over, the redemption of the body is his, and he knows the spotless clothing of his "house from heaven".

N.B. 3. Incidentally the statement "The soul that sinneth it shall die" proves that the soul is not born dead in sin; for a dead soul cannot die but is already dead. Only the living can die.

N.B. 4. The passage in Ps. 51,5, "Behold I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me", only states the same truth. All that David got from his mother was his flesh; his soul and spirit were God's work. Were it not for doctrinal bias we should understand from this verse that it was his mother who was in sin at his conception, not David. Suppose the verse read "in bitterness, or joy, did my mother conceive me!" we should unhesitatingly refer the bitterness or joy to his mother not to David, as is grammatically correct: "in sin" is an adverbial phrase qualifying the verb, not the object.

Many scholars have pointed out that the fact that, when asked by Samuel to bring out his sons, Jesse did not produce David, valiant and spiritual though he already was,37 and that his brethren, like those of Jesus, never seem to have been his close associates but rather to have despised him,38 seems to show that there was some slur on his birth. If this be so David is a fitting type of Christ who also, though untruly, lay under this imputation of being "born of fornication",39 since Mary could not produce His father, and everybody knew it!

Whether this be so or not, it remains the fact that all David got from his mother was his flesh, and that in any view of the case that flesh was sinful.

N.B. 5. So weak is this theory that even Ps. 58,3 is brought in to support it, "The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies". The Psalmist is here speaking in a highly poetic vein—even the "wickedest" little child must wait for a few years before it knows the difference between right and wrong and begins deliberately to tell lies! (Isa. 7,15-16)—and is contrasting those, who seem to delight in evil from an early age, with those who on the contrary like Samuel, David, and John the Baptist, so