neither chaften me in thy kot Difpleasure. He then proceeds to defcribe the miferable Condition he was in, which he was fadly fenfible was owing to the unhappy Effects of his Displeasure, which was provoked by the many great and heinous Offences he had committed. For thine Arrows fick faft in me, and thy Hand preffeth me fore. There is no Soundness in my Flesh, because of thine Anger; neither is there any Reft in my Bones, because of my Sin. For mine Iniquities are gone over my Head; as an heavy Burden they are too weighty for me. What Expreffions can be stronger than thefe of a deep Sense of Guilt, and the great Anguish of Soul he fuftained on that Account; which was

fo great, that he goes on to fay, that he was as a dead Man, who beareth not; and he became as a dumb Man that openeth not his Mouth. Thus was I, fays he, as a Man that heareth not, and in whofe Mouth are no Reproofs. Yet notwithstanding all thefe Calamities, which he knew were brought upon him for his Sins, he had fuch Truft in the Mercy of God, that he would certainly accept his unfeigned Sorrow and Repentance, and cause those Troubles that then befel him to turn out for his future Good.

This Pfalm was compofed fome Years after his Affair with Bathsheba, and therefore there was Time to discover whether the Sorrow he had conceived for his Sins was real

or not. Now can it be imagined, that any Man of common Prudence, and who had the least Sense of what was right and what was wrong, would have prefumed to have appealed to Heaven for the Sincerity of his Repentance, if it had not been fo; and to have prayed to God to have removed his afflicting Hand from him on that Account. Had his Repentance been only feigned and hypocritical, he must have been certain, that his Prayer would not be heard, nor his Supplication regarded by him, who knoweth the very Secrets of our Hearts; and that fo far from having his present Calamities removed, fuch bafe Prevarication would rather have involved him in more and greater.

Having then, I fhould hope, established the Certainty of David's Repentance, by thefe Proofs of Holy Scripture, and fhewn that the Concern he was under on Account of the many great and heinous Crimes he had been guilty of, was fo fincere and real, that it worked in him a Repentance to Salvation not to be repented of: He will not for the future be esteemed as fo vile and wicked a Man, as moft People have been apt to think him, but as they deteft the Crimes he was guilty of, fo they will reverence his Virtues, and endeavour to imitate him in the more amiable Part of his Character. Now if Repentance, when accompanied

companied with. thefe Fruits, restores Man again to the Favour of his Creator, and once more renders him the Object of his Love and Affection, can we then continue to be of Opinion that David (now he was fo remarkable a Penitent) was ftill unworthy of being called even in a moral Sense the Man after God's own Heart. For tho' that Title was given him on a very particular Account, yet I can by no Means think that it would for that Reafon alone have been given him, if he had in every other Refpect been undeferving of it. And I am likewife of Opinion, that as David, when he fell into the Commiffion of fuch foul Sins, as he was guilty of, loft all Right and Title to it, fo, if he had not repented, but had continued hardened in his Wickedness, he could never have recovered it; otherwise we must fuppofe, that the fame Perfon could at the fame Time be both pleasing and difpleafing to God, the Abfurdity of which, I should think, evidently appears. Now fince David's Repentance was as exemplary, as his Tranfgreffions had been notorious, we may reasonably fuppofe, that he was again become as acceptable to his Creator as before. For our bleffed Mafter affures us in his Gofpel, That they who love much, to them much fhall be forgiven, Luke vii. 47.

What remains further to be spoke to in this Treatife, is to confider the Royal Patriarch

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triarch in this particular Part of his Character as a Type of the Gofpel Covenant of Reconciliation, in which Senfe he may be eminently ftiled, the Man after God's own Heart; and likewife to obviate fome few Objections, which have been raised by those who are no Friends either to him or Revelation. For I will venture to affirm, that those who are Enemies to the one, can be no great Friends or Well-wifhers to the other. Thefe Particulars I thought neceffary to mention, though many may think the Defign of the foregoing Treatife to have been complete enough without them, However, I hope to be excufed, as they will tend both to enforce and corroborate what has been already delivered.

PART

PART THE FOURTH.

SECTION THE FIFTEENTH.

H

AVING in the former Sections eftablished the Truth and Reality of David's Repentance, I now propofe to confider him therein as a Type or Figure of the Gofpel Covenant; for he is the first upon the Jewish Record, who having fallen from a State of Piety and Virtue, again recovered himself by fo exemplary a Repentance. Nor is he the only Patriarch among the Jews, whofe Life and Actions were Types of fome Part of the Gospel Covenant. For St. Peter, 1 Epift. Ch. iii. 20, 21, informs us, that Noah and his Family being preferved in the Ark, were faved by Water. The like Figure whereunto, even Baptifm doth alfo now fave us. Here we fee the Apostle makes Noah's being faved in the Ark, a Type of our being washed with the Water of Regeneration in Baptifm. Again,

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