Four Psalms | Page 3

a man feels that he highest thing
in life is to be a shepherd, he calls his Shepherd, and knows that, as the
shepherd, _whose the sheep are_, shrinks not to seek one of his lost at
risk of limb or life, so his God cannot be less in readiness of love or of
self-sacrifice. Such is the faith of strong and unselfish men all down the
ages. And its strength is this, that it is no mere conclusion of logic, but
the inevitable and increasing result of duty done and love kept pure--of
fatherhood and motherhood and friendship fulfilled. One remembers
how Browning has put it in the mouth of David, when the latter has
done all he can do for 'Saul,' and is helpless:
Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift, That I doubt His
own love can compete with it? ... Would I fain in my impotent yearning
do all for this man; And dare doubt he alone shall not help him, who
yet alone can? Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor to
enrich, To fill up his life, starve my own out, I would--knowing which I
know that my service is perfect. Oh, speak through me now! Would I
suffer for him that I love? So wouldst thou--so wilt thou!
Thus have felt and known the unselfish of all ages. It is not only from
their depths, but from their topmost heights--heaven still how far!--that
men cry out and say, _There is a rock higher than I!_ God is stronger
than their strength, more loving than their uttermost love, and in so far

as they have loved and sacrificed themselves for others, they have
obtained the infallible proof, that God too lives and loves and gives
Himself away. Nothing can shake that faith, for it rests on the best
instincts of our nature, and is the crown of all faithful life. He was no
hireling herdsman who wrote these verses, but one whose heart was in
his work, who did justly by it, magnifying his office, and who never
scamped it, else had he not dared to call his God a shepherd. And so in
every relation of our own lives. While insincerity and unfaithfulness to
duty mean nothing less than the loss of the clearness and sureness of
our faith in God; duty nobly done, love to the uttermost, are witnesses
to God's love and ceaseless care, witnesses which grow more
convincing every day.
The second, third and fourth verses give the details. Each of them is
taken directly from the shepherd's custom, and applied without
interpretation to the care of man's soul by God. _He maketh me lie
down_--the verb is to bring the flocks to fold or couch--_on pastures of
green grass_--the young fresh grass of spring-time. By waters of rest
He refresheth me.[1] This last verb is difficult to render in English; the
original meaning was evidently to guide the flock to drink, from which
it came to have the more general force of sustaining or nourishing. _My
life He restoreth_--bringeth back again from death. _He leadeth me in
paths of righteousness for His name's sake_, not necessarily straight
paths, but paths that fulfil the duty of paths and lead to somewhere,
unlike most desert tracks which spring up, tempt your feet for a little,
and then disappear. _Yea, though I walk in a valley of deep darkness, I
will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff_ are not
synonymous, for even the shepherd of to-day, though often armed with
a gun, carries two instruments of wood, his great oak club, thick
enough to brain a wild beast, and his staff to lean upon or to touch his
sheep, while the ancient shepherd without firearms would surely still
more require both. _They will comfort me_--a very beautiful verb, the
literal meaning of which is to help another, choked with grief or fear, to
breathe freely, and give his heart air.
[Footnote 1: The Greek reads: epi hudatos anapauseôs exethrepse me]
These simple figures of the conduct of the soul by God are their own
interpretation. Who, from his experience, cannot read into them more
than any other may help him to find? Only on two points is a word

required. Righteousness has no theological meaning. The Psalmist, as
the above exposition has stated, is thinking of such desert paths as have
an end and goal, to which they faultlessly lead the traveller: and in
God's care of man their analogy is not the experience of justification
and forgiveness, but the wider assurance that he who follows the will of
God walks not in vain, that in the end he arrives, for all God's paths
lead onward and lead home.