2 Arise [Lift up thyself], thou judge of the Gen. 18. 25. world; and reward the proud after their de-2 Cor 5. 10. serving.

3 Lord, how long shall the ungodly, how long shall the ungodly, triumph?

4 How long shall all wicked doers speak so disdainfully, and make such proud boasting? 5 They smite down thy people, O Lord, and trouble thine heritage.

6 They murder the widow, and the stranger, and put the fatherless to death.

7 And yet they say, Tush, the Lord shall not see; neither shall the God of Jacob regard it. 8 Take heed, ye unwise among the people: fools, when will understand?

ye

ye

9 He that planted the ear, shail He not hear? or, He that made the eye, shall He not see? 10 Or, He that nurtureth the heathen, (it is He that teacheth man knowledge,) shall not He punish?

Job 20. 4, &c.

Ps. 31. 20.

Jude 15.

Ex. 2. 23.

Jer. 22. 17, 18.

Ezek. 22. 7.

Mal. 3. 5.

Ezek. 8. 12.

Zeph. 1. 12.

Prov. 8. 5, &c.

Jer. 8. 6, &c.

11 The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, 1 Cor. 3. 20. that they are but vain.

2 Arise, &c. The Psalmist entreats, that God would ascend his lofty tribunal of justice for the destruction of the wicked. Psalm vii. 6, 7.

5 Thine heritage. The land of Israel was God's inheritance, but it seems much better in this verse to apply the expression to his chosen people, who were so likewise. Ver. 14. Psalm xxviii. 10.

8 Take heed, &c. The Psalmist desires these ignorant and senseless persons to reflect, that, whatever perfection there is in created beings, it all comes from God, and must, therefore, pertain to Himself in the highest degree.

9 Planted the ear. This phrase is very appropriate, referring, as it does, to the wonderful structure of the ear, to its insertion into, and connexion with, the head.

10 Or, He that nurtureth, &c. Or, He who condescends, as the sole fountain of wisdom, to teach all mankind the nature of their various duties, and, nourishing the heathen nations with instruction (Amos viii. 11), imparts likewise to them some degree of religious knowledge (Acts xiv. 17. Rom. ii. 14, 15), shall not He be able to discover, and will not He, therefore, be ready to punish, those transgressors of His law, to whom a clearer revelation has been vouchsafed?

11 The Lord knoweth, &c. Jehovah is well acquainted with the emptiness of the reasonings and imaginations of wicked men, even of the very wisest and most ingenious among them; and knows that, with all their contrivances, they will be unable to escape his vengeance.

Job 5. 17.

1 Cor. 11. 32.

2 Pet. 2. 9:

3. 3, &c.

1 Sam. 12. 22.

Rom. 11. 1, 2.

Isai. 42. 3, 4.

Matt. 12. 30.

John 7. 50, 51.

Ps. 124. 1, 2.

12 Blessed is the man, whom thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him in thy law;

13 That thou mayst give him patience in time of adversity, until the pit be digged up for the ungodly.

14 For the Lord will not fail his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance,

15 Until righteousness turn again unto judgment: all such, as are true in heart, shall follow it.

16 Who will rise up with me against the wicked; or, who will take my part against the evil-doers?

17 If the Lord had not helped me, it had not 2 Tim. 4. 16, 17. failed, but my soul had been put to [had dwelt in silence.

Luke 22.32.

1 Pet. 1. 5.

Hab. 3. 17, &c.

Rom. 5. 2, &c.

Isai. 10. 1, &c.

Amos 6. 1, 3.

18 But, when I said, My foot hath slipt, thy mercy, O Lord, held me up.

19 In the multitude of the sorrows, that I had in my heart, thy comforts have refreshed my soul.

20 Wilt thou have any thing to do with the stool of wickedness, which imagineth [frameth] mischief as a law?

12 Whom thou chastenest, &c. Whom, by means of trouble and affliction, thou correctest, O Lord, when he has done amiss, and thus teachest him to study and obey thy will with greater care and diligence. Psalm xviii. 35. Connected, as this verse is, with the next, the Psalmist meant also to express, that any man can derive sufficient consolation from the law of God, to set his heart at ease in days of evil, by feeling a full assurance, that the ungodly is hastening to his reward.

13 The pit. This may signify either the grave (Psalm vi. 5); or that kind of pit, in which beasts were accustomed to be taken (see on Psalm vii. 16), and, consequently, be put metaphorically for de

struction.

15 Until righteousness, &c. Until the judgment seat is no longer polluted by unjust and iniquitous sentences (ver. 20, 21); and, when this takes place, good men will rejoice in, and cheerfully appeal to, the decisions which emanate from it. Yet the Psalmist may have wished to express the certainty of the divine vengeance on the wicked, at some future time, and the "patient continuance in well doing" of the righteous, notwithstanding their present discouragements, from their conviction of this certainty.

17 My soul, &c. I (see on Psalm vii. 2.) should doubtless be now lying in the silence of the grave. Psalm cxv. 17.

20 Wilt thou, &c. Shall the tribunal, erected for the oppression of the sincere and upright, meet with any favor or encouragement from

21 They gather them together against the Prov. 17. 15. soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent Matt. 27. 4, &c. blood.

22 But the Lord is my refuge, and my God Ps. 62. 6. is the strength of my confidence.

Isai. 33. 15, 16.

5. 22, 23.

23 He shall recompense them their wicked-Prov. 2. 22: ness, and destroy them in their own malice; yea, the Lord our God shall destroy them.

THE NINETEENTH DAY.

Morning Prayer.

PSALM XCV.

ST. PAUL, in his Epistle to the Hebrews (iv. 7), has instructed us to consider this Psalm, (which ends very abruptly,) as really an address to believers under the gospel; and he distinctly affirms, that David was its author. It comprises an exhortation to praise God for his greatness and for his works of creation, together with an invitation to worship him, as the preserver of all things: the Israelites are warned, too, by the example of their ancestors in the wilderness, against daring to mistrust and to provoke him. This and the five following Psalms all relate, in their spiritual application, to the same subject, namely, to the kingdom of the Messiah; and are all composed in a similar strain of exultation and triumph.

COME, let us sing unto the Lord; let us Matt. 21. 9. heartily rejoice in the strength [rock] of Col. 3. 16. our salvation.

2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and shew ourselves glad in him with psalms.

Mic. 6. 6.

3 For the Lord is a great God, and a great Jer. 10. 6, 7. King above all gods.

Mal. 1. 11, 14.

Thee; that tribunal, which issues wicked and tyrannical decrees with as much confidence, as if they strictly accorded with the dictates of law and justice?

21 And condemn, &c. It may be merely, they give sentence against the innocent man (Psalm ci. 5); or, perhaps, better, they adjudge the innocent man to be worthy of death.

23 He shall recompense them, &c. God will punish them by bringing upon themselves the destruction, which they wickedly plotted against the righteous. Malice. See on Psalm xxxviii. 17.

1 Let us heartily rejoice. These words refer to the mingled sound of voices and instruments in the public worship of God at Jerusalem. See on Psalm xxvii. 7.

Mic. 1. 4.

Hab. 3. 6, 10.

Gen. 1. 9, 10.

1 Cor. 6. 20.

Ezek. 34. 30, 31.
Acts 20. 28.

Num. 14. 22.
Heb. 3. 7, 15.

Ex. 17.2, 7.
Num. 20. 13.
Heb. 3. 10, 17.
1 Cor. 10. 9, 10.

4 In his hand are all the corners [the deep places] of the earth, and the strength of the hills is his also.

5 The sea is his, and he made it, and his hands prepared the dry land.

60 come, let us worship, and fall down, and kneel before the Lord our maker.

7 For he is the Lord our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.

8 To-day, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness;

9 When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works.

10 Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, It is a people that do err in their hearts, for they have not known my ways;

4 In his hand, &c. The deepest and most secret recesses of the earth, which can be explored by the eye of God, and by His only, as well as all that they contain, constitute a part of his dominion, and are subject to his power.- -The strength, &c. The firm and durable

mountains. See on Psalm Lxxii. 3: xc. 2.

7 The sheep, &c. Those, which are not entrusted to a hireling's care, but which are under his own guidance and protection.

8 To-day, &c. What follows to the end of the Psalm is undoubtedly all spoken in the character of God himself, though David seems, at first, to speak in his own; a change of person, and that, too, in the same sentence, being, by no means, an uncommon thing with the Hebrew writers. Psalm xxii. 25: xcix. 4. The figure of the shepherd and his flock is considered to be still supported; for, in other passages of scripture, the sheep are also represented, as addressed by their guardian and protector. John x. 3, 27. If Jehovah should now, in this your day, grant you a distinct manifestation of his will, do not you refuse to become obedient, nor harden your hearts, as your fathers perversely did at Meribah. For they, instead of calling to mind his frequent interpositions in their favor, and thus confiding in him unhesitatingly, there tempted him, that is, they put his power again to the proof, as if they desired to ascertain, whether he was any longer capable of affording them assistance.

9 And saw my works. Though they had seen the wonderful works, which I performed for them, not only at the Red sea, but ever since they began to wander in the wilderness.

10 For they have not, &c. During the whole space of forty years the Almighty was obliged to be continually condemning the Israelites, for culpable inattention to the various miracles, which he had wrought for them, and for invincible ignorance of the religious duties, which they were required to practise, as tests of their obedience. Deut. xxix. 2-4.

11 Unto whom I sware in my wrath, that Josh. 5. 6. they should not enter into my rest.

PSALM XCVI.

Heb. 4. 3, 5.

THIS Psalm, in commemoration of God's especial presence among his people, was composed by David on the translation of the ark from the house of Obed-edom to the tent, which had previously been pitched for it on mount Sion. It is extant 1 Chron. xvi. 23, &c; but with some slight difference, which is supposed to have originated, when, after the return from Babylon, it was again used at the dedication of the second temple. We have here a solemn exhortation to the Israelites to give praise unto God: they are to acknowledge and adore him themselves, and to publish his great glory among the heathen nations round about, by teaching them, that, as he is the creator of all things, so is he the supreme and just ruler of the world. By the common consent of Jews, as well as of Christians, the Psalm is declared, in the prophetic sense, to be applicable to the times of the Messiah, since the temporal blessings spoken of in it are clearly designed to prefigure those, which were future and spiritual.

SING unto the Lord a new song: sing unto
the Lord, all the whole earth:

2 Sing unto the Lord, and praise his name: be telling of [shew forth] his salvation from day to day:

3 Declare his honor [glory] unto the heathen, and his wonders unto all people.

4 For the Lord is great, and cannot worthily be praised; he is more to be feared than all gods.

5 As for all the gods of the heathen, they Jer. 10. 11, 12. are but idols; but it is the Lord, that made the 1 Cor. 8. 4. heavens.

6 Glory and worship [majesty] are before 2 Pet. 1. 16, 17. Him: : power and honor are in His sanctuary.

11 That they should not, &c. Literally understood, these words signify the entrance of the Israelites into the promised land; but, spiritually and typically, the entering of believers into the rest and enjoyment of heaven, through the merits and mediation of the Messiah.

1 A new song. One that may celebrate another, and a recent instance, of his loving kindness to our nation. These words do not occur in the book of Chronicles, whence it may fairly be implied, that the Psalm was altered by some prophet to suit a new occasion.All the whole earth. The entire land of Palestine. Ver. 9, 13. 2 Be telling of. See on Psalm xxxviii. 12.

16 Glory, &c. This verse was designed to point out the immeasur