posed after that Jerusalem was become the metropolis of Judea and the seat of her kings; which entirely refutes the opinion, that it was written upon occasion of David's victory over Goliah; an opinion which, perhaps, needs no other confutation, than the evident want of any clear allusion to that transaction in the whole Psalm.

[G] Ver. 18. — not perish for ever." The negative No5, which occurs in the first branch of the distich, influences the verb in this.

This whole Psalm seems naturally to divide into three parts. The first ten verses make the first part; the six following, the second; and the remaining four, the third.

The first part is prophetic of the utter extermination of the irreligious persecuting faction. The prophecy is delivered in the form of an , or song of victory, occasioned by the promise given in the 15th verse of the 10th Psalm; and, through the whole of this song, the Psalmist, in the height of a prophetic enthusiasm, speaks of the threatened vengeance as accomplished.

The second part opens with an exhortation to the people of God to praise him, as the avenger of their wrongs, and the watchful guardian of the helpless; and as if the flame of pro

phetic joy, which the oracular voice had lighted in the Psalmist's mind, was beginning to die away, the strain is gradually lowered, and the notes of triumph are mixed with supplication and complaint; as if the mind of the Psalmist were fluttering, as it were, between things present and to come, and made itself alternately present to his actual condition and his future hope.

In the third part, the Psalmist seems quite returned, from the prophetic enthusiasm, to his natural state; and closes the whole song with explicit but cool assertions of the future destruction of the wicked, and deliverance of the persecuted saints, and prays for the event.

PSALM X.

[A] Ver. 1. ———— in critical times," my; "in time of

under its own צרה is the substantive בצרה בצרה trouble

preposition, and is not well rendered as a genitive following Arty. Υπερορας ἐν ευκαιρίαις, ἐν θλίψει. LXX.

.עתות

[B] Ver. 2.

subtleties." I choose this ambiguous word; being in doubt whether the petition against the wicked be, that they may be ruined by their own stratagems against the righteous, or that they may be the dupes of their own atheistical speculations upon moral and religious subjects.

It seems to me that the word

may signify either "crafty tricks" or "refined theories;" and in this latter sense it is

used in the fourth verse.

[C] Ver. 3. Truly the impious is mad, &c." Archbishop Secker places a full stop at 772. He takes YN for a verb (not a participle), making y in the next line, its nominative. He renders this and the following verse to this effect:

The wicked is mad upon his own heart's desire,

Blessing his gains.

The wicked in the pride of his countenance despiseth Jehovah,

No enquiry will be made; there is no God, is all his thoughts.

[D] Ver. 5. His ways;" for 17 read with Houbigant

דרכיו

[E] Ver. 8. The Psalmist passes to another part of the atheistical oppressor's character, viz. that he will descend to the meanest arts and stratagems against the most helpless objects.

— in the villages." It should seem, that for On the "He sitteth in the ambush of the

.עשירים LXX. read

a in

rich:" i. e. He always takes part with the great in the oppression of the helpless. But Houbigant would read foreis. But what authority he has for this sense of the word

I know not. Symmachus and St Jerome certainly read thus,

-as a parti מארב and they both render ,ישב מארב בחצרים

ciple. "He sitteth prowling about the farm-houses." This I take to be the true reading, and the true rendering. The image is that of a beast of prey of the lesser order, a fox or a wolf, lying upon the watch about the farm-yard in the evening.

his eyes are privily set," E.T. or "hide themselves." For 3 from the root "to hide," I would ready from

the root "to look out." "His eyes are always upon the watch for the poor." See Psalm LVI, 6. Bishop Hare thought of this emendation, but judged it unnecessary. The LXX. and St Jerome both had some word which they re

צפן not to צפה ferred to the root

[F] Ver. 10. -the bulwark of the oppressed." For

And he renders .לחכאים Houbigant would read,חלכאים

the whole verse thus, "And the helpless man [1] is cast down, and falls, ya with all his substance, an into the snares." The emendation is ingenious and might be admitted, if this sense of the word ' could be justified. Doubtful of this, I write ' with the Masora as two words, which I translate "the bulwark of the op

pressed."

[G] Ver. 15.

seek the impious and find him not.”

These are the oracular words, corruptly written in the ori

ginal, and for that reason ill translated. For

w, read

,רשע ובל

In three MSS. of Kennicott's the

is omitted. Bishop Hare, I find, proposed to join the to, and Archbishop Secker approved the emendation.

[H] Ver. 16. —— out of his land." Upon this expression Mudge, as it should seem, builds his opinion, that the oppressors, described in this Psalm, were some public enemies of the Jewish nation; conceiving that God's land must be the land of Judea.

PSALM XI.

[A] Ver, 1. ❝ flee sparrows to your hill." Sparrows 5. This word, like most names of animals in the Hebrew language, signifies either the individual or the species. And as the name of the species, it may be used in the singular number for many individuals; and thus used, it may be constructed with plural verbs, adjectives, and pronouns, as here. The expression, I take to be proverbial, denoting a situation of helplessness and danger, in which there was no hope of safety but in flight. It is in this place, the insolent taunt of the persecutor over the defenceless saint.