VERSE 6. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous; but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

This is the good man's consolation. The world may condemn and ridicule his way, and persecute him for persevering in it; yet the Lord knoweth, that is, approveth his way. His eye is evermore upon it for good. He marks well the good man's efforts to perfect himself in the virtues of a child of God, and strengthens him to go on from conquering to conquer. He protects him by his power, guides him by his wisdom, and sustains him by his grace. It was thus that he guided, protected, and sustained Noah in the deluge; Abraham in his wanderings; Joseph in his bondage; Moses in Egypt and in the wilderness; Daniel in the lions' den, and the Hebrew youth in the seven-times heated furnace. The Lord knoweth them that are his, and will never leave them, nor forsake them. is his delight. But the perish! The Lord abhors it. His eye is upon it for evil. He can never approve wicked men's thoughts or ways. His His very nature, being infinitely perfect, binds him to defeat their plans, and punish them. He would not be God, if he could look upon evil and evil-doers with indifference. All the orderings of his providence, and all the arrangements of nature, are therefore in the long run against them to root them out.

The way of the righteous way of the ungodly shall

Who then would not be the man whom our Psalm pronounces blessed? Who would not cease to do evil, and learn to do well, even as he did? He abounded in every good work and word, as the tree abounds with fruit, whose roots are fed by never

failing streams of living water. He so abounded in them because his delight was in the law of the Lord, and he exercised himself therein without ceasing. This was the whole secret of his blessedness, and will be the whole secret of ours, if the Lord shall ever delight in us, as he delighted in him. Our only safety, and our only happiness will be in amending our lives according to God's holy word. It is only as the waters of life reach our souls through the law of the Lord, that its palsied moral powers are quickened into life, and launch out upon an endless career of righteousness, purity, and bliss. And that all of us might have our moral powers thus quickened and directed, God gives his Holy Spirit to all of us who ask Him to put his laws into our minds, and to write them in our hearts. Heb. x. 16. It was to purchase for us this blessed Renovator and Restorer of all good in the soul, that his Son died on Calvary. Let us all then look to the gospel for strength to keep the law. We should use the law only as a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith. Gal. iii. 24. It is still our rule of holy living, but no longer the ground of our justification; and if any of us expect to reach a better world through the merit of our own obedience to the Divine law, and not through the alone merit of Christ's obedience, we shall be most deplorably disappointed. "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." Rom. x. 4.

LECTURE ON PSALM II.

ONE greater than David is here, even the Son of David, whose kingdom ruleth over all. The main reference of this psalm is to Christ. Acts iv. 25–27, xiii. 33: Heb. i. 5, v. 5. It differs from the first, as the gospel differs from the law-that psalm is moral, showing us our duty; this is evangelical, showing us our Saviour. It is always thus that God exhibits the law and the gospel in his word. He never enjoins a duty without pointing us to Him through whom we may be enabled to perform it. If he require us to keep the whole law perfectly, it is in connection with the promise to write the whole law in living impulses upon our hearts. Heb. x. 16. If he tell us of our sins, he also tells us of Him whose blood cleanseth from all sin. If he tell us of our corruptions, he at the same time tells us also of a Divine Spirit, that can renew our souls in righteousness and true holiness. If, then, the sole object of the introduction of Messiah's kingdom be to restore man to purity and bliss-to bring him to delight in the law that is holy, just, and good-to transform him from a child of sin and Satan into a child of God, and elevate him to heaven, why should man oppose it? Why should he meditate its overthrow? Can he carry it against God? or, if he his victory be more disastrous to

could, would not

him than defeat? Some train of thought of this sort seems to be implied in the demand:

VERSE 1. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?

A vain thing as regards God-to attempt the overthrow of a kingdom upheld by Omnipotence, by Him who doeth whatsoever he pleaseth in the armies of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth, and whose hand none can stay. A vain thing, too, as regards themselves-for, supposing they should succeed, what would they have accomplished for themselves morally? The same that they would accomplish for themselves physically, if they were to strike the sun from its place in the heavens, henceforth to grope their way through a darkness that could be felt, and over an earth whence every form of beauty and life had fled. But vain as the undertaking must ever be, to attempt the overthrow of the kingdom of Christ upon earth, the ignorant, degraded, and easily excited multitude have not been the only persons to make it, but,

VERSE 2. The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his Anointed.

Anointed here means the same as Messiah, and both words the same as Christ in the New Testament. How literally were the words of this verse fulfilled, when Herod, and Pontius Pilate, and the rulers of the Jews combined together to put Jesus to death! How cordially they hated each other; and yet how cordially they united in persecuting Jesus! This has been the history of our religion from the beginning. Men who would take counsel together in nothing else, have taken counsel together against

the Lord, and against his Anointed. Christianity has been opposed by every other form of religion beneath the sun. The civil ruler has opposed it with the sword; the bigot with the screw, the wheel, and the stake; the philosopher with sophistry and derision; and the multitude with lawless violence. All have been alike eager to nail it to the cross, thrust a spear into its side, and place upon its head a crown of thorns. And when asked to spare it, the language of all has been, "Not this man, but Barabbas!" This feature of heterogeneous opposition to our religion, is conspicuous in all modern liberal and infidel conventions, where men of all beliefs, and of no belief, ignoring for the time being all their differences, unite heart and soul in a crusade against the word of God. They care little what stars occupy a place in the religious heavens of the world, provided the Star of Bethlehem be not of the number. They will tolerate any other form of religion sooner than the religion of the Lord, and of his Anointed. Of their religion, that is, of the religion revealed to us by the Father and the Son, by the Lord and his Christ, they say,

VERSE 3. Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.

These words, "bands and cords," suggest the secret of the world's great opposition to the gospel of Christ. It cannot abide the strictness of its laws. It is restiff under them, and would break them asunder and cast them off. It was not the strangeness of its doctrines, but the purity of its precepts, that so excited kings, and rulers, and people against