For thy name's sake, O LORD, pardon mine iniquity; for it [is] great.
Ver. 11. For thy name's sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity] Never did prisoner at the bar beg more earnestly for his life than David did for pardon of his great offence, especially in the matter of Uriah; for that lay heaviest. Peccatum cum Bathsheba cuius petit antehac remissionem, et nunc repeto (R. David). Could he but get off the guilt of that, it were an easy matter for him to glory in tribulations with Paul, Romans 5:3, and to cry out, with Luther, Feri Domine, feri; nam a peccatis absolutus sum: Smite, Lord, smite; for I am a pardoned sinner, and therefore all is in mercy, and for good.
For it is great] But that is nothing to so great a God, who delightest in mercy, and makest thy power appear in pardoning the many and horrid sins of thy poor penitents. The high heaven covereth as well tall mountains as small mole hills. The vast ocean swalloweth up huge rocks as well as little pebbles. St Paul was (for the first table) a blasphemer, and (for the second table) a persecutor, and injurious; "but I obtained mercy," saith he; and why? that the grace of our Lord might appear to be exceeding abundant, even to an overflow, 1 Timothy 1:13,14, and that the glory of free grace might be so much the more manifested, Romans 5:20. The more desperate was my disease the greater is the glory of my Physician, who hath fully cured me, said Austin once to one, who upbraided him with his former loose living.