has suggested[465] that national
misfortunes rather than private grievances may have given an impetus to
this class of literary productions. It is true that historical
references are found in some of the hymns, and it is also significant
that not only do these psalms occasionally embody a prayer for the
king,--thus giving to them a national rather than a personal
character,--but the kings are called upon in times of distress to
accompany their libations to the gods with the recitation of a 'lament
to quiet the heart,'[466] as the Babylonians called this class of hymns.

One can easily see how such events as defeat in war would be ascribed to
divine wrath, and not to the workings of evil spirits or witches; and
while the personal tone that pervades most of the penitential psalms
makes them applicable to conditions affecting the individual as well as
the nation, the peculiar fitness of such psalms for occasions of
national importance was a powerful factor in bringing about their sharp
separation from the incantation formulas.

Just as in the hymns we found that the mere contemplation of the
attributes of the gods, apart from the manifestation of these attributes
in any particular instance, led to a loftier interpretation of the
relationship existing between the gods and mankind, so the thought that
evil was due in the last instance to the anger of some god led to
greater emphasis being laid upon this relationship. The anger of the god
prompted both the individual and the nation to greater zeal in securing
the deity's love. To an even greater extent than in the hymns is the
element of love introduced into the penitential psalms, and when not
directly expressed, is so clearly implied as to form the necessary
complement to the conception of the divine wrath. These psalms indeed
show the religious and ethical thought of Babylonia at its best. Their
ethical phase manifests itself more particularly in the conception of
sin which is unfolded in them. The misfortunes of life, more especially
those which could not so readily be ascribed to the presence of evil
spirits, filled the individual with his sense of guilt. In some way,
known or unknown to him, he must have offended the deity. The thought
whether the deity was justified in exercising his wrath did not trouble
him any more than the investigation of the question whether the
punishment was meted out in accordance with the extent of the wrong
committed. It was not necessary