere of the court, where flatterers naturally abounded--for "_he
was a very goodly man_," physically a repetition of Absalom, the Adonis
of his time. We may also fairly surmise that his parents were guilty
of partiality and indulgence in their treatment of him, for David would
love him the more as one who revived the memory of his favourite
Absalom, the idol of the people, distinguished for his noble mien and
princely bearing. Courtiers, soldiers, and people all flattered
Adonijah, and Joab, the greatest captain of his age, next only to the
king, was his partisan, the more so because he neither forgot nor
forgave David's reproaches after the death of Absalom. Even Abiathar,
who represented the younger and more ambitious branch of the
priesthood, joined in the general adulation, until Adonijah,
intoxicated by vanity, set up his own court in rivalry to that of his
father, and when he moved abroad was accompanied by a stately retinue
of chariots and horsemen, and fifty foot attendants gorgeously
apparelled.