Psalms 104 - Wesley's Explanatory Notes

Light — With that first created light, which the psalmist fitly puts in the first place, as being the first of God's visible works.

Waters — In the waters above the heavens, as they are called, Genesis 1:7.

Spirits — Of a spiritual or incorporeal nature, that they might be fitter for their employments. Fire — So called for their irresistible force and agility, and fervency in the execution of God's commands.

Who laid — Heb. he hath established the earth upon its own basis, whereby it stands as fast and unmoveable, as if it were built upon the strongest foundations. Forever — As long as the world continues. God has fixt so strange a place for the earth, that being an heavy body, one would think it should fall every moment. And yet which way so ever we would imagine it to stir, it must, contrary to the nature of such a body, fall upwards, and so can have no possible ruin, but by tumbling into heaven.

The deep — In the first creation, Genesis 1:2, Genesis 1:9.

Rebuke — Upon thy command, Genesis 1:9. Fled — They immediately went to the place which God had allotted them.

Go up — In that first division of the waters from the earth, part went upwards, and became springs in the mountains, the greatest part went downwards to the channels made for them.

A bound — Even the sand of the sea — shore.

Wild asses — Stupid creatures, and yet plentifully provided for by the Divine providence.

The hills — Which most need moisture. From — From the clouds. Satisfied — By this means all the parts of the earth, are made fruitful. The fruit — With the effects of those sweet showers.

Oil — He alludes to the custom of those times and places, which was upon festival occasions to anoint their faces with oil. Bread — Which preserves or renews our strength and vigour.

Trees — Which come up, and thrive not by man's industry, but merely by the care of God's providence.

For seasons — To distinguish the times, the seasons of divers natural events, as of the ebbing and flowing of waters, and other seasons for sacred and civil affairs, which were commonly regulated by the moon.

Darkness — Which succeeds the light by virtue of thy decree.

Roar — They roar when they come within sight of their prey. Seek — Their roaring is a kind of natural prayer to God, for relief.

Creeping — This word is common to all creatures that move without feet.

Leviathan — The whale. Therein — Who being of such a vast strength and absolute dominion in the sea, tumbles in it with great security, and sports himself with other creatures.

Hidest — Withdrawest the care of thy providence.

Spirit — That quickening power of God, by which he produces life in the creatures from time to time. For he speaks not here of the first creation, but of the continued production of living creatures. Created — Other living creatures are produced; the word created being taken in its largest sense for the production of things by second causes. Renewest — And thus by thy wise and wonderful providence thou preservest the succession of living creatures.

Rejoice — Thus God advances the glory of his wisdom and power and goodness, in upholding the works of his hands from generation to generation, and he takes pleasure in the preservation of his works, as also in his reflection upon these works of his providence.

He looketh — This is a farther illustration of God's powerful providence: as when he affords his favour to creatures, they live and thrive, so on the contrary, one angry look or touch of his upon the hills or earth, makes them tremble and smoke, as Sinai did when God appeared in it.

Praise ye the Lord — Heb. Hallelujah. This is the first time that this word occurs. And it comes in here on occasion of the destruction of the wicked. And the last time it occurs, Revelation 19:1, Revelation 19:3-4, Revelation 19:6, it is on a like occasion, the destruction of Babylon.