406 APPENDIX. 



many cabinets and boxes locked down : nor hangs 

 the proper key at every door, but they lie scat- 

 tered here and there, and counter-changed; so 

 that it requires some pains and skill to find them 

 out, and apply them aright. Thus, the key of the 

 Prophetic Scripture lies in the historical, where 

 we often find both the occasion of the prophecy, 

 and the event too ; and that proves usually the 

 best interpreter. Thus, the Acts of the Apostles, 

 which contain the peregrinations and gests of St. 

 Paul, are a great master-key to open his Epistles, 

 and to unlock to us many things, hard otherwise 

 to be understood in them. And thus, in the pre- 

 sent instance, David's History is the proper key 

 to David's Psalter; and so the Books of Samuel, 

 the Kings, and Chronicles, the best and most 

 authentic commentary upon the Psalms. 



For this now before us, lest we should mistake, 

 the Spirit of God hath hung the key at the door, 

 or at least pointed us whence to fetch it: and 

 while the title dates it from the cave, we are 

 plainly directed to 1 Sam. xxiv. There we find 

 the holy man in a great strait of affliction ; wan- 

 dering like an exile, or banditto, in the wilderness 

 of Engedi ; the few men he had, straggling, and 

 shifting for themselves upon the rocks of the wild 

 goats ; implacable Saul, in the mean time, with 

 five times his number, so closely pursuing him, 

 that he is forced to take shelter in the cave : and 

 there being shut up from the sight of Heaven, and 

 light of the sun, and, as it were, buried alive in 



