20. He keepeth all his bones; not one of them is broken.

It is God who preserveth to man the strength of his body, which lieth in the bones; and that vigour of his spirit, which consisteth in firm and well-established principles of faith and holiness. The bones of the true Paschal Lamb continued whole during the passion; and those of the saints shall be raised whole at the last day, when the mystical body of Christ shall come out of its sufferings no less perfect and entire than did the natural.

21. Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate.

The evil of punishment springs from the evil of sin; and no sin works such desolation' as a malicious hatred' and persecution of the true sons and servants of God. Whoso doubts the truth of this, let him only survey and consider attentively the desolation of the once highly favoured nation, for their enmity against the King of righteousness, and his faithful subjects.

22. The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants : and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate. The frequent prosperity of the wicked, and the troubles of the righteous in this world, strike powerfully upon the sense, and are, for that reason, too apt to efface from our minds the notices given us by faith, of that future inversion of circumstances which is to take place after death. To renew, therefore, the impression of such an interesting truth, the redemption of the afflicted righteous

is so often insisted on in the course of this Psalm. Enable us, O Lord, to walk by faith, and not by sight,' until we come to thy heavenly kingdom; where, with all thy saints, made perfect through sufferings, we shall bless and magnify thee at all times,' and thy praise will continually be in our mouth,' for evermore.

Seventh Day.-Morning Prayer.

PSALM XXXV.

ARGUMENT.-The prophet, in this Psalm, as in the twentysecond, which it resembles, personating Messiah, in his state of humiliation and suffering, 1-3. beseecheth Jehovah to interpose in his behalf; 4-8. predicteth the confusion of his enemies, and 9, 10. his own triumph; 11-16. describeth the malice of his persecutors against him, and his love towards them; 17-25. repeateth his supplications for deliverance, and enlargeth upon the cruel insults he met with: 26. he again foretelleth the destruction of the adversary, and, 27, 28. the exultation of the faithful.

1. Plead my cause, O Lord, with them that strive with me: fight against them that fight against me.

David, in his afflictions; Christ, in his passion; the church, under persecution; and the Christian, in the hour of temptation, supplicate the Almighty to appear in their behalf, and to vindicate their

cause.

2. Take hold of shield and buckler, and stand up for mine help. 3. Draw out also the spear, and stop the way against them that persecute me: say unto my soul, I am thy salvation.

Jehovah is here described, as a man of war,'

going forth to the battle against the enemies of Messiah, and his church: the protection afforded by his mercy is figured by the shield of the warrior, covering his body from the darts of the enemy; and the vengeance of his uplifted arm, is represented by the offensive weapons used among men, such as the spear and the sword. 'If God be for us, who can be against us?' If he speaketh salvation, who shall threaten destruction? See Deut. xxxii. 41; Wisdom v. 20.

4. Let them be confounded, or, they shall be confounded, and put to shame, that seek after my soul: let them be, or, they shall be, turned back and brought to confusion, that devise my hurt.

The consequence of the Omnipotent appearing in arms against his adversaries, is here foretold. And the prediction has long since been verified in the confusion' of Saul, and of the Jews, as it will be finally fulfilled in that of Satan, and all his adherents, at the last day; for the manifestation of which day the church now waiteth, in faith and patience.

5. Let them be, or, they shall be, as chaff before the wind: and let the angel of the Lord, or, the angel of the Lord shall, chase them.

The Jews, separated from the church and people of Christ, become useless and unprofitable to any good work, possessing only the empty ceremonies and husks of their religion, and by the breath of the divine displeasure dispersed over the face of the earth, afford a striking comment on this verse, and as striking an admonition to every opposer of the holy Jesus. See Psalm i. 4.

6. Let their way, or, their way shall, be dark and slippery: and let the angel of the Lord, or, the angel of the Lord shall, persecute them.

A traveller, benighted in a bad road, is an expressive emblem of a sinner walking in his slippery and dangerous ways of temptation, without knowledge to direct his steps, to show him the danger, or to extricate him from it; while an enemy is in pursuit of him, whom he can neither resist nor avoid. Deliver us, O Lord, from all blindness, but, above all, from that which is judicial!

7. For without cause have they hid from me their net in a pit, which without cause they have digged for my soul. 8. Let destruction, or, destruction shall, come upon him at unawares; and let his net that he hath hid, or, his net that he hath hid shall, catch himself: into that very destruction let him, or, he shall, fall.

The causeless persecution raised against David by Saul, and against our Lord by the Jews, reverted, through the righteous judgment of God, on the heads of the persecutors. The innocent birds escaped; and they who set the toils, were themselves taken therein. Saul lost the kingdom which he thought to have secured, and his life also; and the Jews who crucified Christ, lest the Romans should take away their place and nation,' had their place and nation taken away by those Romans, for that very reason. In these histories, all impenitent persecutors of the faith, the church, and the servants of God may read their doom.

9. And my soul shall be joyful in the Lord: it shall rejoice in his salvation. 10. All my bones shall

say, Lord, who is like unto thee, who deliverest the poor from him that is too strong for him, yea, the poor and the needy from him that spoileth him?

These verses, as they describe the joy which the soul and body of Christ were to experience after the resurrection, so shall they one day be sung by the mystical body of the Lord, when delivered from the power of the spoiler, and raised entire from the dust. In the meantime, they may express our gratitude for any temporal preservation from enemies, from sad casualties, and dangerous temptations.

11. False witnesses did rise up; they laid to my charge, Heb. asked me, things that I knew not. 12. They rewarded me evil for good, to the spoiling of my soul.

This was never more literally true of David, than it was of the holy Jesus, when, standing before Pontius Pilate, he received no other return from the Jews, for all the gracious words which he had spoken, and all the merciful works which he had done among them, than that of being slandered, and put to death.

13. But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I humbled, or, afflicted, my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine

own bosom.

If David prayed, fasting in sackcloth, for Saul, and his associates, the Son of David, to heal the souls of men, put on the veil of mortal flesh, and appeared in the form and habit of a penitent, fasting forty days and forty nights, making continual intercession for transgressors, and grieving to think