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every fort of enjoyment: and fome modern interpreters have adopted that meaning: but the context feems to require the meaning which I have given. Only the next comma must be separated from this verse, and added to verfe 4. This makes the fenfe clear and confiftent. The pfalmift repines not at the prosperity of the wicked; but deprecates chastisement immediately inflicted on him by the hand of God.Ver. 9. If the last comma of this verse be not likewife disjoined from it, I cannot fee how any tolerable fenfe can be made out of it: but join it to ver. 10, and confider the whole as a resumption of what had before been said in ver. 3, and all will be plain and congruous. Compare the whole book of Job. For the rest, I must warn the reader, that in rendering the last comma of ver. 9. I follow the reading of Sep. Vulg. Arab.-Ver. 12. like a cancer. Others, like a moth. Sep. like a spider.

PSALM XL.-al. XXXIX.

This is partly a psalm of thanksgiving, and partly of supplication. The time of its composition is uncertain. Some parts of it have been supposed to relate to Jesus Christ; and ver. 7. is applied to him by the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews. The title is,

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FOR THE FIRST MUSICIAN: A PSALM OF

DAVID.

I HAVE ftedfaftly looked up to JEHOVAH;

and he hath liftened, and heard my cry:

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hath brought me out of the pit of misery,

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out of the dregs of miry mud:

and, by fetting my foot upon a rock,

hath made all my goings fure.

He hath put in my mouth a new fong;

a fong of praise to our God.

Many fhall fee-and shall revere

and shall put their truft in JEHOVAH.

Happy the man who trusteth in JEHOVAH,

and regardeth not infolent impoftors.

Very many, JEHOVAH !

my God!

are the wonderful works thou haft donethy friendly purposes, toward us,

are beyond all estimation.

To thyfelf I would declare and rehearse them,
but they are more than can be numbered.

Yet for this, thou desirest not facrifice nor donative :
(for mine ears thou haft opened to thy bebeft)
neither holocauft nor fin-offering requireft thou.
Then I faid: "Lo! I come at thy meaning :
In the written volume it is prescribed to me :
"TO DO WHAT IS PLEASING TO THEE."
This, my God! is my delight:

for thy law is in the midft of my bowels.

In the grand affembly I have proclaimed thee just :
lo! my lips, from this I have never restrained.
Thou thyfelf, JEHOVAH! knowest it.

Thy justice I hide not within my heart;
thy truth and thy faving mercy I proclaim :
I conceal not from the grand affembly

thy truth and thy benevolence.

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II

Withdraw not, JEHOVAH! from me thy bounty; 12

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may thy benevolence and truth ever be my guard :

for evils innumerable environ me:

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mine afflictions have fo overpowered me,

that I cannot bear the fight of them.

They are more than the hairs of mine head!

and, therefore, mine heart forfaketh me! Be pleafed, JEHOVAH! to refcue me : JEHOVAH! Come speedily to mine aid.

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May all those be confounded and covered with fhame, 15 who seek to take away my life!

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backward may they speed, and be confounded,
who with evil to me!

may they be overwhelmed with fudden shame,
who fay of me: "Ahah! ahah!"

But let all thofe, who feek thee,

be joyful and rejoice in thee:

let those who delight in being saved by thee,
fay: "Be JEHOVAH, for ever, magnified!"
When I am afflicted and deftitute,

may JEHOVAH confider my cafe!
Thou art my helper and deliverer :
my God! make no delay.

NOTES.

Ver. 4. Many ball fee, &c. The meaning is: That many, by feeing God's merciful dealings to David, fhall be induced to revere the fame God, and put their trust in him.-Ver. 6. The last part of this verse is commonly rendered: "and thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee :" which who understands, may. I believe I have given the true meaning; by disjoining a word from the first comma, and adding it to the second.Ver. 16. Ahab! This is an interjection of contemptuous triumph; which David's enemies are fuppofed to utter, by way of infult.

PSALM XLI.-al. XL.

This psalm appears to have been composed during the revolt of Absbalom; and about the time when David was so seasonably succoured by Shobi, Macbir, and Barzillai; to whom he probably alludes in the whole first paragraph :

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FOR THE FIRST MUSICIAN: A PSALM OF

DAVID.

HAPPY is he, who attendeth to the diftreffed: him JEHOVAH will refcue in the time of trouble. JEHOVAH will preserve him, and keep him alive;

will make him happy upon the earth;

and will not give him up to the will of his enemies. On his bed of ficknefs, JEHOVAH will comfort him; 4 during his infirmity, he will shake his whole couch. When I faid: "JEHOVAH! have pity on me : "heal me-although against thee I have finned:" mine enemies, then, fpoke evil of me : "When shall he die, and his name perifh ?"

And if one came to fee me, he spoke falfehood,
whilst his heart was collecting iniquity;
which, as foon as he went forth, he uttered!
All who hated me, con-whifpered against me:
against me they devised my ruin.

"A lawless deed (faid they) fticketh to him:
"from where he lieth, he shall never rise !”
Nay, my familiar friend, in whom I trusted-
he who ate of mine own bread-
Even he egregiously betrayed me.

But thou, JEHOVAH! have pity on me:
raise me up, that I may requite them.
By this fhall I know, that thou favoureft me,
if mine enemies triumph not over me :

if thou fupport me in mine innocence, and replace me in thy prefence for ever.

Bleffed be JEHOVAH, the God of Ifrael, from eternity, to eternity, Amen, and amen !

NOTES.

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Ver. 4. be will bake his whole couch, i. e. make it easy for him, by turning and shaking it.-Ver. 9. a lawless deed. The common verfion is "an evil disease :" but the meaning I take to be: a lawless deed-namely, David's fin in the cafe of Uriah: which his enemies now affign as the caufe of his prefent calamity: as if they faid:

“His fin hath, at length, overtaken him," &c.—Ver. 10. Even be egregiously betrayed me: commonly rendered, "even he lifted up his heel against me." But I am persuaded that the Heb, word here fignifies not beel, but deceit, treachery.-Ver. 13. replace me in thy prefence, i. e. reftore me to Zion and thy fanctuary.-Ver. 14. seems to be a fort of doxology, added by the compiler of the pfalms; who divided them into five parts; the first of which is concluded by this pfalm.

PSALM XLII.-al. XLI.

This and the following psalm, which make but one in 46 мss. scem to have been composed by David, during his flight from Absbalom; and not long before the decisive battle in the forest of Ephraim. See 2 Sam. 7.

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FOR THE FIRST MUSICIAN; A DIDACTIC, BY

THE SONS OF KORAH.

AS the hart panteth after ftreams of water;
fo panteth my foul after thee, O God!

For God, the living God, my foul thirsteth;
when fhall I come and behold his face?

My tears are my food, by day and by night:
while my foes are daily faying to me:

"Where now is thy God?"

My foul I pour out, when I call to mind those
days;

in which I was wont to frequent thy tabernacle,
'midft fhouts of joy, and the praises of a feftal
throng.

But why, my foul, art thou dejected;

why thus difquieted within me?

Trust in God—that yet I shall praise him,

as my faviour, as well as my God.

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