“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out."’ In his dealings with his sinful children how far are his ways above the ways of men!  “As the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him.”  He dealeth not with them after their sins—­he rewardeth them not according to their iniquities, but knowing their frame—­remembering that they are dust—­that a breath of temptation will carry them away—­pitying them with a most tender compassion, he deals with them according to the everlasting and abounding and long-suffering love of his own mighty heart.  Whenever those who have known him best, to whom he has manifested his grace most richly, whom he has blessed with most abundant privileges, fall, in some evil hour, and without reason, upon the slightest cause, bring dishonor on his name and give occasion to his enemies to blaspheme, and incur his just judgment, behold how he treats them.  Upon the first sign of contrition, the first acknowledgment “I have sinned,” how prompt, how free, how full is the response, “The Lord also hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not die.”  No lingering resentment—­no selfish reminding of his wounded honor—­no thoughts but of love, warm and tender, self-forgetting love and pity for his sorrowing child.  Even when he must resort to chastisement, “his strange work”—­when he must for his great name’s sake, raise up for David evil out of his own house—­when he must, before the sun and before all Israel, show his displeasure at sin; with one hand he applies the rod, and with the other pours into the bleeding heart the balm of consolation, so pure, so free, that his children almost feel that they could never have understood his goodness but for the need of his severity.  When, notwithstanding the earnest prayer of the father, he smites the child of his shame, how soon does he return with a better gift—­a son of peace, who shall remind him only of days of contrition and the favor of God—­a Jedediah, who shall ever be a daily witness to his forgiving love.

And to those who suffer innocently from the crimes of others, how tender are the compassions of our heavenly Father.  To the injured, afflicted Bathsheba is given the honor of being the mother of Israel’s wisest, most mighty and renowned king; and she is, by father and son, by the prophet of the Lord, by the aspirant to the throne, and by all around her, ever approached with that deference and confidence which her truly dignified character and gentle virtues, not less than her high station, demand.  And while not a word of reproach is permitted to be left on record against her, on that monument of which we have before spoken, among mighty and worthy names, destined to stand where many of earth’s wisest and greatest are forgotten, with the progenitors of our Lord and Savior, is inscribed hers “who was the wife of Urias.”

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