be reserved for him. He demands the first-fruits as his peculiar portion ; and if the first-fruits of the field, much more the first-fruits of the immortal soul. O! my young friends, I entreat you to reflect how diflerent God's estimate of you.r conduct is from that which you and your thoughtless com- panions form ; and how bitterly you will one day deprecate his remembrance of those sins, which now you pass over as unworthy of any serious consideration.
But David adverts also to the transgressions which, through weakness or inadvertence, he yet daily committed. And who amongst us is not conscious of manifold transgressions in his daily walk and conversation ? Who is not constrained to say, "Enter not into judgment with thy servant, O Lord:" " if thou shouldest be extreme to mark iniquity, O Lord, who shall stand?" Thus, then, let us also implore God to blot out our sins from the book of his remembrance, that they may never appear against us in the day of judgment, and, " if sought for" with ever so much diligence, may never, " never be found ■■."]
Let us mark yet farther,
in. What he proposes as the rule and measure of
God's dealings with him —
On the mercy of God he founds all his hope —
[Mercy is the favourite attribute of the Deity : it delights to spare the offending, and to save the penitent. It is ready to fly at the call of guilt and misery ; and hastens to execute the dictates of God's sovereign grace. It demands no merit as the price of its blessings : it accounts itself richly recompensed in bringing glory to God and happiness to man. Hence David prayed, " According to thy mercy, remember thou me ! " When speaking of God's interposition between him and his perse- cutors, he could say, " The Lord hath rewarded me according to my righteousness ; according to the cleanness of my hands hath he recompensed me^" But he would not presume to make his own righteousness the ground of his hope towards God. For acceptance with him, he would rely on nothing but mercy, even the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. Herein he has set us an example which we shall do well to follow : in all our ad- dresses to the Most High God, we should adopt his prayer, and say, " Deal with thy servant according to thy mercy*." There is solid ground. Thither the most holy of the saints must come ; and there the vilest sinner upon earth may find a rock whereon to stand with confidence before God. With such a ground of hope, David could approach his God, and say, " Be merciful unto my sin ; for it is great.''']
r Jcr. 1. 20. s Ps. xviii. 20. * pg. cxix. 124,