Page images
PDF
EPUB

How just are the judgments of GOD! If Saul destroyed an innocent people to make provifion for the offspring of a concubine, and the offspring of a daughter, which she bare in confequence of his own faith to David violated *, could any thing be more equal, than that this very iffue, chief agents of his cruelty, fhould now be called for, to make atonement for that guilt!

LET others find their account, and found their fame, in reviling the divine difpenfations recorded in the fcriptures; be it ever my glory to reverence them! to reverence them in the filence of my closet, and to publish that reverence to the world, (when the revilings of others provoke me to it) without any view to the wages either of vanity or wealth!

GIVE me leave to add, that when I fee fome determined philofophers, of the last and present age, purfuing the reputation of David, with as murderous an intent as Saul

* Merab, the mother of five of these victims, was promised to David, upon a folemn and public compact; the conditions of which were fully performed on his fide, to the great glory and fecurity of the ftate and then, in violation of that folemn and repeated engagement, given to another, I Sam. ch. xvii. ch. xviii.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

did his life, I cannot help imagining, that I hear this hero crying out to them, as he did to Saul, (1 Sam. xxiv. 12, 13.) The Lord judge between me and thee, and the Lord avenge me of thee

As faith the pro

verb of the antients, Wickedness proceedeth from the wicked.

CHA P. XVI.

DAVID enters into new Wars with Philiftia. A Conjecture concerning the Caufe of them. The first and laft Edition of the Eighteenth Pfalın (published upon this Occafion) briefly compared. A Digreffion, upon the Ufefulness of Mufic to form the Manners. DAVID's laft prophetic. Words. Afhort Conjecture concerning his Worthies.

T

HE hiftory of the famine, under the reign of David, is fucceeded by a very short account of a war with the Phi

liftiness

liftines; or rather of four fucceffive wars which feem to have lafted a confiderable time, inasmuch as they were not ended till after four pitched battles; each of which concluded in David's favour. Nor are any other particulars related of them; but that a man of gigantic ftature and strength fell on the fide of the Philistines, in each of them; the last of whom had fix fingers on each hand, and fix toes on each foot *: and that in the firft of thefe battles, David was in danger of being flain by Ishbi-benob, the fon of a giant, (whether of Goliah, or some other, is not known) had he not been timely fuccoured by Abishai, the fon of Zeruiah, who fmote and flew him. The account left us of this matter by Jofephus is to this purpofe: That David, having put the enemy to flight, and being foremost, and carried too far in the ardour of the pursuit, after some time, grew weary, and faint with the fatigue.

* Inftances of gigantic men are familiar enough in the collections of the commentators, on this, and other paffages of the fame nature and Dr. Patrick quotes Tuverine's relation of the grand fignior's Seraglio, Page 95. wherein he tells us, That the eldeft fon of the emperor of Java, who reigned in the year 1648, when he was in that ifland, had fix fingers on each hand, and as many toes on each foot, all of equal length.

[blocks in formation]

Which Ifbbi-benob perceiving, and being armed with a huge fpear, (as Jofephus relates) and girded with a new fword, (as the text is understood) found that a fit occafion to affault the king; and had fucceeded in his purpose, had not Abishai come seasonably to David's aid, and destroyed his adversary.

THE apprehenfion of the king's danger ftruck his people with deep concern and confternation; and they immediately bound themselves by a folemn oath, never more to fuffer him to hazard his perfon in battle; adding a reason, which fufficiently indicates their high opinion and esteem of him; That thou quench not the light of Ifrael, left they should be deprived of a prince who was at once their guide, and their glory!

*

THE caufe or occafion of these wars is no-where mentioned in the facred history; but there is a paffage, 2 Sam. xv. 18, 19, &c. on which to ground a rational conjecture concerning the origin of them: And all bis fervants paffed on befide him; and all the Cherethites, and all the Pelethites, and all the Gittites, fix hundred men which came after

In Hebrew, lamp.

him from Gath, palled on before the king. Then faid the king to Ittai the Gittite, Wherefore goeft thou also with us? Return to thy place, and abide with the king: for thou art a ftranger, and also an exile whereas thou cameft but yesterday, &c. And Ittai the Gittite paffed over, and all his men. From whence it appears, that Ittai, an exile from Gath, arrived at Jerufalem, with all his men, the very eve eve of David's flight before his fon Abfalom. From whence I con

jecture, that the Philistines, hearing of Abfalom's rebellion, took that opportunity to shake off the Ifraelite yoke; and to that purpose drove out all the friends and favourers of David's government over them; and among the reft, Ittai and his followers; who arrived very providentially at Jerufalem, to fupport David in the extremity of his distress. And as this revolt of Philiftia was fucceeded by a long famine in David's dominions, we could not reasonably expect to hear of any measures taken by that prince to chastise that revolt, till after the ceafing of this calamity; and then we immediately hear of the wars now recounted.

WHEN

« PreviousContinue »