Produced by David Newman, Valerine Blas and PG Distributed Proofreaders
Edited by
The Rev. W. Robertson Nicoll, LL.D.
Elegantly bound in cloth, price 1s. 6d. each.
Christ and the Future Life.
By R.W. Dale, LL.D.
The Seven Words from the Cross.
By the Rev. W. Robertson Nicoll, LL.D.
The Visions of a Prophet.
By the Rev. Professor Marcus Dods, D.D.
Why be a Christian?
Addresses to Young Men. By the same
Author.
The Four Temperaments.
By the Rev. Alexander Whyte, D.D.
The Upper Room.
By the Rev. John Watson, M.A., D.D.
Four Psalms.
By the Rev. Professor George Adam Smith, D.D., LL.D.
Gospel Questions and Answers.
By the Rev. James Denney, D.D.
The Unity and Symmetry of the Bible.
By the Rev. John Monro Gibson, D.D.
HODDER & STOUGHTON
The twenty-third Psalm seems to break in two at the end of the fourthverse. The first four verses clearly reflect a pastoral scene; the fifthappears to carry us off, without warning, to very different associations.This, however, is only in appearance. The last two verses are as pastoralas the first four. If these show us the shepherd with his sheep upon thepasture, those follow him, shepherd still, to where in his tent hedispenses the desert's hospitality to some poor fugitive from blood. ThePsalm is thus a unity, even of metaphor. We shall see afterwards that itis also a spiritual unity; but at present let us summon up the landscapeon which both of these features—the shepherd on his pasture and theshepherd in his tent—lie side by side, equal sacraments of the grace andshelter of our God.
A Syrian or an Arabian pasture is very different from the narrow meadowsand fenced hill-sides with which we are familiar. It is vast, and oftenvirtually boundless. By far the greater part of it is desert—that is,land not absolutely barren, but refreshed by rain for only a few months,and through the rest of the year abandoned to the pitiless sun that sucksall life from the soil. The landscape is nearly all glare: monotonouslevels or low ranges of hillocks, with as little character upon them asthe waves of the sea, and shimmering in mirage under a cloudless heaven.This bewildering monotony is broken by only two exceptions. Here and therethe ground is cleft to a deep ravine, which gapes in black contrast to theglare, and by its sudden darkness blinds the men and sheep that enter itto the beasts of prey which have their lairs in the recesses. But thereare also hollows as gentle and lovely as those ravines are terrible, wherewater bubbles up and runs quietly between grassy banks through the openshade o