comes intelligible, only if we keep in mind that the
words at the beginning, "The Lord is my salvation," are an expression
of the conviction of the speaker; hence are equivalent to: we
acknowledge Him as our God; so that the first part expresses the
subjective disposition of the Church; the second, the objective
circumstance of the case--that on which that disposition is founded,
and from which it grew up.

Ver. 3. "_And ye draw water in joy out of the wells of salvation._"

During the journey through the wilderness, the bestowal of salvation
had been represented under the form of granting [Pg 134] water. It is
to it that we have here an allusion. The spiritual water denotes
salvation.

Ver. 4. "_And in that day ye say: Praise the Lord, proclaim His name,
declare His doings among the nations, make mention that His name is
exalted._ Ver. 5. _Praise the Lord, for He hath done great things; this
is known in all the earth._"

Ver. 6. "_Cry out and shout thou inhabitant of Zion; for great is the
Holy One of Israel in thy midst._"

* * * * * * * * * *

There now follows a cycle of ten prophecies, which, in the
inscriptions, have the name [Hebrew: mwa] "burden," and in which the
Prophet exhibits the disclosures into the destinies of the nations
which he had received on the occasion of the threatening Assyrian
invasion under Sennacherib. For, from the prophecy against Asshur in
chap. xiv. 24, 25, which is contained in the very first burden, it
clearly appears that the cycle which, by the equality of the
inscriptions, is connected into one well arranged and congenial whole,
belongs to this period. This prophecy against Asshur forms one whole
with that against Babel, and by it the latter was suggested and called
forth. In that prophecy, the defeat of Asshur, which took place in the
14th year of Hezekiah, is announced as future. It is true that the
second burden, directed against the Philistines, in chap. xiv. 28-32,
seems to suggest another time. Of this burden it is said, in ver. 28,
that it was given in the year that king Ahaz died; not in the year in
which his death was impending, but in that in which he died, comp.
chap. vi. 1. The distressed circumstances of the new king raised the
hopes of the Philistines, who, under Ahaz, had rebelled against the
Jewish dominion. But the Prophet beholds in the Spirit that, just under
this king, the heavenly King of Zion would destroy these hopes, and