urselves.

From this point of view the penitential Psalms"[2] might profitably be
used not merely as the expression of personal penitence, but as an act
of reparation, an offering to God of our sorrow for the worldliness and
imperfections of His Church; as an incentive also to effort, that we
may do our part to remove the "reproach of the heathen," to restore the
Church from within, to seek her unity and peace.

There is, however, another side to the problem of the Church's
failures. Israel and Jerusalem are constantly described in the Psalms
as being the marks for the malignity and opposition of external
enemies. Indeed, a persistent note of the Church, Jewish as well as
Christian, is the hatred which she awakens in the powers of this world.
The object of suspicion and attack from Egypt, Assyria, and Babylon in
early days, Jerusalem fares no better after the humiliation of the
Captivity. The attempts to {87} rebuild the Temple and restore the
city arouse the bitterest hostility from the surrounding peoples, a
hostility not merely political, but traceable to a deeper cause. The
attempts of Antiochus Epiphanes in the second century B.C. to break
down Jewish separation and to destroy Jewish worship are marked by the
same spirit, working in a more arrogant and brutal manner. Our Lord
Himself promises no smoother or more popular course for His faithful
ones. "Ye shall be hated of all men." S. Paul recognises the same
antagonism running throughout the history of the elect: "As then he
that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the
Spirit, even so it is now" (Gal. iv. 29).

The Psalter will not allow us to shut our eyes to this malignant and
persecuting attitude of the world. The enemies of the Righteous find a
place in almost every Psalm. The malice of human nature at its worst
seems to be marshalled against Him, in slander and ingratitude and
treachery. But there is also the opposition of the heathen as a whole
against Israel. The vicissitudes of her history are typical; they
illustrate a permanent principle which is found working from age to
age. It was not less active nor less brutal in the first three
Christian centuries {88} than it was in the days of Antiochus. To-day,
though its attack is less outwardly cruel, the spirit which prompts it
is just as deeply seated, and more malignant perhaps in proportion as
it is veiled. The Church has not merely to contend with the hatred of
th