Ver. 10.-0ur attit,ide towa,·d evil. "Hate evil." In Scripture the term "evil" is employed in two sense~-calamity and wrong-doing. We can only "hate evil" when it stands for wrong-doing. But it is necessary to carefully distinguish between bate of the _wrong-doer_ and hate of the wrong-doing. 'l'he first is never right, the second 1s always right. We are to hate our own wrong-doing, and to hate other people's. The term "hate" is also used in Scripture in two senses. Some- times it means "feel intense dislike towards;" sometimes it means "put in the second place of your regard." The use of the term as applied to evil, and as repre- senting tbe attitude t-0wards evil of those who love God, may be seen in the other synonymous terms used in the Bible. 1. To hate is to eschew. A strong term, applying to son1etbing found unpleasant in the mouth, and therefore cast out. Of Job as an upright man it is said, " He feared God, and eschewed evil." 2. To hate is to depart from. So the psalmist (xxxiv. 14) bids us "depart from evil, and do good." 3. To hate is to abhor. The Apostle Paul (Rom. xii. 9) bids us "abhor that which is evil, cleave to that which is good." Gibbes says," A man may know his hatred of evil to be true, first, if it be universal: he that bates sin truly hates all sin. Secondly, true hatred is fix.ed; there is no appeasing it but by abolishing the thing ha.ted. 'l'hirdly, hatred is a more rooted affection than anger; anger may be appeased, but hatred remains and sets itselr against the whole kind. Fourthly, if our hatred be true, we hate all evil, in ourselves first, and then in others. Fifthly, he that hates sin truly hates the greatest sin in the greatest measure. Sixthly, our hatred is right if we can endure admonition and reproof for sin, and not be enraged." The points that may be opened and illustrated are these- I. THE HATE WE CHERIBH FOB EVIL 18 AN INWARD FEELING. Show the natural repulsion of the pure-minded from foul conversation. Those who love God become like-minded with God; and so inwardly feel sin to be " the abominable thing." II. THE HATE WE CHERISH FOB EVIL WILL FIND OUTWARD EXPRESSION, 1. Jn separation from it. 2. In resistance of it. 3. In fighting with it. But never in any persecution of, or unauthorized attempts to punish, the wrong-doers.-R. T. Ver. 10.-Our Soul-preserver. It has always been a source of questioning and doubting to anxious-minded men, such as the Psalmist Asaph, that God does not always preserve the bodies, or the cirC'/1,mstances, of hie servants. But this ought to be no surprise to those who apprehend that God promises to preserve the soul; and he may, sometimes, be actually preserving the soul by not preserving the body. But perbaps this involves the higher Christian idea of the soul. In the older Scripture, and sometimes in the newer, the word ''soul" is equivalent to "life; " and preservation of natural life is the thing assured. Take the promise in its twofold sense. I. GoD PRESERVES oun NATURAL LIFE. \Ve press that truth into the familiar saying, "Man is immortal till his work is done." Nothing can ever touch a man's life s~ve on God's permi~sion. Evil of circumstance can never of itself rise to that height. Illustrate by the permissions and restrictions given to the "Satan" of the Book of Job. But oar Lord raises an argument on God's care of our life. He who keeps alive will surely provide. The Preserver of our soul is surely the Provider of our need. What we may ever need of deliverance is guaranteed in the grace of our Preserver. Keeper always, Redeemer at call of our need. II. GoD PREsEnvEs oun SPIRITUAL LIFE, That is our supreme treasure; or rather, that i~ our true, our permanent self. Natural, animal life we do but share with the auimals, and we can have it but for a time; circumstances are only the surroundings of our time of probation. They may all go, and we rt main. What we are, when we 1'8, xcvu. 1-12.] THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 339
huve clone with circumstances, and have ended our animal life, is the matter of supreme concern to us, It is, then, the soul-character that God preserve~ and deliver9; as the apostle says, "He will keep that we have committed to him nnto the great day." Not a thing we have, and say we own, is safe. All may take wing and flee away. But with absolute confidence we may say," He shall preserve our soul."-R. T.