The world's history offers no example where the merits and defects of absolute monarchy were so rapidly developed, where they were displayed so strikingly, as in this little Hebrew monarchy, instituted with the view of escaping from anarchy by the express desire of the people itself. Three kings succeed to the throne, in origin, character, conduct, and reign absolutely dissimilar. Saul is a warrior, chosen by Samuel for his strength, bodily beauty, and courage; ever ready for the combat, but without foresight, without perseverance in his military operations; easily intoxicated with good fortune; hurried away by brutal, capricious, or jealous passions; now engaged in furious struggles, now appearing in a dependent position, with his patron Samuel, his son Jonathan, his son-in-law David; a genuine barbarian king, arrogant, changeable of humour, impatient of control, prone to superstition, a moment serving Israel against her enemies, but incapable of governing Israel in the name of its God. {203} David, on the contrary, is the faithful and consistent representative of religious faith and religious life in Israel; the fervent and submissive adorer of the Eternal; he is so at all the epochs and in the most varying aspects of his career, whether of humility or of grandeur; at once warrior, king, prophet, poet; as ardent to celebrate his God in his character of poet, as to serve Him in the capacity of warrior, or to obey Him in that of king; equally sublime in his thanksgiving to the Eternal for his triumphs as in his invocation to Him in his distresses; accessible to the most culpable human weaknesses, but prompt to repent the offence once committed; and giving always to impulses of joy or pious sadness the first place in his soul; very king of the nation that adores the very God. {204} David accomplishes the work of his time: he obtains the object for which the monarchy had been demanded and instituted: he leaves behind him the tribes of Israel reunited at home, and reassured against foreign enemies, proceeding too in the path of good order and confidence. Heir to his father's work, his father's success, Solomon comes next, and reigns forty years--years of almost as much repose as splendour: "God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore." [Footnote 66] "And he had peace on all sides round about him. And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon." [Footnote 67] [Footnote 66: 1 Kings iv. 29.] [USCCB: Footnote 66 should be: 1 Kings iv. 9.] [Footnote 67: Ibid. 24, 25.] [USCCB: Footnote 67 should be: 1 Kings iv. 4, 5.]