whirlwinds, and the tempestuous billows of the ocean, to the ravages
of the sword, famine, pestilence, and numerous diseases; and at
length he must sink into the grave, and his body must become the
companion of worms! The most dignified and haughty of the sons of men
are liable to these and similar degradations as well as the meanest
of the human family. Yet, in such circumstances, man—that puny worm
of the dust, whose knowledge is so limited, and whose follies are so
numerous and glaring—has the effrontery to strut in all the
haughtiness of pride, and to glory in his shame.
When other arguments and motives produce
little effect on certain minds, no considerations seem likely to have
a more powerful tendency to counteract this deplorable propensity in
human beings, than those which are borrowed from the objects
connected with astronomy. They show us what an insignificant being—
what a mere atom, indeed, man appears amidst the immensity of
creation! Though he is an object of the paternal care and mercy of
the Most High, yet he is but as a grain of sand to the whole earth,
when compared to the countless myriads of beings that people the
amplitudes of creation. What is the whole of this globe on which we
dwell compared with the solar system, which contains a mass of matter
ten thousand times greater? What is it in comparison of the hundred
millions of suns and worlds which by the telescope have been descried
throughout the starry regions? What, then, is a kingdom, a province,
or a baronial territory, of which we are as proud as if we were the
lords of the universe and for which we engage in so much devastation
and carnage? What are they, when set in competition with the glories
of the sky? Could we take our station on the lofty pinnacles of
heaven, and look down on this scarcely distinguishable speck of
earth, we should be ready to exclaim with Seneca, "Is it to this
little spot that the great designs and vast desires of men are
confined? Is it for this there is so much disturbance of nations, so
much carnage, and so many ruinous wars? Oh, the folly of deceived
men, to imagine great kingdoms in the compass of an atom, to raise
armies to decide a point of earth with the sword!" Dr. Chalmers, in
his Astronomical Discourses, very truthfully says, "We gave you but a
feeble image of our comparative insignificance, when we said that the
glories of an extended forest would suffer no more from the fall of a
single leaf, than the glories of this extended universe would suffer
though the globe we tread upon, 'and all that it inherits, should
dissolve.'"
Verses 5-8. These verses may set forth man's position among the
creatures before he fell; but as they are, by the apostle Paul,
appropriated to man as represented by the Lord Jesus, it is best to
give most weight to that meaning. In order of dignity, man stood next
to the angels, and a little lower than they; in the Lord Jesus this
was accomplished, for he was made a little lower than the angels by
the suffering of death. Man in Eden had the full command of all
creatures, and they came before him to receive their names as an act
of homage to him as the viceregent of God to them. Jesus in his
glory, is now Lord, not only of all living, but of all created
things, and, with the exception of him who put all things under him,
Jesus is Lord of all, and his elect, in him, are raised to a dominion
wider than that of the first Adam, as shall be more clearly seen at
his coming. Well might the Psalmist wonder at the singular exaltation
of man in the scale of being, when he marked his utter nothingness in
comparison with the starry universe.
Thou madest him a little lower than
the angels —a little lower in nature, since they are immortal,
and but a little, because time is short; and when that is over,
saints are no longer lower than the angels. The margin reads it, "A
little while inferior to." Thou crownest him. The dominion that God
has bestowed on man is a great glory and honour to him; for all
dominion is honour, and the highest is that which wears the crown. A
full list is given of the subjugated creatures, to show that all the
dominion lost by sin is restored in Christ Jesus. Let none of us
permit the possession of any earthly creature to be a snare to us,
but let us remember that we are to reign over them, and not to allow
them to reign over us. Under our feet we must keep the world, and we
must shun that base spirit which is content to let worldly cares and
pleasures sway the empire of the immortal soul.
Verse 9. Here, like a good composer, the poet returns to his
key-note, falling back, as it were, into his first state of wondering
adoration. What he started with as a proposition in the first verse,
he closes with as a well proven conclusion, with a sort of quod
erat demonstrandum . O for grace to walk worthy of that excellent
name which has been named upon us, and which we are pledged to
magnify!
EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS
Title. "Gittith," was probably a musical instrument
used at their rejoicings after the vintage. The vintage closed the
civil year of the Jews, and this Psalm directs us to the latter-day
glory, when the Lord shall be King over all the earth, having subdued
all his enemies. It is very evident that the vintage was adopted as a
figurative representation of the final destruction of all God's
enemies. Isaiah 63:1-6; Revelation 19:18-20. The ancient Jewish
interpreters so understood this Psalm, and apply it to the mystic
vintage. We may then consider this interesting composition as a
prophetic anticipation of the kingdom of Christ, to be established in
glory and honour in the "world to come," the habitable world. Hebrews
2:5. We see not yet all things put under his feet, but we are sure
that the Word of God shall be fulfilled, and every enemy, Satan,
death, and hell, shall be for ever subdued and destroyed, and
creation itself delivered from the bondage of corruption into the
glorious liberty of the children of God. Romans 8:17-23. In the use
of this Psalm, then, we anticipate that victory, and in the praise we
thus celebrate, we go on from strength to strength, till, with him
who is our glorious Head, we appear in Zion before God. W. Wilson,
D.D., in loc.
Whole Psalm. Now, consider but the scope of the Psalm, as the
apostle quoteth it to prove the world to come. Hebrews 2. Any one
that reads the Psalm would think that the psalmist doth but set forth
old Adam in his kingdom, in his paradise, made a little lower than
the angels—for we have spirits wrapped up in flesh and blood,
whereas they are spirits simply—a degree lower, as if they were
dukes, and we marquises; one would think, I say, that this were all
his meaning, and that it is applied to Christ but by way of allusion.
But the truth is, the apostle bringeth it in to prove and to convince
these Hebrews, to whom he wrote, that that Psalm was meant of Christ,
of that man whom they expected to be the Messiah, the Man Christ
Jesus. And that he doth it, I prove by the sixth verse—it is the
observation that Beza hath—"One in a certain place," quoting David.
(Greek) hath testified; so we may translate it, hath testified it,
etiam atque etiam, testified most expressly; he bringeth an
express proof for it that it was meant of the Man Christ Jesus;
therefore it is not an allusion. And indeed it was Beza that did
first begin that interpretation that I read of, and himself therefore
doth excuse it and make an apology for it, that he diverteth out of
the common road, though since many others have followed him.
Now the scope of the Psalm is plainly
this: in Romans 5:14, you read that Adam was a type of him that was
to come. Now in Psalm 8, you find there Adam's world, the type of a
world to come; he was the first Adam, and had a world, so the second
Adam hath a world also appointed for him; there is his oxen and his
sheep, and the fowls of the air, whereby are meant other things,
devils perhaps, and wicked men, the prince of the air; as by the
heavens there; the angels, or the apostles, that were preachers of
the gospel.
To make this plain to you, that that
Psalm where the phrase is used, "All things under his feet," and
quoted by the apostle in Ephesians 1:22—therefore it is proper—was
not meant of man in innocency, but of the Messiah, the Lord Jesus
Christ; and therefore, answerably, that the world there is not this
world, but a world on purpose made for this Messiah, as the other was
for Adam.
First, it was not meant of man in
innocency properly and principally. Why? Because in the first verse
he saith, "Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou
ordained strength." There were no babes in the time of Adam's
innocency, he fell before there were any. Secondly, he addeth, "That
thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger;" the devil that is,
for he shewed himself the enemy there, to be a manslayer from the
beginning. God would use man to still him; alas! he overcame Adam
presently. It must be meant of another therefore, one that is able to
still this enemy and avenger.
Then he saith, "How excellent is thy
name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens."
Adam had but paradise, he never propagated God's name over all the
earth; he did not continue so long before he fell as to beget sons;
much less did he found it in the heavens.
Again, verse 4, "What is man, and the
son of man?" Adam, though he was man, yet he was not the son of man;
he is called indeed, "the son of God" (Luke 3:38), but he was not
filius hominis . I remember Ribera urgeth that.
But take an argument the apostle himself
useth to prove it. This man, saith he, must have all subject to him;
all but God, saith he; he must have the angels subject to him, for he
hath put all principalities and powers under his feet, saith he. This
could not be Adam, is could not be the man that had this world in a
state of innocency; much less had Adam all under his feet. No, my
brethren, it was too great a vassalage for Adam to have the creatures
thus bow to him. But they are thus to Jesus Christ, angels and all;
they are all under his feet, he is far above them.
Secondly, it is not meant of man fallen,
that is as plain; the apostle himself saith so. "We see not," saith
he, "all things subject unto him." Some think that it is meant as an
objection that the apostle answereth; but it is indeed to prove that
man fallen cannot be meant in Psalm 8. Why? Because, saith he, we do
not see anything, all things at least, subject unto him; you have not
any one man, or the whole race of man, to whom all things have been
subject; the creatures are sometimes injurious to him. We do not see
him, saith he, that is, the nature of man in general considered. Take
all the monarchs in the world, they never conquered the whole world;
there was never any one man that was a sinner that had all subject to
him. "But we see," saith he—mark the opposition—"but we see Jesus,"
that Man, "crowned with glory and honour;" therefore it is this Man,
and no man else; the opposition implieth it." . . . . So now it
remaineth, then, that it is only Christ, God-man, that is meant in
Psalm 8. And indeed, and in truth, Christ himself interpreteth the
Psalm of himself; you have two witnesses to confirm it, Christ
himself and the apostle. Matthew 21:16. When they cried hosanna to