PREFACE
There is nothing truly great or lasting in literature
which is not, in the broadest and deepest sense, hu-
mane.
The best poetry is that which comes closest to the
common experience of mankind, — gives form and col-
our to the feelings which enter every heart, — it is
^^ the blossom and fragrance of all human knowledge,
human thoughts, human passions, emotions, language."
Thus it becomes true, as Wordsworth has said, that
the poet is ^' the rock of defence of human nature, an
upholder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him
relationship and love.'
It seems to me that we may discern in this truth, at
least in part, one secret of the vitality and power of the
Bible. There is no other book which lies so near to
the great throbbing heart of the world. Its humanity
is no less manifest, no less potent, than its divinity.
There is life in it, and life is always interesting.
We need to be on our guard against any method of
using or interpreting these Scriptures which would put
them far away from us, or make them shadowy and
unreal. When they are regarded chiefly as a collec-
tion of mystical charms, a itiine where we may dig for
doctrines, or a compUation of forms of sound words,
their best influence is lost. A desiccated Bible will
have small power with anybody except the supersti-
tious.
We ought to be grateful that it did not fall down
from heaven like the fabulous statue of Diana of the
Ephesians; nor was it whispered into any man's ear
by a pigeon after the fashion in which Mahomet said
that he received the Koran ; but God caused it to grow
upon the earth, and to draw into itself all that was
noblest and purest in many generations of our fellow-
men. We ought to remember that there is not a book
in it, and hardly a chapter, the threads of which are
not interwoven with the actual experience of a human
life.
It is in this spirit that I have tried to write the
story of some of the psalms. My desire has been to
brbg these ancient a^d sacred i^ems into close con-
nection with the lives of the men who wrote them, —
men of like passions, and sins, and trials, and hopes,
and aspirations, with ourselves. To do, this will not
lessen our reverence for the psalms, and it may in-
crease our love. For it will bring them home to us
and give them the touch of reality. It will help us to
understand that the depths of our nature, like the pro-
fundities of the ocean, are unchanged by the tides and
tempests which play upon the surface, and that trufl
religion is the same in every man and in every age.
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