The Pulpit Commentary — 1 Chronicles — Section 240

same ti~11e to fling a just, manly defiance at the mer~iless spirit of remorse and to pay the mentrd homage to goodness and to God. The life of many a good man owns to many a sin, many a folly, and, when he goes not so far as these, to many a great and to- be-regrelted mistake. Ilut tbe most marked differences between the good man and the ba,l are then to be seen. This goes from bad to worse, and the tangled victim ere very long becomes the mournful and miserable sacrifice. That goes from bad with tear with striving, with prayer, toward the lost or awhile eclipsed good. The very mark ~f the man made dfrinely wise is discerned in tbe repentance wherewith he repents, the promptness of the sorrow and the fear inspired, the deliberateness and the thoroughness of the amendment made or attempted. This chapter gives the history of such a repentance and of its happy consequences. Notice-- I. THE EXCEEDING FEA¼,.AND INTENSE GRIEF OF FIRST MOMEN1'8 OF FAILURE AND PUNISHMENT HAD NOT BEEN 'suFFERED TO OVERWHELM AND TO PROSTRATE MIND AND EI,"'ERGY. Given a little time to recover nature's tone---some three months had by this 11me passed-and something b~tter than nature did also return. A willing thought- fulness supervened; deep searchmgs of the heart, of the written Word, and of what had been actually done had their way; and convictions just and right and wholesome were formed. There is always oue great model exhibited in Scripture of repentance. To Saul's exceeding fear and intense and sudden visitation there needed some interval for recovery, and such interval was granted. Even where it may be possible, it is not advisable to act, when under the influence of the extremes of feeling, when the storm of mental emotion is at its height. But it is infinitely hazardous to neglect the right time of action; and, so soon as the first intensity of feeling is passed, how many have waited prostrate till all disposition to rouse to altered and improved action has also passed I !I. FRAJIK, OPEN, AND EVEN PUBLIC CONFESSION OF THE ERROR THAT HAD BEEN. David now lays down tbe Law (vers. 2, 13) in the very act of conression of that Law broken. He lays down the Law, but not out of his own lip--by distinct and emphatic quotation of itself. He now saw and read the Law exact, and he saw how far distant the conduct for which he was in an eminent degree responsible, and of which he had literally been part, had strayed from the letter and spirit of that exact Law. This is in fact what still in deepest sense, and in the deepest hidings of our spiritual nature, pro- duces conviction of the most spiritual kind-conviction of sin. When the eye of the conscience can be gained for a moment to see this sight, and to notice the wide difference between a holy perfect Law and the actual life, which should lie under its governance but does not so, the Spirit of God has gained this end--0ur conviction. Ill. A CONFESSION THAT DOES NOT SHELVE THE BLAME UPON OTHERS, BUT ACCEPTS ITS OWN FULL SHARE. David quotes the Law that concerns the occasion (ver. 2). He exhorts "the chief of the fathers of the Levites" to sanctify themselves and prepare in all respects according to the Law for the great and holy work now before them (ver.12). Ee also does not shrink from addressing these pointedly, as those who were officially and in their own persons to blame. Ilut he does not finish his remonstrating and warning sentence without distinctly including himself among those in fault, and super- seding "ye" by "we" (ver. 13). There was never any bare v_erbal confession of sin more open than that of Adam, but there was never any confession more worthless, for he wished to lay all the essence of the sin qn Eve. 'l'he same may be said of Eve, as reo-ards her tempter, the serpent. That kind of confession of sin is nothing worth. It ha~ no semblance of meritoriousness in it. No sacred virtue inheres in it. A double depth of the heart's hardness, a double sluggishness of conscience, sleep,_a _double self- deception is there. Short of this, however, there are not a few, whose 1t 1s to exhort and warn others, who will largely forget in spirit, even when not in le~ter, to include themselves in needful reproof and in united confession. Yet how often 1s the leader of the flock doubly answerable, in reality doubly blarnable, and in deep truth tenfold called upon to make humblest and most penitent confession I !V. A REMARKABLE AND SINCERE READINESil ON THE PART OF ALL TO BEPAIR WHAT BAD DEEN AMIBB. If we often think too well of ourselves individually, and sometimes speak too forgetfully of the inherent disease of human nature, yet we arc frequently dis- poseci. to underrate the effect of the word that is spoken in the Name of the Lord, of the faithful appeal that is pointed plainly but lovingly to the consciences of those who have been in error, and of the influence of our own repenting and confessing example, Put oH. xv. 1-29.] THE FIIlST BOOK OF THE CHRONICLES. 235