ng blood, and from avenging myself with mine own hand.'

It is plain then, that David's notion of his duty to his enemies was
very different from that of the monks. But still they are
undeniably imprecations, the imprecations of a man smarting under
cruel injustice; who cannot, and in some cases must not avenge
himself, and who therefore calls on the just God to avenge him. Are
we therefore to say that these utterances of David are uninspired?
Not in the least: we are boldly to say that they are inspired, and
by the very Spirit of God, who is the Spirit of justice and of
judgment.

Doubtless there were, in after ages, far higher inspirations. The
Spirit of God was, and is gradually educating mankind, and
individuals among mankind, like David, upward from lower truths to
higher ones. That is the express assertion of our Lord and of his
Apostles. But the higher and later inspiration does not make the
lower and earlier false. It does not even always supersede it
altogether. Each is true; and, for the most part, each must remain,
and be respected, that they may complement each other.

Let us look at this question rationally and reverently, free from
all sentimental and immoral indulgence for sin and wrong.

The first instinct of man is the Lex Talionis. As you do to me--
says the savage--so I have a right to do to you. If you try to kill
me or mine, I have a right to kill you in return. Is this notion
uninspired? I should be sorry to say so. It is surely the first
form and the only possible first form of the sense of justice and
retribution. As a man sows so shall he reap. If a man does wrong
he deserves to be punished. No arguments will drive that great
divine law out of the human mind; for God has put it there.

After that inspiration comes a higher one. The man is taught to
say, I must not punish my enemy if I can avoid it. God must punish
him, either by the law of the land or by his providential judgments.
To this height David rises. In a seemingly lawless age and country,
under the most extreme temptation, he learns to say, 'Blessed be God
who hath kept me from avenging myself with my own hand.'

But still, it may be said, David calls down God's vengeance on his
enemies. He has not learnt to hate the sin and yet love the sinner.
Doubtless he has not: and it may have been right for his education,
and for the education of the human race through him, that he did
not. It may have been a good th