Lord, my heart is not haughty
The heart of every man is naturally so, and everything in civil
life tends to make it more so; as riches and honour, birth and
blood, wisdom, knowledge, and learning, strength and beauty,
especially where there is a superiority of those to others; and
in religious if persons have not the true grace of God, their
hearts will be haughty; if they have a notion of the purity of
human nature, and the goodness of their hearts, and are pure in
their own eyes, and of the power of their free will to do this
and the other, and of their perfection in good works, and are
full of their own righteousness, and have some external gifts,
and some degree of notional knowledge; but if the heart is made
truly contrite under a sense of sin, and is melted with
discoveries of pardoning love, it will be humble and not haughty:
and those have such hearts who have seen the haughtiness of their
hearts, and the exceeding sinfulness of sin; their impotency to
that which is spiritually good; their imperfection in all they
do; the excellency and suitableness of Christ's righteousness,
and that all their salvation is of grace, and that grace is
entirely free; and the more spiritual knowledge and experience
they have, the more humble they are: and this was David's case,
and what he here said was no doubt true, since he hated lying;
and besides he speaks this in the presence of and to God the
searcher of hearts; though he had been anointed by Samuel, and
knew that he was to be successor in the kingdom, yet his heart
was not elated with it; nor mine eyes lofty;
or "lifted up" F12, they were lifted up to God in
prayer often, out not above his fellow creatures; he behaved
himself humbly as well as wisely in Saul's court, where he was
raised to great dignity, which gained him the affections of the
court, and of all Israel; but there are too many whose eyes are
lofty, and their eyelids lifted up, who disdain to look upon
those that are inferior to them, as the rich on the poor, the
Pharisee on the publican; see ( Proverbs
30:13 ) . This is the character of antichrist, that his look
is more stout than his fellows, and is abominable in the sight of
God, even a proud look as well as a proud heart, ( Proverbs
6:17 ) ( 16:5 ) . But
this was not David's case; as he could not bear this in others he
would not suffer it in himself, ( Psalms 101:5
) ; neither do I exercise myself in great
matters;
or, "walk" F13 in them; these were not the subject
of his employment and conversation; he did many great things, in
killing the lion and the bear that came into his father's flock;
in slaying Goliath with a sling and stone only; in leading out
the armies of Israel, and slaying his ten thousands; and he
exercised himself in the great things of the law, which he was
careful to observe, and studied the great things of the Gospel,
which he had the highest esteem of, and desired to understand;
but he did not seek human greatness, or the great things of this
world, for himself; he had no ambitious views, or was desirous of
the kingdom he was anointed to, before the proper time; see (
1 Samuel
18:18 1 Samuel
18:23 ) ; or in things too high for me:
or "too wonderful" F14; see ( Job 42:3 ) . He
contemplated the wonderful make and frame of his body, the
texture, symmetry, and use of each of its parts; he observed the
wonderful providences of God towards him ever since he had a
being; and particularly he took notice of the wonderful love of
God to him, and remembered and talked of, and declared, the
wonderful works of grace and redemption; but not things above his
capacity, out of his reach, and which are secret, or not clearly
revealed: and such things we should be content to be ignorant of,
or not to have adequate ideas of, or be capable of accounting
for; as the being and perfections of God, particularly his
immensity and eternity; the mode of subsisting of the Persons in
the Godhead; the generation of the Son and procession of the
Spirit; the incarnation of Christ, and the union of the two
natures in him; present providences, unsearchable and past
finding out; and future things, especially the times and seasons
of them; see ( Psalms 139:6
) .