versy. Men there have been driven before the wrath of kings to wander outlaws and exiles, whose musings and actings have been recorded to us in the minstrelsy of our native land. Draw these songs of the exile into comparison with the psalms of David, and know the spirit of the man after God's own heart; the stern defiance of the one, with the tranquil acquiescence of the other; the deep despair of the one, with the rooted trust of the other; the vindictive imprecations of the one, with the tender regret and forgiveness of the other. Show us the outlaw who never spoiled the country which had forsaken him, nor turned his hand in self-defence or revenge upon his persecutors, who used the vigour of his arm only against the enemies of his country, yea, lifted up his arm in behalf of that mother, which had cast her son, crowned with salvation, away from her bosom, and held him at a distance from her love, and raised the rest of her family to hunt him to the death;-in the defence of that thankless, unnatural mother country, find us such a repudiated son lifting up his arm, and sending its vigour, in smiting and utterly discomfiting her enemies, whose spoils he kept not to enrich himself and his ruthless followers, but dispensed to comfort her and her happier children. Find us among the Themistocles, and Coriolani, and Cromwells and Napoleons of the earth such a man, and we will yield the argument of this con N troversy which we maintain for the peerless son of Jesse. "But we fear that not such another man is to be found in the recorded annals of men. Though he rose from the peasantry to fill the throne, and enlarge the borders of his native land, he gave himself neither to ambition nor to glory; though more basely treated than the sons of men, he gave not place to despondency or revenge; though of the highest genius in poetry, he gave it not license to sing his own deeds, nor to depict loose and licentious life, nor to ennoble any worldly sentiment or attachment of the human heart, however virtuous or honourable, but constrained it to sing the praises of God, and the victories of the right hand of the Lord of Hosts, and his admirable works which are of old from everlasting. And he hath dressed out religion in such a rich and beautiful garment of divine poesy as beseemeth her majesty, in which, being arrayed, she can stand up before the eyes even of her enemies, in more royal state, than any personification of love, or glory, or pleasure, to which highly gifted mortals have devoted their genius. "The force of his character was vast and the scope of his life immense. His harp was fullstringed, and every angel of joy and sorrow swept over the chords as he passed; but the melody always breathed of heaven. And such oceans of affection lay within his breast, as could not always slumber in their calmness. For the hearts of a hundred men strove and struggled together within the narrow continent of his single heart: and will the scornful men have no sympathy for one so conditioned, but scorn him because he ruled not with constant quietness, the unruly host of divers natures which dwelt within his single soul? of self-command surely he will not be held deficient, who endured Saul's javelin to be so often launched at him, while the people without were ready to hail him king; who endured all bodily hardships, and taunts of his enemies when revenge was in his hand; and ruled his desperate band like a company of saints, and restrained them from their country's injury. But that he should not be able to enact all characters without a fault, the simple shepherd, the conquering hero, and the romantic lover; the perfect friend, the innocent outlaw, and the royal monarch; the poet, the prophet, and the regenerator of the church; and withal the man, the man of vast soul, who played not these parts by turns, but was the original of them all, and wholly present in them all; oh! that he should have fulfilled this high priesthood of humanity, this universal ministry of manhood without an error, were more than human. With the defence of his backslidings, which he hath himself more keenly scrutinized, more clearly discerned against, and more bitterly lamented than any of his censors, we do not charge ourselves; but if, when of these acts he became convinced, he be found less true to God, and to righteousness; indisposed to repentance, and sorrow, and anguish; exculpatory of himself; stout-hearted in his courses, a formalist in his penitence, or in any way less worthy of a spiritual man in those than in the rest of his infinite moods, then, verily, strike him from the canon, and let his psalms become monkish legends. But if these penitential psalms discover the soul's deepest hell of agony, and lay bare the iron ribs of misery, whereon the very heart dissolveth, and if they, expressing the same in words, which melt the soul that conceiveth, and bow the head that uttereth them, then, we say, let us keep these records of the psalmist's grief and despondency as the most precious of his utterances, and sure to be needed in the case of every man who essayeth to live a spiritual life." |