Thy wickedness [may hurt] a man as thou [art]; and thy righteousness [may profit] the son of man.
Ver. 8. Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art] Wicked men are many ways mischievous to others; and have much to answer for their other men's sins. How many are undone by their murders, adulteries, robberies, false testimonies, blasphemies, and other rotten speeches, to the corrupting of good manners! &c. What hurt is done daily by the devil's factors, to men's souls, bodies, names, estates! Besides that they betray the land wherein they live into the hands of divine justice, while they do wickedly with both hands earnestly, Micah 7:3; that I speak not of the manifold miseries they pull upon themselves.
And thy righteousness may profit the son of man] Thyself and others; for the just liveth by his own faith; he maketh a living of it, and a good one too. And as for his charity, it is the mother of all manner of good works, whereof others have the benefit. Papists, and some as silly, have shrunk up charity to a hand's breadth, to giving of alms. But besides that, a good man draweth out, not only his sheaf, but his soul to the hungry. He also warneth the unruly, comforteth the feeble-minded, supporteth the weak, and tradeth all his talents for the good of others, 1 Thessalonians 5:14. He is a common blessing to all that are about him. As Plutarch said of the neighbouring villages of Rome, in Numa's time, That sucking in the air of that city, they breathed δικαιοσυνην, righteousness; so may it be said of the city of God, and her citizens.