I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way. O! when wilt thou come
unto me? I will walk within my house with a perfect heart.
I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes: I hate the work of them
that turn aside, _it_ shall not cleave to me.
A froward heart shall depart from me; I will not know a wicked
_person_.
Whoso privily slandereth his neighbour, him will I cut off: him that
hath an high look and a proud heart will not I suffer.
Mine eyes _shall be_ upon the faithful of the land, that they may
dwell with me: he that walketh in a perfect way, he shall serve me.
He that worketh deceit shall not dwell within my house; he that
telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight.
I will early destroy all the wicked of the land, that I may cut off
all wicked doers from the city of the LORD.
This Psalm contains a most solemn and necessary doctrine: and David
puts forth himself, so great a king, as an example. He teaches that
impious members and courtiers ought not to be borne with by any godly
magistrate or prince. He recounts also the iniquities, by which those
who are in the courts of kings and princes, more especially harm the
state and the church. He shews that they do the greatest evil when
they are given to sin or to false doctrine; and when they injure the
causes of good men by their hatred of them.
In the opening of the Psalm David says, “I will sing of mercy and of
judgment:” that is as if he had said, ‘I will sing that God most
certainly, according to the word of the first commandment, visits the
godly with mercy, and the ungodly with judgment, at all times.’ Of
this visiting mercy David was himself an example, seeing that he had
been so many times delivered from the very claws and jaws of the
devil. And of the divine visitations of judgment, Absalom, Ahithophel,
Joab, and others, were examples. And every king and magistrate, who
sets himself to defend the true religion, and to do good to his
nation, is at once exposed to the hatred of all men, even of his own
family and court: which is plainly seen in the case of Absalom,
Ahithophel, and other persecutors of David.
Hence it is that David, having so often experienced God’s fulfilment
of the word of his first commandment, sings in all places and at all
times, ‘that God is God over all, exercising mercy and judgment.’ And
it is with God alone that a kingdom and commonwealth can be rightly
governed: for where God is not, there all things are scattered and in
confusion, and neither families are subject to their heads, nor
citizens to their rulers.