Psalms 64

And Jeremiah 18:18: "Come and let us smite him with the tongue" — you may smite another and never touch him. Psalm 64:3: "Their tongues are arrows shot out." A slanderer wounds another's fame, and no physician can heal these wounds.

Alas, we have no other remedy, but the ancient Christians' weapons, prayers and tears; these may break their nets, and blunt their weapons; good Jeremiah knew not that they had devised devices against him, but he reveals his cause to God in prayer, and then God shows him their d…

5. Slanderers, turn from your evil ways. The sin of slandering is one of the worst sorts of lying; and the teeth of slanderers are compared to spears and arrows, and their tongue to a sharp sword (Psalm 57:4), and when they utter their slanders, they bend their bow, and shoot th…

Though they may do it with an air of assurance, as if they run no hazard, yet he that rolls this stone, it will certainly return upon him sooner or later. They that speak against religion speak against their own heads, and their own tongues will at last fall upon them (Psalm 64:…

How many witnesses will be brought in, to cast you in the great Day? Your own tongue shall then fall upon you, as the expression is, Psalm 64, 8. And out of your own mouth, God will fetch abundant evidence to condemn you.

So I may speak of Jeremiah, and Joseph, and other servants of God, yes our Lord himself endured the contradiction of sinners. Jesus Christ that was so just and innocent, which did so much good in every place, yet meets with odious aspersions (Psalm 64:3-4): They bend their bows…

God will not help that man that has legs to go, and will not. 8. We are to rouse up ourselves (Psalm 64:7). And there is none that calls upon your name, that stirs up himself to take hold of you.

Tear me, meaning in his name that was rent and torn in pieces with their reproaches: the abjects gathered themselves, etc. Base dust will many times be flying in the faces of the children of God, and Jeremiah tells us, I have heard the defaming of many: and Job and other servant…

So in (Psalm 34:2): My soul shall make her boast in the Lord, the humble shall hear thereof and be glad, that God had preserved and reserved David still. So in (Psalm 64:10): The righteous shall be glad in the Lord and trust in him, and the upright in heart shall glory — that is…

Eminence is commonly blasted by slander. Psalm 64:3: Their tongues are as arrows shot out. The tongue of a slanderer shoots out words to wound the fame of another, and make it bleed to death.

But rather the unmeasurable heap of our evils ought to be full of spurs or pricks to prick us forward to pray. As also the prophet teaches us by his example, saying: Heal my soul, because I have sinned against you (Psalm 64:5). I grant indeed that in such sayings there should be…