worship toward Thy holy temple," is set aside by 1 Sam. i. 9, "Eli sat by a post of the temple of the Lord," and iii. 3, where the same expression is used long before the erection of the Temple of Solomon. So that the very objection, when thus cleared up, becomes an incidental proof of the genuineness and authenticity of both the Psalm and the historical book of Samuel; for a forger in later times would never think of introducing a phrase which at first sight would seem inconsistent with the times of both Samuel and David, prior to the building of the Temple. Similarly, in accordance with the Hebrew conception of a "temple," the essential feature of which is, not the building, but the consecration to GOD, Jacob says (Gen. xxviii. 22), " This stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be GOD'S house."

Another phrase (Ps. xiv. 7), from which a plea has been drawn for a post-Babylonian date is, "When the Lord bringeth back the captivity of His people, Jacob shall rejoice." But the same phrase occurs in one of the oldest books of the Bible, Job xlii. 10, "The Lord turned the captivity of Job." It is evidently a Hebrew idiom for to "reverse one's misfortunes." For Job was never literally a captive. Moreover, if the fourteenth Psalm had been written during the Babylonian captivity, the Psalmist could never have thought of such a prayer as, O that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion!" for this implies the manifestation there of the Shekinah cloud of glory, indicating GOD's presence. Now we know from Ezek. xi. 22, 23, that "the glory of the GOD of Israel " had visibly left the city of David soon after the commencement of the captivity. But was there any event in the times of David which would satisfactorily explain the phrase, “the captivity of JEHOVAH'S people"? On turning to Judg. xviii. 30, we read of Jonathan and his sons having been priests to Micah's image "until the day of the captivity of the land." Now, as the period of the judges ends with Samuel, and in the beginning of the first book of Samuel (iv. 10, 11, vii. 14) we have a full account of the discomfiture of Israel before the Philistines, and of the capture of the ark by the uncircumcised

enemy, and the taking of many of the Israelite cities, there can be little doubt that this is "the captivity of Jehovah's people" alluded to in the book of Judges, not the Assyrian carrying away of the ten tribes ages subsequently. The seventy-eighth Psalm (ver. 60, 61) strongly confirms this view: "God forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which He placed among men; and delivered His strength into captivity, and His glory into the enemy's hand." As this, then, constituted "the captivity of JEHOVAH'S people” and “land,” so the "bringing back that captivity" consisted in the restoration, beginning with the bringing back of the ark to Kirjath-jearim. In striking coincidence with the history. (1 Sam. vi. 13, "They of Beth-shemesh lifted up their eyes, and saw the ark, and rejoiced to see it,") are the closing words of David's fourteenth Psalm, "When the Lord bringeth back the captivity of His people, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad."

But this joy was only of a transient kind. kind. For still JEHOVAH withheld the manifest tokens of His presence with His people. For twenty long and sad years the ark abode in Kirjath-jearim; "and all the house of Israel mourned after the Lord" (1 Sam. vii. 2). The next step towards "bringing back Israel's captivity" was Samuel's call of the people to national penitence, and their obedience, at Mizpeh. At Samuel's intercession, the Philistines, who drew near to battle against Israel whilst he was offering the burnt offering in Israel's behalf, were routed utterly. The Israelites had been (ver. 7, 8)" afraid of the Philistines," and, at their approach, had said to Samuel, "Cease not to cry unto the Lord our GOD for us, that He will save us out of the hand of the Philistines." But now the fear was transferred to their proud and GOD-despising enemies; for (ver. 10) “JEHOVAH thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the Philistines, and discomfited them." How well the Psalmist's (xiv. 5) language coincides with all this, and at the same time how unstudied and natural is the coincidence! "There were they in great fear, (where) no fear was," i.e., where, humanly

speaking, nothing was to be feared from a weak and defeated people, like the Israelites. Elated with past victories, the Philistines had, without a thought of fear, anticipated an easy conquest. But "when they said, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction came upon them." Overwhelming horror suddenly surprised them amidst a prosperity which never dreamt of fear. The cause is stated: "For GOD is in the generation of the righteous." His presence with Israel was the secret of the sudden and overwhelming discomfiture of their oppressors (Ps. xiv. 5). The consequence of GOD'S presence is stated in the sister Psalm (liii. 5), "GOD hath scattered the bones of him that encampeth against thee." As the oppressors "shamed the counsel of the poor," ie., tried to put them to shame for their counsel, or determination, to rely on JEHOVAH (Ps. xiv. 6), therefore, in righteous retribution in kind, JEHOVAH "put them to shame" (Ps. liii. 5). "JEHOVAH is Israel's refuge" (Ps. xiv. 6), therefore "GOD hath despised their proud foes (Ps. liii. 5). How happily the Psalmist's language harmonises with that significant title which Samuel gave to the stone, the memorial of the deliverance, Eben-ezer , the stone of help), saying, "Hitherto hath the Lord.

This bringing back of Israel's captivity was advanced a step farther when David, under the special guidance of the Lord, smote the same foe, who heretofore had so trodden down Israel as not to allow them to have a smith throughout the land (1 Sam. xiii. 19—22), at Baal-perazim, and again from Geba to Gazer (2 Sam. v. 20—25). One step further remained to complete the reversing of Israel's captivity, and for that David earnestly longed, as the consummation of his hopes, as a patriot and a child of GOD; that was, to bring back the ark from its place of long obscuration in the forest-town of Kirjath-jearim (at Ephratah, "in the fields of the wood," Ps. cxxxii. 6), and to enthrone it in the tabernacle on Zion. "David consulted with the captains, and with every leader, and said unto all the congregation of Israel, If it seem good unto you, and that it be of the Lord our GOD, let us send

abroad unto our brethren everywhere, that are left in all Israel, and also to the priests and Levites, that they may gather themselves unto us: and let us bring again (7) venaseebah, from sabab) the ark of our GOD to us; for we enquired not at it in the days of Saul” (1 Chron. xiii. 1—3). The Hebrew words in this passage and in Ps. xiv. 7, are akin in origin, as in sound: "When the Lord bringeth back the captivity of His people" (beshub).

What further confirms the connection and the view taken above is, that David realized his much-cherished hope, and that PSALM XV., composed to celebrate the removal of the ark of the covenant to its permanent dwelling on Zion, naturally follows Psalm xiv. As at the close of the fourteenth Psalm David prayed that "salvation might come out of Zion," so in the fifteenth he shows, under the Spirit, what worshippers alone can have access to the Holy One by this time enshrined there. The fifteenth Psalm exhibits the Lord's answer to the prayer, and His fulfilment of the inspired prophecy, that "when the Lord should bring back the captivity of His people," the pledge of which was the ark enthroned on Zion, "Jacob would rejoice, and Israel be glad." "Joy" and "gladness were the marked characteristics of the occasion. "David brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed-edom into the city of David, with gladness "—" with joy "—" dancing before the Lord with all his might" (2 Sam. vi. 12, 14; I Chron. xv. 25).

There is one prominent expression in the fourteenth Psalm, which the history of David illustrates: the unbelieving sinner is designated as "the fool." One striking instance, confirming the justice of this scriptural designation, had come under David's special notice, as the independent history records. The sinner, however sagacious in his own estimate, because of his worldly wisdom, and however gilded over with success, is in God's esteem "a fool." The name of Nabal (fool), answering to his nature, which was selfish, unbelieving, folly, could not fail to make a deep impression on David. Often. must he have remembered his wife Abigail's speech, which

was the means of keeping him from an act of violent vengeance: "Let not my lord regard this man of Belial, Nabal; for as his name is, so is he: Nabal is his name, and folly is with him" (1 Sam. xxv. 25). How suddenly did "great fear" come upon him in the midst of his feasting, "where no fear was " (Ps. liii. 5); for "in the morning, when the wine was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him" of his imminent danger, "his heart died within him, and he became as a stone,"—that same "heart" that had been just before so "merry within him," as if he had "said in his heart, There is no God;" like the rich man who, in the midst of his plans of self-aggrandisement and self-indulgence, received the awful summons, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee" (1 Sam. xxv. 36, 37; Ps. xiv. I; Luke xii. 16-20). The same peculiar phrase recurs from David's lips again, in his lament over Abner: "Died Abner as a fool dieth?" (2 Sam. iii. 33.) Also Saul calls himself so (1 Sam. xxvi. 21) in confessing David's magnanimity: “Behoid, I have played the fool, and have erred exceedingly." Nabal, in refusing his bread to David, was virtually betraying him to Saul. Thus the language of the Psalms (xiv. 4, liii. 4) is accurately in accordance with the historical facts: "Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and call not upon the Lord?" Heartless conduct to man, and disregard of God, are just the traits which the history brings out in Nabal's and Saul's characters. Can we think the coincidence of phrase between the Psalm and the history fortuitous? In the title of Ps. ix., Muth-labben, the same reference is found, if the explanation, as is likely, be true, that Labben is an anagram for Nabal, and that the title means, Concerning the dying of the fool (1 Sam. xxv. 38). It seems difficult to avoid the conclusion, that the coincidence. is of that real, yet obviously undesigned kind, which flows from truth, the Psalm and the independent record alike faithfully representing the words of the royal Psalmist.

How natural, moreover, in the same history, is the image used by Abigail in her intercession with David, (1 Sam. xxv. 28,