used in the 4th verse of the 63d Psalm: “As long as I live will I magnify Thee.” Thus it would amount to an emphatic warning against the very thing which it is supposed indirectly to sanction.
I do not say that either of these versions is free from difficulty: but their difficulties are not to be compared with that of supposing a connexion indirectly licensed in the 18th verse, which in the 16th had been virtually condemned under such very heavy penalties.
We may speak on this head with all confidence, seeing that in such interpretation we are but echoing the voice of our own Church, and of the whole uncorrupt, undivided Church of God. For as to the Jewish commentators, both before and after our Lord's time, we are told indeed that the prevailing sect, the Talmudists, take altogether the laxer side in this question: but what Christian would follow them in such matters, they being the very interpreters, of whom our Lord said, “Except your righteousness exceed theirs, ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven:”—the blind guides, who taught men that they were not answerable for evil thoughts; that they should love their neighbour but might hate
