confederate army of Ammonites, Moabites, and Idumæans; which seems, indeed, to have advanced within a day's march of Jerusalem. But this expedition miscarried by a quarrel between the troops of the three different nations, of which the army was composed, not in consequence of any panic with which the whole was seized.-2 Chron. xx.

Uzziah had frequent wars with the Philistines, Arabs, and Ammonites, in which he was generally successful.

Ver. 2. Beautiful for situation"; rather, "Beautiful in extension," i. e. in the prospect which it extends to the eye.-BATE and Parkhurst.

"Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King;" rather, "Zion. In the northern quarters are the buildings of the great King," i. e. of the great King Jehovah; "his buildings," the buildings dedicated to him,-the temple with its ample precincts.

Ver. 5. -and hasted away;" rather, "they were seized with panic."

Ver. 7. Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind." A land army diverted from their purpose by a panic! A fleet destroyed by a storm! Who could these confederate princes be, who meditated an attack upon the Israelites both by sea and land?

Ver. 8. As we have heard, so have we seen." As we have heard of the miracles wrought for the deliverance of our fathers in former times, so we have seen and experienced the like in our own.

Ver. 9. We have thought of thy loving kindness;" rather, "We waited in tranquillity for, or, we sat in tranquil expectation of thy mercy." We repaired to the temple, and trusted to that merciful aid from thee, which our prayers should implore.

Ver. 10. According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise." The event answered our highest wishes. The mercies which we have experienced, justify what is said in our holy books of the power and goodness of our God.

Ver. 13. consider ;"— perhaps, "-take a plan of—”

Ver. 14.

even unto death." by. These words undoubtedly belong to the title of the following Psalm. This verse, therefore, should be rendered thus,

"Truly this God is our God,

For ever and ever he will be our guide.

PSALM XLIX.

[A] Among various attempts to illustrate this obscure poem, the two different interpretations of Dr. Kennicott and Father Houbigant principally deserve attention. Dr. Ken nicott's is published in Mr. Merrick's Appendix to his An notations on the Psalms. It is chiefly recommended by the very clear sense, which it seems to give to some very obscure expressions, without any other alterations of the text, than what the antient versions warrant, and the most judicious critics have admitted. But besides many particular exceptions to the senses which he puts upon particular words and phrases, his notion of the subject of the Psalm is liable to this general objection, that the Psalm, as understood by him, contains nothing answerable to its animated proem; in which the author bespeaks the attention of men of all countries, and of all ranks, to lessons of high importance and universal concern. After this opening, almost the whole of the Psalm, in Dr. Kennicott's notion of the subject, is taken up in propounding the erroneous maxims of the infidels of the Psalmist's time; and the doctrine of general importance, opposed to these irreligious maxims,-the doctrine of a future life, in which the good shall be exalted, and the wicked humbled,—is mentioned only in a slight and transient manner. "This Psalm," says Dr. Kennicott, "gives us the faith of the

Psalmist, in opposition to the maxims of atheists and deists in his days, on the awful subject of death, and its consequences." But in Dr. Kennicott's translation, we find, indeed, the maxims of atheists and deists very particularly stated, but we find very little of the Psalmist's own faith.

Were this objection removed, it would, perhaps, be no great difficulty that nothing enigmatical is to be found in the whole Psalm, according to Dr. Kennicott's interpretation; notwithstanding that the Psalmist, in the proem of the song, talks of an ænigma, that he is to open upon his harp. It is well observed by Bishop Hare, that the word , ver. 4. though, taken strictly, it signifies an ænigma, is nevertheless applied to poetical compositions, in a highly adorned and finished style, in which nothing enigmatical appears. From the etymology of the word, it should seem that it may signify any discourse apt to penetrate the mind; to strike, as we say in English, and make a deep impression.* Nevertheless, since the Hebrew word properly renders an ænigma, if an interpretation can be found, which, without unwarrantable alterations of the text, and without any unnatural and forced interpretations of the words and phrases of the text as it stands, shall bring out ænigmata of the highest and most general importance, such an interpretation will deserve to be received in preference to any other, as making the body of the poem most consistent with its opening. Upon this ground,

* See Parkhurst's Lexicon, T.

Houbigant's interpretation is greatly to be preferred to Kennicott's, with respect to the general subject of the Psalm. The liberties taken with particular passages, by the learned French critic, are more than may be allowed; but they are also unnecessary to his general interpretation.

The Psalm, according to Houbigant's conception of the subject, is a mysterious song, in which the doctrines of a Redeemer more than man, the immortality of the soul, and a future retribution, are delivered in ænigmata.

[B] Ver. 2. Both the sons of the low and the sons of the high."

See Archbishop SECKER's dissertation upon the force of the Hebrew phrases, in Merrick's Appendix.

[C] Ver. 4. I incline-I propound."

I think these verbs, though in the future form in the original, express rather the Psalmist's usual practice of giving reverent attention to the revelations addressed to himself by the inspiring Spirit, and publishing what he had been taught, in compositions for the harp, than his particular intention upon the present occasion. They are more properly rendered, therefore, by verbs of the present tense in our language.

[D] my dark saying;" literally, "my ænigma." T *gobanua μɛ. LXX. i. e. a riddle propounded for solution. My ænigma—not an ænigma of my making, but the ænigma