A trial by sacrifice took
place on Mount Carmel before the whole people. Each party was to
prepare a bullock and lay it on the altar without setting fire to
the wood; and the divinity who should answer by fire was the
true God. The prophets of Baal came first and sought after their
own manner to influence their deity. They shouted and leapt
wildly, wounded themselves with swords and lances till they were
covered with blood, and kept up their raving ecstasy from morning
till mid-day, and from mid-day till evening. During this time
Elijah looked at them and mocked them, saying, "Cry louder, for he
is a god; either he is talking, or he is somehow engaged, or he
is asleep and must be awaked." At last his turn came; he repaired
the altar of Jehovah, which was broken down, spread the pieces of
the sacrifice upon it, and, to make the miracle still more
miraculous, caused them to be flooded two or three times with
water. Then he prayed to Jehovah, and fire fell from heaven, and
consumed the sacrifice. The people, up to this point divided in
their mind, now took the side of the zealot for Jehovah, laid hold
of the prophets of Baal, and slaughtered them down below at the
brook.
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