These two quotations express incontestable general truths, verified by the cynical wisdom of ages; and yet they are religion at a very low temperature. The point, thus illustrated, is that a rational religion must not confine itself to moments of emotional excitement. It must find its verification at all temperatures. It must admit the wisdom of the golden mean, in its season and for those whom it can claim by right of possession; and it must admit “that time and chance happeneth to them all.”
The collection of Psalms is not properly a reflective book. It is an expressive book. It expresses the emotions natural to states of mind hovering between a universal and a tribal religious conception. There is joy in the creative energy of a supreme ruler who is also a tribal champion. There is the glorification of power, magnificent and barbaric:
The earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.
