God's coming to judge the apostate people of Israel; 5, 6. of the assembly to be present, and his appeal to men and angels; 7-13, the rejection of the legal, and, 14, 15. the establishment of the Christian worship and services; 16,-20. the impenitent Jews are arraigned, and, 21. threatened, and, 22. exhorted to consider, to repent, and, 23. to embrace the evangelical, or spiritual religion. It is to be observed, that in this Psalm, as in our Lord's discourse on the same subject, the particular judgment of Jerusalem is a figure and specimen of the last general judgment. Hypocritical and wicked Christians are therefore to apply to themselves what is primarily addressed to their elder brethren, the unbelieving and rebellious sons of faithful and obedient Abraham.

"1. The mighty God, even the LORD, hath spoken, and called the earth, from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof."

66

"God, who at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son," Heb. i. 1. The everlasting Gospel hath made its glorious progress from the eastern to the western world; and the nations have been thereby called to repentance.

"2. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined."

The law which was given by Moses, proceeded from Sinai, the mount of fear and horror; but the word of grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ, issued forth from Sion, the chosen mountain of beauty and excellency, in Jerusalem. There that glory first arose and shone, which, like the light of heaven, soon diffused itself abroad over the face of the whole

earth.

"3. Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence: a fire shall devour before him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about him."

The prophet, having described the first advent of Christ, and the promulgation of the Gospel, now foretelleth his coming to take vengeance on the hypocritical Jews; as also, his advent to judge the world prefigured thereby. Upon both those occasions, his coming was to be with sounds and sights of terror, with all the marks and tokens of wrath and fiery indignation, like those displayed on Sinai.]

"4. He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that he may judge his people."

Heaven and earth, men and angels, were to be witnesses of the righteous judgments of God, executed upon his apostate people; as all the celestial armies, and all the generations of the sons of Adam, are to be present at the general judgment of the last day.

5. Gather my saints together unto me; those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice."

These are the words of God, summoning mankind to attend the trial "calling to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that he may judge his people." Thus it is said of the Son of man, Matt. xxiv. 31. "He shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."

Such is the general idea entertained of this Psalm, by the best Christian expositors, cited in Pool's Synopsis, where we are likewise informed, that the Jewish Rabbies affirm the subject of it to be that judgment, which will be executed in the days of Messiah"-ignorant, alas, that they themselves, and their people, are now become the unhappy objects of that judgment -"Psalmi quinquagesimi argumentum est ex genere Didactico ad moralem Theologiam per tinens, grave imprimis et fructuosum Deo nimirum non placere Sacrificia et externos ritus religionis, sed sinceram potius pietatem, laudesque ex grato animo profluentes; neque vero has ipsas pietates significationes, sine justitia cæterisque virtutibus. Ita duas habet partes; primo arguitur cultor pius quidem, sed ignarus et superstitioni obnoxius; deinde improbus pietatis simulator. Si totum hujusce Ode apparatum et quasi scenam contemplamur, nihil facile potest esse magnificentius. Deus universum genus humanum solemni edicto convocat, ut de populo suo judicium publice exerceat; ponitur in Sione augustum Tribunal: depingitur Dei advenientis majestas imaginibus a descensu in montem Sinam petitis: Coelum et Terra invocantur Divinæ justitiæ testes: tum demum inducitur Dei ipsius sententiam dicentis au. gustissima persona, per reliquam Oden continuata; unde cum cæteris ejus partibus admirabilis illa exordii majestas et splendor communicatur." Lowth, Prælect. xxvii. ad init.

"6. And the heavens shall declare his righteousness: for God is judge himself."

Th' applauding heavens the changeless doom,
While God the balance shall assume,

In full memorial shall record,

And own the justice of their Lord.

MERRICK.

7. Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee: I am God, even thy God."

This is the voice of the omniscient Judge, impleading his ancient people, who are commanded to attend to the words of him, their God and covenanted Saviour, thus constrained to clear his justice before the world, and to show that they had destroyed themselves. Nominal and wicked Christians will be addressed in the same manner at the last day.

8. I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt-offerings, to have been, or, they were, continually before me."

This judicial process was not commenced against Israel, for their having neglected to offer the sacrifices of the law; their oblations were on the altar, morning and evening, continually, insomuch that God, by the prophet Isaiah, declares himself "weary of them," as not having been accompa nied with faith and holiness in the offerer. Many pharisaical Christians will be condemned for the same reason, notwithstanding their strict and scrupulous attendance upon the ordinances of the new law, if it shall appear, that they left religion in the church behind them, instead of carrying it with them, in their lives and conversations.

9. I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he-goats out of thy folds. 10. For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. 11. I know all the fowls of the mountain; and the wild beasts of the field are mine. 12. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof."

The Jewish folly of doting on the legal offerings, as things in themselves acceptable to God, and conferring justification on man, is reproved in these verses, from the consideration, that the various animals slain in sacrifice were long before, even from the creation of the world, the sole right and property of JEHOVAH; which, therefore, he needed not to have required at the hands of his people; nor would he have done so, but for some further end and intent, signified and represented by such oblations. What that end and intent was, Christians know. And Jews formerly did know. Learn we hence, not to dream of any merit in our works and services; since God hath a double claim, founded on creation and redemption, to all we have and all we are.

"13. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?"

Another argument of the Jews' blindness, is the gross absurdity of imagining, that a spiritual and holy being could possibly be satisfied and pleased with the taste and smell of burnt-offerings, (which God often declareth himself to have been) any otherwise, than as they were symbolical of some other sacrifice, spiritual and holy, and therefore, really propitiatory and acceptable in his sight. That man judaizeth, who thinketh to please God by an external, without an internal service: or by any service without Christ.

"14. Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the Most High: 15. And call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me."

The carnal and bloody sacrifices of the law being abolished by the coming of Messiah, the spiritual and unbloody oblations of the Gospel succeed in their stead. These are, the eucharistic sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving for the mercies of redemption: that hearty repentance, that faith unfeigned, and that obedience evangelical, promised and vowed in baptism: that perfect trust in God, and resignation to his will, which our Lord expressed in his prayer, during his sufferings, and which we ought to express in our

prayers, when called to suffer with him, if we desire to glorify God for our deliverance through him, in the day of visitation. These are the services enjoined to such Jews as would become Christians, and to such Christians as would be Christians in deed and in truth.

"16. But unto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest take my covenant in thy mouth? 17. Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest my word behind thee."

From hence, to the end of the Psalm, we have an expostulation of God with the unbelieving Jew, who boasted his relation to Abraham, without a spark of Abraham's faith in his heart; and gloried in a law, which condemned him as a breaker of its precepts in every instance. St. Paul's expostulation with the same person, Rom. ii. 17, &c, is so exact a parallel to this before us, that the one will be the best comment upon the other-"Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest his will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructer of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou, therefore, that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God?" Every minister of God should try and examine himself by these passages in our Psalm and St. Paul, on the former of which the famous Origen is once said to have preached, making application to his own case, not without many tears. And indeed, "if thou, O Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, who, among us all, shall stand? But there is forgiveness with thee," Psalm cxxx. 3, 4.

"18. When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him, and hast been partaker with the adulterers."

St. Paul proceeds in the very same manner-"Thou that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? Thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?"-All Christians, the clergy especially, should beware not only of committing evil themselves, but of "consenting" to, or "partaking" of, the evil committed by others.

"19. Thou givest thy mouth to evil, and thy tongue frameth deceit. 20. Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother; thou slanderest thine own mother's son."

Had St. Paul thought proper to have gone on to this instance, he might have said "Thou that teachest a man should not bear false witness, dost thou bear false witness?" For certainly never men brake that commandment in a more flagrant manner than the Jews; never men "gave" their "mouth" more "to evil," or "framed" more "deceit," than they, when they "sate and spake against their brethren," and "slandered their own mother's children," for believing in Jesus Christ. Let us look at this picture of slander, and we shall never fall in love with so detestable a vice.

"21. These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself: but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes."

The forbearance of God only tempted the Jews still to think him on their side, till at length he made the Roman armies his instruments of conviction; who, by crucifying multitudes of their countrymen, in sight of the besieged, did in a wonderful manner "reprove them, and set before them things which they had done." The day of judgment will do this to all sinners, if temporal chastisements effect it not before that day shall come.

"22. Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver."

The stupendous desolation of Jerusalem, for rejecting so kind an admonition of her Saviour, and suffering him to weep over her in vain, should,

in a most powerful manner, enforce that admonition on the inhabitants of Christendom, to prevent its falling after the same example of unbelief.

"23. Whoso offereth praise, glorifieth me; and to him that ordereth his conversation aright, will I shew the salvation of God."

This verse resumes and repeats the conclusion intended by the whole Psalm, concerning the Jewish and the Christian worship; and St. Paul, in the place above cited, affords us a complete comment upon it. "He is not a Jew, which is one outwardly nor is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly: and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of God."

PSALM LI.

ARGUMENT.

In this Psalm, composed upon a sad occasion, but too well known, we have a perfect model of penitential devotion. The royal suppliant, robed in sackcloth, and crowned with ashes, entreats for mercy, 1, 2. from a consideration of his own misery, and of the divine goodness; 3. from that of his confession; 4. of God's sole right to judge him; 5. laments the corruption of his nature; but, 6. without pleading it as an excuse; 7. prays for gospel remission, in legal terms; 8. for spiritual joy and comfort; 9, 10. for pardoning and cleansing grace; 11, 12. for strength and perseverance, that he may, 13. instruct and convert others; 14, 15. deprecates the vengeance due to blood; 16, 17. beseeches God to accept an evangelical sacrifice; and, 18, 19. concludes with a prayer for the church.

"1. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving-kindness; according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgres

sions."

The penitent's first ground for hope of pardon is his own misery, and the Divine mercy, which rejoiceth to relieve that misery. The riches, the power, and the glory of a kingdom, can neither prevent nor remove the torment of sin, which puts the monarch and the beggar upon a level. Every transgression leaves behind it a guilt and a stain; the account between God and the sinner is crossed by the blood of the great propitiatory sacrifice, which removes the former; and the soul is cleansed by the Holy Spirit, which takes out the latter.

"2. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my

sin."

The soul that is sensible of her pollution, fears she never can be sufficiently purified from it; and therefore prays yet again and again, continually, for more abundant grace, to make and to keep her holy.

"3. For I acknowledge my transgressions; and my sin is ever before me." The penitent's second plea for mercy is, that he doth not deny, excuse, or palliate his fault, but confesses it openly and honestly, with all its aggravations, truly alleging, that it haunts him night and day, causing his conscience incessantly to reproach him with his base ingratitude to a good and gracious Father.

"4. Against, or, to, thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight; that thou mightest, or, therefore thou wilt, be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest."

A third reason why the penitent sues for mercy at the hand of God is, because God alone certainly knows, and is always able to punish the sins of men. David sinned "against" many; as against Uriah, whom he slew; against Bathsheba whom he corrupted; and against all the people, to whom he became the cause of much offence and scandal. But the sin was committed in secret; and if it had not been so, he, as king, had no superior, or

judge, in this matter, but God only; who being able to convict the offender, as he did by the prophet Nathan, would assuredly be justified in the sentence he should pronounce. And he will appear to be so in his determinations at the last day, when he will surprise the wretched, unthinking, sinner, with a declaration similar to that which he made by his prophet to the royal offender, 2 Sam. xii. 12. "Thou didst it secretly; but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun."

"5. Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me."

The Divine mercy is implored by the penitent, fourthly, because that alone can dry up the fountain of original corruption, from which the streams of actual transgression derive themselves; and which is here only lamented as their cause, not alleged as their excuse; seeing, that the greater our danger is of falling, the greater should be our care to stand. David was the offspring of the marriage bed, which is declared to be "honourable and undefiled." No more, therefore, can be intended here, than that a creature, begotten by a sinner, and formed in the womb of a sinner, cannot be without that taint, which is hereditary to every son and daughter of Adam and Eve."*

"6. Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts, Heb. the reins; and in the hidden part thou shalt make, or, hast made, me to know wisdom." The force of" Behold" is-" It!is too plain; I feel it but too sensibly; the punishment I suffer is evidence sufficient, that thou art not contented with a superficial appearance of goodness: thou lovest truth and sincerity in the bottom of the heart." This God was now teaching him, by the correction he made him suffer. The punishment inflicted tended to give him a right understanding of things, and to work it deep into him. MUDGE.

"7. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.'

He therefore petitioneth, in this verse, for the purification which cometh from God only, through the one great propitiatory sacrifice, by the Holy Spirit; and which was foreshown under the law by the ceremony of sprinkling the unclean person with a bunch of "hyssop," dipped in the "water of separation." This rite is described, Numb. xix. and explained, Heb. ix. 13, 14. "If the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of CHRIST, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?" From the latter part of the verse we learn, that, by grace and mercy, the pardoned penitent is arrayed in garments no less pure and splendid than those of innocence itself.

"8. Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice."

Next to the blessings of forgiveness, is to be desired that joy and comfort in the conscience, which forgiveness only can inspire: the effect of this, in repairing the vigour of the spirit, decayed through sorrow and anguish, is compared to setting broken bones, and restoring them again to perfect strength. At the resurrection of the body, this petition will be granted in a literal sense, when the "bones" that are mouldered into dust, shall" rejoice and flourish as an herb," Isa. lxvi. 14.

9. Hide thy, face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities." The soul still restless and uneasy, reiterates her request, that God would not only cease to behold her iniquity for the present, as a man who turneth away his face from a writing, but that he would not behold it more, as a man who blotteth out what is written, so that it can never be read again.

And so much must surely be intended, as the learned Bossuet observeth-Numquid David de adulterio natus erat? De Jesse viro justo natus erat, et conjuge ipsius. Quid ergo se dicit in iniquitate conceptum, nisi quia suscepit personam humani generis, et attendit omnium vincula, propaginem mortis, originem iniquitatis advertit.