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FOR THE FIRST MUSICIAN, ON THE GITHITH:
A PSALM OF THE SONS OF KORAH.

HOW lovely are thy tabernacles, JEHOVAH
GOD of hofts!

my foul longeth, nay languifheth for the courts of
JEHOVAH!

mine heart and my flesh cry aloud for the living GOD! The very sparrows find an abode,

and the swallows a neft, where they may lay their

young,

by thine altars, JEHOVAH, GOD of hosts!
my king, and my GOD!

Happy they, who dwell in thy house,
and are continually founding thy praise.
Happy they, whose strength thou art :
fecurity reigns in their hearts.

If they pass through a defolate valley,

they fhall drink from a fountain:

nay, the rain itself shall bestow its bleffings.

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They fhall go on, from stage to stage,

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ΙΟ

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until they appear before GOD, in Zion!

JEHOVAH, GOD of hofts! hear my prayer:

give ear to me, O GOD of Jacob!

O GOD, our protector, behold! and regard thine

anointed.

For better is a day, in thy courts,

than a thousand elsewhere!

I would rather live at the threshold of the house of

my God,

than dwell in the tabernacles of the wicked.

For a fun and a fhield is the GOD JEHOVAH :

JEHOVAH giveth grace and glory: he withholdeth nothing that is good from thofe who walk in innocence. JEHOVAH, God of hofts!

happy those who truft in thee.

NOTES.

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Ver. 2. The fwallows. From a fimilarity of found, the Hebrew word deror, or darur, is fuppofed to be the Arabic dururi; which Forskal faw in Egypt. But as he gives not the Arabic name either in Arabic or Hebrew characters, the finilarity of found is an unsure authority. I have therefore, with the antients, kept to the fwallow, which we know builds in the walls of houfes as well as the sparrow. For the reft, fome interpreters, thinking it indecent that birds fhould neftle in the temple of God, have violently wrested the text to a different meaning: and our Green thus difpofes of it: "Even the fparrow findeth herself a house, and the ring-dove a neft, where the may lay her youngbut when shall I approach thy houfe and thy altars?" A ftrange ellipfis this! But temples of every fort have been every where the refort of certain birds: and the orientalists confider this so far from being a profanation, that they will not allow the neftlers to be disturbed.-Ver. 6, 7. These verses are to me altogether unintelligible in all the versions, that I have feen. I have tried to make fenfe of them, without changing a fingle letter in the text; but only giving new, and I trust well founded meanings to three or four of them. But fee C. R.

PSALM LXXXV.-al. LXXXIV.

Some are of opinion that this psalm was composed by Samuel, what time the Philistines oppressed the Israelites. But, with Venema, I would rather refer it to the times of the Maccabees. The title is,

FOR THE FIRST MUSICIAN: A PSALM BY
THE SONS OF KORAH.

I

THOU haft beretofore, JEHOVAH ! been favourable 2

to thy land:

thou haft reverfed the captivity of Jacob:

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thou forgaveft the iniquity of thy people :
thou coveredft all their fins :

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thou restrainedst all thy wrath:

thou abatedft the heat of thine anger.

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Turn to us, also, thou GOD of our falvation:

and let thy wrath towards us cease.

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Wilt thou, for ever, be wroth with us?

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that thy people may rejoice in thee?

and grant us thy faving aid.

I think I hear, what the GOD JEHOVAH will fay: He will announce felicity to his people,-his worfhippers;

if they return no more to their folly.

Truly, his faving aid is nigh to his reverers;

to make his glory reinhabit our land.

Mercy and truth fhall yet meet again:

Justice and peace shall embrace !

Truth fhall shoot up from the earth,
and justice show itself from the heavens !
For, JEHOVAH being favourable to us,
the earth fhall yield its full increase.

Juftice fhall walk before every one,
and direct his steps in the right way.

NOTES.

Dr. Kennicott fancied that the first three verfes of this pfalm are misplaced, and belong to pf. 60. But he did not attend to the paucity of moods in Hebrew: which has no preter-perfect; but from contin

gency. The pfalmift elegantly contrasts the former favours of God to his people, with his prefent feeming dereliction of them; and promifes himself a return of the divine mercy.-The beauty of ver. 9. muft ftrike every fenfible reader. Indeed the whole pfalm is beautiful.— Ver. 14. There is here a relative without an antecedent: the text runs thus: " 'Justice shall walk before him;" without faying before whom. Hence fome render, " the juft man walks before him (i. e. God), and he (God) directeth his footsteps," &c. Street: "The juft profpereth in his prefence, because he placeth his footsteps in his way." But neither of thefe can, I think, be the meaning. The meaning is well expreffed by the antient tranflator Symmachus; whofe verfion I have followed. See C. R.

PSALM LXXXVI.-al. LXXXV.

It was pro

This psalm seems well to correspond with its title. bably composed by David, during bis persecution by Saul.

A PRAYER OF DAVID.

INCLINE thine ear, JEHOVAH! hear me :

for diftreffed and deftitute I am.

Save my life-fince pious am I:

fave thou, my GOD, thy fervant who trusteth in thee.

Have pity on me, JEHOVAH!

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for thee I daily invoke.

Exhilarate the foul of thy fervant,

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for to thee, JEHOVAH! my foul I raise.

For, good and forgiving art thou, JEHOVAH;

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and full of mercy to all, who thee invoke.

Give ear, JEHOVAH! to my prayer,

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and attend to my fupplications.

In the day of my distress I thee invoke,

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because thou art wont to hear me.

Among the gods, there is none like thee, Jehovah!

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nor are there any works like thy works.

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All the nations which thou haft made,

should come and worship thee, JEHOVAH!
and ought to glorify thy name.

For great art thou, and wonderful are thy works!

Thou art a fingular, and only GOD!

Teach me, JEHOVAH! thy ways,
that by thy truth I may walk:

Direct mine heart to revere thy name.

I will praise thee, my GOD, JEHOVAH!
with mine whole heart;

and will ever glorify thy name.

For great hath been thy kindness towards me:

and oft haft thou refcued me from the lowest Hades.

The proud, O GOD! are rifen up against me;
and an affemblage of cruel men feek my life:
for thee they have no regard!

But thou, JEHOVAH, art a kind and gracious GOD,
long-suffering, most merciful, and true.

Look on me, and have compaffion on me;

impart thy ftrength to thy fervant;

and preferve the fon of thine hand-maid.

Give fome fignal token in my favour,

that they, who hate me, may fee, and be ashamed: fince thou,' JEHOVAH, helpeft, and comfortest me.

PSALM LXXXVII.-al. LXXXVI.

When, and by whom, this psalm was composed, it is altogether. uncertain: I would refer it to the reign of Solomon. It is replete with strange difficulties, which I have encountered, I fear, without But it was necessary to give some sense or other, or leave it altogether untranslated.

success.

M