ing them that which they desired,
on the one hand, or sending them something which they did not desire,
on the other. They have brought the gods their offerings, their
sacrifices, their words of praise, and have asked that they might be
successful in war, that they might bring home the game which they
sought when they went on a hunting expedition. When there have been
disease, pestilence, famine, drought, no matter what the nature of the
evil, they have been regarded as allotments of these divine powers sent
on account of something they have done or omitted to do. It never
occurred to them to interpret these as part of a natural order, because
they knew nothing about any natural order. They reasoned as well as
they were able to reason at that stage of culture in any particular age
of the world's history which they had reached. But this has been the
thought of men time out of mind concerning the method of the divine or
spiritual or unseen government of the world.

Is this way of looking at it confined to primitive man, confined to
pagan nations? Do we find something else, some other condition of mind,
when we come to study carefully the Old Testament? Let us see. Take the
first verse which I read as a part of my text. The author of this Psalm
we do not know who he may have been says, "I have been young, and now
am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed
begging their bread." As I have read this a great many times in the
past, I have wondered as to the strange experience that this man must
have had in human life, if this is a correct interpretation of that
experience. I have been young: I do not like to admit that as yet I am
old; but, whether I am or not, I have a good many times seen the
righteous forsaken, and his seed begging their bread.

It seems to me that the writer of this verse was trained in a theory of
the government of human affairs that does not at all match the facts.
He has this magical, this arbitrary theory in his mind. It was the
general conception I think, as any one will find by a careful reading
of the Old Testament or study of Jewish history, the ordinary
conception among the Hebrews, that God was to reward people for being
good by prosperity, long life, many children, herds of cattle,
distinction among his fellow-men, positions of political honor and
power; and the threat of the taking away of these is frequently uttered
against those that presume to do wrong. In other words,