been already past, and disregard all means of grace as though it were utterly in vain to use them.]
2. Desponding fears in reference to God —
[He properly referred every thing to God as the one source of all good : but instead of deriving comfort from this, he made it an occasion of increased despondency. And thus it is with many: " They remember God, and are troubled." Every attribute of the Deity is brought against them, to aggravate their guilt and ensure their condemnation. Even mercy and truth are regarded by them as arrayed in hostile attitude against them, and as uniting their influence on the side of offended justice. His paternal corrections are con- sidered by them as judicial inflictions, and as the forerunners of yet heavier judgments in the lake that burnetii with fire and brimstone. His delays in answering prayer are viewed as absolute refusals, and as decisive proofs of final dereliction. Hence their fears are vented in terms similar to those in the passage before usm.]
An apprehension of the true import of these ques- tions will enable us to discover,
II. Whence they proceed —
Justly did Asaph say, " This is my infirmity :" and a grievous infirmity it was. Such questions as his arise,
1. From impatience —
[There is great impatience in the mind of man, yea, even of good men, and especially under any dark and mysterious dispensation. We are apt to think that God is, as it were, bound to hear us, and to interpose, either for the solution of our dif- ficulties, or the removal of our trials, as soon as we call upon him. We cannot wait his leisure. Like Saul, we think he has forgotten us ; and, that our enemies will crush us, before he can come to our relief". Thus David was exercised, as he himself tells us : "I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes0." To such a degree was he agitated on one occasion, that he declared, it was altogether in vain that he had served God : " Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocencyP." And, as for all that God's saints had spoken from the beginning of the world respecting the grace and mercy and fidelity of God, he did not hesitate to pronounce it all a downright falsehood : " I said in my haste, all men are liars q." The Prophet Jeremiah, too, cast reflections even upon God himself, as having deceived him by false promises ; " Thou
m Lam. iii. 17, 18. "1 Sam. xiii. 12, 13. ° Ps. xxxi. 22.
p Ps. Ixxiii. 13, 21. i Ps. cxvi. 11.