is, darkness
from which streams out the thunder-rain; it is "thick clouds of the
skies;" or perhaps the expression should be rendered, "heavy masses of
clouds." Then comes the crash of the tempest. The brightness that lies
closer around Him, and lives in the heart of the blackness, flames
forth, parting the thick clouds--and through the awful rent hail and
coals of fire are flung down on the trembling earth. The grand
description may be rendered in two ways: either that adopted in our
version, "At the brightness that was before Him His thick clouds
passed--hailstones and coals of fire;" or, "Through His thick clouds
there passed hailstones and coals of fire." The former of these is the
more dramatic; the broken construction expresses more vividly the fierce
suddenness of the lightning blaze and of the down-rush of the hail, and
is confirmed by the repetition of the same words in the same
construction in the next verse. That verse describes another burst of
the tempest--the deep roll of the thunder along the skies is the voice
of Jehovah, and again the lightning tears through the clouds, and the
hail streams down. With what profound truth all this destructive power
is represented as coming from the brightness of God--that "glory" which
in its own nature is light, but in its contact with finite and sinful
creatures must needs become darkness, rent asunder by lightning! What
lessons as to the root and the essential nature of all punitive acts of
God cluster round such words! and how calm and blessed the faith which
can pierce even the thickest mass "that veileth Love!"--to see the light
at the centre, even though the circumference be brooding thunder-clouds
torn by sudden fires. Then comes the purpose of all this apocalypse of
Divine magnificence. The fiery arrows scatter the psalmist's enemies.
The waters in which he had well nigh drowned are dried up before the hot
breath of His anger. "That dread voice" speaks "which shrinks their
streams." And amid the blaze of tempest, the rocking earth, and the
failing floods, His arm is thrust forth from above, and draws His
servant from many waters. As one in later times, "he was afraid, and
beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me; and immediately He
stretched forth His hand and caught him."

A calmer tone follows, as the psalmist recounts without metaphor his
deliverance, and reiterates the same assertion of his innocence which
we have already found so frequently in th