that character. Some other solution, therefore, must be found in order to remove the real difficulty in the case.

(5.) A fifth remark, therefore, in regard to the prayers in these passages considered as invocations of vengeance or of punishment on the wicked may be suggested. The real question is, whether under any circumstance such prayers-such imprecations-can be right; and whether, if ever right, the circumstances in the Psalms were such as to make them proper.

To obtain a just view of this, several remarks are to be made. (a) David was a magistrate; a king. He was, by the appointment of God, the civil and military ruler of the nation. His authority was not an usurped authority; nor were his acts those merely of a private man, a man individually wronged. As a king—a magistrate-he was appointed to preserve order; to maintain law; to dispense justice; to detect, arraign, and punish the guilty. As a magistrate, he represented the state; the majesty of the law; the interests of justice. As a magistrate, an act done-an offence committed-a crime in the community, did not respect him as a man—an individual—but as appointed to administer the government and to defend the state. No one can deny that David sustained this relation to the state, and that the duty of maintaining and administering law rested supremely with him. From anything that appears, also, the remark here made is applicable to each of the cases where "imprecations" are found in the Psalms. The question, then, is, whether there is anything in the office and functions of one appointed to make and execute the laws of a land which would render such imprecations justifiable.

(b) Punishment is right. It is not wrong that a penalty should be affixed to law; it is not wrong that the penalty of a law should be inflicted; it is not wrong that pain, privation of office, imprisonment, and the loss of life itself, should follow the commission of crime. So all laws determine; so all nations have judged. It is material here to remark that this is not an arbitrary thing; that it is not a matter of individual or local feeling. It is laid in our very nature. It is found in all nations. It is acted on among all people. There is SOMETHING in our very nature, account for it as we may, which approves of punishment when properly inflicted; which approves of the appointment of a penalty for crime. If this is wrong, it is a wrong in our very nature; it is a universal wrong; it is a wrong which has gone into the enactment of all laws-for all law has a penalty. A law without a penalty would be a mockery and a farce.

When a man in accordance with a just sentence of law is fined, imprisoned, executed, WE APPROVE OF IT. We feel that it is what ought to be done, and in this feeling we are conscious of no wrong. We are conscious that we are not to be blamed for approving the sentence which condemns the guilty any more than we are for approving the sentence which acquits the innocent. The foundation of his feeling is laid in the very nature of man, and, therefore, it cannot be evil. No man feels that he is blameworthy when he thus finds himself approving of a just sentence of law; no man feels that this principle of his nature ought to be resisted or reversed, so that he would be a better man if he were conscious of the opposite feeling.

(c) In accordance with this principle, there are arrangements in every community for detecting and punishing crime. There are laws made which define crime, and designate its just penalty; there are arrangements made for arresting the guilty, and bringing them to trial; there are prisons built in anticipation that there will be men to be punished. There are courts organized for the express purpose of trying offenders; there are penalties affixed by law to different classes of crimes; there are processes prescribed in the law books for arresting, indicting, committing, arraigning, and judging those charged with a violation of law. There is a class of men whose business it is to detect and arrest offenders; there is a class whose business it is to try them; there is a class whose business it is to inflict punishment on them. Hence we have a detective police—men whose calling it is to find out offenders; we have an array of constables, jurymen, and judges; we have sheriffs, keepers of prisons, and executioners. These arrangements are necessary in our world. Society could not do without them. No community would be safe without them. No man would feel that his life, his property, his family were secure without them. They enter into the very structure of society as it exists on earth; and if these were abolished, the world would soon be filled with anarchy, bloodshed, and crime.

(d) These are lawful, proper, and honourable employments. The business of a detective officer, of a constable, of a sheriff, of a juryman, of a judge, is as lawful as that of a farmer, a blacksmith, a school-teacher, a physician, a clergyman. No man occupies a more honourable position than the judge of a court, though it be a criminal court; no man is rendering more valuable service to his country than he whose daily business it is to detect offenders, to prosecute for crime, or to administer

the laws of a nation. The constable and the judge may go to their work with as conscious a feeling that they are engaged in an honourable work as the farmer or the merchant; and the foreman of a jury who declares that a man arraigned for crime has been found "guilty," and the judge who pronounces the sentence of the law, and the man who executes the sentence, may each one lie down on his bed at night as calmly as the man who during the day has been engaged in sowing seed in his field, or gathering in his harvest, or administering medicine to the sick, or preaching the Gospel. Through all that day the one may be as conscious that he has had no malice towards his fellow-men, no desire of revenge, as the other. In the bosom of each one there may have been only the consciousness of a simple desire to do his duty.

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(e) It is lawful and proper for such a man to pray ;—a detective officer, a constable, a juryman, a judge, a keeper of a prison, a hangman. It is as proper for such a man to pray as any other man. He may pray in his closet and in his family; he may breathe forth a mental prayer when searching for a man charged with an offence, or when bearing a testimony against him, or when sitting in judgment on him, or when inflicting the penalty of the law. He may pray, as other men do, that he may be "diligent in business;" that he may be "fervent in spirit;" that he may serve the Lord" in that calling. He may pray that he may have grace to be faithful to his trust; firm in his conduct; successful in what he is appointed to do. But what is this? It is that the wicked-the guiltymay be brought to punishment; that they may be punished; that they may receive the due reward for their deeds. It is not malice against an individual; it is not a desire of revenge; it is not the indulgence of any private feeling; it is not conduct inconsistent with the widest benevolence. The officers of justice are engaged in the very work of bringing men to punishment; and why may they not pray for success in the work in which they are engaged? Why may not any man who loves the cause of justice, and who desires the security and good order of a community, pray that the wicked may be checked in their career-arrested-confined-punished? Since men lawfully engage in doing the thing, why may they not lawfully pray for the Divine blessing to aid them in doing it?

It is further to be remarked that a magistrate offering such a prayer would have a very different feeling from one who was engaged in an unlawful employment. How can a man engaged

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in the manufacture and sale of intoxicating drinks pray? How can he ask for success in his work? To do this would be to pray that his neighbour, his fellow-men, near or far off, might spend their property for that which would not profit them; might waste their time, ruin their health, cut short their lives, and destroy their souls; that they might be profane, gross, offensive, beastly; that they might be a pest in the community, be led into crime, and find their home in an almshouse, a penitentiary, or an insane asylum; that their families might be beggared, and that a once peaceful home might become a hell; and that the young, the vigorous, the hopeful, the beautiful, the sons of the virtuous and the pious-might go down early to the drunkard's grave; that the hearts of wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters might be crushed and broken, because a husband, a father, a brother, had been made a drunkard. But what fiendish malignity would there be in such a prayer as this! Hence such men do not ask the Divine blessing on their work. But a magistrate may pray, and should pray. He may pray that he may be successful in discharging the duties of his office; administering justice; in prosecuting for crime; and in pronouncing the sentence of the law. His prayer, in fact, is simply that justice may be done to all; that punishment may be inflicted when it is deserved; and that he may be made an instrument in the hands of God in detecting and punishing crime. At the same time this may be so far from being a vindictive and revengeful spirit, that he himself may be among the most kind and humane men in a community, and when he pronounces the sentence of the law, he may be the only one in the court room that shall weep. Tears may flow fast from his eyes as he pronounces the sentence of the law, while the hardened wretch sentenced to the gallows may be wholly unmoved. It indicated no want of feeling and no malevolent spirit when Washington signed the death-warrant of the accomplished André, for he did it with tears.

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In the same way, and with the same spirit, a man may go forth to the defence of his country when invaded, or when one portion of it has risen up in rebellion against a lawful government. A soldier called forth to defend his country may pray; the commander of an army may pray-should pray. But the prayer of such an one may be, and should be, in the line of his duty; for success in that which he has undertaken. It will be a prayer that the enemies of his country may be overcome and subdued. It indicates no malice, no personal feeling, no spirit

of revenge, when he prays that the enemies of his country may be scattered as chaff before the wind; or that their counsels may be turned to foolishness; or that he may be successful in subduing them. It is a prayer for the triumph of a righteous cause; and as all his acts as a soldier tend to the destruction of the enemies of his country; as he is actually engaged in endeavouring to subdue them; as all his plans contemplate that; as he cannot be successful without that,-if the employment itself is right, it cannot be wrong that he should pray for success in that is, that his enemies may be delivered into his hands, and that God would enable him to overcome, to scatter, to subdue them. In this view of the matter there is necessarily no feeling inconsistent with the purest benevolence when the defenders of liberty and law and right apply to themselves the language of Psalm cxlix. :-"Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand; to execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgment written," vers. 6-9.

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(f) It only remains to be added, as bearing on the point here suggested, that it cannot be demonstrated that there is in the psalms that are called "Imprecatory Psalms" any more of malice, or of a spirit of revenge, than there is in the heart of a detective officer, a constable, a sheriff, a juryman, a crown lawyer, a prosecuting attorney, a judge, the keeper of a penitentiary, or an executioner, when he goes to the daily discharge of the duties of his office, and when, in his closet, or in his family, in his morning devotions, he prays that he may be faithful and successful in the discharge of his official duties through the day :-for success in any of these duties will be in the line of prayer, and may be in answer to prayer. If the detective officer is successful in ferreting out a burglar or a counterfeiter; if a magistrate is successful in bringing him to justice; if a juryman pronounces an honest verdict finding him guilty; if an attorney is successful in prosecuting the guilty to conviction; if a judge delivers a just sentence; and if the keeper of a prison closes the massive bars and bolts on the guilty,—at night, when they reflect on their work, they may regard their success in the lawful duties of the day as being as real an answer to prayer in the proper business of human life as the waving golden harvest is an answer to the prayers of the pious farmer, or the ship laden with the rich productions of the East, as she glides gallantly into port, should be regarded