by the powers of mechanism, or the necessary laws of matter and motion.
But this, as we imagine, cannot be done. The primary causes of things
must certainly be some powers and principles not mechanical, otherwise
we shall be reduced to the necessity of maintaining an endless
progression of motions communicated from matter to matter, without any
first mover; or of saying that the first impelling matter moved itself.
The former is an absurdity too great to be embraced by any one; and
there is reason to hope that the essential inactivity of matter is at
present so well understood, and so generally allowed, notwithstanding
some modern oppugners of this hypothesis, that there can be but few who
will care to assert the latter. All our reasonings about bodies, and the
whole of natural philosophy, are founded on the three laws of motion
laid down by Sir Isaac Newton, at the beginning of the “_Principia_.”
These laws express the plainest truths; but they would have neither
evidence nor meaning, were not inactivity contained in our idea of
matter. Should it be said that matter, though naturally inert, may be
made to be otherwise by divine power, this would be the same with saying
that matter may be made not to be matter. If inactivity belong to it at
all, it must belong to it as matter, or solid extension, and therefore
must be inseparable from it. Matter is figured, movable, discerptable,
inactive, and capable of communicating motion by impulse to other
matter: these are not accidental but primary qualities of matter.
Beside, matter void of inactivity, if we were to suppose it possible,
could produce no effects. The communication of motion, its direction,
the resistance it suffers, and its cessation, in a word, the whole
doctrine of motion cannot be consistently explained or clearly
understood without supposing the inertia of matter. Self-moving matter
must have thought and design, because, whenever matter moves, it must
move in some particular direction, and with some precise degree of
velocity; and as there is an infinity of these equally possible, it
cannot move itself without selecting one of these preferably to and
exclusively of all others, and therefore not without design. Moreover,
it may be plainly proved that matter cannot be the ultimate cause of the
phenomena of nature, or the agent which, by any powers inherent in
itself, produces the general laws of nature, without possessing the
highest degree of knowledge and wisdom; which might be easily evinced or
exemplified by adverting to the particular law of gravitation. “The
philosopher,” says an excellent writer, “who overlooks the laws of an
all-governing Deity in nature, contenting himself with the appearance of
the material universe only, and the mechanical laws of motion, neglects
what is most excellent, and prefers what is imperfect to what is
supremely perfect, finitude to infinity, what is narrow and weak to what
is unlimited and almighty, and what is perishing to what endures for
ever. Sir Isaac Newton thought it most unaccountable to exclude the
Deity _only_ out of the universe. It appeared to him much more just and
reasonable to suppose that the whole chain of causes, or the several
series of them, should centre in him as their source; and the whole
system appear depending on him the only independent cause.” If, then,
the Deity pervades and actuates the material world, and his unremitting
energy is the cause to which every effect in it must be traced; the
spiritual world, which is of greater consequence, cannot be disregarded
by him. Is there not one atom of matter on which he does not act; and is
there one living being about which he has no concern? Does not a stone
fall without him; and does, then, a man suffer without him? The
inanimate world is of no consequence, abstracted from its subserviency
to the animate and reasonable world: the former, therefore, must be
preserved and governed entirely with a view to the latter. But it is not
mere energy or the constant exertion of power that is discernible in the
frame or laws of the universe, in maintaining the succession of men, and
in producing men and other beings; but wisdom and skill are also
conspicuous in the structure of every object in the inanimate creation.
After a survey of the beauty and elegance of the works of nature, aided
by the perusal of Matt. vi, 28, &c, we may ask ourselves, Has God, in
the lowest of his works, been lavish of wisdom, beauty, and skill; and
is he sparing of these in the concerns of reasonable beings? Or does he
less regard order, propriety, and fitness in the determination of their
states? The answer is obvious. Providence also implies a particular
interposition of God in administering the affairs of individuals and
nations, and wholly distinct from that general and incessant exertion of
his power, by which he sustains the universe in existence.
The doctrine of providence may be evinced from the consideration of the
divine perfections. The first cause of all things must be regarded as a
being absolutely perfect; and the idea of absolute perfection
comprehends infinite power, wisdom, and goodness; hence we deduce the
doctrine of providence. The Deity cannot be an indifferent spectator of
the series of events in that world to which he has given being. His
goodness will as certainly engage him to direct them agreeably to the
ends of goodness, as his wisdom and power enable him to do it in the
most effectual manner. This conclusion is conformable to all our ideas
of those attributes. Could we call that being good who would refuse to
do any good which he is able to do without the least labour or
difficulty? God is present every where. He sees all that happens, and it
is in his power, with perfect ease, to order all for the best. Can he
then possess goodness, and at the same time not do this? A God without a
providence is undoubtedly a contradiction. Nothing is plainer than that
a being of perfect reason will, in every instance, take such care of the
universe as perfect reason requires. That supreme intelligence and love,
which are present to all things, and from whence all things sprung, must
govern all occurrences. These considerations prove what has been called
a _particular_, in opposition to a _general_, providence. We cannot
conceive of any reasons that can influence the Deity to exercise _any_
providence over the world, which are not likewise reasons for extending
it to _all_ that happens in the world. As far as it is confined to
generals, or overlooks _any_ individual, or _any_ event, it is
incomplete, and therefore unsuitable to the idea of a perfect being.
One common prejudice against this doctrine arises from the apprehension
that it is below the dignity of the Deity to watch over, in the manner
implied in it, the meanest beings, and the minutest affairs. To which it
may be replied, that a great number of minute affairs, if they are each
of them of some consequence, make up a sum which is of great
consequence; and that there is no way of taking care of this sum,
without taking care of each particular. This objection, therefore, under
the appearance of honouring God, plainly dishonours him. Nothing is
absolutely trifling in which the happiness of any individual, even the
most insignificant, is at all concerned; nor is it beneath a wise and
good being to interpose in any thing of this kind. To suppose the Deity
above this, is to suppose him above acting up to the full extent of
goodness and rectitude. The same eternal benevolence that first engaged
him to produce beings, must also engage him to exercise a particular
providence over them; and the very lowest beings, as well as the
highest, seem to have a kind of right to his superintendence, from the
act itself of bringing them into existence. Every apprehension that this
is too great a condescension in him is founded on the poorest ideas;
for, surely, whatever it was not too great condescension in him to
create, it cannot be too great a condescension in him to take care of.
Beside, with regard to God, all distinctions in the creation vanish. All
beings are infinitely, that is, equally, inferior to him.
Accident, and chance, and fortune, are words which we often hear
mentioned, and much is ascribed to them in the life of man. But they are
words without meaning; or, as far as they have any signification, they
are no other than names for the unknown operations of providence; for it
is certain that in God’s universe nothing comes to pass causelessly, or
in vain. Every event has its own determined direction. That chaos of
human affairs and intrigues where we can see no light, that mass of
disorder and confusion which they often present to our view, is all
clearness and order in the sight of Him who is governing and directing
the whole, and bringing forward every event in its due time and place.
“The Lord sitteth on the flood. The Lord maketh the wrath of man to
praise him,” as he maketh the “hail and rain to obey his word. He hath
prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all. A
man’s heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps.” No
other principle than this, embraced with a steady faith, and attended
with a suitable practice, can ever be able to give repose and
tranquillity to the mind; to animate our hopes, or extinguish our fears;
to give us any true satisfaction in the enjoyments of life, or to
minister consolation under its adversities. If we are persuaded that God
governs the world, that he has the superintendence and direction of all
events, and that we are the objects of his providential care; whatever
may be our distress or our danger, we can never want consolation; we may
always have a fund of hope, always a prospect of relief. But take away
this hope and this prospect, take away the belief of God and of a
superintending providence, and man would be of all creatures the most
miserable; destitute of every comfort, every support, under present
sufferings, and of every security against future dangers.
PSALMS. The book of Psalms is a collection of hymns, or sacred songs, in
praise of God, and consists of poems of various kinds. They are the
productions of different persons, but are generally called the Psalms of
David, because a great part of them was composed by him, and David
himself is distinguished by the name of the Psalmist. We cannot now
ascertain all the Psalms written by David, but their number probably
exceeds seventy; and much less are we able to discover the authors of
the other Psalms, or the occasions upon which they were composed. A few
of them were written after the return from the Babylonian captivity. The
titles prefixed to them are of very questionable authority; and in many
cases they are not intended to denote the writer but refer only to the
person who was appointed to set them to music. David first introduced
the practice of singing sacred hymns in the public service of God; and
it was restored by Ezra. The authority of the Psalms is established not
only by their rank among the sacred writings, and by the unvaried
testimony of ages, but likewise by many intrinsic proofs of inspiration.
Not only do they breathe through every part a divine spirit of
eloquence, but they contain numberless illustrious prophecies that were
remarkably accomplished, and are frequently appealed to by the
evangelical writers. The sacred character of the whole book is
established by the testimony of our Saviour and his Apostles, who, in
various parts of the New Testament, appropriate the predictions of the
Psalms as obviously apposite to the circumstances of their lives, and as
intentionally composed to describe them. The veneration for the Psalms
has in all ages of the church been considerable. The fathers assure us,
that in the earlier times the whole book of Psalms was generally learned
by heart; and that the ministers of every gradation were expected to be
able to repeat them from memory. These invaluable Scriptures are daily
repeated without weariness, though their beauties are often overlooked
in familiar and habitual perusal. As hymns immediately addressed to the
Deity, they reduce righteousness to practice; and while we acquire the
sentiments, we perform the offices of piety; while we supplicate for
blessings, we celebrate the memorial of former mercies; and while in the
exercise of devotion, faith is enlivened by the display of prophecy.
Josephus asserts, and most of the ancient writers maintain, that the
Psalms were composed in metre. They have undoubtedly a peculiar
conformation of sentences, and a measured distribution of parts. Many of
them are elegiac, and most of David’s are of the lyric kind. There is no
sufficient reason however to believe, as some writers have imagined,
that they were written in rhyme, or in any of the Grecian measures. Some
of them are acrostic; and though the regulations of the Hebrew measure
are now lost, there can be no doubt, from their harmonious modulation,
that they were written with some kind of metrical order; and they must
have been composed in accommodation to the measure to which they were
set. (See _Poetry of the Hebrews_.) The Hebrew copies and the Septuagint
version of this book contain the same number of Psalms; only the
Septuagint translators have, for some reason which does not appear,
thrown the ninth and tenth into one, as also the one hundred and
fourteenth and one hundred and fifteenth, and have divided the one
hundred and sixteenth and one hundred and forty-seventh each into two.
It is very justly observed by Dr. Allix, that, “although the sense of
near fifty Psalms be fixed and settled by divine authors, yet Christ and
his Apostles did not undertake to quote all the Psalms they could, but
only to give a key to their hearers, by which they might apply to the
same subjects the Psalms of the same composure and expression.” With
regard to the Jews, Bishop Chandler very pertinently remarks, that “they
must have understood David, their prince, to have been a figure of
Messiah. They would not otherwise have made his Psalms part of their
daily worship; nor would David have delivered them to the church to be
so employed, were it not to instruct and support them in the knowledge
and belief of this fundamental article. Were the Messiah not concerned
in the Psalms, it would have been absurd to celebrate twice a day, in
their public devotions, the events of one man’s life, who was deceased
so long ago, as to have no relation now to the Jews and the
circumstances of their affairs; or to transcribe whole passages from
them into their prayers for the coming of the Messiah.” Upon the same
principle it is easily seen that the objections, which may seem to lie
against the use of Jewish services in Christian congregations, may cease
at once. Thus it may be said, Are we concerned with the affairs of David
and of Israel? Have we any thing to do with the ark and the temple? They
are no more. Are we to go up to Jerusalem, and to worship on Sion? They
are desolated, and trodden under foot by the Turks. Are we to sacrifice
young bullocks according to the law? The law is abolished, never to be
observed again. Do we pray for victory over Moab, Edom, and Philistia;
or for deliverance from Babylon? There are no such nations, no such
places in the world. What then do we mean, when, taking such expressions
into our mouths, we utter them in our own persons, as parts of our
devotions, before God? Assuredly we must mean a spiritual Jerusalem and
Sion; a spiritual ark and temple; a spiritual law; spiritual sacrifices;
and spiritual victories over spiritual enemies; all described under the
old names, which are still retained, though “old things are passed away,
and all things are become new,” 2 Cor. v, 17. By substituting Messiah
for David, the Gospel for the law, the church Christian for that of
Israel, and the enemies of the one for those of the other, the Psalms
are made our own. Nay, they are with more fulness and propriety applied
now to the substance, than they were of old to the “shadow of good
things then to come,” Heb. x, 1. For let it not pass unobserved, that
when, upon the first publication of the Gospel, the Apostles had
occasion to utter their transports of joy, on their being counted worthy
to suffer for the name of their Lord and Master, which was then opposed
by Jew and Gentile, they brake forth into an application of the second
Psalm to the transactions then before their eyes, Acts iv, 25. The
Psalms, thus applied, have advantages which no fresh compositions,
however finely executed, can possibly have; since, beside their
incomparable fitness to express our sentiments, they are at the same
time memorials of, and appeals to, former mercies and deliverances; they
are acknowledgments of prophecies accomplished; they point out the
connection between the old and new dispensations, thereby teaching us to
admire and adore the wisdom of God displayed in both, and furnishing
while we read or sing them, an inexhaustible variety of the noblest
matter that can engage the contemplations of man.
Very few of the Psalms, comparatively, appear to be simply prophetical,
and to belong only to Messiah, without the intervention of any other
person. Most of them, it is apprehended, have a double sense, which
stands upon this ground and foundation, that the ancient patriarchs,
prophets, priests, and kings, were typical characters, in their several
offices, and in the more remarkable passages of their lives, their
extraordinary depressions and miraculous exaltations foreshowing him who
was to arise as the head of the holy family, the great prophet, the true
priest, the everlasting king. The Israelitish polity, and the law of
Moses, were purposely framed after the example and shadow of things
spiritual and heavenly; and the events which happened to the ancient
people of God were designed to shadow out parallel occurrences, which
should afterward take place in the accomplishment of man’s redemption,
and the rise and progress of the Christian church. (See _Prophecy_.) For
this reason, the Psalms composed for the use of Israel, and by them
accordingly used at the time, do admit of an application to us, who are
now “the Israel of God,” Gal. vi, 16, and to our Redeemer, who is the
King of this Israel. It would be an arduous and adventurous undertaking
to attempt to lay down the rules observed in the conduct of the mystic
allegory, so diverse are the modes in which the Holy Spirit has thought
proper to communicate his counsels to different persons on different
occasions; inspiring and directing the minds of the prophets according
to his good pleasure; at one time vouchsafing more full and free
discoveries of future events; while, at another, he is more obscure and
sparing in his intimations. From hence, of course, arises a great
variety in the Scripture usage of this kind of allegory as to the manner
in which the spiritual sense is couched under the other. Sometimes it
can hardly break forth and show itself at intervals through the literal,
which meets the eye as the ruling sense, and seems to have taken entire
possession of the words and phrases. On the contrary, it is much oftener
the capital figure in the piece, and stands confessed at once by such
splendour of language, that the letter, in its turn, is thrown into
shade, and almost totally disappears. Sometimes it shines with a
constant equable light, and sometimes it darts upon us on a sudden, like
a flash of lightning from the clouds. But a composition is never more
truly elegant and beautiful, than when the two senses, alike
conspicuous, run parallel together through the whole poem, mutually
corresponding with and illustrating each other.
Thus the establishment of David upon his throne, notwithstanding the
opposition made to it by his enemies, is the subject of the second
Psalm. David sustains in it a twofold character, literal and
allegorical. If we read over the Psalm first with an eye to the literal
David, the meaning is obvious, and put out of all dispute by the sacred
history. There is indeed an uncommon glow in the expression, and
sublimity in the figures; and the diction is now and then exaggerated,
as it were, on purpose to intimate and lead us to the contemplation of
higher and more important matters concealed within. In compliance with
this admonition, if we take another survey of the Psalm, as relative to
the person and concerns of the spiritual David, a nobler series of
events instantly rises to view, and the meaning becomes more evident, as
well as exalted. The colouring, which may perhaps seem too bold and
glaring for the king of Israel, will no longer appear so, when laid upon
his great antitype. After we have thus attentively considered the
subject apart, let us look at them together, and we shall behold the
full beauty and majesty of this most charming poem. We shall perceive
the two senses very distinct from each other, yet conspiring in perfect
harmony, and bearing a wonderful resemblance in every feature and
lineament, while the analogy between them is so exactly preserved, that
either may pass for the original, from whence the other was copied. New
light is continually cast upon the phraseology, fresh weight and dignity
are added to the sentiment, till gradually ascending from things below
to things above, from human affairs to those which are divine, they bear
the great important theme upward with them, and at length place it in
the height and brightness of heaven. What has been observed with regard
to this Psalm, may also be applied to the seventy-second; the subject of
which is of the same kind, and treated in the same manner. Its title
might be, “The Inauguration of Solomon.” The scheme of the allegory is
alike in both; but a diversity of matter occasions an alteration in the
diction. For whereas one is employed in celebrating the magnificent
triumphs of victory, it is the design of the other to draw a pleasing
picture of peace, and of that felicity which is her inseparable
attendant. The style is therefore of a more even and temperate sort, and
more richly ornamented. It abounds not with those sudden changes of the
person speaking which dazzle and astonish; but the imagery is borrowed
from the delightful scenes with which creation cheers the sight, and the
pencil of the divine artist is dipped in the softer colours of nature.
And here we may take notice how peculiarly adapted to the genius of this
kind of allegory the parabolical style is, on account of that great
variety of natural images to be found in it. For as these images are
capable of being employed in the illustration of things divine and
human, between which there is a certain analogy maintained, so they
easily afford that ambiguity which is necessary in this species of
composition, where the language is applicable to each sense, and obscure
in neither; it comprehends both parts of the allegory, and may be
clearly and distinctly referred to one or the other.
On this book Bishop Horsley remarks:--These Psalms go, in general, under
the name of the Psalms of David. King David gave a regular and noble
form to the musical part of the Jewish service. He was himself a great
composer, both in poetry and music, and a munificent patron, no doubt,
of arts in which he himself so much delighted and excelled. The Psalms,
however, appear to be compositions of various authors, in various ages;
some much more ancient than the times of King David, some of a much
later age. Of many, David himself was undoubtedly the author; and that
those of his composition were prophetic, we have David’s own authority,
which may be allowed to overpower a host of modern expositors. For thus
King David, at the close of his life, describes himself and his sacred
songs: “David, the son of Jesse, said, and the man who was raised up on
high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of
Israel, said, The Spirit of Jehovah spake by me, and his word was in my
tongue.’ It was the word, therefore, of Jehovah’s Spirit which was
uttered by David’s tongue. But it should seem, the Spirit of Jehovah
would not be wanting to enable a mere man to make complaint of his own
enemies, to describe his own sufferings just as he felt them, and his
own escapes just as they happened. But the Spirit of Jehovah described
by David’s utterance what was known to that Spirit only, and that Spirit
only could describe. So that, if David be allowed to have had any
knowledge of the true subject of his own compositions, it was nothing in
his own life, but something put into his mind by the Holy Spirit of God;
and the misapplication of the Psalms to the literal David has done more
mischief than the misapplication of any other parts of the Scriptures
among those who profess the belief of the Christian religion.