Let not thine heart envy sinners
Their present prosperity and happiness, the pleasure, profit, and
honour, they seem to enjoy; all which is but a shadow, fading had
temporary; and yet good men are apt to envy it in their hearts,
if they do not express it with their lips; and are ready to
murmur and think it hard that they should be in straitened
circumstances while the wicked are in flourishing ones; and
inwardly fret and are uneasy at it, which they should not, (
Psalms 37:1
Psalms 37:7 )
( 73:2 )
; or do not "emulate" or "imitate" F26 them, or do as they do,
thinking thereby to enjoy the same prosperity and happiness;
choose not their ways, nor desire to be with them, to have their
company, or be ranked among them, ( Proverbs
3:31 ) ( 24:1 ) ;
but [be thou] in the fear of the Lord all the day
long;
let the fear of God be always before thine eyes and in thine
heart; be continually in the exercise of fear, which is attended
with faith and trust in the Lord; with love and affection to him,
and joy and delight in him; be constantly employed in the duties
of religion, private and public, which the fear of God includes;
and this will be a preservative from envying, murmuring, and
fretting at the outward happiness of wicked men; and from joining
with them in their evil ways. Aben Ezra, and who is followed by
some others, render it, "but [emulate or imitate] the men that
fear the Lord all the day long" F1; be followers of them, and do
as they do; let their constant piety and devotion stir up a holy
emulation in thee to copy after them and exceed them; but the
former sense is best.