SERMON XVIII.

THE BEAUTY AND USEFULNESS OF THE BOOK OF PSALMS.

PSALM Cvii. 43.

Whoso is wise will ponder these things; and they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord.

No part of the Old Testament is more deeply interesting to the pious Christian than the book of Psalms. Written by the influence of a different Dispensation from that under which it is our privilege to live; and, consequently, giving thanks for blessings which may have never fallen to our lot-mourning over calamities with which we have never been afflicted, and alluding to circumstances concerning which we have no information—it might have been supposed that much of the value and interest of these compositions

would have passed away; and that, though we might still peruse them with curiosity, and even profit, as pictures of past times, and as examples of the effect which the Jewish law produced on the pious mind, and the manner in which the saints of old gave utterance to their feelings of love, adoration, or sorrow; yet that the Christian -possessor of nobler privileges, and seeing more deeply into the designs, and partaking more largely of the blessings of the Almighty, than even the most favoured Jew, would give expression to his emotions in strains of corresponding loftiness, and, as he was the heir of a better covenant, so he would express his thankfulness in language of more exalted piety. Yet so it is, that Christians in all ages have been compelled to have recourse to the sentiments of a Jew to convey in something like adequate terms the feelings which have their origin under a better dispensation; and it is a fact calculated to exalt our conception of the spiritual nature of the Mosaic covenant, that it elevated the

with its principles to a height of purity, which the most advanced Christian might be proud to emulate. It is true, indeed, that he, by whom the greater number of these holy psalms was composed, was favoured with peculiar gifts, and endowed with natural qualifications for his office, which can fall to the lot of few. He was, we know, the "man after God's own heart" selected especially to " perform all his will." He was chosen out of all the tribes of Israel to fill a most arduous, and hitherto unexampled situation;-to render the discharge of the kingly office consistent with the sovereignty and superintendence of the Almighty, and to show how the law and the priesthood might retain their pre-eminence, and yet the king be at once the sovereign of the people and the servant of the Most High. This was a task in which Saul his predecessor had failed; and he had been, on that ground, ejected from his kingdom; and therefore, to discharge this task, and to set an example of obedience to the Almighty to all succeeding kings, was David taken "from

the sheep-folds," and elevated to the throne of Israel. Hence, also, as God's representative, and monarch of God's people, he was the peculiar and appropriate type of that Messiah which was to come; who, like David, was to reign, in a spiritual sense, on earth, and be to all the world, what David was to the Jews, the Anointed of the Lord, and the dispenser of his benefits. To fulfil this typical character in its utmost extent, the chosen monarch was endued with the gift of prophecy; and often, in the assumed name of the Messiah, he speaks of himself in language so descriptive of the person, and nature, and office of Jesus Christ, that though it may perhaps be doubtful whether it was permitted to him to see the full meaning of the predictions which by the Holy Spirit he was made to utter,—yet the Christian, looking at them through the glass of history, and judging of the distinctness of the prophecy by the accuracy of its accomplishment, feels that he is perusing the sentiments, not of a Jew of old, but of a disciple of Jesus Christ, and

finds the anticipated triumphs of the inspired Israelitish monarch more than commensurate with the actual exultation of the heir of the Gospel promises. To these supernatural advantages were added others which rarely meet in the same individual, and which strengthen the hold which the Songs of David still continue to possess over the minds of the pious and the thoughtful. The wonderful vicissitudes of his life brought him acquainted with human nature in all its forms, and opened in his heart feelings which might never have been awakened, and thoughts which might never have arisen, had his experience been confined to any one station in life. He had studied in the school of adversity-he had tried the fidelity of friends -he had been born in a low station, and had been elevated, apparently by his personal merit, to a high one--he had sinned deeply, and been severely punished-he had repented sincerely, and been forgiven; and, endowed with that kindly and humane feeling which cannot be soured by any calamity, but sympathises with