Some may be disposed to cavil at its bitterness, and to say that for Christians it is too full of threats and vengeance. Perhaps it is; nay, certainly it is. But there are two noble feelings in it, and two vivid pictures of character. The Psalm is inspired by a brave contempt for wickedness in high places, and by a most devout trust in the love of God. And in expressing these two noble tempers, the poet analyses two characters. He analyses the character which is ruled from within by the love of Self, and he gives his own experience of a character inspired from without by faith--by faith in the mercy of the Living God. We Christians too hastily dismiss from our own uses the so-called Cursing Psalms. It is unfortunate that the translators have so often tempted us to this by exaggerating the violence of the Hebrew at the expense of its insight, its discrimination, and its sometimes delicate satire. If only we had a version that produced the exact colours of the original, and if we ourselves had the quick conscience and the honest wit to carry over the ideas into terms suitable to our own day--in which the selfishness of the human heart is the same old thing it ever was, though it uses milder and more subtle means,--then we should feel the touch of a power not merely of dramatic interest but of moral conviction, where we have been too much accustomed to think that we were hearing only ancient rant. So treated, Psalms like the fifth, the tenth, the fourteenth, and the fifty-second, which we so often pass over, offended by their violence, become quick and powerful, the very word of God to our own times and hearts. Let us take a more literal version of the Psalm before us: _Why glory in evil, big man? The leal love of God is all day long. Thy tongue planneth mischiefs, Like a razor sharp-whetted, thou worker of fraud. Thou lovest evil more than good, Lying than speaking the truth. Thou lovest all words of voracity, Tongue of deceit. God also shall tear thee down, once for all_, _Cut thee out, and pluck thee from the tent, And uproot thee from off the land of the living. That the righteous may see and fear, And at him they shall laugh_. '_Lo! the fellow who sets not God for his stronghold, But trusts in the mass of his wealth, Is strong in his mischief_.' _But I like an olive-tree, green in God's house, I have trusted in God's leal love for ever and aye. I will praise Thee for ever, that Thou hast done [this], And I will wait on Thy name--for 'tis good-- In face of Thy saints_. The character who is challenged is easily made out, and we may recognize how natural he is and how near to ourselves.