Page:The spirit of the Hebrew poetry 1861.djvu/34

 in a measure, conceivable, just by help of its coalescence with an element of every one's sense of the brevity and frailty of life. So it is that the theology and the human consciousness are made to constitute a one article of belief in that spiritual economy under which man, as mortal, is in training for immortality;—as thus—"Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, Thou art God." But now, in the immediate context of an affirmation which approaches the abstract style, there is found what serves to bring the higher truth into a near-at-hand bearing upon the vivid experiences of our mortal condition. "Thou turnest man to destruction, and sayest. Return, ye children of men; for a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is passed, and as a watch in the night." Then there is conjoined with this doctrine a cautionary provision against the oriental error of so musing upon vast theologic conceptions as that the individual man forgets himself, and becomes unconscious of his own spiritual condition. It is not so with the writer of this Psalm:—"Thou hast set our iniquities before Thee; our secret sins in the light of Thy countenance.…So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom."

For making sure of this amalgamation of theologic elements with those emotions and sentiments that constitute the religious life there is found, in several