REFLECTIONS.
We have here another family psalm. It compresses all the blessings of the Hebrew covenant into a short compass.
(1) We have the character: he fears the Lord. He is in every view a truly religious man.
(2) He shall be blessed in his affairs. His lands, his cattle, his commerce, shall prosper under God's peculiar care.
(3) He shall be blessed with children, and ten thousand gifts in a virtuous wife.
(4) His children shall be blessed with health, and shall flourish like olive branches round his table.
(5) He shall be blessed in his own soul when he worships, with a blessing out of Zion: heaven shall open to his view, and make his temporal prosperity figurative of the richer grace which shall replenish his heart.
(6) Long life shall crown the whole; he shall see his children and his grandchildren rise, like trees of righteousness, to glorify the God of Israel.
These fine things which are said of the covenant might be regarded as a dream, had not providence multiplied the Jews in Egypt, and prospered them under David and Solomon beyond what language can paint. We must add, that all those blessings belong to the christian church; the Hebrew and the Christian covenant being in substance the same.