The acrostic sequence fails at this point, if the Masoretic text is adhered to. There is evident disorder in the division of verses, for ver. 28 has four clauses instead of the normal two. If the superfluous two are detached from it and connected as one strophe with ver. 29, a regular two-versed and four-claused strophe results. Its first word (L'olam = "for ever") has the Ayin, due in the alphabetical sequence, in its second letter, the first being a prefixed preposition, which may be passed over, as in ver. 39 the copula Vav is prefixed to the initial letter. Delitzsch takes this to be the required letter; but if so, another irregularity remains, inasmuch as the first couplet of the strophe should be occupied with the fate of the wicked, as antithetical to that of the righteous in ver. 29. "They are preserved for ever" throws the whole strophe out of order. Probably, therefore, there is textual corruption here, which the LXX. helps in correcting. It has an evidently double rendering of the clause, as is not unfrequently the case where there is ambiguity or textual difficulty, and gives side by side with "They shall be preserved for ever" the rendering "The lawless shall be hunted out," which can be re-turned into Hebrew so as to give the needed initial Ayin either in a somewhat rare word, or in one which occurs in ver. 35. If this correction is adopted, the anomalies disappear, and strophe, division, acrostic, and antithetical refrain are all in order. The last section (ver. 30 to end), like the preceding, has the psalmist's experience for its centre, and traces the entail of conduct to a second generation of evil-doers, as the former did to the seed of the righteous. Both sections begin with the promise of firmness for the "goings or steps" of the righteous, but the later verses expand the thought by a fuller description of the moral conditions of stability. "The law of his God is in his heart." That is the foundation on which all permanence is built. From that as centre there issue wise and just words on the one hand and stable deeds on the other. That is true in the psalmist's view in reference to outward success and continuance, but still more profoundly in regard to steadfast progress in paths of righteousness. He who orders his footsteps by God's known will is saved from much hesitancy, vacillation, and stumbling, and plants a firm foot even on slippery places. Once more the picture of the enmity of the wicked recurs, as in vv. 12-14, with the difference that there the emphasis was laid on the destruction of the plotters, and here it is put on the vindication of the righteous by acts of deliverance (vv. 32, 33).