A final pair of verses, answering to the introductory pair, gathers up the double truth, which the psalmist has learned to grasp more firmly by occasion of his doubts. To be absent from God is to perish. Distance from Him is separation from life. Drawing near to Him is the only good; and the psalmist has deliberately chosen it as _his_ good, let worldly prosperity come or go as it list, or, rather, as God shall choose. By the effort of his own volition he has made God his refuge, and, safe in Him, he can bear the sorrows of the godly, and look unenvying on the fleeting prosperity of sinners, while, with insight drawn from communion, he can recount with faith and praise all God's works, and find in none of them a stumbling-block, nor fail to find in any of them material for a song of thankfulness. PSALM LXXIV. 1 Why, O God, hast Thou cast us off for ever? [Why] smokes Thine anger against the flock of Thy pasture? 2 Remember Thy congregation [which] Thou didst acquire of old, Didst redeem [to be] the tribe of Thine inheritance, Mount Zion, on which Thou hast dwelt. 3 Lift up Thy steps to the everlasting ruins, The enemy has marred everything in the sanctuary. 4 Thine adversaries roared in the midst of the place where Thou dost meet [us], They set up their signs as signs. 5 They seem like one who heaves on high Axes against a thicket of trees. 6 And now--its carved work altogether With hatchet and hammers they break down. 7 They have set on fire Thy sanctuary, [Rasing it] to the ground, they have profaned the dwelling-place of Thy name. 8 They have said in their heart, Let us crush them altogether. They have burned all meeting-places of God in the land. 9 Our signs we see not, There is no prophet any more, And there is no one who knows how long. 10 How long, O God, shall the adversary reproach? Shall the enemy despise Thy name for ever? 11 Why dost Thou draw back Thy hand, even Thy right hand? From the midst of Thy bosom [pluck it and] consume [them]. 12 Yet God is my king from of old, Working salvations in the midst of the earth. 13 Thou, Thou didst divide the sea by Thy strength, Didst break the heads of monsters on the waters. 14 Thou, Thou didst crush the heads of Leviathan, That Thou mightest give him [to be] meat for a people--the desert beasts. 15 Thou, Thou didst cleave [a way for] fountain and torrent; Thou, Thou didst dry up perennial streams. 16 Thine is day, Thine also is night, Thou, Thou didst establish light and sun. 17 Thou, Thou didst set all the bounds of the earth; Summer and winter, Thou, Thou didst form them.