Arise, O LORD; O God, lift up thine hand: forget not the humble.

Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God? he hath

said in his heart, Thou wilt not require it.

Thou hast seen it; for thou beholdest mischief and spite, to requite it with thy hand: the poor committeth himself unto thee; thou art the helper of the fatherless.

Break thou the arm of the wicked and the evil man: seek out his wickedness till thou find

none.

The LORD is King for ever and ever: the heathen are perished out of his land.

LORD, thou hast heard the desire of the humble: thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine ear to hear:

To judge the fatherless and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress.

THIS Psalm is a fervent prayer, and contains complaints of the deepest concern against Antichrist, that most atrocious enemy of God and the gospel, who will ever assail and lay waste the church, not by force and tyranny only, but with all the mavagylą of Satan, all his frauds and impostures, and with an infinite variety of outside deception and hypocrisy.

This "Man of Sin" is descriptively pourtrayed in the present Psalm ;-that he really rages against the body with the sword, ruins and destroys souls by his all-crafty and infinite hypocrisy, and with his sweet poison of false doctrines, and imposing forms of worship; but that he has no concern whatever about teaching any one kindly and with gentleness, nor instructing them seriously unto god

liness or true comfort, but has his mouth ever full of cursing and deceit.

This we have manifested in the kingdom of the Pope, and in the tyranny of the Romish-church. All those fulminating and thundering excommunications are mere execrations and cursing, by which he has wished to make himself, and has succeeded in making himself, formidable even to kings, under the false pretence of the apostolic name, and divine authority. And his 'craft' and lies are all that infinite and inexplicable variety of hypocrisy and traditions of men; together with all that outward whitewash of holiness, and those deceptive forms of worship, by means of which, and his delusions of masses at one time, and of indulgences at another, this Antichrist ceases not to turn to wicked lucre all things human and divine, under the blasphemous cover and pretext of the name of God.

In the end of the Psalm we have a consolation ; which declares that such an abomination shall, in the end of the world, be revealed, and, having been made openly manifest by the sudden judgment of God, shall be rooted out.

This Psalm has reference to the Second Commandment, and to the second petition of the Lord's Prayer; as have all the Psalms of supplication.

PSALM XI.

David encourageth himself in God against his enemies.-The providence and justice of God.

To the chief Musician, a Psalm of David.

IN the LORD put I my trust: how say ye to my soul, flee as a bird to your mountain ?

For, lo, the wicked bend their bow, they make ready their arrow upon the string, that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart.

If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?

The LORD is in his holy temple, the LORD's throne

is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.

The LORD trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul` hateth. Upon the wicked be shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup.

For the righteous LORD loveth righteousness; his countenance doth behold the upright.

THIS Psalm is a complaint against erroneous and fanatical spirits: of which kind are all those who in the present day draw men astray from the pure and true doctrine of faith, and from the true worship of God, (which stands in true faith and the fear of God in the heart,) to hypocrisy, which has always an outward show of something great and wonderful:these, I say, are the erroneous and fanatics, who thus draw away men like so many birds, and make them fly over to their mountains: that is, make them turn easily over to hypocrisy, and white-wash holiness, which, in outward show, appears to be something great and wonderful, and a firm rock, whereas it is all a thing of nought.

David ascribes to these characters that which is the peculiar characteristic of hypocrites,-that they arrogantly, proudly, and with high looks, despise and deride the truly godly. What, say they, can that righteous one, that fine fellow of a christian, that poor miserable creature, do?

In the end we have a consolation that God will certainly hear, and regard the afflicted; that he will be present with them, and show them by manifest tokens of his hand that he will not forsake them, and that he will, by horrible judgment, take vengeance on scoffers of this kind; on these pharisees and other enemies of David.

This Psalm has reference to the Second precept of the Decalogue, and to the first petition of the Lord's Prayer.

PSALM XII.

David, destitute of human comfort, craveth help of God.-He comforteth himself with God's judgments on the wicked, and confidence in God's tried promises.

To the chief Musician upon Sheminith, a Psalm of David.

HELP, LORD; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men. They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.

The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things;

Who have said, with our tongue will we prevail;

our lips are our own: who is lord over us?

For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of

the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.

The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.

THIS is a prayer containing a heavy complaint against them, who, introduce human doctrines instead of the word of God, and who, afterwards, by various new traditions and forms of worship disturb the church, and fill all things with a white-wash show of religion, and with the outward daubing of pharisaism and hypocrisy, so that wicked men and hypocrites reign on every side, as the last verse complains. For when human doctrines have once invaded the church, they go on to rage far and wide, and spread in all directions like a cancer; there is no end to their corruption and destructive influence; they take possession of all things and wonderfully vex and torment consciences: so that the number of the true saints and of those that truly fear God is few and small indeed of this the infinite variety of papistical hypocrisy affords a manifest example.

But we are consoled and comforted under all these afflictions by the consideration that God always raises up in his church, sometimes in this place and sometimes in that, his salvation; that is, his word and gospel; which, while the prophets, apostles, and other ministers throughout the world, boldly and plainly teach against all heresy, they detect and bring to light false doctrines, and overturn all false worship; for where the salvation of God is, (that is, the saving word of Christ and his gospel) it burns up and consumes, like a suddenly-kindled fire, all the chaff and straw of human traditions, and delivers oppressed consciences.

This, however, never takes place without afflictions, and the cross in various forms. But as gold