remoin there, to pass long hours there, oe (comp. Pa. xv. 5; Isa. i. 23; Jer. xxii. 17: it were to dwell there (comp. Pas. xxiii. Ezek. xxii. 12; Hos. iv. 10; Micoh iii. (j; xxvii. 4; lxiii. 2). And the plaoe where 11, etc.). thine honour dwelleth; literally, the place Ver. ll.-llut a.a for me, I will walk in of the tabernacling of thy glory-the place mine integrity; i.e. I will continue to walk where thy 11:lory-the Sliechinah-ia en• as I have walked hitherto (see ver. 1)-( shrinecl and abides. will be "integer vitre scelerisque purus" Ver. 9.-Gather not my soul with sinners. -a brave and good resolve. Had he but Unite me not in one cloom with open sinners kept to it I Redeem me, and be merciful -those with whom I have always refused unto ms (compare the comment on ver. 1). to consort (vers. 4, 5)-whose congregation Though hitherto he has walked innocently. I have "hated." " That the righteous and is resolved still to continue to walk should be as the wicked, that be far from innocently ; he nevertheless feels that he thee: shall not the Judge of all the earth has need of redeeming mercy. Though he do right?" (Gen. xvi ii. 25). Nor my life "knows notliing by himself, yet he is not with bloody men. Bloody men-literally, thereby justified" (1 Car. iv. 4). llfany, men of blood.a-are the worst of wicked doubtless, are his "secret sins," which God men, cut-throats, assassins, murderers. At has " set in the light of his countenance" any rate, put me not on a par with them. (Ps. xc. 8). Little, probably, did the psalmist think at Ver. 12.-My foot standeth in an even this time how soon he was to become, place; or, on le~el ground-where there is practically, a murderer, and to "slay Uriah nothing to cause me to stumhle (comp. the Hittite with the sword of the children Ps. xxvii. 11). In the congregations will I of Ammon" (2 Sam. xii. 9). bleaa the Lord; i.e. in the assemblies o[ the Ver. 10.-In whose hands is mischief; i.e. people for public worship. Dn.vid conslontly who are always occupied with some mischief acknowledges this duty (Pss. xxii. 22, 25; or other-always engaged in carrying out xxvii. 6; xxxv. 18; xl. 9, 10; lxviii. 26, etc.). wicked devices (see Prov. xii. 2; xiv. 17). Indeed, it is the general idea that unclcrlie11 And their right hand is full of bribes. Which all hie psalms of praise, since they were they have taken to condemn the innocent composed to be reoited in the congregation.
HOMILETICS. Ver. 2.-Faith's bold request. "Examine me," etc. A very bold prayer. The image is taken from the testing and purifying of gold in the furnace, to which the word rendered " try" properly applies. It is as if the gold begged to be cast into the furnace (Job xxiii. 10). Who can sn.y, if this prayer is to be answered, how hot the furnace may need to be? But "we have boldness" (Eph. iii. 12). There o.re cases in which this bold prayer may be justifiable, wise, needful. It includes- I. A RECOGNITION OF Gon's ALL·SEAROHING KNOWLEDGE. (Ps. cxxxix. 1; Jer. xvii. 10; Rev. ii. 23.) God's free, forgiving mercy is represented under the image of his.forgetting our sins (Heb. viii. 12, etc.). 'l'his must not make us lose sight of the fact of his actual knowledge (Heb. iv. 13). If men see faults where God does not, it is their blindness, not their keenness. II. 'l'JIE APPEAL OF CONSCIOUS INTEGRITY, from men's slander or misjudgment to tho righteous judgment of God. Such an appeal is perfectly consistent with true humility and a deep sense of sinfulness before God (cf. Acts xxiii. 1; :x.xiv. 16; 1 Cor. iv. 3-5 with 1 'firn. i. 12-15). At the same time, we can hordly suppose David could have composed this psalm after his great and shameful foll. Regarded apart from that dark passage of his life, we see a man, with the faults, it is true, of an ardent, passionate temperament, but conscious of honest purpose, high sense of duty, fervent love to God, and true desire to rule God's people well; yet we must bear in mind (what Bishop Perowne has well expressed) that" the full depth and iniquity of sin was not disclosed to the saints of the Old Test11ment. Sin could only appear to be sin in all its blackness nnd malignity when it was brought .nto the full light of the cross of Christ. And it is only as any man grasps that cross that he can bear to look into the pollution which cleaves to his nature" (Perowne, ad loc.). III. PRAYER AGAINST SELF-DECEPTION. An appeal not only from the unfair jud~- ments of men, but from our own ignorance of ourselves (Pss. xi.x, 12; cxxxi.x. 23, 24). Peter's boastful, self-ignorant self-confidence was the immediate forerunn~ of his fall (Matt. xxvi. 33, 35). PSALMS, 0 Hl4 THE BOOK OF PSALMS. [rs. XXVI. 1-12.
• IV. SunM1ssroN TO Goo's METHODS OF TRIAL. These may be severe, the faithful severity of love. It needs the courage of faith-undoubting confidence in God's love- to enable us to offer thio prayer with full thought of all it may mean in our case, Christ sits as a Refiner (Mal. iii. 2, 3). God searches by his Word (lieb. iv. 12), by his Spirit (John xv. 8), by the dealings of his providence and outward trials (1 Pet. i. 6, 7), even by the permitted temptations of the evil one (Luke xxii. 31, 32). Thus a prayer which would be the height of rash presumption, offered in the spirit of self-righteous self-confidence, becomes a wise, safe, and fitting prayer, offered in the spirit of humble, childlike faith.