Judges 2:10

Judges 2:10. And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers— The sacred writer means evidently to speak not only of those of the Israelites who had seen the works of God in Egypt, and in the wilderness, but those also who had seen the Jordan crossed over with dry feet, the walls of Jericho overthrown with the sound of the trumpet, the sun stopped at the command of Joshua, &c.; prodigies, the impression of which had powerfully attached them to the service of the Lord, and with them bound to him their cotemporaries. The generation immediately following that of Joshua was of quite another character than the foregoing. Solely occupied with the care of settling themselves, of building houses, planting vineyards, and improving their estates, these new Israelites were little, if at all, engaged in the care of knowing the Lord, or studying his religion. Not having been eye-witnesses of the wonders which the great God had wrought to deliver the nation, or to facilitate its conquest of the land of Canaan, they paid them but a superficial attention. We see them without scruple form the closest connections with the Canaanites, whom they had orders to destroy. In the midst of peace, prosperity intoxicated their hearts. It is commonly thus: the Greeks and Romans, each in their turn, fatally experienced the like. Happy the people who are never reduced to the disgraceful necessity of applying to themselves the words of the famous Latin poet: the evils we suffer are the fruit of a long peace! Juven. Sat. 6: ver. 2:293.