The Pulpit Commentary — Psalms — Volume 2 — Section 309

•HOMILETICS, Ver, 6.-Sainuel. The venerable figure of Samuel forms the living link between two great and very diverse stages in the history of ancient Israel. He was the l~t of the judges (Acts xiii. 29), he was the first of the prophets (Acts iii. 24). Not that there were no prophets between Moses and Samuel (Judg. iv. 4; 1 Sam. ii. 27), but from his time the prophetic gift and office took that leading place which belonged to it down to the days of Malachi. As judge, Samuel's administration brought to a. close the period of anarchy recorded in the Book of Judges ; as prophet, he was commis- sioned to choose and anoint the first King of Israel; and, on Saul's proving himself utterly unable to understand bis position as the Lord's servant, and thus unfit to reign, to declare his deposition, to anoint David, and probably to train him for his high office, and to promise to the seed of David au eternal throne and kingdom. The life and character of Samuel present at least three grand lessons and line3 of thought (to be treated in different discourses). I. SAMUEL AN EXAMPLE OF .A CONSECRATED LIFE, A consecrated childhood the preparation for one of the noblest, purest, grandest, and most useful lives history records. When wo think of Samuel, the image that most naturally rises to our view (as Dean Stanley observes) is not of the aged ruler and seer, with his unshorn grey locks on his shoulders (1 Sam. i. 11 ; xii. 2), but of" the child Samuel" (l Sam. i. 27, 28; ii. 11, 18, 21; iii. 1-10, 19). Excepting the holy Child Jesus, there is none other in Scripture whose childhood and early piety, consecration, and inspiration are thus prominently recorded. The whole life is of a piece. "'WilJ excesses in youth are often followed by energy, by zeal, by devotion. We read it in the eHwples of Augustine, of Loyola, of John Newton . . . But it is no less certain that tbey are rarely, very rarely, followed by moderation, by calmness, by impartial wisdom . . . whatever else is gained by sudden and violent conversions, this is lost. \Vhatcver else, on the other h1md, is lost by the experience of evil, by the calm an,l even life that needs no repentance, this is gained. . . . Samuel is the chief type, in ecclesiastical history, of quiet growth, of a new creation without convereion" (Stanley's 'History of the Jewish Church,' i. 364, 365). To such a childhood, the key-notl:l of which was 316 THE BOOK OF PSALMS. [rs. XOIX. 1-0.