thanks unto Thee, O Lord, among the people, and I will sing unto Thee among the nations.  For the greatness of Thy mercy reacheth unto the heavens, and Thy truth unto the clouds.  Set up Thyself, O God, above the heavens, and Thy glory above all the earth.

Some people now-a-days would call this poetry; and so it is.  But what poetry!  They would call it a Hebrew song, a Hebrew lyric; and so it is.  But what a song!  There is something in us, if we be truly delicate and high-minded people, which will surely make us feel a deep difference between it and common poetry, or common songs; which made our forefathers read or chant it in church, and use it, as many a pious soul has ere now, in private devotion.

David did not compose it in church or in temple.  He never meant it, perhaps, to be sung in public worship.  He little dreamed that we, and millions more, in lands of which he had never heard, should be repeating his words in a foreign tongue in our most sacred acts of worship.  He was thinking, when he composed it, mainly of himself and his own sorrows and dangers.  He intends, he says, to awake early, and sing it to lute and harp.  Perhaps he had composed it in the night, as he lay either in the cave of Adullam or Engedi, hiding from Saul among the cliffs of the wild goats; and meant to go forth to the cave’s mouth, and there, before the sun rose over the downs, he would, to translate his words exactly, “awake the dawning” with his song in the free air and the clear sky, singing to his little band of men.

And to some one more than man, my friends.  For his poetry was poetry concerning God.  His song was a song to God.  He does not sing of his own sorrows to himself, as too many poets have done ere now.  He does not sing to his men; though he no doubt wished them to hear him, and learn from him, and gain faith and comfort and courage from his song.  He sings of his sorrows to God Himself; to the God who made heaven and earth; the God who is above the heavens, and His glory above all the earth.

This is the secret, the virtue, the charm of the song; that it sings to God.  This is why it has passed into many lands, into many languages, through hundreds and hundreds of years, and is as fresh, and mighty, and full of meaning and of power, now, here, to us in England, as it was to David, when he was a poor outlaw, wandering in the hills of the little country of Judaea, more than 2000 years ago.

The poet says,

   A thing of beauty is a joy for ever,

and this psalm is most beautiful, and a joy for ever to delicate and noble intellects.  But more, a thing of truth is a help for ever.  And this psalm is most true, and a help for ever to all sorrowing and weary hearts.  For the Spirit of truth it was, who put this psalm into David’s heart and brain; and taught him to know and say what was true for him, and true for all men; what was true then, and will be true for ever.